Reelin' in the Years: Part One

Chapter Two: 1990s-00s (click here for Chapter One)













Not sure when this was taken, but it was probably
around 1991. I volunteered at KCMU between 1988-
92, serving as music director for three of those years.
Here, I'm with Mike D of the Beastie Boys and some
fellow DJs, including Rob Green in his trademark
KGB t-shirt. I'm wearing my KXLU "More
Punk, Less Junk" tee. We wuz stylin'.












Not sure when this was taken, but I rem-
ember the location: the photo booth in
the Broadway Market on Capitol Hill.












Same story as above.












Cider at the Blue Star, circa '05.












At the 'Star again, around the same time.












Party at the Baranof, circa '08.












SIFF closing night part, '09.

***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** *****

Endnote: Click the links for Reelin' in the
Years: Part Two (film folk), Three (cats),
Four (more film folk), and Five (relatives).

Read more »

Dial P for
Pussy
Galore:
Part Five

Click
here
for
part
four



***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** *****

They in effect reverse-engineered a new kind of lo-fi scum
rock from collections of obscure '60s garage-punk singles like
Back from the Grave and Nuggets—trying to preserve some
semblance of the disorienting experience they presumed au-
diences must have had 20 years earlier listening to cheaply
recorded, poorly played, but primitively ecstatic rock and roll.
-- Carly Carioli, The Boston Phoenix

***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** *****

Jon also listens to the Gibson Brothers, and proclaims them
excellent, which I found a little unexpected. Although they
have a Cramps-like grungabilly sound, they're rootsier, less
garage-oriented. "They've been around forever," Jon added.

"So, what do you think about the groups people compare you to
the most, like the Rolling Stones, the Cramps, and Sonic Youth?
Have you ever heard or do you listen to any of them often?"

Jon replied "yes" to the first question, qualifying, "I don't think we sound like Sonic Youth, though our guitars are often out of tune..."

As for the 'Stones comparison, Pussy Galore has encouraged it
by swapping licks (and not crediting them), covering tunes like
"Get Off of My Cloud" live, and by releasing a severely limited-
edition version of the now-out-of-print Exile on Main Street.

"Will you ever re-release it?"

"No way!"

[Exile would later materialize on CD, only
to disappear just as quickly as the cassette.]

"Dick Johnson" (Dial 'M' for Motherfucker, 1989)

"Will you ever re-release any of your other out-of-print tit-
les, like Feel Good About Your Body or Pussy Gold 5000?"

"No. We have enough stuff out right now, as it is."

I wonder if Jon knows or cares that,
for this very reason, bootleggers are
re-pressing the stuff themselves—
and reaping the financial rewards.
I'd rather see 'em go to the band.

[The EPs Feel Good, Groovy Hate, and Pussy Gold are
now available as part of the Corpse Love collection.]

"When I first heard your version of Exile," I told Jon, "it remind-
ed me of the Cramps' Rockinandreelininauklandnewzealand."

"Really?!" Although he couldn't see why I would think that, and
insisted again that he'll never reissue it, Jon flipped at the men-
tion of that disc, proclaiming it one of the greatest things ever.

***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** *****

And there you have it. Pussy Galore makes some of the noisi-
est, most aggressive non-hardcore I've ever heard, but they're
still punks in the same way as the Seeds or Standells. I wouldn't
recommend their fare to everybody, and if you hate it, you'd be
far from alone, but they're the ultimate garage band for the '80s.



Endnote: After one more album, 1990's Historia de la Musi-
ca Rock, Pussy Galore called it quits. Click the links for my
All Music Guide reviews of 1 Yr. Live, Groovy Hate Fuck, and
Dial 'M' for Motherfucker. Incidentally, the image at the top
post-dates Spencer's PG era and comes from Jazz Internet.

Full credit: "The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion at
the House of Blues in Las Vegas. The show was on
October 4, 2002. Photography by R.J. Bianchino
copyright © 2002-3 Moondog Productions."
Pussy Galore image from Last.fm.

Read more »

Dial P for Pussy
Galore: Part Four

Click here for part three

I asked Jon, "What about the
song 'Fuck Ian MacKaye.' Did you
ever record that?" Pussy Galore
used to perform it live while they
were based in DC, which the band
left because they never felt they
fit into that city's music scene.

"No," Jon replied. "We played it just to get attention." And
it worked (see Unrest's "answer" record, Fuck Pussy Galore
and All Her Friends). That comment confirmed my suspicion
that he really has been courting controversy from the start,
rather than just falling into it by accident time after time.

Jon did acknowledge, however, that he thinks Minor Threat,
MacKaye's early, straight-edge hardcore band, was "all right."

I didn't get the impression that he ever hated their music, or
that of the Dischord label's other acts; he probably just didn't
have much in common with those influential punks, not be-
ing straight-edge or hardcore, but I'm just speculating.



At this point, I queried Jon about the kind of stuff he listen-
ed to while he was growing up; anything that might have in-
fluenced what he's doing now or that he was just "really into."

"Nothing," he replied.

Bewildered, I volleyed, "Well, how did you end up making music?"

His answer had to do with getting aggression out and attracting at-
tention, as opposed to a love of music. That kind of surprised me.

"Weren't there certain groups you really got into in high school?"

"Well, yeah," Jon admitted, but he didn't elaborate, so who knows.

"So, what do you listen to the most these days?"

"Rap. NWA. We've been listening to them a lot lately."

"Do you like Public Enemy?"

"Yes. And Tad. Stuff like that."


Einstürzende Neubauten - "Yu-Gung" (Adrian Sherwood remix, 1985)

"Did you get Public Enemy's permission to sample the line,
'Don't believe the hype' in your cover of EN's 'Yu-Gung'?"

"Are you kidding?" Jon asked in amazement.

[Uh, no.]

The way he sees it, hip-hop acts have been ripping off
James Brown, et al. for years without giving them any cre-
dit, so why should his combo give those guys any credit?

What's the other sample you use in 'Yu-Gung'?" I asked.

"Rob Base and, and..."

"DJ E-Z Rock?"

"Yeah." The sample comes from "It Takes Two," a monster
hit in NYC the summer of its release, especially in Manhat-
tan, where he couldn't escape it no matter where he went.

"But otherwise, they suck," Jon stressed (several times, in fact).

Click here for part five



Endnote: Image from The Boston Phoenix.

Read more »

Dial P for Pussy
Galore: Part Three



Click here for part two



***** ***** ***** *****
Worst rock 'n' roll
band ever. I love it.
-- YouTube commenter
***** ***** ***** *****



"It seems to me that the people who find your stuff the least offensive are those who find the most humor in it," I noted.

"Yes," Jon agreed, "but we aren't a joke band. We're serious about
our music." That doesn't surprise me much. Pussy Galore's lyrics
can be pretty amusing, but in a more darkly comic way than the
Dead Milkmen or Mojo Nixon. You know, subversive. In the
same breath, he added, "We're not a real band, though..."

For a "fake" band, Pussy Galore has garnered a great deal of
attention, especially considering they're still relatively new on
the scene. They've put out several different releases since 19-
85 on a variety of labels and have gone through several line-
up changes. They currently consist of Jon, Neil Hagerty,
and Kurt Wolff on guitar, and Bob Bert on percussion.

In 1987, Neil left to devote his energies full-time to his ex-
perimental duo Royal Trux with girlfriend Jennifer Herre-
ma. He's back now, but who's to say whether he'll stay put.

As for Bob Bert, he originally drummed for Sonic Youth and
features prominently on their live record Sonic Death. Found-
ing member Julia Cafritz (vocals, guitar) left the group midway
through Dial 'M', and later formed Free Kitten with Kim Gordon.

Jon's wife, guitarist Cristina Martinez, went on to play with
Wolf in the Honeymoon Killers before forming Boss Hog with
her husband. When Julia and Cristina were in Pussy Gal-
ore, there were as many as five guitarists at one time.


"Fuck You, Man" (Right Now!, 1987)

I asked Jon if dropping bass and adding metal to their percus-
sive arsenal were planned or accidental developments. Jon says
he planned it to be like that from the start. As for the sheet metal
that Bob incorporates into his attack, Jon admits that he does like
industrial music, such as Neubauten, the originators behind "Yu-
Gung," so maybe that appreciation factored into the unique set-
up. (Could be that he admires Savage Republic, too, since those
guys have been banging on oil drums for a few years now.)

Though they operate without bass and conventional drums,
Pussy Galore are still as funky as hell, which is particularly
impressive for a combo without a "complete" rhythm section.

As for the kind of attention they've been garnering, well, people
either hate Pussy Galore or they love 'em. I told Jon I thought
that was pretty cool, because few other band these days have been
able to generate the same sort of controversy. (Hard to believe the
Stones' "Let's Spend the Night Together" was once banned from the
airwaves. Times have changed a lot since then, and it's harder to
get a rise out of all but the most conservative listeners.)

I asked if he's read any of the many reviews and articles that
he and his band mates have inspired. "Yes," he said. "Does the
negative press bother you?" "No." (Clearly, he's also a man of few
syllables.) I got the impression that Jon likes to know what mus-
ic writers think about Pussy Galore, but that he doesn't let
any of it bother—or change—him and his group in any way.

Click here for part four



Endnote: Image from I Heart Noise.

Read more »

Dial P
for Pussy
Galore:
Part Two



Click here
for part one





***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** *****

Combining garage rock rhythms with bursts of noise,
New York's own Pussy Galore were taking no musical
prisoners–from song titles to album titles to damag-
ed song structures, they were all about attitude.
-- I Heart Noise

***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** *****

"Why," I asked Jon about Pussy Galore's latest release, "if the full
title is Dial 'M' for Motherfucker, does it read Dial 'M' on the cov-
ers and spines of all three configurations? What's up with that?"

Apparently, this wasn't censorship in action on the part of Car-
oline, their record label, or some other party, as I suspected, but
something the group planned so that "Tower would stock it."

For the free-speech adher-
ents out there: the word does
appear on the LP and CD la-
bels and is only missing from
the cassette version due to
a duplication error.

While I understand Jon's
concern regarding sales, I've always regarded Pussy Galore
as one of the least compromising rock acts around. I mean, this
is the same crew who titled a 1987 collection Groovy Hate Fuck
and an '88 EP Sugarshit Sharp (big Michelle Shocked fans...?).
It can't get much more profane than that, but perhaps the re-
sulting flack led them to hedge their bets this time around.

Incidentally, Big Black released Songs About Fucking around the
same time the Leaving Trains issued Fuck, and both albums seem-
ed to do well on the independent charts, so I'm not sure that Pus-
sy Galore needs to tread quite so lightly, but I could be wrong...

I asked Jon if they'd gotten much feedback from feminists, since
some women take offense to their very name, even if Agent 007
got there first. Jon says they haven't received much of a negative
response, and sounded a little surprised by that. "Do you think a
response if necessary if a woman says she finds your work degra-
ding?" I wondered. Jon said it depended on whether or not she
was familiar with his work; in which case, yes. If not, then no.

Click here for part three



Endnote: Images from Musical Family Tree and the All Music Guide.

Read more »

Dial P for Pussy Galore



Here's another in my series of musician interviews for KCMU's long-defunct mouthpiece Wire. In this one, I speak with Pussy Galore's Jon Spencer, who would go on to form the more commercially viable Jon Spencer Blues Explosion (JSBX) and Heavy Trash. Along the way, he has collaborated with the likes of Andre Williams, the Gibson Brothers, Dub Narcotic Sound System, and wife Cristina Martinez in Boss Hog.

***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** *****

Pussy Galore created an unholy metallic ruckus that was
part serious avant-garde noise wail, part nonsense pose.
-- John Dougan, All Music Guide

***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** ***** *****

Riddle me this. What would happen if you took the following re-
cords and popped 'em in a microwave on high: The Rolling Stones,
Now!, the Fall - Totale's Turns, the Cramps - Rockinandreelininauk-
landnewzealand, Einstürzende Neubauten - Halber Mensch, and
NWA - Straight Outta Compton? Aside from the fact that you'd
have a sticky, black mess and a hefty repair bill, you'd also have
the raw ingredients for pressing up half a dozen copies of Pus-
sy Galore's latest long-player, Dial 'M' for Motherfucker.

In August [presumably in 1989], I interviewed Jon Spencer,
the lead singer of Pussy Galore by phone. He was back home
in New York City after the completion of the band's US tour.

First question: Why "Damaged"?

The original idea, as Jon puts it, was for Pussy Galore to
cover "New York City" by Johnny Thunders, "since we're from
New York," and for Tad to cover a Sex Pistols song about London.
Why a song about London for a band from Seattle, I couldn't say.

In any case, Tad's answer was, "No, I don't wanna cover a song by
a British band." And since Sonic Youth and Mudhoney had already
traded tunes for an earlier [Sub Pop] single, the whole Black Flag
idea came about. Jon said he liked 'em. Apparently Tad did, too.

Click here for part two



Endnote: Slightly revised from the original text.
Formed in Washington DC in 1985, Pussy Galore
called it quits in '90. Spencer image from the BBC.

Read more »

Movie of the Month: Part Eight

I recently reviewed the following
film for Video Librarian, and thought
the results were worth sharing.

SCOTT WALKER: 30 CENTURY MAN
(Stephen Kijak, 2006, US, 95 mins.)

"It was this thing that seemed to be flowing outside of time in a way."
-- Kijak on the first time he heard Walker's voice

After his 1960s success with the UK-based Walker Brothers ran its course, Ohio-born Scott Walker released several solo albums, and then disappeared. Every few years, a new record would mat-
erialize, but the former teen idol would not. He wasn’t finished with music-making, but he was finished with show business, and called a halt to all interviews, tours, and television appearances.

In talking about the film, Stephen Kijak, co-director of the fes-
tival favorite Cinemania, has explained that he earned the re-
clusive Walker's trust through years of email messages, phone
calls, and faxes until the man with the bottomless baritone final-
ly agreed to sit down for a couple of conversations and to allow
cameras into the studio during the making of 2006's eerie Drift.

Along with executive producer David Bowie, who credits Walker
for influencing his own theatrically-oriented work, speakers include Brian Eno, Lulu, Alison Goldfrapp, and Pulp's Jarvis Cocker (Queer as Folk actor Gale Harold provided further production assistance).

Conspicuous by their absence: friends and relatives, because Walker doesn't talk about his personal life, excepting a brief acknowledgement of a little too much “imbibing” in his past.

Though some may see this as a deficit, it allows the artist to main-
tain his well-guarded privacy and to retain an air of mystery. In-
stead, Kijak looks at specific albums and songs, and allows a few
outside voices to come into play, but there are no real dissenters.

Remarkably, the director dodges the hagiography bullet. As
he states in the production notes, "The plan was to try and shine
a black-light on the enigma—not to penetrate it, but to respect it, and to let the music tell its own story." Consequently, his docu-
mentary lives or dies by the otherworldly music, rather than
the earthbound life, of its subject. Highly recommended.

Click here for Movie of the Month, Part Seven: Stranded



Endnote: Slightly revised from the original text. Click
here for my '07 interview with Kijak about the film. Images
from Urban Honking and Alama Drafthouse Cinema Blog.

Read more »