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.

Norma Jackson's Winning Photo of the Byrds 1968, Tacoma, Washington

So looking through my October 1968 copy of Flip Teen Magazine (Monkees, Raiders, Sajid, Star Trek, Bee Gees cover), I came across this new to me amatuer photo of the Byrds with Gram at the front of the muy serio McGuinn, Hillman and Kelley. Roger (Jim) thinking about how to wipe Gram's vocals off more of the nascent "Sweetheart" tracks before they get back to LA? I can't seem to find any actual tour date in any of my Byrdmaniax sources though this guy was there (and he seems to think it was after the lp release of SOTR though there was a lot of touring outside the US after the release so who knows):

I saw [Gram] with the Byrds sometime in '68 at the University Of Puget Sound fieldhouse (gym) in Tacoma. Don't remember the exact date, but I believe Sweetheart had been released. They did several songs off that album plus some Byrds hits. I remember them doing You Ain't Goin' Nowhere twice - once in the first set and then again in the set after the break. Opening act was local band Merilee Rush and the Turnabouts fresh off their hit Angel Of The Morning. Went with a few guys from high school (I graduated in '68) that had an band (The Obsolete Lampshade) and we all stood right in front of the stage for the whole show. Good times! This is probably the show I wish I could go back in time and see again the most.

James Dean Pop/Tyranny and Mutation/"A supernova in the stardust. It's a HARD ROCK band"/Radios Appear [repost October 2009]

The Stony Brook mafia cast a wide net in the pre-punk days. Its influence ranged from the shores of San Pedro, California to the bowery of Manhattan, to the coasts of Australia and as far north as Finland. As another piece of the pre-punk universe, I present for your consideration, straight out of Helsinki and fronted by likely Gulcher/Creem approved frontwoman Annika Salminen, Dead End 5. It was a world away from Helsinki to Bloomington, but Annika and the crew would have been right at home chomping burgers with the Cutters, downing Rolling Rocks and listening to the Dictators. Their 1976 lp “Dead Ends” features covers of BOC, ZZ Top and even “Let Me Go Rock n’ Roll” by KISS. A BOC and Kiss-lovin’ proto-punk, female fronted band. Would it have rated the Back Door Man seal of approval?

Methinks so given the rarity of such acts in 1976. On “Dead Ends” there may be a few too many Deep Purple moves for your tastes but it sounds fine to these ears.   The blurb on the back cover (penned by their svengali manager) sums it all up:

DEAD END 5 is English. It's the street you live in. Your mental state. A nuclear charge in the atmosphere. Your insane self. A supernova in the stardust. It's a HARD ROCK band. It's DEAD END 5.

Roger that. Their manager was also the manager just prior to Dead End 5 for Finnish proto-punk glam heads Virtanen. Dig these clips.


Was the “Dead Ends” lp a fluke? Not after the first Ramones lp. Move over E. Bloom and welcome to the master race rock of Jeffrey Ross Hyman. Dead End 5’s early 1977 single "James Dean Pop/ Teräsneitsyt" is Finland's first punk rock record, with the a-side a cover of "Blitzkrieg Bop". The second LP, "Läpilyönti" (1977) also had another Ramones cover "Judy is a Punk" ("Judy et Jackie Punk"). How All-American is that baseball cover art - do I detect Thurman Munson in the image? A Gabba Gabba Hey cat? These guys put together that the Ramones would be played in sports arenas as jock jams a good thirty years ahead of the rest of the western world. That cover art also rates nicely to the baseball themed cover art of the Jon Tiven (and Ivan Julian) led Yankees lp. Are they the Finnish Shakin’ Street? Not quite the same deal. Annika put out a solo 45 following "Läpilyönti" which has a turgid cover of Buddy Holly’s “It’s So Easy” (Ronstadt arrangement) backed with “Nobody Does it Better” from "The Spy Who Loved Me." Awful stuff but then again Patti used to sing “You Light Up My Life” in much the same manner.

So for the tunage. First up on deck is a cover of BOC’s “ME 262” from 1976's "Dead Ends." Second is the cover of “Blitzkrieg Bop” now christened “James Dean Pop.” Woulda gone down well at the Masque as does the entire second baseball lp. Now not to get into too much of a side tangent, the other great early Finnish punk band Briard (which featured Andy McCoy pre Hanoi Rocks), also had a tune called "James Dean Pop" which is NOT a Ramones cover or even a Dead End Five cover. Go figure these crazy Finns and their James Dean/punk rock fetish. Third track is Briard doing the “James Dean Pop.” Batting clean-up, and bring us all back to tyranny and mutation, we have Radio Birdman covering “Transmaniacon M.C.” live in Sydney 1976. Lastly is "Judy et Jackie Punk" from 1977.








With divshare dropping most of the old sound files, here are some of the missing tracks:

"Who's On First?"/Metal Mike California trip report, October 1971

I have to admit that the whole Brendan Mullen/Marc Spitz/Metal Mike spat over "We Got the Neutron Bomb: The Untold Story of L.A. Punk" made me so exasperated that I felt like I was watching the great Abbott and Costello's "Who's On First" routine. Our friends over at Terminal Boredom give you the Cliff Notes version for everyone who missed it here. Thanks guys. Let's just say that Metal Mike's bona fides are unassailable. I am guessing that a lot of folks made the mistake of passing up on Metal Mike's 1999 cd called "Surf City or Bust." What they missed was the most excellent FOURTEEN bonus tracks comprising his and his brother Kevin's previously unreleased 1969 lp as The Rockin' Blewz entitled "I'm a Roadrunner Motherfucka." I first heard one track some time last century on a cd comp Chris put out. Raw and as hi-energy as you would expect from two high school brothers recording in the bedroom or family lounge. It is in Metal Mike's s own words "a pre-Beatles garage band style (2/3rds covers)... Bo Diddley, Buddy Holly, Ronnie Self, Ernie K-Doe, Shirelles--that kind of material, played with your vintage 60's Fender and Gibson equipment of the time, some pretty crude cool sounds. Wacked out 'originals' that could have been on a Bonzo Dog Band or Mothers of Invention album." Came across this great letter again recently from when Metal Mike was in the midst of his statistics degree in Austin (written from the UT library?) which had me thinking of Metal Mike. I do think Future does not get its due and "Out of the Question" is just as good as anything on the first two lps.

It's So Happening We Can Hardly Stand It!!

I have been thinking that the late Richard Creamer was the Brassaï of Hollywood in the 1970's. Why there has been no retrospective is truly a shame. No books for that matter as well. Just piecing together the photos that actually made it to print, mostly in periodicals of the throwaway variety.  "If you weren't at this party, darlings, you're a failure in Hollywood."  From my archive copy of PRM, April 1973.

Clint Eastwood is Boss/Will The Real Clint Please Stand Up

From the 28 July, 1979 NME featuring the Talking Heads (cover), Swell Maps and Pretenders. I wonder what Lee Perry thought of Clint talking to the chair at the Republican National Convention? I have always liked the Upsetters lp named after him (with the great "Dry Acid"). My guess is he would have approved and could possibly claim that he came up with the idea first. I did see Scratch interrogate/talk to both E.T. and R2-D2 set up on the edge of the stage at a memorable show in the 1990’s, well before the phantom BHO conversation on national television. I revisited Clint’s convention performance recently and enjoyed it (as much as I enjoyed all the great late 1970’s travelogue footage of the San Fernando Valley and Burbank in Clint’s “Every Which Way But Loose” which surprisingly has aged well). Clint was a somewhat unlikely though solid JA icon from the 1960’s onward. Given the steady stream of spaghetti western, kung fu and grindhouse fare into JA, it is not surprising that Clint in his outlaw guise was a constant lyrical trope outside of strictly liturgical subject matter. Then there are the numerous tributes to GREAT American 1970’s television, some with the great production of Joe Gibbs. How many Starsky and Hutch 12 inch singles are there? David Soul and Paul Michael Glaser as Kingston icons! And so was Kojak! Can we ask David Katz why there is no Scratch produced cover version of “Don’t Give Up on Us Baby” to sit alongside the great cover by Sharon Isaacs of Morris Albert’s “Feelings” (which some friends swear by). The hybrid liturgical/hard case cinema stuff is the most intriguing. Clearly, the JA gospel/gangster precedent does not get quite the recognition that it should from American hip hop in its wake –(e.g., the lyrical content of certain of the Bone Thugs-N-Harmony catalogue, Jay-Z and his occasional gospel/gangster foray etc., etc). Which brings us to this article from the archive from the NME. Music lawsuits and the threat of music related lawsuits. All of the current legal tussle between GG (as RP refers to him on possibly the most engrossing and interesting Twitter feed out there here ) has me thinking it might be time to put my lawyer hat on and do some court reporting from the Central District of California to break down some legalese for you tell you how the current Black Flag legal saga all shakes out.

L.A. Scene Report: November 1977/"Three Bands Stand Out. The Weirdos, Backstage Pass and the Screamers"/Nickey Beat Has "Movie Star Potential"

In an alternative universe, the Weirdos' lp from 1977-1978 (that they never got the chance to make) would make the all time top ten list. More importantly, how could two of the world's greatest bands of 1977 - the Weirdos and the Screamers - not record a single lp ("Condor" excluded)? Maybe the Weirdos were too picky for an lp deal or maybe Sire could have invested something in LA. Was Lou Adler sitting on the great LA punk live lp from the rejects of the "Up In Smoke" sessions? Was Crime courted by the major labels up in SF? After the success of the Runaways, why not Backstage Pass, perhaps the most criminally underdocumented of all the early LA punk bands?? As a teenager, I was able to find domestic cutouts of "Radios Appear" and "(I'm) Stranded." Why couldn't a teenager in Brisbane, Melbourne or Sydney find a cutout of the Screamers lp, one of the greatest major label underground lps of the 1970's outside of the Hampton Grease Band. It simply was not meant to be. Continuing a Screamers theme, some scans from the archive from my favourite US/FR zine, IWBYD: