Archive Review: The Pagans’ The Blue Album (2008)

Formed in the industrial wasteland that was late ‘70s Cleveland, Ohio, the Pagans were the result of the same disturbing musical zeitgeist that spawned the Dead Boys, Rocket From the Tombs, and Pere Ubu. Although their original run was short, but explosive – they first broke up in ‘79 – the Pagans have crawled back up out of the gutter more than once over the past 20 years, always fronted by growling vocalist Mike Hudson and buzzsaw guitarist Mike Metoff.

The Blue Album is the result of one of those reunions, the Pagans captured live in some dive in Madison, Wisconsin in ‘88. The sound ain’t half-bad, considering the crude recording, and the performance is the epitome of raw power: drunken, sloppy, and loud, with plenty o’ feedback, distortion, attitude, and crackling energy. More than a mere archival document, The Blue Album offers a balls-to-the-wall, first-gen punk-rock experience. (Smog Veil Records, released 2008)

Review originally published by Blurt magazine...

 

 

Hot Wax: Ronnie & the Savoys’ “Domino” b/w “Slapping Rods and Leaky Oil” (1958/2023)

Former record label executive Steve Popovich’s place in rock ‘n’ roll history is carved in stone. Starting his career with a job in the Columbia Records’ Cleveland warehouse, he quickly vaulted up the ladder into sales and promotion, ending up as Columbia’s first Vice President of Promotion by the age of 30. A couple years later, he made a lateral move into A&R for Epic Records, where he signed or launched artists like Cheap Trick, Boston, Jaco Pastorius, The Soul Children, and Southside Johnny & the Asbury Dukes, among many others.  

Using the experience and knowledge gained from a decade in the music biz, Popovich branched out on his own in 1977, launching Cleveland International Records from his adopted hometown. Best known, perhaps, for the overwhelming success enjoyed by Meat Loaf’s Bat Out of Hell album (40+ million hubcaps sold and counting!), Cleveland International found its niche as a forward-thinking independent rock ‘n’ roll label releasing albums like Meat Loaf wingman Jim Steinman’s solo Bad For Good and Ellen Foley’s Night Out as well as records by artists as diverse as The Boyzz, Ian Hunter, Ronnie Spector, and the Euclid Beach Band (their “There’s No Surf In Cleveland” is a post-punk, power-pop gem!). Oh yeah, Cleveland International also released a few more Meat Loaf LPs that sold by the truckload…

Long before Popovich became embroiled in the murky morass that is the music industry, he was banging out tunes on his own with bands like The Twilighters and Ronnie & the Savoys. Formerly known as The Polka Kings, they changed their name when Popovich brought his bass guitar skills to the band. Ronnie & the Savoys entered into the studios at Cleveland Recording Company sometime in 1958 and laid down two red-hot slabs of primal rock ‘n’ roll for release as a single and, thanks to the good folks at Cleveland International (now run by Steve Jr.) and Little Steven’s Wicked Cool Records, you can add this nifty 7” wax with picture sleeve to your collection.

The 45’s A-side, “Domino,” is a period-perfect roller-coaster o’ rock ‘n’ roll cheap thrills. Featuring swaggering vox by “Poppy” laying out a narrative of the title character’s tragic fate, the song is layered with manic guitarplay, Tim Tokish’s blaring saxophone, and a rhythmic backbone straight and strong enough that you could run it up a flagpole and salute. Clocking in at a radio-friendly three-minutes, more or less, “Domino” found ready airplay from Cleveland radio, but the single also found friendly programmers in Pittsburgh and on the West Coast.

The flapjack’s B-side is equally bodacious, “Slapping Rods and Leaky Oil” a scrappy, madcap instrumental that captures a real hod-rod vibe with Jim Sellers’ wiry fretwork (a few licks evince a Duane Eddy twang) and Zupancich’s explosive drumbeats clashing with Tokish’s out-of-control saxplay. At a hair over two-minutes, the song takes off like a rocket and quickly achieves orbit. Ronnie & the Savoys became a fairly well-known band in the Cleveland area, honing their sound with nightly performances at Leo’s Café, a blue-collar joint in the city’s Polish neighborhood.

Ronnie & the Savoys would later move up to larger venues and bigger crowds, but they could never break free of Cleveland and long-term success wasn’t knocking at the door. Popovich would eventually pursue his love of music in a different forum, helping other musicians achieve their vision. Sadly, Popovich passed away too young in 2011, but his fingerprints can be heard every day through Classic Rock radio playlists. Ronnie & the Savoys was the first step towards creating Popovich’s legacy, and you can get the single exclusively through the Cleveland International Records website…take a look around, you’ll find some other cool stuff while you’re there!

Archive Review: Rocket From the Tombs' Rocket Redux (2004)

The near-mythical art-punk forebears of both Pere Ubu and the Dead Boys, Rocket From the Tombs is one of the great lost bands of rock ‘n’ roll. Fronted by pre-Pere David Thomas, a giant of a man with a fractured voice who went by the name of Crocus Behemoth, RFTT was a fixture on the mid-‘70s Cleveland rock scene. Influenced by bands like the Stooges, Velvet Underground and Kiss, RFTT experienced an ever-changing line-up of musicians with Thomas as the only constant. It wasn’t until Thomas hooked up with songwriter/guitarist Peter Laughner that the band settled down with a roster that included guitarist Gene O’Connor (a/k/a Cheetah Chrome), bassist Craig Bell, and drummer Johnny “Blitz” Madansky.

Rocket From the Tombs’ Rocket Redux

It is this RFTT line-up that is considered by Cle-punk aficionados as best representing the inspired mix of hard rock, heavy metal and art-rock that would become Rocket From the Tombs’ legacy. The band would release several singles during its brief lifespan, circa 1974-75, songs like “Sonic Reducer,” “30 Seconds Over Tokyo” and “Final Solution” that would later be revisited in classic versions by Pere Ubu and the Dead Boys. Creative tensions would eventually break the band into rival factions, with Thomas and Laughner forming Pere Ubu and O’Connor and Madansky forming the Dead Boys with Stiv Bators. RFTT never recorded a full-length album during it’s brightly-burning existence, the band’s disparate demo tapes and live recordings traded feverishly by hardcore fans for two and a half decades until they were collected on CD in 2002 with The Day the Earth Met Rocket From the Tombs.

Laughner would leave Pere Ubu shortly after its formation, starting and discarding a number of bands while he was writing about music for Creem magazine. The talented songwriter would die of liver failure in 1977 at the young age of 25, but his creative progeny would forge careers of various lengths. The Dead Boys lived fast and died young after a few years and a couple of albums while Thomas and Pere Ubu would soldier on into the new millennium. The RFTT myth kept growing through the years, however, and during the summer of 2003 surviving band members Thomas, O’Connor, and Bell got together for a brief tour under the Rocket From the Tombs name. Television’s Richard Lloyd filled the Laughner position and Pere Ubu’s Steve Mehlman sat in on the drums. The response was encouraging and performing the old songs was fun so much like the Rubber City Rebels recently did, the five RFTT members ventured into the studio.

Sonic Reducer RFTT

Rocket Redux is the result of the reformed band’s studio sojourn. Produced by Lloyd in his NYC studio, the album is the collection of songs that RFTT never got the chance to record in 1975. Not surprisingly, the tunes still sound great after almost 30 years. All the members of RFTT’s current line-up have worked as musicians since the ‘70s so there is a fair degree of professionalism in the performance of these familiar songs. These guys are also some of the most hallowed names of the punk and post-punk eras, so the songs show a fair degree of off-kilter enthusiasm and reckless energy as well. Lloyd’s production on Rocket Redux offers a nice balance of melodic grunge and outsider art, red-hot twin guitars leaving scorched earth beneath Thomas’ vocal caterwauling.

If the songs on Rocket Redux are familiar, the arrangements and performances are not…this is how these songs were meant to be heard, and the band takes them back from history by adding its own brand to the titles. “Sonic Reducer RFTT” strips this gem of Stiv’s Iggy mannerisms and brings the song back to its minimalist art-punk roots with flailing vox by Thomas and stunning six-string work by O’Connor/Chrome and Lloyd. Pere Ubu’s rendition of “Final Solution RFTT” was never as eerie as this, Bell’s throbbing bass and Mehlman’s tribal drumwork giving way to Gothic vocals and screaming guitar riffs. It is some of the lesser-known works of the RFTT canon that benefit most from this reclamation project, tho’, Laughner’s tragic “Amphetamine” for instance is provided a reverent reading with delicate chiming guitarwork and somber vocals by O’Connor (or is it Lloyd?). New life is breathed into Laughner’s “Ain’t It Fun,” this “screwed and chopped” version bolstered by intricate guitar interplay and the hauntingly prescient line “ain’t it fun when you know that you’re gonna die young?” Stellar performances of “Down In Flames,” “Frustration” and “Life Stinks” show that RFTT has transcended time in its pursuit of rock ‘n’ roll’s Holy Grail.

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Five, or maybe ten years ahead of its time, Rocket From the Tombs was fated to become one of those dusty footnotes to rock ‘n’ roll history, the band’s importance appreciated by critics and a few fans. To paraphrase Frank Zappa, however, “the modern day punk refuses to die,” the reformed Rocket From the Tombs adding another chapter to the band’s growing legacy with Rocket Redux. Whether you’re an old school fan or a young punkster learning about the genre from reissue CD, you owe it to yourself to discover/rediscover the myth that is Rocket From the Tombs. (Smog Veil Records, released February 24th, 2004)

Review originally published by Alt.Culture.Guide™ zine

Also on That Devil Music: Rocket From the Tombs' The Day the Earth Met the Rocket From the Tombs CD review