BROADCAST #03
AIR DATE: 01-10-06

I hope you liked the show tonight. I thought we had some good music this time around. Not to beat a dead horse, but here’s that information one more time about the sites and all the rest.
I have made a pretty cool online journal thing called Dispatches on my 213 website that will be maintained diligently. You asked for it and for better or worse, you got it. http://21361.com/ takes you there. Also, if you want, sign up for the newsletter and we’ll send it to you. There will be a photo section on the Harmony site and the 213 site as well. Both will be different. One will be more music stuff and the other will be more travel photos. Hopefully I’ll be able to send in some cool stuff from the road. I don’t see why I can't.

Also, I will be gone for a couple of weeks but like I said, Engineer X and I whipped together two cool shows for next week and the week after that should make you happy. I will be back live ASAP. I am on the move a lot as you know by now. It will be a very trying and eventful three months coming up from my end and you can check in on it with the Dispatches thing we’ll have up in a day or two. When it’s up and running, I will be sending out a newsletter with that info and some live date info as there’s shows in January, February and March in New Zealand, Australia, USA, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Britain, Scotland and Ireland. We’ll be posting the dates on the site as they firm up.
Anyway, here’s some notes from what we heard tonight. That Raymond Scott tracks was something else, right?!
Also, an archive of the last two shows can be found here:
http://www.rollins-archive.com/.
Thanks for listening. It’s so great to be back on the air. --Henry

Angelic Upstarts – I’m An Upstart: This is from the first album, Teenage Warning. Produced by Sham 69's Jimmy Pursey. I think it came out in 1980. I remember it sounding so much sonically better than anything at the time, it sounded a little mainstream to my ears. I played it a lot and checked out the band’s follow up 2,000,000 Voices album but it didn’t do it for me as much as this first one, which still sounds really good to me. I got a chance to play with them in 1982 when they opened for Black Flag. I hung out with them and gave their singer, Mensi a bottle of stuff to gargle with to keep his voice. They played a pretty good set and it was cool to have seen them. We were behind them on tour and would play at a lot of the same venues. Every time we showed up somewhere they had played, someone would tell us the Upstarts had told the audience how bad we were. Oh well. Still, this is a really good record.

Black Flag - Fix Me: From the classic Black Flag Nervous Breakdown EP. One the finest 7” records of all time and Fix Me is one of the greatest songs of the last century. The very capable Keith Morris on vocals. If liked this and want to hear more, get the Black Flag First Four Years CD, that’s a must have record.

Obsessed - A Touch of Everything: This is from The Church Within album on Sony. I have known Obsessed frontman Scot “Wino” Weinrich for many years. He has not done any bad records as far as I’m concerned. He’s had a few different bands, Hidden Hand, Obsessed, Shine, Spirit Caravan. He was a member of SST band St. Vitus for years and did a lot of records and shows with them. Wino’s a strong song writer, singer and guitar player. He gets the big respect from other musicians because he makes most of them seem like pretenders. He’s one of the most intense people I’ve ever met and his records are not to be missed. Check the Incarnate album for some heavy, heavy jams.

Matt Payne - Nobody Has To Lose: A couple of years ago, Matt sent me a CDR of his music. At that point he was just on his own, no music, no beats. I played one of the tracks on the show. Months later he sent me another CDR with his newest stuff which eclipsed the previous one. A few months ago, he sent another one in and I think this is the best one yet. Get ready for Gospel Rap!!

Fats Waller – You Run Your Mouth: From the Fats Last Years set on RCA. This is my favorite era of Fats. It’s all good to me but later on, he was funnier and his playing was really amazing. Fats Waller was one of those I found on my own. No one recommended him to me. I think I was in Australia many years ago and saw this set and got it figuring I had to learn something about the guy. I knew that he had written or at least c0-written Honeysuckle Rose and Ain’t Misbehavin’ and I had seen some footage of him and he seemed really great. I knew that David Lynch was a fan. That might have been a big reason. Anyway, I got this record and found a book on him called Ain't Misbehavin': The Story of Fats Waller by Ed Kirkeby. The more I read and listened, the more of a fan I became of his. The story about him taking Art Tatum from bar to bar is amazing. We’ll have to get some Art Tatum on the show. He’ll blow you away, a genius piano player. Anyway, Fats—Fats played a lot, ate and drank a lot and enjoyed a lot. He was loved everywhere he went and would play for hours at a time. He’s hilarious and always had a rippin’ band. His vocal phrasing is incredible. He was so at home singing and playing it’s not to be believed. The RCA sets of Fats are really good. There’s a lot of best-ofs out there. Here’s a little web info: http://www.redhotjazz.com/fats.html

Buzzcocks – ESP: from the Buzzcocks 1978 Love Bites album, which included the single Ever Fallen In Love. At this time, the band were enjoying success with fans and critics alike and the fact that they followed up their brilliant debut Another Music In A Different Kitchen in a little over half a year with Love Bites only increased their momentum. All territories that released this record made slight changes to the LP jacket sending collectors scurrying. If you want to check out a really cool Buzzcocks website that shows all the different jackets and labels of pretty much every Buzzcocks record there is, go to: http://www.btinternet.com/~buzzcocks/. From what I’ve been told, the rarest version of this record is a two LP white label test pressing with side A on one LP and side B on the other. I have not seen it listed anywhere but I know people who have seen it so I am sure it exists. The band recorded some of the songs on Love Bites at the BBC for the John Peel show and I considered playing the Peel version tonight but I think the album version sounds better. There’s a cool book on the Buzzcocks called The Complete History by Tony McGartland that’s really informative but hard to find. I’ve had mine for many years and don’t see it often but it’s worth pursuing if you want a day by day history of the band. The book even details, with slight errors, the first time I saw them play in Washington DC 09-04-79. This album is good all the way through and deserves attentive and repeated listening.

Kraftwerk - Taschenrechner (Pocket Calculator): From the Computer Welt album. If you heard one song from this album, it very well could have been this one. But tonight, we will make it a little more interesting by playing the German version. Kraftwerk have recorded some of their albums in English and German. If you look, you will see listings for the band’s most well known albums with their titles in both languages: The Man-Machine, Radio-Activity, Trans-Europe Express and Computer World also appear as Die Mensch-Maschine, Radio-Aktivitat, Trans Europa Express and Computer Welt respectively. Besides the obvious difference of the language being used in the songs, there’s a lot more to note. The mixes and edits are often quite different and after some listens, you may find yourself favoring the German versions. I do. For many years I knew of the German versions of these albums but never made any attempt to get them. I am in Germany all the time and in one of my frequent record store raids there I picked up all of them in one fell swoop and was so glad I did. The German versions are really interesting and the more familiar you are with the English language versions, the more these German versions will draw you in. I don’t remember where, but I was told there’s a version of Computer World in Japanese. I have seen a Japanese pressing of this album, complete with obi band but never checked it out all that closely. I have looked for this Japanese version and so far, have not been able to locate one. If anyone out there knows of one, please let me know. There’s some cool websites with more info than I could ever provide with my measly knowledge of the band. I am more fan of the music than expert on the band’s history but here’s a good site to give you some background on the early years of the band. http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip/8880/. Some say Ralf and Florian invented electronic music. If you listen to these records and see the dates when they were made, it’s quite possible. There’s no way Bowie, DEVO, Suicide and countless others didn’t check these records out. You can’t talk about Kraftwerk without eventually getting to the German band Neu!, which no doubt, many of you are fans of as well. We’ll have to play them further on up the road. Perhaps we can check out some Can as well.

Gen X - Happy People: Contrary to what you may be thinking, no, I am not trying to play the Gen X album Kiss Me Deadly in its entirety song by song as the weeks go by. It’s just that I have been playing this record a lot over the last few months and my enthusiasm spills onto our show tonight. Last week we heard Untouchables and tonight it’s Happy People. I think I waxed enthusiastically enough about this record in the last two show notes so I’ll leave it alone for now but I can’t leave this out: The re-issue of Kiss Me Deadly doesn’t include many of the Gen X songs released as b-sides around the album’s release like Rock On, Ugly Rash and the extended version of Dancing with Myself. It does include one interesting track that pertains to the one we heard tonight. Hubble, Bubble, Toil and Dubble, which is an extended version of Happy People and pretty cool. The only time I have seen this before is on the b-side of the promo USA 12” of Dancing With Myself (extended version). I just apprehended an Australian white label test pressing of this record and it sounds great. I remember when this record came out. By that time, even I had figured Generation X a kind of over and done prospect as I was one of the only people I knew who even liked their 2nd album Valley Of The Dolls. I played the album a couple of times and shelved it. I did listen to the singles off the album quite a bit though. Only recently I took it down again and started playing it. This was perhaps due to the re-issue of the CD and the release of some early versions of the songs on the KMD: Sweet Revenge album. Anyway, I now promise to lay off this record for awhile.

Routineers - Streetlights: From the debut and self-titled album released in 2004. I got to see the band play 06-30-05 in Washington DC at Fort Reno. It was a great night and a great bill. The Routineers opened the evening and then the Evens went on afterwards. The Routineers have Amanda MacKaye on vocals and the Evens, a duo with Amy Farina on drums also contains Ian MacKaye so it was quite the family affair onstage. The Fort Reno shows are really cool. They’re outdoors and free. I ran into people at this show I hadn’t seen in years, including people I went to highschool with. A lot of gray hair going on. Anyway, it was the third time I had seen the Evens and they were great but what really grabbed me was how great the Routineers were! I only had the record, which I really liked but live it’s really something. Amanda sings great and the songs come off great live. They played a few new ones that sounded even better than the ones I recognized. I was so happy I got to be in town for this. I can’t wait for the next record. If you’re ever in DC in the summer time, you should try to make it to some of those Fort Reno shows. Here’s where to get yourself some info on the band: http://www.routineers.com/.

The B-52's - 52 Girls: Not the version you might be familiar with. This is the pre Warner Brothers signing version. The band made their own single with Rock Lobster on the A-side. Ian got this when it came out and we played all the time. Soon after, their debut album came out and we stopped playing the single. I finally found a copy of my own a few years ago and for the benefit of you all, I put it onto CDR and brought it into the station. That first record is really cool. I only have the first two albums. I spent a lot of the 80’s wiping blood off my face and I kinda lost track of them.

The Fall – Telephone Thing: From the Fall’s 1990 album Extricate. Great all the way through. This was also a single with a dub mix. A great era for the Fall. The band came right back in 1991 with Shift-Work and hit again in 1992 with Code: Selfish. Four versions of this song to choose from: we have the regular version, the extended, the dub and what is most likely a demo version that can be easily found on a few different Fall CDs. What, you think I carry all this information in my head?! I wish! All you need to know about this song and every other Fall song can be found on the amazing Fall website: http://www.visi.com/fall/.

El Guapo – Rumbledream: From the super/system album on Dischord. This album blew me away when I got it. I am surprised I didn’t get to it the last time I was on the air. It was probably due to the fact that the band’s next album Fake French was out and I was playing tracks off that one. Both these records are in my opinion, some of the most interesting and artistically reaching albums Dischord ever released. This was a great time for a great label with the Black Eyes, El Guapo and Q and Not U all releasing records. I like this song Rumbledream a lot. I get the same feeling listening to it as when I listen to Suicide’s I Remember. As you probably know, the band changed their name to Supersystem and just released Always Never Again on Touch & Go. We hard a track of theirs on the first broadcast a couple of weeks ago. El Guapo info can be found at the Dischord Records site: http://www.dischord.com/main.shtml.

Vega – Deuce Avenue: Here we go again. Last time we had the show in 2004, we listened to a lot of Alan Vega. Since I have not played any Vega yet this time around, we better get to it. This is the title track from the Deuce Avenue album. I released this on my label Infinite Zero years ago. It met great critical reviews but didn’t sell all that well and went out of print. That being said, the people who did pick up on the Suicide front man’s solo work really dug it. Alan Vega is one of the originators. He’s the real thing and has done many cutting edge career risk projects because he’s the real deal. We’ll be listening to a lot of Alan Vega on the show. He’s one of my all time heroes and inspirations. His art is on my walls and his music is frequently coming out of my speakers.

Roky Erickson – Click Your Fingers Applauding The Play: Roky! I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: There’s no bad Roky songs. His albums are desert island listening to me. Thanks to his brother Sumner Erickson and the people at the Roky Erickson Trust, Roky is doing better than ever. In times past, things were not as good for Rok as they are now. I can’t explain it as well as the biographical info on the sites can so I’ll let those do the talking but I can comment from my extensive experience with the man that he’s doing really well and it’s due to the amazing commitment of his brother Sumner. I was in Austin TX for a show 10-05-05 and Sumner and Roky were due to show up. About n hour before show time, Sumner walks up and greets me as I was standing outside the bus. I ask him where Roky is. Sumner tells me he’s parking the car. Parking the car?! I can’t explain to you how hard this blew me away. Years ago, it would be unthinkable that Rok would be driving, much less leaving the house. Sumner points to a car making a turn next to the venue and tells me that’s him driving. I run up to the car in disbelief and stick my head in the passenger side window, Roky looks me square in the eye and says, “Hi Henry!” WHOA!!! Anyway, after the show, we’re hanging outside the bus and Rok asks if we can go in the bus as he’s never been on one. I take him on the tour of the bus and we hang out in the front lounge until we had to head down the road for the next show. Anyway, there’s a lot of good things happening in the world of Roky Erickson and we’re really happy he’s back on Earth. A lot of his albums are back in print, including the one we pulled this track from, the amazing The Evil One. Check out of one of the greatest American musicians we’ve ever had: http://www.rokyerickson.net/roky.htm and http://www.rokyerickson.net/ seem to be two versions of the official site.

UK Subs – Perfect Girl: From the Keep On Runnin’ single. Two versions of this single. A two song 7” with Keep on Runnin’ and Perfect Girl and an EP with the aforementioned songs as well as Ice Age and Party In Paris (sung on French). Both are out of print but easy enough to find on GEMM or EBay. All four songs are also included on the Diminished Responsibility CD on Captain Oi! Records. This EP and the band’s She’s Not There EP contain perhaps my favorite UK Subs songs. Boy, do those records hold up. Over 25 years on, I still listen them all the time and if you check out this show, so will you! The 2 song version of the single comes on blue vinyl and I have never seen it in black. The 4 song version comes in black vinyl and so far, I have not seen any A label promos of these releases although I know of a test pressing of the 2 song version in a private collection. Now, since we’re on the subject and I won’t be able to write about the UK Subs again for at least a week, let’s talk about that version of Party In Paris sung in French. I know of three versions of this song. There’s the version found on the Diminished Responsibility album. The single version with Fall Of The Empire on the b-side. Easily found on orange vinyl, not as easily on black. I have seen the black vinyl version with A label stamps with a push out center and the orange with A label stamps and solid centers. I have never seen either color without the A label promo stamp. And lastly, this one sung in French. Originally this was released as a limited one-sided fan club freebie, limited to 500. You don’t see this one very often.

The Panik – Murder: From the It Won’t Sell! EP on Rainy City Records. I have had this record for about 27 years now. It’s a great one. As far as I know, this is the only record they did. Too bad they didn’t do an album because all three songs on the EP are great. The Punk ’77 site has info on the band. When we had the show going in 2004, we listened to another song on the EP called Modern Politics that contains the great line, “I don’t need a cause to fight.” I like that. We can’t listen to the song Urban Damnation because of the line “Urban damnation, causing so much fucking frustration!” so we’ll listen to this one. To get that band info and the info on a ton of other punk bands from a long time ago, check out this site: http://www.punk77.co.uk/. The three songs were collected on the long out of print Short Sharp Shock CD from John Esplen’s Overground Records http://www.overgroundrecords.co.uk/ but I looked that up and it’s hard to find as is the single and expensive when you do. If you find yourself interested, check the GEMM site for availability. http://gemm.com/.

Gene Defcon – Little Punk Girl: Gene Defcon’s back! This is from GD’s newest one Throw Up & Die. Many months ago, he asked me if I could draw a cop riding on the back of a unicorn. I told him I couldn’t draw but he asked me to do it anyway and send it to him for album artwork. I drew this awful zero talent factor thing and sent it in. Months later I receive a copy of the album and on the inside, there’s the very bad drawing. I have a feeling Mr. Defcon was making sport of me but I remain a fan nonetheless. Here’s where to get yourself some Gene info: http://www.retarddisco.com/?artist=gd. If you heard the broadcasts we did in 2004, we played a lot of songs from his Party With Me 2000 album.

Screamers – 122 Hours of Fear: After I saw a Screamers live video and heard some live tracks on a cassette it occurred to me that they should have taken over the world. The band’s frontman Tomata Duplenty, even from the little bit I have seen of him is one of the most riveting front men I have ever seen. When I got to LA in 1981 I was very curious about the local bands as I had some of the records by bands like the Germs, the Weirdoes, X, etc. I had heard about the Screamers from Jello Biafra but had never heard them. Someone who used to see them every time they played made me a tape of some live show and it was a revelation. A few years ago, I found an LP of demos as well as a 2CD set called In A Better World on Xeroid Records. As the band had no proper release, these two will have to do and they are awesome. The Screamers were bright lights in that LA scene and were fairly worshipped by their fans. Unrelenting abrasive synth-driven nihilism with the incredible Tomata in front of it. I met the guy once, I think it was at the Zero One gallery in Hollywood. He wasn’t looking all that good. It was cool to meet him. I don’t remember if we spoke or not. Like I said, he didn’t look good. Here’s some info on one of the greatest bands the world never heard.
Screamers info: http://www.synthpunk.org/screamers/.
V. Vale write up on Tomata: http://www.researchpubs.com/features/tomatafeat.shtml
Obit for Tomata: http://elvispelvis.com/tomataduplenty.htm.

Thin Lizzy - Just the Two of Us: An early single for the band. I had the single for many years and was always hoping it would come out on one of box set or compilations that never stop coming out yet rarely give the fan something rare. This song was a b-side off the killer Black Rose album with Do Anything You Want To on the a-side. That’s a great one! I don’t know why they didn’t put this track on the CD version of the album. Anyway, this is off the 4CD retrospective Vagabonds Kings Warriors Angels box set. You know, when they make these box sets, the label should go to some of the band’s fan sites and ask them what they would like to hear on the release and maybe they would learn something and give the fans what they want. Don’t get me started!

Saccharine Trust - Effort to Waste: From the We Became Snakes album on SST. I don’t know if this one’s all that easy to find at this point. What a band. I saw them play a lot of times as we toured together a lot back in the Black Flag days. I never saw them do a bad show. The two main guys in the band were guitar player Joe Baiza and singer Jack Brewer. The bass players and drummers would come and go but they were always good. There’s one of their records that never got put on CD and it’s a crime, it’s called Surviving You Always and it has some of their best work. Singer Jack sent me an MP3 of a new song and it’s really good. Really good website by the band with info and lots of photos here: http://www.saccharinetrust.com/.

The Mad - The Hell: From the legendary New York shock punk band from back in the day. I got to see these guys a couple of times and they were great. I was smart enough to pick up their records at that time because they sure are hard to find now. Thankfully, the two singles and some other live cuts have all been issued on a CD called We Love Noize. The cut we heard tonight was from the Fried Egg EP from 1979. It has a great fold out poster sleeve. Screaming Mad George, the singer did all the artwork. George is now a serious effects guy in the movie industry. You can check out his site here: http://www.smgfx.com/. If you want to see the picture sleeve of the record we heard tonight, it’s here: http://www.thisispunkrock.btinternet.co.uk/ps/us/4/madfried.htm. I saw these guys open for the Bad Brains in DC in 1979 or 1980 at Madams Organ, a hippie commune / performance space we saw a lot of great shows at. The stage was in the living room and you could just walk right up in front of the band and see them up close. One night I was watching the Bad Brains play and the singer, HR jumped right on me and pinned me to the floor and sang at me from an inch away. Now THAT is rock and roll!

Wire - Culture Vultures: We haven’t played any Wire so far so we better hop to it. It’ll only take a sec. This is from the Peel Sessions CD. I can’t recommend the first three Wire albums Pink Flag, Chairs Missing and 154 highly enough. This song isn’t found on these records and I guess is exclusive to the Peel Session. The guys in Wire have had many split off projects over the years. There’s been a lot of releases and they’re not always easy to find and some are very challenging for the listener. If you ever get a chance, check out the Dome releases. Dome 1-4 are on CD on Mute Records. I don’t know if they’re still in print but you can find them easily enough. They’re not the easiest going but they’re really cool. We’ll get some Dome going later on in the year for sure.

Iggy Pop - Livin' On The Edge Of The Night: An interesting track from the Undisputed King of Rock and Roll. As I remember, this was part of the Black Rain movie soundtrack. I have this promo CD with two edits of the song. This is kinda hard to find but you should seek out the video for this song. Iggy is amazing in it. It’s just him and his guitar player in a room and that’s all Iggy needs. It’s one of the coolest videos I have ever seen. Back when I was fab and had some pull, I got someone at Virgin to snag me a copy. I played to anyone to who would sit still. I like it when Iggy goes into that lower register vocal. Always cool.

Raymond Scott - Don't Beat Your Wife Every Night: As promised last week! Really cool. If you want to get way out there, check out his Soothing Sounds for Baby CD series. I got those in Japan years ago and they’re great. Again, that site address: http://www.raymondscott.com/

Metal Boys - Suspenders In the Park: Three bands you can kind of lump together: Metal Urbain, Doctor Mix and the Remix and Metal Boys. All three share French noise terrorist Eric Debris. Metal Urbain being the hardest on the ears, Doctor Mix the most rock and roll and I don’t know exactly where Metal Boys fits in. I got all these records many years ago and were listening to all three bands at the same time. Doctor Mix which did electro covers of cool songs like No Fun and Sister Ray was the easiest to get to, the lyrics being sung in English helped as well. I always wondered what Debris wasn’t getting out of the other outlets which made him do the Metal Boys Tokio Airport album. It seems like he’s out of his element, trying to get the music to a different venue and this is what he thought would work. I am not trying to put the guy down, I like the record but there’s something about it that seems to be trying where his other two incarnations were not looking side to side in any way. So, why play the band then? It’s still a good record and we listened to Metal Urbain and Doctor Mix so we might as well collect the whole set!

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Thanks for listening.