BROADCAST #02
Air Date: 01-09-07

Fanatics, I am in Tel Aviv Israel tonight. I hope I’m in Israel because if I’m not, then things have not been going according to plan and that might be problematic, considering the places I have been in lately. Anyway, here’s some very quick notes to tonight’s broadcast. Most likely, nothing you have not encountered before. I try to make the shows we pre-tape as good as I can but if I am not actually there live, I don’t want to play too much new or rare stuff as it’s much more fun to do it in real time. Still, I think we had a good show tonight and we have two more pre tapes coming up before I’m back and those are good ones as well. Anyway, here’s some abbreviated notes. I will probably expand them later in the year. I am pretty busy at the moment so it’s hard to be able to go too long on the notes as I am prone to do. One thing I can tell you, it’s going to be a great year of music on this show so please please please tune in as often as you can! STAY FANATIC!!! --Henry
For you Europeans, Australians and New Zealand Fanatics, there is a re-broadcast time of Friday mornings, 0200 – 0400 hrs. West coast time so you all can check out the show and not have to set your alarms to too rude an hour.
X - Johnny Hit And Run Paulene: From the first album by X, Los Angeles. I did a lot of shows last year. It was great to see them that often. I have seen X many times over the years and it’s always worth it. I will always wonder why they were not a bigger band. I am not saying they don’t have fans, they do. I have seen it right up close but I don’t understand why they were not all over the radio and in every home. The first four X albums are to me at least, mandatory listening. They are: Los Angeles, Under The Big Black Sun and More Fun In The New World.
Birthday Party - Blast Off: I first heard this on a single. Release The Bats was the A-side. I am so glad I got to see this band. I feel very lucky to have done so, seeing how little they played in America. I am a major Birthday Party Fanatic and all their records sound good to me. This track can be found on the Junkyard CD
The Fall - So Called Dangerous: It’s a new year and we’re still playing The Fall. It would have been a great opportunity, at the beginning of the year, to do something different but no! we’re going to play the whole damn catalog by the time this is over. Tonight’s track is from 1992’s Code: Selfish album. The Fall were really on a roll here. Only 11 months before, they released the Shift-Work album. Both are great although Shift-Work contains the one Fall song I can live without and always skip it and that is The Book Of Lies. Can’t stand the vocal on that one. It’s not Mark singing on the chorus and I can’t get to how the guy is singing it. It’s a new year so let a man come in and do the Unofficial Fall Website address: http://www.visi.com/fall/
Public Image Ltd. - Public Image: The first ever Public Image single. I don’t know much about the band in that I don’t have every album and am sure I have not heard every record but I really like those first two albums and I saw them once in 1982 and they were really intense. Mr. Rotten used to call Black Flag poser suburban rich kids in interviews. We figured we would have an in-band fight to see who got to wear his ears on string around our necks. Ah, youth.
Public Enemy - Public Enemy #1 (Demo): I think I got this on cassette from Ian about 21 years ago. Sounds pretty cool, right? At one point, the Public Enemy guys were working on a documentary of the band and asked me to be interviewed. I jumped at the chance to talk about one of my favorite bands and one of my heroes, Chuck D. I played the crew the demo and none of them had ever heard it. I made them a copy. It made me wonder what other demos of their early stuff is out there. I have not seen any PE bootlegs with anything like that.
The Ruts – Backbiter: It won’t be long before we will have played every track from The Ruts amazing album The Crack. This is one of those albums I will never get tired of. It was one of my favorite albums as soon as I heard it. The Crack and an album of singles, radio sessions and live cuts called Grin And Bear It are now on one CD, that’s a great one.
Squatweiler - Hot For Teacher: I don’t want you to get the wrong idea about my appreciation of this band. I have played Squatweiler doing Van Halen’s Hot For Teacher a few times. I don’t want you to think that I don’t like any of their other songs. I do. I did a lot of shows with this band and they were always great. I like all their albums, they have a few. It was many years ago, someone from their label sent over a copy of their first album Full Bladder. I played it and became a fan immediately. Eventually we did some shows together over a couple of tours. Rockin’ Indie music. This track is found on a Spinart Records Promo CD.
Parliament - Mr. Wiggles: I don’t know why but I always associate Parliament with Washington DC. I remember when those Parliament tours would come through DC. I think they played the Capitol Center. I never went to see them play but some people at my school did. I got all their records years later. I remember their singles on the radio but never heard many of the albums all the way through. Someone at my school lent me a couple and I think Motor Booty Affair, the album we pulled tonight’s track from, was one of them. I got into all of it later. A lot of times, I am years behind stuff but I eventually catch up.
The Inspirations - You Know What I Mean: This is from one of the many Lee Scratch Perry CD comps. there are in the world. Perry is that prolific and that important to Reggae and dub that eventually everything he’s done is now out. I have a lot of his records and comps. of bands he recorded but don’t know much about him. I don’t know much about Reggae, dub stuff, etc. There are some people I like, Dillinger, Scientist, Perry, King Tubby but most of the time, I get Reggae or dub records because they look interesting but I really don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know why but it’s kinda cool doing it that way. I don’t mind being a little lost in it. This track is taken from Lost Treasures Of The Ark.
Sleater-Kinney - Night Light: From their album, The Woods. I don’t have ever Sleater album but I have heard most of their work and saw them play a few times. Of all their albums, The Woods is my favorite one. I guess they have broken up now. That’s too bad but perhaps there will be some interesting music from the different members. This album is really heavy and the guitars are crazy. We listened to their song Jumpers last year. Great band.
The Firesign Theatre - The Chinchilla Show: I don’t know many people who listen to the Firesign Theater. For those of you who don’t, I think you’re missing out. I remember hearing How Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You’re Not Anywhere At All, and it went a bit, or actually pretty far over my head. I checked back in with them years later when I got their album Everything You Know Is Wrong! and I was hooked. Over the years I found their records used for really cheap so I became a Firesign Fanatic because they were really good and they fit my budget. Many of you who have already checked them out probably have the same experience, you listen to one of their records you hear something and it’s as if you never heard it before or have heard but it never clicked until that moment. That happens to me fairly often when I listen to their stuff. These are very funny people. When we listen to them on this show, I often bring in this best of Shoes For Industry! because the tracks are individually banded. Sometimes on their album CDs, you only get side 1 & 2. I have all their stuff in my iPod and have made CDRs of all their stuff that’s not on CD yet. If you liked this track and want to check them out, Shoes is a good place to start, also Dear Friends or Don’t Crush That Dwarf And Hand Me The Pliers are also really good. I don’t know if everyone would find these guys funny but I think they’re genius.
Flipper - Ha Ha Ha: Flipper was one of the heaviest live bands of all time. In the Black Flag days, we played with them several times. This is Flipper at their finest I think. This song, Love Canal, all the stuff on the Generic album, it’s all pretty amazing in all its damaged beauty and mangled magnificence. I got a letter from Steve the band’s drummer recently and he said they have licensed all their music from the labels who put it out and that there will be several Flipper releases this year. I hope this is true because there’s some outtakes I have bad sounding copies of that I hope get put out. I think there were some more songs from the session that they pulled this song from. I think there’s at least a version of Boom Boom Boom and perhaps Shine. Steve promised to write when the stuff was going to come out and when he does, I’ll see what I can do to get us some advance tracks for the show. The track you heard tonight was from the Sex Bomb Baby CD that is at this point, out of print, hopefully not for much longer.
Bobby Byrd - Hot Pants - I'm Coming: When I was very young and heard James Brown doing Sex Machine, I wanted to be Bobby Byrd but I didn’t know it. When I heard JB sing, there was someone else doing the backing vocals and his voice really did it to me. Years later, when I heard the live version on the Revolution Of The Mind album, there it was again, that voice. When JB wanted to go to the bridge, he would yell out, “Can I take them to the bridge?!” the voice would say, “Take them to the bridge!” I wanted to be in JB’s band and I wanted to have that job. That voice was Bobby Byrd, one righteous R&B singer in his own right. Bobby Byrd kills and he’s got the JB’s as his band, forget it, it’s out of the park. His Best Of CD is worth checking out as well as anything he does with James Brown is really great as well. Many years ago, I got a bootleg video of James Brown in Japan. It was a bunch of TV appearances cobbled together and one of them was James and band doing Sex Machine and there was Bobby Byrd doin’ live and it just killed me. Many years ago, JB was going to do this pay-per-view thing and he wanted me to come to band practice and do Bobby’s part and I thought I had won the lottery. My manager called me one day and asked, “Are you sitting?” and then he laid it all out that JB’s people had called, etc. I had met him a few days before and told him how much his music meant to me. He was very cool about it. Of course, it didn’t work out as nothing that good will ever happen but for a minute there, I felt good!
The Stains - Sick And Crazy: Can’t go wrong with The Stains. This is one of the more sought after SST titles. This one goes for good money on eBay. Too bad that SST doesn’t want to put it on CD so everyone can get in on the fun. There are a couple of Stains tracks on CD. This is taken from the Chunks comp. CD. I got to see them play a few times. Those were some scary nights. These guys created tension and made crowds go nuts. The audiences in those days didn’t need much encouragement to get hectic but when The Stains played, there was something that happened and the room became very dangerous. The band were very heavy guys themselves, East LA badasses with very some heavy friends in tow. Wonderful days. I hope this record comes back into print one day. I would release it in a minute if I could.
The Clash - Remote Control: I can’t play the first Clash album too often. It makes me miss Joe Strummer too much and this album takes me back into nostalgia land and leaves me there for some time. I play it now and again but like I said, it’s hard to get back to the present after I do. Like many of you Fanatics, I played this album over and over. Why wouldn’t you?! The Clash were so good it’s hard for me to listen to their records because I just get frustrated. I am glad that Sony has at least remastered everything and put out some rare studio and live tracks. For the last few years, I have been checking out a lot of the vinyl bootlegs that have been coming out and also the CDRs that Joel F, top shelf Fanatic from Ohio sends to me now and then. There are some rippin’ early shows out there. There’s one show where there’s at least 100 people if tat and the band is just shredding it. My manager was at that one. He saw them a lot. I’m glad I got to see them when I did. The band released two different versions of their first album. Same basic songs, but the UK version had a few different songs than the US version. I had the UK version growing up but when they re-issued them a few years ago, I got them both because I am ridiculous that way. Tonight’s track is from the UK version.
Casual Dots - Mama's Gonna Make Us A Cake: We listened to this song a long time ago. It’s not the only song on their album but it’s a great one. I would rather play something we have not played before from this band when I am live in the studio with you. It’s way more fun that way. I seem to remember at one point, the band had planned another album but I don’t know what happened. Could be that bass player Kathi becoming a mom could have had something to do with it. I really like the album and hope they do more stuff. I am writing these notes up at an Air Force Base in Qatar at the moment and don’t have any access to internet info on the band so this will be a bit information free. As you Fanatics know, Kathi was a member of Bikini Kill, Christina was in Autoclave among other bands and drummer Steve was a member of Deep lust. As far as I know, the band have just released the one self-titled CD we took the track from tonight. You can find more info on the band at the Kill Rockstars site.
Harriet Tubman - Asiatic Research: Melvin Gibbs on bass and the rest of the people, I don’t have in front of me. I should not have put this track into the mix here, should have left it for when we were all together live but it sounded so great, I thought it would work really well here. This is from an album called I Am A Man on Knitting Factory. The band is Brandon Ross on guitar, J.T. Lewis on drums and Melvin. I don’t know anything about the “other two” and I apologize for that and will make amends ASAP. A friend of Melvin’s gave me this CD some time ago and I have listened to it a few times. I like it. There is a second album of the band called Prototype that was not all that easy to find but I tracked it down, we’ll get into something off that one later in the year but for now, I hope you enjoyed the jam. I always felt that my lack of musicality limited what Melvin could do so it’s interesting to hear him in a different element than the one he was in when we played together. He’s one of the most amazing musicians around.
Juliana Hatfield - My Pet Lion: I have known Juliana a long time. At this point, I don’t remember how we met. I know it was way back when she was in The Blake Babies and I would put them up at my place when they came through town. Good band. At one point, she left me a bunch of drawings that I still have. Years ago, she went solo. I don’t have all those records, I have a couple and Made In China is one of them. We exchange letters every great once in awhile. I don’t know what she’s up to at the moment.
Jimi Hendrix – Remember: I think I got the Hendrix best-of album Smash Hits when I was very young. I don’t know how I got a hold of it. I may have heard my mother playing it and spirited it away to my room. I don’t think this was on the US version of Are You Experienced? But it was on Smash Hits. I am sure you Fanatics have heard this song many times but sometimes nothing else does it like Hendrix. This track is on the current version of Are You Experienced? The Hendrix remasters are worth the purchase. At this point, they have been available for years and chances are, they are the ones you the ones you listen to but if you have any of the older masterings and really like those records, it’s worth it to check out the new versions. Some of you Fanatics can remember when the Hendrix catalog was in disrepair. Typos on the CD spine copy, wrong songs on releases, etc. It was hard to see the music get so disrespected but thankfully things got straightened out. I can only listen to James Marshall Hendrix in small doses as to this day I still get frustrated that he died so young. Someone should have been looking out for him but everyone was so out for their piece of the guy, they didn’t notice what was happening.
Dinosaur Jr. - I Don't Think So: Many years ago, I was going out with a woman and for a sort period things were pretty good and then they weren’t and we parted ways. I played this song about six times in one day and kind of howled at the moon. I got better after awhile. I don’t think about her much but I still play this song and the album it came from, Without A Sound album frequently. I have some cool Dinosaur Jr. tracks coming up in future broadcasts and the other night, Mike Watt told me Dinosaur Jr. has a new album planned for this year. Lucky us.
The Castaways - Liar, Liar: I don’t know anything about this band. I am presently sitting on a C-17 cargo plane headed towards Djibouti Africa and can’t access any information. I threw this song into the mix because it reminds me of the old days at SST. Dukowski had some interesting records and he had this song on either a single or some compilation LP. I used to make mix tapes from any records I could find at our hovel and sometimes the mixes were eclectic by default as for some reason, strange records would turn up at our place. This was one of the songs I put on a tape. I noticed it was on thee Nuggets box and threw it into tonight’s set list.
Muluqèn Mèllèsè - Wètètié Maré: Many moons ago while on tour, a Fanatic gave me a couple of CDRs of the Ethiopiques series. Before I could listen to them, they got scratched up so I never heard them. Engineer X made me some CDRs of this series as he figured I would like them. As you know, Engineer X, my Brother In Sonic Jihad has made many musical suggestions to me that I wisely listened to. I have been jamming these Ethiopiques CDs the last few weeks and really liking them. I will check them all out and start throwing some of the tracks into the mix. I think that you Fanatics will really like some of this stuff. Some really great singing and playing going on here. I have been doing some reading on the series and it’s basically Ethiopian music that spans from decades ago to the present. So far, it’s been great listening. Tonight’s track is from Ethiopiques 1.
The Wall – Ghetto: A great Post Punk song you have heard before on our show. I have all the Wall records I have been able to find but seem to listen to two of their early singles more than the rest of their stuff, this track from a single Fresh Records has Another New Day on the other side and an EP on Small Wonder that hasa great track called Exchange which we listened to in 2004. The Wall released some albums that I have not listened to very much to tell the truth. Tonight’s track was taken from the Fresh Records - The Punk Singles Collection CD. It is Christmas day, I am in Djibouti Africa and without internet access as I write this. When and if I get internet access in the next few days, I will see if I can raise some more information on this band for you. If I were back at the office, I would have handed in a better breakdown of this song.
Blondie - X Offender: An early single for Blondie. I don’t know much about the band. I have a best of collection and that’s it. I always thought they were cool, especially Debbie Harry. I met her years ago, she was really cool to me and I went all gooey inside.
Wire – Surgeon’s Girl: Another track from Wire’s must-hear album Pink Flag. At some point, we should listen to this one all the way through, even though most of you Fanatics have heard this album many times, it would be cool to play it from start to finish some time. I am sure at this point, I have worn you out on how much I like this album. If you have not checked this one out, the time is right, the newly remastered version released last year is fantastic.
Wolf Eyes – Damzel: I have yet to meet the person who has a good collection of those cool limited edition releases Wolf Eyes seems to release almost weekly. The band sent me a couple last year and they were great but only made me want to hear the other 100 they have made. This is from the band’s self-titled CD and it’s a real eviscerating experience. I have not had the chance to listen to the band’s newest Subpop album Human Animal too many times but I have it with me and plan on checking it out more. Wolf Eyes is the zero-compromise room-clearing stuff.