Claw Hammer live 1992

I was pretty shocked to see that this clip is 25 years old now. I can’t think of another band that I saw more often in the late 1980’s/early 1990’s than Claw Hammer. Just one of the best live bands at the time and one that played out a LOT. Unfortunately, there is not a lot of video out there though there is an early public access tv thing that is not yet on youtube. What I like about this clip is that it does capture their live power - as well as Al Hambra, Rob and Bob’s hair and Jon’s tucked shirt (thanks Whittaker!) looking like he was outta a 1972-3 J.C. Penney catalog. Man, did I proselytize about these guys to the extent that I even won over my hardcore Lazy Cowgirls contingent to going to see them at EVERY possible opportunity. Gotta hand it to Dave Laing and Dog Meat/Grown Up Wrong Records (and Eddie Flowers' write up in Forced Exposure) for really getting the ball rolling. Dog Meat of course was responsible for putting out the posthumous Imperial Dogs lp and then Grown Up Wrong put out the first 45s by both Claw Hammer ("Poor Robert") and Crawlspace ("Silent Invisible Conversation") - both bands I religiously followed at the time in LA. The Imperial Dogs lp was a MAJOR deal at the time to me and my friends. As I followed Australian rock pretty close in the era and it was funny that Grown Up Wrong put out the two best local bands of the time . . . . that we had to get on import!

"If you dropped the name of the Sweet in the course of rock chat"

So Claw Hammer is playing here next month, and I am not sure if I saw a band more often in the late 1980's to the mid-1990's than those guys in both the Rick Sortwell and Bob Lee era. I was thinking of all the covers the band played at one time or another, and in the deep, deep fog of my memory, I seem to recall Claw Hammer covering this nugget by the Sweet. Is that even right? That plus inspiration from the late, great Joesph Fleury's OVER THE TOP intro to his "Will Success Spoil the Sweet?" story from 1973. :

Beam Me Back to 1995/Larry Clark, Chris Knox, the Kilgour Bros., Robert Scott and Harmony

Now if only Clark had included Monoshock's "Walk to the Fire," the Dead C, Claw Hammer, the Dirty Three, Royal Trux, Haino, "Torch of the Mystics" and the Nephews and ya got yerself a 1995 party mix. Optional copy of the Blackjack Records catalog on top of a case of Lucky Lager. Located in a box in the barn and destined for recycling. From around the time of the press junket for "Kids" in 1995.