What with the Depression soon to be upon us I look forward to lots more cheap entertainment being available. Keeping it fresh and local and one step ahead of the big crash is my buddy Geezer. He's gotten together some musicians and a local tavern to start up a showcase of both homegrown and not so local talent. I freely admit to being a north of Boston girl, and I don't mean North Shore either! I'm well inland and a little freaked out by a big ass city like Quincy, but one day I hope to overcome my fear of driving south of Boston and get myself to one of these shows. The line-up this week looks very impressive. Can I get a volunteer to ride shotgun? I managed to corner Geezer and get the scoop on what's coming up this week and beyond! Here's what he told me...
Quincys only Garage Nite! FEB 27th GARAGE BLOW OUT 7:30 Lonesome Lil and the Boy's ( lillian donnelly) 8:00 The Peculiar ( great Local alterative ROCK band) 8:30 Adam Earley ( comming down from Maine solo set) 9:00 Jay Allen and the Arch-Criminals (Catchy old school) 9:30 Frank Rowe (Classic Ruins) solo Set 10:00 The Ten Foot Pole Cats ( great blues band) 11:00 Jeff Crane (Classc Ruins)solo set 11:30 Geezer Deluxe (the RAW garage stuff)
A long time Quincy tavern known for good pizza the Granite Rail Tavern at 16 Cottage Ave in Quincy (617-479-2726) has opened the place to local musicians and beyond. A night of old and new friends, musicians and family. The opening act "Lonesome Lil and the Boys" is my daughter, 17, singing and on piano, my son, 15, on drums and me on lap steel or acoustic guitar, playing Hank Williams Sr. covers, folk songs and some original americana. From then it's garage r'n'r bands, old school boston r'n'r guys, local alternative rock bands and solo folk/americana blues band. Classic rock, just a mixed bag. We're no music snobs at Geezers Garage Nite, I want everyone to play that wants to, I get as many acts up as I can. The garage nite is once a month, usually near the end of the month and hosted By Geezer Deluxe. We ask for a 5$ suggested donation that is stuffed into an old oil space heater. The bands can sell Cds or merchandise. Basically, it's a night out for us old Guys/Gals to get together and pick out some tunes and bring younger musicians in on it so if any musicians want to throw in with us, the more the merrier. Just get in touch on the Geezers Garage Nite at the Granite Rail Myspace
And just a look at next months March 27th Garage Nite: the Dirty Shames (New York City) Tokyo Tramps (Fun Band playing Bluesy country) Rustbbucket (great jammin r'n'r)
Hi, it's me, Tontileo, again. I couldn't find any vids of the Granite Rail. We have to rectify that in the future, but here's some footage of a brush fire in Quincy. The tapes of people jumping into the quarries were pretty cool, but I don't want to encourage that type of dangerous and possibly illegal behavior here. Besides this one has firemen! Putting out a fire with push brooms. I wonder if that's why they call it a brush fire?
I got this great Metrowave tape from Jaded Jase and I've been looking around to try and find some info on The Unattached and can find very little. How funny is it that I just had to change the spelling on the widget. Unattached only has one N, your queen, not two. I managed to find this little blurb from Chuck Warner on his Hyped to Death site.
Unattached -EP (Bisque-18) The last thing that we released. Jaime Sever had started out in the Jetsons, and helped run the legendary Gulcher collaborative/ cooperative back in Bloomington, Indiana. He moved back to Worcester, MA where the Unattached recorded some demos (Volume insists there was a 19822 Unattached cassette in circulation). Jetsons fans have some idea, perhaps, of how great "Genetically Stupid" was, live. They played Boston on occasion but they were superstars in Wormtown...they just never thought about putting out a record. Oh yeah, and they broke up all the time. I got them to re-form for the Let's Breed! record-release parties (10 bands, two nights at the Rat) and again for the first Chain Link Fence record-release party, I think, but it wasn't til '87 that they stayed together for any length of time. Anyway, the EP is sorta over-polished and over-raw at the same time, and it might have launched a very profitable career, except that Alice Cooper heard one of their demos and loved it --though he wanted to write new lyrics for it. He even invited Jaime and Mark to come and play on "Trash", which was of course a big hit and re-established Alice's career, but Jaime and Mark celebrated this brush with fame by firing their long-suffering rhythm section and that was the end of them. And Throbbing Lobster.
I am further intrigued and decide to do more research. Genetically Stupid has long been imprinted on my brain. Very catchy stuff and I follow some clues and find a site for The Jetsons, the band who first did the song and have been kind enough to include it on their page. My quest for info on The Unattached continues in my immediate circle of The Coalition of the Fabulous with a call to a dear friend I'll call...oh, let me see...Deep Throat. I'm going to both protect the identity of my source and try to ward off more taunts that I am a name dropper. I admit, that made me wince. In my defense, I am trying to maintain a somewhat historical perspective here and you can't have history without details and names happen to be an important detail. Besides, no one reads this shit anyways and we're all friends here, right? Well, mostly friends. So I ask DT and he tells me I should ask Gerry Lehane. Oddly, the same answer I get to about 37% of my questions. Gerry emailed me back. "Jamie Sever, he's around. I'm not sure how you would get in touch with him though. I believe Simon Ritt was in the band."
Why Simon Ritt is the love of my darling old friend Jan, yet another member of The Co-Fabs, and I write her to find out what she has to say.
"Yes, Simon was the bass player and is on their EP which we have a box of down in the basement! Jamie Sever used to walk around Kenmore with a white rat on his shoulder...Mike Zadroga was the drummer, Mark Frazier was the guitar player. They had the number one local single on BCN for a bit and they were in the Battle of The Bands...I don't think they won..Jamie Sever went on to be in the Fighting Cocks..."
With her encouragement, I wrote to Simon for more and he graciously responded.
"I played bass w/ the Un's for a few years through their Rumble/Throbbing Lobster era or what I prefer to think of as their 'Golden Period'. I do recollect doing a couple of live radio broadcast's w/ 'em....was metrowave on WERS? F.Y.I. Jamie (the singer) Is a stay @ home dad of 2 great little girls. He's NEVER been on a computer but I'll let him know I heard from you via the traditional telephone talking device. I'm also glad to inform you that Mark Frazier the boneheaded guitarist gave up music & left Boston years ago. The drummer Mike Z lives In NYC & Is a T.V. sound Tech. with a great job working Pro-Sporting Events."
I have left out some of the more salacious details of their emails, hysterical as they were. I do TRY to be discreet. Sometimes. Check out The Darlings to see what Simon is up to these days.
Poking around in the internets a little more yielded this nugget of lore from sleazegrinder. This guy's stuff is great. It is like crack to me. Or whatever highly addictive illegal substance the kids are all doing now. Frankly, I can't be bothered to keep up to speed on what the kids are doing these days. I'm going to post a quote and hope that they don't kill me, but really, check out the stuff this guy writes. It's pretty cool.
"So anyway, we're waiting to get in on the guestlist and these two beat-looking tattooed, cowboy junkies are on us like flies on sherbert with the "Yo, Vinnie" Reveah-Beach accents, completely covered in bad tattoos--even worse than mine---glammed-out, to the hilt. Headbands, stretch jeans, pirate hoops, cowboy boots, scarves, Lip Service vests---babbling about Dogs D'Amour and G.G. Allin. They embraced the whole cliche'. Us, too. Immediately, they're talking over one another, telling us how they're, "Like, da only glam dudes in Boston-except for dis one other guy, Simon, from the Unattatched, and uh, the Voodoo Dolls, and Tony Triggah from da Love Junkies, dis Cats 'N' Boots guy. And uh, Desi and Jimmy from da Touch Me Hookers, and Rafe from da Royal Pimps, who used ta be da Blackjacks, and anotha band called, uh, Jet Black Somethings, and dis hot girl singah from da Seventh Veil. She's gonna go crazy when she sees you, dude!" I can still somehow remember their names were Eric and Rob and I later went to a David Bowie concert with them, but that was pretty much my first conversation with any Boston locals. My initial introduction to Boston. Not everybody there was like Rob and Eric."
So that was my adventure researching The Unattached. If anyone has any photos or other information or memorabilia on them send it along and I'll put it up.
Many thanks to Jaded Jase for having the wits to tape some of these fantastic Metrowave shows. I have one more from him up my sleeve that I'll put up soon. I know there are issues with the sound on the tapes I've posted from Metrowave and other MBR and ERS shows. I don't mind at all. They sound just like I remember, hell, I only lived 25 miles North of Boston and I could only hear those stations on a clock radio in a house across the street. The tapes I made on fucking Charles Street have rough spots on them and Emerson was just four blocks away and MIT was just over the river. Crazy. These tapes are beyond precious since someone at Emerson dumped boxes and boxes of the originals in the trash when they moved. Feel free to be pissed about that and send me any tapes you might have and would like to share.
Always, always a good time and a good show. Sounds simple, but not so easy to pull off. Never underestimate the searing power of a shirtless man wearing spike heels with trousers that look like they've been painted on with black nail polish.
You don't see production values like this every day. And it reminds me of a Magritte painting called A Little of the Bandits' Soul too. It's win win! Rene Magritte, photographed by Lothar Wolleh in Brussels, 1967
