Well, Jobriath was gayer than Liberace but he could Rock like a motherfucker (or a daddyfucker in this case). One thing's fer sure - his stage moves were severely lacking. However, he had a killer band behind him that can make me sorta ignore his ridiculous onstage presence.
Much like one of my favorites, Klaus Nomi, Jobriath couldn't keep away from other dudes' penises at a time when AIDS was just beginning to cast its shadow. He began to feel ill in 1981 and then died in '83, only three days before Klaus died.
"Maybe you're still lookin' for kiss. Remember, I'm still here."
Rock & Roll "legends" are a dime a dozen. You see the names all the time, playing for arenas full of adoring fans and garnering accolades from every "critic" in the glossy magazines. They're honored in their home towns and get worthless trophies and awards. However, there are some musicians that make massive contributions yet never receive the praise they deserve for one reason or another.
Johnny, Suzanne, and daughter Jamie
Nearly every Johnny Thunders article or anecdotal soundbite has more to do with his drug intake than his musicianship. It's a travesty because he invented post-60s Rock & Roll guitar. As the New York Dolls developed into a new musical force and he matured into a formidable guitarist, he played a new form of amphetamine-fueled Rock & Roll that had never been seen or heard before. He could channel all the great Blues, R&B, and British Invasion guitarists and had a songwriting ability that stayed with him until the end, from Personality Crisis to Some Hearts.
As his life neared its End, his career was taking off again - playing new songs to sold-out venues. Who knows what could have been...
Long live Johnny Thunders and many blessings to his family who lost him far too soon.
Here are a few tunes the casual listener may never have heard before - and if you happen to be one of those casual JT listeners, you probably never expected him to sound like this:
"Flight" is one of the oldest Heartbreakers tunes - penned by Walter Lure - dating back to '76 or so. Sadly, they never recorded it as a unit, but Waldo later put it on the Waldos' "Rent Party" LP. It's a fantastic, poppy tune that fit right in with the 'Breakers other songs. It would make its way into the setlist occasionally, all the way into the early 80s. Now, Waldo plays it during his solo shows.
(The video above was filmed at Max' Kansas City on April 28, 1979. Below is solo Waldo at Don Pedro's in Brooklyn on January 29, 2011)
Tell your friends you went to the show, Now tell your Mama where she can go. Yes I love that suicide, don't die in your home. Now baby, baby, we're on our own. Let's make that run tonight, Let's make that flight tonight, Be at the airport, a quarter to nine, Baby won't you be on time. Love to me, it seems like a dream, You wake me now and I start to scream. The sky is on fire, [-?-] Well baby, baby, it's me and you. Let's make that run tonight, Let's make that flight tonight, Be at the airport, a quarter to nine, Baby won't you be on time. Don't let anybody know, This ain't no time to lose control. We're gonna fly all into the night... Let's make that run tonight, Let's make that flight tonight, Be at the airport, a quarter to nine, Baby won't you be on time. It's all I can do, I don't know if it's true, It's hard enough to get through to you. Don't hang me up on this cold side of town, Just pack your bags and come on down. Let's make that run tonight, Let's make that flight tonight, Be at the airport, a quarter to nine, Baby won't you be on time.
Bryan Stow, 42, a San Francisco Giants fan and paramedic was beaten nearly to death at
the Los Angeles Dodgers season opener last week. He remains hospitalized and in critical
condition. He has signs of brain damage and has had seizures. Bryan Stow
remains in a medically induced coma with half his skull removed to allow
his injured brain to swell. He was slammed to the ground while walking
through the Dodger parking lot, then repeatedly kicked in the head.
Bryan’s attackers, two Latino men in their late teens or 20s, have yet
to be found by police. A reward for information leading to an arrest
rose to $150,000 last week, with contributors including the Dodgers,
Giants and L.A. city and county governments.
Giants fan Bryan Stow, shown holding his 12-year-old son and 8-year-old daughter
Please visit his family's website,www.support4bryanstow.com, and think about donating to his cause. According to his sister, as of 14 April "Bryan's ventilator was removed and he had a trach put in, which should make him more comfortable. Tonight they are moving his feeding tube to his stomach. A CT scan
was done about an hour ago and we are hoping for positive results. Please, keep the prayers coming!"
You can also visit the Facebook page created in support off Bryan. Giants pitcher Tim Lincecum just donated $25,000.
If I could condense this evening of music into a single sentence, it would read something like, "Loud night of heavy riffin', blues-based, Rock & Roll, with a dash of slow-groovin' Texas twang."
As with the last concert I went to, Shane and I met Coop at his house in VA and drove into DC. Our ultimate destination was the Rock N Roll Hotel, but first we needed some grub. Shane recommended a place just down the street from the RNRH calledThe Argonaut. I'd never been to this section of DC, The Atlas District (wow, when I see that written down it sure looks like the name for a 70s gay bathhouse!) - a strip of H St. NE that is a combination of boarded up stores and pretentious eateries and wine/coffee bars. Gentrification here we come! Anyways, back to the Argonaut...
The view from the front door (taken from the Argonaut's website)
I was expecting simple bar-food, but when I ordered a simple grilled cheese and chicken soup, I was more than surprised at the taste/quality. First of all, our server Manny and his very cute first-day-on-the-job assistant (can't remember her name!) promptly brought us to our table. We ended up ordering fried manchego cheese appetizer and a pitcher of Heavy Seas beer. They didn't have Guinness, so we went with their recommendation - the pitcher was promptly emptied. The chicken soup wasn't your typical chicken soup: elbow pasta and potato, along with the perfect amount of spice, made it a VERY good cup of soup! My grilled cheese & tomato on Texas toast was perfect, and my choice of side dish, grilled asparagus, was delicious, if only a slight bit too buttery. OK, sufficiently filled, we walked down the street to the venue...
A very simple first-floor 400-capacity venue. Walk in, ticket counter is to the left, and walk through the big wooden doors to find a long, narrow, black-walled room with a bar on the left and the stage on a raised platform at the far end. On the second floor is another bar and a couple rooms set-up with old, mid-20th Century furniture (the kind your grandparents let you take to college). The urinals are a throwback! Ever piss into a bathtub?
Bathtub urinals are dangerous - watch for splashing piss!
OK, on to the show. The openers,Hacienda, were outstanding. A four-piece blues-based band of brothers (and a cousin) out of San Antonio, TX, Hacienda played some stomping Texas grooves (emphasis on Texas and grooves) with a healthy dose of Gibson lead guitar and farfisa organ. I was impressed enough to buy a copy of their latest CD, Big Red & Barbacoa, after the show from lead singer/bassist Rene. Go to their website for a free download. Here's a YouTube of them playing SXSW:
After Hacienda's set, I refueled with a 20oz Pabst Blue Ribbon and waded back into the crowd of about 100, and on to the headliners, The Greenhornes. Blues/Brit Invasion-influenced Rock & Roll will never go out of style. I wasn't able to grab a setlist, but they pretty much played all my favorite tunes except for It Returns and Pattern Skies. Pattern Skies is actually my favorite tune of theirs - especially the harmony on the chorus. They jumped from slow blues numbers to heavy foot-stomping riff-based Rock to straight up R&R to balladry.
Lead singer Craig Fox is a statue of a frontman - imagine an Arthur "Killer" Kane that can play his instrument and sing - sometimes I thought he was going to tip over, eyes-closed standing stone-still! Even when he was setting up his gear before his set, he was sorta walking around in a half-zombie state. That said, he sung as well as any white-boy bluesman out there, expressing emotion through voice and guitar alone. Who needs Rock Star-poses, anyways? The core members, Fox, Jack Lawrence (bass), and Patrick Keeler (drums), were joined by rhythm guitar/organ/percussionist (and Jared Leto lookalike) Mark Watrous. I don't know if he's just a touring 4th man or a new Greenhorne.
A highlight for me was the Classic Rock-infused take on James Brown's "I'll Go Crazy." All said, this was a great night of music for less than the cost of Dinner at the Argonaut. Well worth the money and I hope they come around again in the not-too-distant future.
There are few New York musicians who have been able to combine high art, edgy musicianship, and pure bizarreness as well as Klaus Nomi. My brother and I definitely appreciate music outside the norm, and Klaus Nomi is the perfect example of that. He played all the same clubs my favorite bands played, from CBGB to the Mudd Club to Max's Kansas City. But unlike the Ramones or the Heartbreakers, Klaus's music didn't embody the shambolic guitars of the Punk scene. It was musical. It was operatic. Nothing like it had come before him. And to be honest, there ain't any other place in the world where Klaus Sperber could have become Klaus Nomi (except for maybe France, but then nobody would have given a shit, really).
Unfortunately, like so many promiscuous gays in New York City around the "End Of The Century," from the late 70s into the 80s, he developed AIDS and died far too early, at the age of 39 in 1983. If you get the chance to watch the documentary about him, "The Nomi Song," you'll hear about how his friends would go out looking for him and find him fucking on the docks - all the time.
Klaus Nomi's Epitaph
Here is possibly his greatest performance, recorded as HIV was destroying him, in front of his native Germany in Munich during December 1982. Although shortness of breath and fatigue deeply frustrated him, Klaus was determined to perform. He chose Henry Purcell's "Cold Song," from King Arthur - a wise selection, as there may not have been song as prophetic as this one:
What Power art thou,
Who from below,
Hast made me rise,
Unwillingly and slow,
From beds of everlasting snow!
See'st thou not how stiff,
And wondrous old,
Far unfit to bear the bitter cold.
I can scarcely move,
Or draw my breath,
I can scarcely move,
Or draw my breath.
Let me, let me,
Let me, let me,
Freeze again...
Let me, let me,
Freeze again to death!
I had been searching for a good ole Garage Rock band to go check out and lucky for me - The Greenhornes are hitting DC next week! Tickets are $12, so how can I not go? I am not gonna waste a whole lotta thought on this post and I'll post an extensive concert review after the show.
Johnny and company had been touring relentlessly across Europe throughout 1984, and as 1985 dawned they slowed down just a little bit in January before hitting Japan for 9 gigs in 10 days. Anyways, in January '85 they played a few dates in Spain, one of which was broadcast on the La Edad De Oro TV show on 29 January.
Jerry Nolan is lookin' dandy as ever in his fashionable duds, Billy Rath looks like classic Billy in all black and leather, Syl Sylvain is dressed like a 1920s newspaper boy, and Johnny...well he looks magnificent as a guitar-wielding toreador, resplendent in histraje de luces(suit of lights).
This is one of the best available videos of JT. Toward the end of the broadcast he had changed outifts and looked a little out of it, but for the first half, he was in classic form. Enjoy.
