New Stooges book

I'm just re-reading Paul Trynka's magnificent Ig tome "OPen Up And Bleed" right now with its often forensic examination of the terminal-stage Stooges' death throes tour laying it out in all its stark and harrowing glory, but you can never get too much Stooges.

Photographer Roberet Matheu has authored this newie and knows the principals well so you know it's going to be worthy.

Max Raabe. WTF?

It's possibly poor form for an ungrateful ezine to complain about promos but even poorer form for a publicist not to know their market. So, after a string of tenors of various group denominations, priests and faux swing band CDs and DVDs landing in the I-94 Bar post office box, should I "out" the PR person who sent this abomination?

Reggae version of "Trash"? Oh dear...

The new Two York Dolls album "Cause I Sez So" contains a cover of "Trash" with "gently strummed guitars and a reggae beat"? Too Much Information Too Soon for mine. The preview track I heard somewhere sounded very metal too. The signs are not good (echoes of "The Weirdness" by the Stooges) but the jury is still out. Portents of things to come here.

New(ish) I-94 Bar Podcast

Ah, we forgot. Episode 21 went up last week. Subscribe via links on the right or go here and this is the playlist:

Jesus Invented Beer -The Bible Beaters (Drink. Fight. Fuck. Volume III)

Lex In B - The Pink Fits (De Ja Blues)

Doin' Time - The Candy Snatchers (Drink. Fight. Fuck. Volume III)

Stickin' Around - The Soul Movers (unreleased 7")

Bruna - Simon Chainsaw (Alpha Negra)

Memory Layne - The Dolly Rocker Movement (Our Days Mind The Tyme)

Underdog - The Movements (The World The Flesh And The Devil)

Revolution Blues - Blood Group (Revolution Blues EP)

Strange Kind Of Love - Molten Universe (No Love Around EP)

Rock-N-Roll Victim - Death (For the Whole World to See EP)

Hold On Together - Dollhouse (Rock and Roll Revival)

Tell Me Why - Tony Worsley (Before Birdmen Flew)

Primitive Tales - The Kits (Primitive Tales)

I'm A Lover Not A Fighter - The Downliners Sect (International Stomp-O-Lation)

Know Your Product - The Saints (Pig City - Live In Brisbane 2007)

The Pink Fits: "I'm on the Red"

Filmed at Off the Hip Records in Melbourne. The Baty brothers as movie stars!

The Perils of Drugs

Props to Judy Jetson from Brisbane for this one:

Short, quick, busy.

The Drones open a national tour behind new album "Havilah" with shows at The Corner on Thursday and Friday, with both featuring supports from Kev Carmody and the Witch Hats. Now that's a bill that could either flop like a pancake or rise like a souffle. There's a lot of respect for Carmody in the Drones camp- they covered one of his most incisive songs, "River Of Tears" on a tribute album- here's hoping that translates across to the crowd.

While on Saturday, Crystal Thomas & the Flowers Of Evil play their first show for 2009 at Yah-Yah's in Collingwood. Their album was one of my faves from last year- it's good to see them back.

Kick Out the Podcast Jams, Chickenpluckers

A Podcast about chicken. C'mon, give some points for originality!

Get it in iTunes, download it from the link or listen to it by clicking on the player on the I-94 Bar. There should be a player on this here blog, if you look down the right-hand side.

Here's the playlist:

Super Chicken (Toon Tunes: 50 Favorite Classic Cartoon Songs)

Cockblocked - The Jack Saints (Rock and Roll Saved Our Lives...But Now It's Trying to Kill Us!)

Chicken Scratch - The Raunch Hands (Learn To Whap-A-Dang)

The Greasy Chicken - Andre Williams (Movin' On - Greasy And Explicit Soul Movers 1956-1970)

Run Chicken- The Milkshakes (Rockabilly Psychosis and the Garage Disease)

Flight Of The Shit Bird - Six Ft Hick (Canetrash)

Thunder Chicken -The Mighty Imperials (Thunder Chicken)

Chicken Of The Sea - The Raunch Hands (Learn To Whap-A-Dang)

Chicken Head- Whiskey Daredevils (The Essential Whiskey Daredevils)

Chicken - Spark Plugs (Born Bad - Volume 4)

Kicks & Chicks - The Zipps (single)

Finger Lickin_ Chicken - Radors (single)

Chicken Thighs - Andre Williams (Movin' On - Greasy And Explicit Soul Movers 1956-1970)

Chicken Hawk -The Pink Fits (Fuzzyard Gravebox)

Barnyard Blues - 13th Floor Elevators (Bull Of The Woods)

Secret Track

Sable Starr R.I.P.

News is in from The Next Big Thing blog that self-declared uber-groupie and onetime squeeze of Johnny Thunders, is dead at 51. She's pictured with JT and a wobbly-booted Iggy Pop.

UPDATE: Here's the post at The Houndblog that Lindsay Hutton of Next Big Thing mentions in comments.

Congratulations are due

...to Dave and Leisa Thomas, on the birth of their boy Charlie Asheton Thomas, on Sunday.
Here's a couple of lullabies for him, played at a recent show, as only Dave can play them:

Za/zo *

I can't believe I didn't post about this in advance. Oops.
Anyway, I celebrated by going to Missing Link on Saturday, seeing a bunch of friends as well as an excellent set by Wasted Truth. On Sunday I saw Spencer P. Jones and Mick Turner play sets at Greville Records, and saw more friends. And drank some beer. I did remember to buy a couple of CDs, too.

* it was this killer combo, put down by my opponent about four goes in on Saturday afternoon, that led me to concede this year's Scrabble tournament game, and save everyone some valuable drinking time.

Jet Shredded

Most will say this is well-deserved:

A tip of the to hat to Rodney Todd of Sydney for the heads-up.

Forking good review

Crawdaddy reckons Neil Young's newie "Fork In The Road" is his best since "Living With War". THe fact is that "War" was terribly over-bloated (I preferred the limited edition set of unadorned demo's) but this review makes it sound like he's back on the money.

The Woggles in Huffington Post

The Woggles from Atlanta, Georgia, are one of the premier garage/50s-influenced bands in the world. So what's the Huffington Post doing with an interview with vocalist The Professor Mighty Manfred?

I don't read the Huffington Post. Have I been missing something? Is this usual? More importantly, is that suntanned, stylistic whore Tom Jones really covering Johnny Thunders songs?

Seymour Stein's daughter has made a movie

“Burning Down the House: The Story of CBGB,” directed by 34-year-old Mandy Stein, follows of the history of the club that launched the careers of Blondie, The Ramones, Talking Heads, Television, and Patti Smith....

“I remember being there, and being really young, and Johnny Ramone was scolding my Mom and saying, ‘What the fuck did you bring your kid to?’” says Stein, recalling her early memories at the gritty venue. “There is so much flavor in the East Village; but when I was a younger, it was scary. There was a sense that you had to be aware and watch where you were going,” she says.

Yes, I have a CBGB obsession. So should you. More here.

An ache I can't shake.

Well, I'm still recovering from Boogie, almost a week later. Great weather, 30 or so bands, a 1000 or so beers. Highlights included ECSR, Puta Madre, and Dan Auerbach's surprise Sunday set. Box Wars and a bottomless margarita were just the icing on the cake. It sold me- I'll be back next year for sure.
Anyway, to business.
One of my favorite haunts, the Old Bar, is celebrating shit again on Friday:

That's pretty damn good value, actually.
I can't find out much about this "Afternoon In St. Kilda" thing, not even a decent .jpeg of the flier, but it looks interesting:

The line up includes GUT, Tim Rogers, the Crack Whores Dave Larkin and Smoke Machine- Dave Last's latest carcrash of an outfit. $50 gets you beers, drinks and BBQ from 3.00pm til it runs out, and it's all for a good cause.
This one's even harder to read, but I suspect that's deliberate:

The Gruntled, still Australia's best avant-medieval improvised drone noise psychedelic combo after five years of making music influenced by Syd Barrett, medieval songs about drinking, love and death, Can, Neu!, The Misunderstood and The Electric Prunes, are playing a few shows in Fitzroy, Melbourne next week.
If you've never heard them, you may want to check out the samples available at that link there before heading off to the Birmingham on Saturday. Just sayin'.

The New Order

No, not that New Order but the L.A. band Ron Asheton put together with Dennis Thompson and Jimmy Recca, post-Stooges and MC5. Machine Gun Thompson tells the whole story on his blog.

Preview of "Gloria" LP by the New Christs

Three tracks from the forthcoming long-player "Gloria" on Impedance are up at the band's MySpace. It's coming out on vynil and CD in Europe (May), Australia (June) and the USA (July).

Hydromatics on DVD

Sounds like the project is progressing well, according to Tony Slug's blog. It couldn't be in better hands than Joe Chonto, a NY cable TV music program host.

What I missed in Sydney last night

Marky Ramone wigging out with his cover band. To be brutal, I was ambivalent. His last spoken word tour (followed by a set with the Spazzys as backing band) was so-so.

The Mother Hen

Simpson the cat is ailing, advanced in years. Ron Asheton breaks off from his stories of heroin, macrobiotic rice and aluminium afros to attend to him gently, pouring a saucer of milk and checking on his medication. This is the man who similarly ministered to his fellow Stooges, cooking for them in the house in which we sit, working in the Pigments Of The Imagination head-shop to subsidise their meagre earnings, removing lit cigarettes when they’d nodded out. These days – 1995 – he simply ministers to their legend.

More of Paul Trynka's eloquent tribute here on his blog.

Double dose of special.

Now, I don't do festivals. Actually, that should probably be "I don't do festivals well." I get bored. I get cranky. Crowds annoy me. I wanna go and sit down somewhere quiet after a few hours. But I'm making an effort this weekend, for Boogie 3.

Look at that line up- apparently ECSR and Tony Joe White are closing the first night. That was enough to sell me on going, actually.
Although considering it's limited to 500 people, and is within walking distance of the nearest town if I really really want to get away for a while, I think I'll stick at it.
If I do decide to bail, though, I'll head straight into town for this:
Gimme Shelter ends it’s residency at the Exford Hotel on Saturday 11th April. We’ll be taking a long overdue break, giving ourselves time to focus on other projects and priorities. Gimme Shelter might be back further down the line in some shape or form, but there is also the distinct possibility that this might just be it...
It'll be a shame to see it go. No word on what this means for the same crews' Primitive nights- I assume they're over, too. Still, bearing in mind what some of the "other projects" mentioned are, this may turn out to be a good thing overall.

Lindt time again.

Regular readers may have picked up on the fact that for me, this time of year is all about the Lindt. Forget your resurrection, forget your hot cross buns (especially those peel-less travesties) and go for the chocolate. It doesn't have to be rabbit shaped, either- I'm going to give this a go:

Though you may want to take it easy- next week, it's time for tsoureki:

Rose Tattoo - Rock 'n' Roll Outlaw (1978)

Blast from the past.

OMG! CBGB 3D

From the Stashdauber: A 3D tour of CBGB.

Not much more can be said about this

The last five minutes of a particularly unhinged version of "Surfing Bird" by the Cramps:

Remembering New York's punk past

Nostalgia often sucks but so what? I wanna go on one of these walking tours of Manhattan's punk rock hot spots. This review in the London Daily Telegraph probably doesn't do them justice.

The photo is the women's toilet at CBGB, by the way. I have pix of me in the men's shitter but they don;t look as artily good as this one. More NYC photos hereand photographer Joseph O. Holmes blogs here.

Sometimes it's OK to be a racist.

I like UV Race. I like them quite a lot. They have been busy of late- their debut album is due out soon, they got profiled in hipster rag Vice ( a publication I would never wish to appear in) and have a very busy weekend lined up.

On Saturday they are supporting the Late Arvo Sons on the first of their April Tote residency shows. Future supports for the Sons will be Flying Scissor Kicks on the 11th, Chinese Burns (18th) and Super Wild Horses on the fourth and final show on the 25th, by the way.


The Race are then part of the bill at the afore-mentioned Super Wild Horses own single launch, at the Lithuanian Club, along with the Twerps and Noah & the Arks, as well as "Eddy Current DJs", which I'm guessing is basically Mikey Young with some records- good ones.
They are also doing a private party gig later that night. Fuck these kids have stamina.

Facebook Fun With The Clash

You know what I hate? Those shonky Facebook quizzes that ask silly questions to establish what punk rock figurehead you are. Ex-Clash member Mick Jones apparently took one:

Onetime Clash guitarist Mick Jones is publicly expressing doubts about the accuracy of the Facebook Quiz application after the results of the "Which Punk Rock Star Are You?" quiz revealed he is Joe Strummer.

You can ready all about it - and Paul Simonon's witty riposte - here. And as he's a Pommy, Simonon really should know that the Queen's English has the term as "arsewipe".

So can anyone tell me if the Shea Stadium live album is any good?

Switching the TV back on? Naaaahhh

Has Richard Lloyd re-joined Television and will their new album will be out on Matador Records on May 12? Of course there was no mention of this on Lloyd's website or that of the label - and the news was posted on a mailing list on April 1.

Surely the revelation that Green Day are producing a musical is from the same batch of jokes? Not when the dateline is March 31.

Friday conflict.

Hmmm, another tough call on Friday.
My old faves the Witch Hats are playing at the Old Bar, with Diamond Sea, Mother and Midnight Caller. No special occassion, apparently- just another night at the Old.


BUT just down the road at the Tote, Graveyard Train are launching their debut album, out now on Afterdark Records, with support from the Brothers Grimm & Sailors and Swine.

Trust me, the Old Bar and Afterdark folks won't mind too much which one you choose.

Followers.

How odd.
It's kinda flattering though. Feel free to sign up- I need the money. If I don't actually know you, it'd be nice to get an email or something first. Don't just show up. If you do, though, please bring a six pack and a copy of John Carpenter's "The Thing" on DVD to ensure a warm welcome, and give us something to talk about.
Note: those of you who are Twitter users will shortly have another option for keeping track of this nonsense.

Stoogesongs will rise

There will be more contemporary Stoogemusic released and from what Iggy told a French press conference, it will be more primal and raw. There are five unreleased tracks, two of which Ig has worked on.

Presumably there are songs demo'd for "The Weirdness" but never committed to tape in the recording sessions proper. This gels with other information that I've heard around the Bar and has nothing to do with the soon-to-surface early '70s live stuff slated for two labels.

The rest of Iggy's press conference (to plug his forthcoming jazz/jizz album "The Preliminaries") is here (thanks Cathy) in which he leaves himself open to doing a string of Vegas dates and gives the forthcoming biopic of his life the big thumbs down. You can watch a video news release about Pop's new album here.