TEENAGE KICKS (almost)
I was seven years old, on a road trip to Florida. My grandparents took my
brother and me for a couple of weeks. We drove in the blasting heat in a gold
Cadillac, made the drive from Watertown, NY to Fort Lauderdale in less than
three days. This was an American vacation, maps were still available for free.
I believe that these were my last innocent days. I swam in the pool, played
Monopoly, fought with my brother, drank fresh orange juice for the first time.
Gramp talked me into a new haircut, very short, he was very pleased. Within
hours, my ears were amazingly sunburned.
We went to the beach only once that trip. I picked up shells with the
old-timers, while the real kids were digging the Best of Bread. That was the
beginning of my tendency to hang with older kids.
My brother and I fly back to the Syracuse International Airport, then my folks tell me matter-of-factly that we're moving. Not across the street, but out to the freakin' WOODS! It was only about twenty miles away, but we were already in a suburb. We moved to a place that didn't have a proper name, you couldn't get a cab or anything.
A three mile bicycle ride got me to the nearest village, called Phoenix. The community was very proud of the burning bird, and all it promised. The furniture in our house, and all of my belongings had already been moved, this was for real. I had to say goodbye to my best friend, who was twelve. His life unfortunately continued downhill from that day.
NO APPARENT MUSICAL TALENT
In the Fourth grade, one day, the Music Man came into our subterranean
classroom. He handed out pictures of different musical instruments, carefully
prescribing them to each of us. Clarinets, oboes, and flutes went to the girls;
boys saw trumpets and trombones. Some of the intellectually challenged guys
were getting excited about the snare drum. I was digging on the trumpet, but my
better mind told me to go for the glockenspiel or Sousaphone.
In my wonderment of these photographs, I soon forgot about Mr. Man and what he was saying. He was drawing staves and measures, whole and half notes, etc. He sent around a written test for the class to take. I did the best I could, considering I hadn't paid attention.
We each got a Flutophone, a plastic recorder type instrument, to take home for the weekend. By Monday morning, I was unstoppable on that squeaky piece of junk. I'd learned the assigned songs, plus the solo to Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey. I was ready to pick my favorite instrument and join the school band.
Music Man returned to collect his Flutophones, and to audition the musicians. He called out name after name, I waited patiently while he listened to each kid play "Mary had a little lamb." Being at the end of the alphabet, I knew I would be almost last. The S names, the T names, we even had a U name. All were called.
The Music Man called out for some non-playin' M.F. named Wagner. I was shocked. I must have flunked the written test so badly that he assumed I had no apparent musical inclination. It was a very sad day. My music career was on hold for some years to come.
MY BAND IS SO HOT
Whether you're in Seattle, Minneapolis, San Francisco, Tampa, or Madison, there comes a time of year when you just have to stay inside from the weather. Upstate New York certainly is no exception. Some have attributed unbearable weather for inspiring many young people to stay in and make something. Where I grew up, people didn't seem to need an excuse to stay inside. There wasn't anything going on.
Everyone jams in the basement sometime. If you've never done it, you're missing out. Go do it now, and come back to read the rest of this, so you'll understand... I actually never got off on jamming, 'cause I didn't know the songs everyone played. In 1980 everyone in Oswego County was into Boston, Toto, Poco, Foghat, Van Halen, all the goodies.
I'd just begun wearing out Sound Affects by The Jam. Still digging heavily on London Calling, I was looking for an LP of Joe Jackson's first album to replace the 8-track of it that had bitten the dust.
I did finally get on with some fellow players eventually, because I wanted to play at the NY State Fair that year, in their talent contest. We started a band, called The Kids. My brother was in it for a short time, but quit after we lost the contest.
We practiced for weeks without a drummer, then one great day he appeared. He arrived with girlfriend attached, I remember she sat on the drum stool with him as he played. He brought our songs to life, he was a godsend, despite the fact that he owned a set of Rototoms. Those were a dreadful accessory to his kit, three little drums that you could change the pitch of while playing.
THE KIDS
(1979): MIKE SMITH, CVS, ALAN LOCKLIN, REV. JEFF JOHNSON
Our hot band played a bunch of cover tunes, plus a few originals we had written. I got into my experimental-protest period early, writing songs like "Greenhouse Effect," and "Dirty Sox." This gave way to love songs later.
The Kids broke up, I believe, because I was too young. The rest of the group had ripened into puberty, and I couldn't hang in the same way.
CVS: DESTROYER OF PUBLIC PROPERTY WITH A GIRL GETTIN' GROUP
Punk Rock and New Wave saved my life, thank you very much. Adolescence arrived, I was giving myself haircuts while playing Give 'Em Enough Rope by The Clash at a moderately high listening level. Rural life as it should be. Mom was thoroughly confused by this time, but stayed out of my hair and way.
She did throw a fit, however, when I insisted on wearing some orange and brown striped pants to my brother's graduation. I will add that those pants were very hip, and they could fetch quite a fortune at a vintage boutique.
While I was dabbling in such high fashion, I had formed a new group called the U-Turns. Other names that didn't make the cut were The Bored Teenagers, and Me & the Instigators. The problems with those names were that we weren't bored, and also we couldn't decided on who "Me" would be.
Since there wasn't any independent press or music column for local bands, we had to promote ourselves more creatively. Our first campaign was to make some billboards, so we painted the band logo on bridges and highway overpasses near our homes. The logo was designed to look like a no u-turn sign, so my buddy Ted and I spent Christmas eve laying in the snow with hacksaws, cutting down the biggest u-turn sign in the county. Later that year, we scored a large stop sign as well.
The U-Turns
(1981): Ted Boone, Mike Carter, CVS
With our image and concept intact, we started playing out in Syracuse, and suddenly every minute of effort made sense. The one after-hours club in town had new wave groups until 6 a.m., and everyone looked freakier than we could ever hope to. We probably sounded terrible, but it was vastly more fun than taking acid or water skiing. Actually, I've yet to successfully partake in either of the latter.
When we couldn't play in the closest city, we played some teen rec room parties where girls mixed wine and whisky, and guys had beer chugging races. The Dad had built the rec room, with a little bar and three stools, a Sears stereo set, and paneling on the wall. We'd schlep our gear in the snow, through the garage, past Dad's wine making machine, and set up next to the wood burning stove. At these performances I learned that you could get attention from girls just from playing guitar. Outasite! Or so I thought at the time...
Ted got way into heavy metal, I didn't. The drummers from both of those bands became preachers for a while.
GO WEST, GREEN YANKEE
In the spring of '85, my pal MR talked me into moving to San Francisco. I thought it might be like L.A., but then I didn't know what that was like either. I had a feeling that it could be something like a T.V. show, but I didn't know. I got in the van and went anyway. The best part of the move was dropping my toothbrush on the pavement in Topeka, and living in a residential hotel once I got to S.F.
Musically, I had a slow start in San Francisco, I met some non-playin' guys at first. We'd get together and jam (there's that word again) on some grooves and riffs. Some chords and changes. Some hemming and hawing. "Oh, yes, of course, I know Sympathy for the Devil."
Soon later, I met the guys in Flying Color, an S.F. pop group making records like I was wanting to make. I've been told I went to one of their shows, was hanging around backstage, and said to one of them, "You guys are great. You'd be even better if you got me to replace your lead guitar player." I eventually did just that, but I didn't know I had premeditated it. After I'd joined, the group never made another record. Maybe they had premeditated that.
CVS and Dale Duncan
Christmas 1988, S.F.
(closeup 31K)
photo by EvS
TALKING BACK IN NEW YORK BLUES AGAIN
Five years had past since my arrival in California, I'd grown up, it seemed. That van trip was so long ago in my mind. What I wanted to do now was what I had always wanted, really. To play some real music, to quit screwing around wasting time, the usual gripes. To feel what I'd felt the first time I played with a drummer. To have heartfelt fun, which I had taken for granted in my attempt to grow up.
I met a musician, Paul Collins, of The Beat, at the last Flying Color show I played. He wanted me to play some guitar on his new record at the time. Paul got me really excited about some of my new material, and encouraged me to get out of Flying Color, since that second record was nowhere in sight. He encouraged me to spend a lot of money, and have a lot of fun. We spent a lot of money having fun.
Looking worried at
S.F. Aquatic Park 1989
(closeup 18K)
photo by EvS
Once again, I was talked into driving across the U.S. on some kind of musical search for the right place to be. Paul didn't have a van, though. We piled into his VW with guitars and an air mattress, we could have stayed out there forever. Winter was approaching, and we felt it as we were leaving the southwest. It was decided that we would go straight for NYC before the snow came.
As usual for me, a dual feeling of excitement, and a sense of dread welcomed me to Manhattan. The skyline with a foreground of twisted greasy metal of old bridges was my first impression of New York. Now this was being played back verbatim. There I was, everything fine, I was having fun, but the dread factor loomed fairly close.
I wasn't truly sold on the concept of living in NYC. I had enough green to stay for a while, long enough to fight out a New York winter. I guess the best part about my lifestyle there, other than not having to work, was the ancient health club where I bathed.
Getting ready for the tub
It's a Russian bath house built in 1891, some might never dare enter. I ran into Lou Christie there one day. For me it was a nearly daily ritual, blanching my skinny white body in 200+ degrees of the oven heated room for a schvitz, then plunging into a freezing ass cold pool, that makes me think of the North Atlantic. Then back in for more heat. I sweated myself down to 145 lbs. It was clearly time to get back to San Francisco for a burrito, and get me back to my fighting weight.