The Droogs and Plug n Socket Present a Special Edition in Salute to Sky Saxon (1977)

An odd/inspired public relations move to publish a fanzine/press release dedicated as much to your inspiration Sky Saxon as your own band, the Droogs. We salute ‘em as the zine captures the first Seeds revival in full force. Sky had I guess by 1977 drifted back to LA from Hawaii after the Source family implosion, and the Droogs’ fourth single “Overnite Success,” was “dedicated to the epitomal punk rocker, that lost legend of the mid-sixties, Sky Saxon, and of course his Seeds.” I have no idea whether the distribution for this thing was anywhere outside the San Fernando Valley. Blink and you missed picking up a copy at the Gramophone record store next to the La Reina Theater. What I can tell you is that it acts almost as the prototype for the lost (Ken Barnes calls it “mythical”) issue of Mark Shipper’s Flash III. It includes Ken Barnes’ Seeds piece which ended up in part in Who Put the Bomp No. 12 (November 12, 1974), though the Bomp piece only included a small portion of what was published here, and was intended for Flash III as Barnes states in the postscript. What is intriguing for historians is the appearance in the zine of former Droogs impresario Mark Shipper's “Flash” column, that is actually a one page dry run version of his 1977-78 comedic/fantasy novel “Paperback Writer” with the Seeds replacing the Beatles in the fantasy reunion realm and 18,000 fans (including Jack Nicholson and Jackie Onassis) waiting for the return of Sky Saxon and the Seeds to the stage of the Los Angeles Forum.