And you, of course, want the latest "New Wave" releases?/The Weirdos' 1977 Bomp Store Ad

From the classic November/December 1977 Back Door Man No. 13 (Tom Petty cover "Call me a punk and I'll fucking cut you!" - don't worry Tom, we're not). Nice typo in original ad copy as well. One of the "must see" locations (5230 1/2 Laurel Canyon Blvd) on my SFV drivng tour.

"Always be prepared for the Instant Bummer . . . " (Terminal Zone, 1977)

From a barn copy of Terminal Zone #1, 1977 (Chuck Berry cover). Issue has a long piece on The Aesthetics of Rock as well. Terminal Zone was a conscious turn from pure fanzine writing to something I dunno, more scholarly in an American cultural studies sort of way. Footnotes and whatnot (not that I have anything against them ).  Something that would get the stamp of approval of the Dean if ya know what I mean. This may be the only thing in there which doesn't quite have that stench. Just nice to see the state of the art record disease from 1977, and a nice LA record store tour as well ;

Greg Shaw Reviews Clap's "Have You Reached Yet?"/Who Put the Bomp! Summer, 1974

I have been a huge fan of Clap’s 1973 lp “Have You Reached Yet?” lp ever since the first time I heard it on a kinda muddy sounding bootleg, and have mentioned them a bunch. Just a perfect out of tyme - or ahead of your time - lp for the 70's (kinda like Fortune Teller's "Inner City Scream"). "Have You Reached Yet?" was clearly one of those lps you didn’t think you would ever get to hold in yer hands, let alone a new vinyl edition of the lp in MONO (which sounds fantastic). So, I finally landed an out-of-print copy put out by perhaps the best reissue label in the world, Sing Sing outta NY. What jumped out in the new liners by Phast Phreddie Patterson is that he says: “around 1976, I gave my copy of “Have You Reached Yet” to Greg Shaw, who wrote about it in his Bomp! Magazine – thus igniting the legend of Clap.” Well, while I was researching to find real time reviews of the lp, I found that Greg Shaw reviewed the lp as early as the Summer 1974 issue of “Who Put the Bomp!” when the lp itself may have only been a year old (even though Greg says the lp is from 1971 in the review - perhaps said in the grip of "Love It to Death" comparisons). Did he end up reviewing the lp twice? What is intriguing is also that the review says “the cover’s great too – its got a photo of a lizard-skin platform boot on a stool with a flashlight beam on it!” Does anyone know whether there was an earlier press of the lp with that cover? The boot photo is on the back cover as a small snap, even smaller than the band photo or logo. Anyway, another essential purchase if you can still find it.

Someone Saved My Life Tonight/Iggy, Elton and the Gorilla Suit/"I Simply Can't Understand Why Iggy Isn't a Huge Star"

Some of the more interesting rock reads are those where there is on the surface an incongruity between the writer and the subject material. Oddly enough the results are usually as fascinating if not more so than the material. Case in point is Byron Coley's Motley Crue book I recently wrote about, as well as Bangs' Rod Stewart and Blondie books (interestingly, Bangs did not rate very highly Blondie's later records in much the same manner of his dislike of most of Rod the Mod's solo career). Thankfully Seymour Stein and Sire Records in the mid-70's sponsored a slew of rock bios and today we feature Greg Shaw's "Elton John: A Biography in Words and Music" - nice cover shot, no? In the 70's, if you wanted an lp that was the antithesis of Luciano Cilio's "Dell 'Univero Assente," look no further than Elton at his most bombastic.



I remember seeing at least 10 copies of this for peanuts years back at a shop and passing on it. So, back in LA earlier this year prior to the return to the NZ bush, the time was right as I had just finished the essential "Bomp 2: Born in the Garage" - (a public service by Suzy Shaw and Mike Stax if there ever was one). So, Michael Gira, thank you and Alice Bag for the inspiration to reinvestigate the John catalog. You are dead on that there is something in the austerity of those early records and Greg Shaw perfectly articulates that "Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting" is "a powerful, hard-rocking single in the style of Slade." I couldn't have put it better myself. Greg even proclaims the single "the party record of the year." Strangely enough, "Daniel" had been the previous single. The schizophrenic nature of those first 6-8 records all within a relatively short time period is fascinating and the volume of output obviously fueled by some serious substances. The singer-songwriter with strings v. the glam/pop hits. Can't really make up our minds. Do we thank Elton for inspiring some of the lesser junk shop glam cash ins? Not unlike people who hate the Doors/Jim Morrison but lavish praise on those undeniably inspired by that font of greatness. For some reason when I see the Creem greatest hit below, I am now reminded of Nick Kent's great anecdote about luckily being confused with Elton's guitar player.



Elton gets a lot of slams for the "persona," but who else knew both Nick Drake (and demoed Drake's and John and Linda Martyn's great early songs with Linda Thompson) and Iggy Stooge - and championed them both - in real time while both Drake and the Stooges were recording. The only other Drake/Iggy connection I can think of and which I have been writing about to post here soon, is Francoise Hardy, whose 1971 lp, "La Question," I usually rate in my top 10 records.





Last time I was at the Hollywood Bowl, it was checking out John Fogerty perform an awesome 4th of July show a couple years back - man, is his guitar playing underrated. However, there were not five pianos on stage nor Groucho, Elvis and Beatle impersonators. It would have livened it up. And Linda Lovelace was not the emcee. As Gira asks, where is the audacity of the performer today and why are they hiding under rocks. I quote: "creatures like him are what make the rest of us retreat and slink away into the murk of daily existence, cowering and furtive, only to emerge again when the light and sound and magic of an Elton John lures us, hypnotized, out of our dismal caves." NB: I always thought that "Philadelphia Freedom" was a bicentennial ode but in fact, Greg Shaw notes that it was a simultaneous tribute to Gamble & Huff - thus the Philly connection with strings - and his favorite tennis player Billie Jean King. Poor Booby Riggs. Not even Bowie on "Young Americans," ripping off the same sound, could pen him a tribute.

Oh, I forgot the important thing, the group's record is excellent/Big Star "When My Baby's Beside Me" 45/UA Records "House Freak" Marty Cerf

Name checked in Marty Cerf's February 1973 Big Star 45 review: Paul McCartney, Emmit Rhodes, the Count Five, the Yardbirds, the Guess Who, Alice Cooper, Albert Hammond (Snr.), the Troggs, Roy Head and the Traits, Johnny Kidd and the Pirates, Vince Taylor, Elvin Jones, Sonny & Cher, the Hollies, the Beatles, the Honeycombs, the Doobie Brothers and the Byrds. For some reason, Marty never really gets his due as a writer. He and Greg Shaw were responsible for making Phonograph Record Magazine so great during its brief and golden run. Meltzer even said that Marty was one of the few editors who let the writers write. Always nice for an excuse to look into some of the referenced artists - maybe some records you need to dig out yourself. From the barn archive and the PRM stash purchased from the Shaws.

PRM Magazine, February 1973

And a little gratuitous Guess Who - first a Neil cover and then a ripping "Shakin' All Over":

UA's Attempt to Sell Hawkwind to US Teens Circa 1972-73: Space Poet and Intergalactic Chanter/A Mindblower in the 1967 Tradition

“Like the early San Francisco bands, Hawkwind are vitally linked to the community that spawned them, the hip subculture of London’s Notting Hill district. Also in the tradition of their mid-60’s San Francisco progenitors, they’re as eager to play for love as for money, having performed free more than any other group in Britain . . ." (emphasis added). Whoever came up with this ad copy at least got it right that SF possibly peaked in '65-66. Been working on an upcoming short post on the much maligned Jefferson Airplane - just finished Gleason's 1969 trade paperback on JA in which he repeats his insipid VU trashing (why out yourself AGAIN as a MORON on the subject of the VU for a NATIONAL book as late as 1969 when nobody outside of the Bay Area read your 1966 bash in the first place and could have left it at that - was that one syndicated like his other columns?). Not a horrible book all in all but a bit fawning and self-congratulatory (surprise surprise when the subject is the JA). And yeah, please don't lump in Hawkwind with the self-important crew that RUINED the reputation of the JA try as I might to disassociate the music makers from the music (Volunteers even sounds as good to my ears as Briggs-era Royal Trux at the moment.) Anyway, as to the barn scans, I remember buying a box of various issues of Phonograph Record Magazine from 1972-1974 from Greg and Suzy Shaw about 20 years ago. Before they all fall apart, I copied some and hope to post more of my favorite reviews and ads here soon.