Club Flyers and Invites from 1970s and 1980s: Part 4

Text (c) Robert Barry Francos, 2011
Images are owned by the artists
Also, images can be enlarged by clicking on them.

As stated in an earlier blog, throughout the years I have collected flyers, especially from the 1970s and '80s. Many were sent to me directly by the bands while I was publishing FFanzeen. Below are some scans I made from my personal collection, in no particular order. I did see many of them, but not all, and I will comment on them from time to time. Note that I do not financially profit off of publishing them, but only do so to honor the work that was involved, and for archival purposes.

Desperate Teenage Lovedolls was possibly one of the first hardcore fiction films to be released. Actually, its first incarnation was as the VHS-only Desperate Teenage Runaways, which they had to legally change the name due to the growing popularity of the Runaways (yes, I own a copy). The film was pretty bad, and starred or had cameos by many local So-Cali scenesters (similarly, as did the British Jubilee). When the film came out in larger format, it was shown on the big screen for the first time on the East Coast at Danceteria. The opening bands, Adrenalin O.D. (aka AOD) and White Flag were powerhouse hardcore acts. It was a fun night, for sure.

Not only did Donny Fury do sound at CBGBs and have an inexpensive basement practice studio for local bands not far from the club, but he also fronted the Donny Fury Band. We did an article about him/them in FFanzeen, but I never actually saw the band perform. This show was not on his home turf, but deep in Brooklyn, around Caransie (definitely not the so-called cool, hipster part of the Borough of Kings where the clubs are now), at the famed Zappaz. I frequented the club a few times, occasionally clashing with the Tony Manero wannabes on the corner. Anyway, the photo collage on the flyer is excellent.


Though invited to this mainstream rock Press Conference held at the Hard Rock Café, I didn’t go. WNEW was the classic rock station, and I just wasn’t interested in whomever they would invite. I had been to a similar one for the USO in 1980 with Stephen Stills, and members of Kansas, America, and Cheap Trick, among others. With the exception of the CT… yawn. Now if the Ramones would have been there, that would have been another story.

Though I don’t actually know much about Johnny Jewel, I’m fond of the Television song they were named after. Feel free to let me know if you were at this Ritz gig, and if they found their little wing head.

The Vipers, led by Jon Weiss, were a fun garage band during those heady revival days of the early ‘80s. When I interviewed them for FFanzeen at their loft in Alphabet City, their manager (RIP) had to leave early to go catch Bruce Springsteen at the Garden, which I found weird at the time, for some reason. While “Cheated and Lied” was not their biggest hit, relatively speaking, I still hear it and smile for the extraordinary cut it is. I still have their demo cassette, with the songs in a different order from their LP. While I know someone who worked at the Cat Club, I can’t remember ever being there. But I did see the Vipers numerous times at various venues (mostly Irving Plaza, though).

The Cucumbers’ 1988 Holiday on Ice Tour was, I believe, their first big East Coast outing. Based in Hoboken, NJ, I saw the quirky band play a couple of times around New York, and participated in an interview on cable access show Videowave. They were a cut-up for my (still) camera between takes.

The Undead seem to be more understandably popular now that they’re history than when they played the Mudd Club. Bobby Steele’s girlfriend at the time, Laurie, posed for the cover of FFanzeen wearing nothing but one of our tee-shirts while leaning on a hydrant. That is one of my biggest memory of the band. They did set the local – and then national – scene on fire with their scorching horror hardcore.

The Beach Blanket Blowout at the Palladium seems like a show that may have been inspired by some of the Ritz mash-ups that I loved, such as their Girls Night Out series. Here the performers include Joy Askew and Get Wet’s vox Sherri Beachfront. Then there’s the infamous Neon Leon. I didn’t go to this because, well, it was the Palladium, one the uncoolest venues for us club rats in the city. I believe they were trying to lure us in with some star acts of the downtown fashionistas.

While the Mudd Club had the reputation for occasional debauchery and some amazing acts, such as this night with the Fuzztones and the Chesterfield Kings, I rarely went there because their door policy was ridiculously prohibitive. For example, they would almost never let in two males who were together (but any females were always accepted, as look as they looked “good”). Why travel all the way to the club to find out you probably wouldn’t get in, even though one of my writers worked there. Good show + bad door policy / policing = fuck ‘em.

Speaking of debauchery, probably no club during the ‘80s had the repute of one that had been a grand church, the Limelight. While their shows were interesting, between sets they were basically another Palladium, filling the air with beats and scratching (I remember hearing a 20-minute version of Lauper’s “Girls Just Wa-wa-wa-wa-wa-n-n-n-n-n-na have f-f-f-f-f-f-f-f-f-un fun fun fun fun”). It was, however, an excellent venue for Peter Zaremba’s Love Delegation for their signing to Celluloid Records. Zaremba was and is an R&B man who mixed it with punk and garage maniacality (yes, I know there’s no such word… deal with it). As a Fleshtones’ side project, he got to play a more undiluted version of what he loves. (RIP Wendy Wild.)

THE UNDEAD: Just a Modern Folk Band!

Text by Julia Masi, intro by Robert Barry Francos
Article & interview © 1982; RBF intro © 2010 by FFanzeen
Images from the Internet

The following article about New York-based hardcore metal band The Undead, led by ex-Misfits Bobby Steele, was originally published in FFanzeen magazine, issue #9, in 1982. It was written by Julia Masi.

While I never saw the Undead play (nor the Misfits, for that matter), I did get to hang out with Lori Wedding (of the band Suburban Berlin, who was Bobby Steele’s girlfriend at the time) and Julia, while Julia photographed her for the front cover of the issue. The one thing I remember her saying was that she was not attracted to handsome men (and so I hoped she did not find me winsome).

Bobby Steele is often on social networks, going off on right wing rants against us liberals (though I wonder if he would consider himself more libertarian, but I’m not sure), and for that I respect him (and not). There are actually many right winger punkers (like Johnny Ramone, for example). Whatever his political affliation, Bobby made some fine pulse-pounding music, and still does to this day. – RBF, 2010

The Undead are an uncanny mixture of politics, personality, and high-volume, high-intensity rock’n’roll. Bobby Steele, vocals and guitar, Natz, bass, and Patrick Blank, drums, who have just released their first EP on Stiff Records, Nine Toes Later, are often inaccurately pigeon-holed into the hardcore category. But they prefer to describe their music, which often incorporates a twist of rockabilly or a flair for the satirical, as modern folk.

“We’re a modern folk band,” says Natz, who tries to convince interviewers that he’s Che Guevara: “We’re, like, puttin’ the word across music.”

“Folk music used to be acoustic because the world was a lot quieter,” Bobby adds. “Now you’re competing with a lot of things in the background. You’ve got trucks and heavy traffic. You’ve got jack hammering. You’ve got atomic bombs blowing up and everything. So, you’ve gotta sing your folk songs a little louder. You’ve gotta amplify them.

“Our music is our own kind of music. We can do a soul rock song, or we can do a rockabilly song if we want. We’re not locked into a certain category. A lot of bands make the mistake of categorizing themselves, then they’re locked into that category. Then they’re stuck in that category and it’s what the people expect, like George Reeves is Superman.”

Patrick, whose lanky body and horn-rimmed glasses recall the stereotype of the Science Club president, feels that the Undead “try to avoid the trends, because trends are just that – trends.

“We’re a rock’n’roll band with something to offer. There is politics and you have to talk politics; the point is you can’t get too serious.” He sees the band’s politics as a form of anarchy. “Not like writing an ‘A’ in the circle on the corners. Only in the ideas of no rules. That’s the problem. There are too many rules.” He further explains, “We can’t get put in any groups, because once you do that you become a trend. And if you become a trend, then once you get accepted, you’ll change. And if rules weren’t observed, if rules weren’t thought about, then nothing would ever get done. The rule there is a universal rule, to reach people through quality. Quality means giving your all – 150% towards quality.”

Their ability to abandon the rules is evident in the unorthodox way that the Undead presented themselves to Stiff Records. The band had been hanging out in a bar one night last March when they heard about a private party at Stiff. Immediately, Bobby started to cook up a scheme to con his way into their consciousness.

“We grabbed this wino off the street,” Bobby remembers, “and said, ‘You’re our manager tonight.’ And we just walked up to the door at the place and told them, ‘We’re the Undead and this is our manager.’ We just went in there and we graffitied and spray painted the whole place. And then a few days later we went down there and coated the whole building with posters, and made sure we never showed our faces again.”

For months the band teased the record company by sending flyers and press releases to their office, always careful to make sure that they arrived the day after an important gig. Stiff got so frustrated by this mysterious band that they sent an all-points bulletin into the streets to find them. But Bobby’s phone number is classified information and his friends wouldn’t tell Stiff where to find him. Finally, DJ Tim Sommers brought the Undead and Stiff together, and the band was signed.

Shortly afterward, they went into the studio to record their EP, which includes their own “1984” and “I Want You Dead.” But just as the recording sessions got underway, they had to be interrupted so that Bobby could have his toe amputated. “It was rotting away and stinking up everything,” he explains. Hence the title of the EP, Nine Toes Later.

Recently, the Undead completed a brief tour of the Midwest: Dayton, Detroit and Indianapolis. The audience reception was warmer than they expected and the band is anxious to get back on the road again. Patrick is hoping that he’ll eventually play Ireland, “Because the scene is so sporadic that the kids are starved for music over there.” Bobby’s goal is a little more patriotic: he’d like to play “El Salvador. It would be fun. Join the USA,” he grins.