The Cure For Skepticism

I wasn't a big fan of The Cure. In fact, aside from Love Cats I really, actively disliked everything else I had heard by them. Which, admittedly, wasn't a lot because what I had heard I didn't like, and why delve deep into a band's catalog if I don't like them in the first place?

I started dating Ms. Polly Purebread in the late summer of 1988. We worked at a health food store together and there was something about her that got me all antsy in the pantsy. So I screwed up the gumption to introduce myself. We realized that we had a lot of the same tastes in music; COCTEAU TWINS, Kate Bush, SIOUXSIE AND THE BANSHEES and a lot more. However,  (cut to sound effect of car tires screeching and a needle across a record) she told me one of her favorite bands was The Cure. Not necessarily a deal breaker, but...

I didn't let that come between us and we were a happy family for 5.5 years. In fact, for her birthday I bought her a limited edition picture disc version of the latest Cure album 'Disintegration'. She was ecstatic and put it on the turntable immediately. 

'Plainsong' was the first track and I was able to ignore it. 'Pictures Of You' was next and I stopped what I was doing and just stared at the stereo. When the song was over I asked her to play that one again, and she graciously obliged. I was in love. Pictures Of You was the song that made me see the light. Ms. Polly finished playing the album (none of the other songs really hit me in the same way) and said "well, if you liked that one song let me play you this" and she proceeded to school me in all things Cure. Turns out I had only heard really bad material by them and not the good stuff. Like the 'Faith' and 'Pornography' albums. I realized that 'Let's Go To Bed' was not typical of their sound and that they were, in fact, much darker and broodier.

Skip ahead a few years and Ms. Polly came home one day with a pair of tickets to see The Cure at the very very large local sports arena. She said that she bought me a ticket but that if I didn't want to go she'd understand and take her friend. I agreed to go and we eagerly awaited the date. It was announced that The Cranes were booked to be the opening band, which was great news. Ms. Polly and I both really enjoyed their album 'Wings of Joy'.

Showtime rolls around and I had never been in our very very large local sports arena. I had attended a few area concerts but tended to not like them that much as  the sound was never good and the band always looked like they were half a mile away.  Our seats were pretty good, though, and by the time The Cranes were half way through their set the sound had been dialed in and wasn't too bad.

As is usually the case I don't remember much from the show. Luckily for all of us some intrepid taper happened to be there and captured this rather good sounding artifact of the evening. So for your edification, and dedicated to Ms. Polly Purebread and her faith that I would finally come around ot enjoying one of her favorite  bands I present to you said audience recording via youtube.

THE CURE MINNEAPOLIS JULY 13 1992

Growing Up With The Suburbs

 

I'm writing this the day after I found out about the untimely, accidental death of Suburbs guitaris Beej Chaney (swimming accident in California). 

 

I got to see the original Suburbs a handful of times back in the day. The first time was summer of 1983 when they played a free show at Loring Park. As a 15 year old New Wave die-hard I was in heaven. Being the loner weirdo that I was I didn't have any friends that were fans of the band I ended up going on my own and I was fine with that. As you can see from some of these pictures it was pretty well attended, and I jockeyed for a position close to the stage. I owned In Combo and Credit In Heaven and was not disappointed when I recognized most of the songs on offer that evening. My only other overarching memory was that it was particularly warm and I, along with the 1000 other people there, sweated our gluteus maximii off dancing. These photos and a few more are available at Go Johnny Go long with some really good recordings made by the late, great Suburbs uberfan and archivist Mr. Terry Katzman.

I had to wait almost another year before I had the opportunity to see The Suburbs again. They were booked to play a dance for the students at Washburn High School in south Minneapolis. Washburn was the school I was supposed to go to, but I opted to be bussed across the city to attend the Television Production magnet class offered at North Community High School. I had a few friends that went to Washburn and one of them was able to grab a few tickets for me, my then-girlfriend and a few of her friends, none of whom were Washburn students. I remember being nervous abut being asked to prove that we were enrolled at the school, show our student ID cards or something, but we sailed right thru after we handed the person working the door our tickets. I don't remember a thing about the Suburbs' performance that night, just that we all had a great time and were happy we were able to crash the party.

I'm pretty sure I saw the "final" concert in 1993, as by that time I was over 21. I'm not 100% positive I was there, but parts of THIS VIDEO seem really familiar, while other parts are completely foreign to me.

I was at the first reunion in 2002 which can be SEEN HERE. I recorded the show and may still have the tapes somewhere, but the video is just as easy to play so I haven't bothered digging up my cassettes.

The Suburbs opened for The B-52's at the 2003 MN State Fair and I was able to see that show thanks to the overwhelming kindness of the woman I was dating at the time. It was her fist time seeing The 'Burbs, and my first time seeing The B-52's (which is surprising considering how immensely important those early B-52's records were to me). Sadly the frat boys in the crowd made it impossible to watch the entire B-52's set, but the first 5 songs were off the first 2 albums so my New Wave yen was satiated.

With a heavy heart I attended the 2010 Bruce Allen Tribute concert at First Avenue where another favorite local band The Suicide Commandos opened. TPT did a nice piece on the whole thing that can be SEEN HERE. It was a great, if heartbreaking, show and everyone stepped up to the plate to remember Bruce Allen. He's been sorely missed ever since.

I saw "The Suburbs" one last time when it was just Chan Poling (vox/keys) and Hugo Klars (drums) and a bunch of new members, but I don't really consider this version to be the actual Suburbs.

So here's to the memory of Bruce, Beej, and Terry Katzman, and the joy they brought me.

There's some Talk Talk regarding the Psychedelic Furs

Here's how I remember it:

The Psychedelic Furs, July 23 1984, five days before I saw them

I started high school in the fall of 1982, already with the reputation of being Minneapolis' #1 New Wave fan (if only in my own head) and with a voracious appetite for "new" music.  There were a few hardcore mohawked-and-leather-jacketed punks at the school, but aside from myself and a kid named Chad (who's phy-ed attire were those 70's running shorts with the white piping up the side, and an Ian Dury & the Blockheads tour shirt) there were no other obvious New Wave kids in attendance. After a few months of school I met KT (see my Saturday Night Dance Party for a little more of her backstory). KT was one of the few New Wave kids that made themselves known, and told me in the back of Social Studies class "there's gonna be a band we like on King Biscuit this Sunday, but I can't remember what band it is."  I logged it in the musical notebook that lived in the back of my brain, and when Sunday night rolled around I tuned into KQRS (now the "classic rock" station, back then they had the exact same playlist but it was just called "rock") at the appropriate hour and slid in to a hot bath tub to find out who the mystery "band we both like" was. I was very happily surprised when the announcer said that that night's King Biscuit Flour Hour welcomed The Psychedelic Furs.  Now, I had of course heard The Furs thanks to KBEM's Friday overnight punk and New Wave show Ready Steady Go, but I never paid really close attention. However, after listening to the KBFH I was sold and considered myself a firm fan.

Fast forward about 16 months. I was "dating" An(gie) Archy and we heard through the New Wave grapevine that the Furs were going to be playing at the Orpheum Theater, and Talk Talk was slated to be the opening band. Tickets were purchased immediately, then came the torturous wait from the time the show was announced until the actual showtime.

A few weeks before the concert it was announced that The Psychedelic Furs were going to be signing records at Hot Licks (soon to change their name to Northern Lights Music) the afternoon of the show.

When the day finally rolled around I went to the in-store by myself, about half an hour before the band were supposed to arrive, and I grabbed a copy of Forever Now. Mirror Moves was the album they were touring on, but I wanted Forever Now as it was my favorite then (and still is).  Soon enough the band and managers rolled in to the store and took up residence behind the counter. Richard Butler, lead singer, had throngs of people vying for his attention and signature, and I didn't feel like pushing my way through just to get a record singed. What I noticed, however, was the sunglasses-wearing John Ashton, Psychedelic Furs guitar player, standing near the window at the opposite end of the counter with nary a fan recognizing him let alone asking for an autograph. Since no one was bothering him I sauntered up and thrust my virgin copy of Forever Now towards him. He graciously took it and signed his name in gold Sharpie. While handing it back he asked if I wanted him to have Richard sign it. I politely declined and said "everyone's gonna have his autograph. How many have you signed so far?" to which he replied "about four."

Photographer Unknown

All other photos by Ron Clark

Autograph session completed I hopped a bus back home and prepared for the concert. The plan was to meet An(gie) and her friends downtown before the concert and hang out for a bit beforehand. I slapped my newly acquired album on the cobbled-together garage sale stereo I had and figure out what I was going to wear. My typical togs of the time were suit pants or army fatigues, some kind of t-shirt, and one of the many old, thrifted suit jackets that were in my closet. My parents were gone for the weekend, so I had no supervisory interference and could get on with it at my leisure.

Showered, and in my best New Wave gear I hopped a bus back downtown at about 4:30. Half an hour later I was waiting for the girls to show up at our designated rendezvous point, Slice Of New York (the first of many hang-outs I haunted from my teens til my 40s). Shortly they showed up with the news that one of them had forgot their ticket and they had to bus it back to her place for retrieval. I was asked if I wanted to go with, but it was more important to me to see Talk Talk, so I politely declined and said I'd see them in the theater.

With an hour or so to kill I wandered around City Center, a now-defunct but then-thriving shopping center in the middle of downtown just kind of window shopping and people watching. It was your typical mid-80s mall and held very little interest to anyone whose taste may have ran outside of the mainstream, but since I had nothing better to do I just meandered. While walking past the teeny-bopper shop clogged with neon socks and skirts I noticed a sign in the window that said "free ear piercing with purchase of earring. MUST BE 18 OR OLDER!"  "well," I thought to myself, "I'm gonna go in and get my ear pierced. I have an extra $4.50, why not?" Now keep in mind I was only 16 and hadn't even started shaving yet, but I thought I'd see if I could get away with it. I strolled in acting as natural as can be, and an older New Wave woman asked if she could help me. "Older" as in she was probably 20, maybe 21... I told her I wanted my ear pierced and she handed me a board covered in black velour with about 40 ear studs poked thru it. I picked out a nice faux ruby on a gold plated post. The clerk fished around in  plastic bin, found what she was looking for and loaded it into the piercing gun. 20 seconds later I had a new hole in my head and a slip of paper laying out how to care for my new embellishment. I handed her a $5.00 and told her I didn't need change. As I was walking out she casually asked "oh, uh, you ARE over 18, right?" and I assured her that I was. With that I made my way to the food court and sat down with a Mountain Dew and a wee bit more time to kill, and a mild sting in my no-longer-virgin earlobe.

Soon enough it was time to mosey over to the theater where the concert was being held, and I dutifully took my place in line and waited for the girls to join me. The line started moving, and just before I reached the door tAn(gie) and her friends showed up. We took our seats, I showed off my earring, and I seemed to be the only one impressed with it. After what seemed like ages the lights dimmed, and 5 guys dressed all in white took the stage. It was Talk Talk, and I was just as geeked to see them as I was the headlining band. At this point the only record of Talk Talk's that I had was a 5 song EP. I'm not sure if their actual album had come out in America yet, but more on that later. Talk Talk put on an amazing show, if a bit brief, and left the stage. Lights up, small talk made between the 4 of us, and then the lights dimmed again. I don't remember much about the Furs' performance. All I remember was thinking they were one of the best live bands I had seen so far. An encore or 2 later and the show was over. The girls and I slowly shuffled out of the theater, and then one of us had the idea to go around to the stage door in the alley to see if we could catch any of the Furs as they were leaving.

There was a big tour bus sitting there with the engine running, and we could tell there was movement inside, so one of An(gie)'s friends knocked on the door. As she stood back the door opened and one of the guys from Talk Talk popped his head out. Yeah, we were hoping for the Furs, but as I said, I liked Talk Talk just as much. Soon enough the entire band alighted from the bus and were talk-talking to us, asking us how we liked the show, telling tour stories etc. Mark Hollis, the singer (and later known to be a publicity-shunning recluse [sadly he died in 2019]) said "Hang on a minute, kids, I'll be right back." He went back into the bus and a minute later came back out with posters and album flats (reproductions of album covers used as promo material), and had the band sign everything. He said "sorry we don't have any records or shirts to give you, these are the best we can do." We all HAPPILY took our swag just as the tour manager started hustling everyone back on the bus. We thanked everyone and made our way to the bus that would take us all back to An(gie)'s house for a little post-concert decompression. 

We all hung out for a few hours , then An(gie)'s mom drove us all home, dropping me off last. An(gie) followed me to the back door of my house, out of sight of her mom, and we both enjoyed a quick smooching session. She then pulled herself away and as she was running back to the car told me she'd call me in the morning.

When I went in the house I immediately realized that, with my parents out of town for the weekend, my brother decided to throw a party. The house was crammed with drunken high schoolers making weak attempts to cop off with someone of the opposite sex. I pushed my way through, giggling to myself with the thought of just how much trouble my brother was getting himself in to. I got up to my bedroom, which was currently occupied by a young couple engaged in their own smooching session. I kicked them out, shut the door behind me and tried to go to sleep.

The next day my parents called. My brother was frantically trying to straighten the house back up after his night of party hosting, and threatened me with death if I ever said anything about it. I asked my mom where the hydrogen peroxide was. Nervously she asked what I needed it for, and I calmly told her I got my ear pierced. With a sigh of relief she told me where in the overcrowded bathroom closet to find it and some cotton balls. Then she handed the phone to my dad, who gruffly asked what dumbshit thig I did that I needed the peroxide for. When I told him that I had got my ear pierced there was about 27 seconds of silence, then he just said "well, I hope you got the left one done, 'cause if you got the right one done it'd mean you're 'funny'!"

July 28 1984

1. Love My Way
   Play Video
2. Pretty in Pink
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3. Here Come Cowboys
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4. My Time
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5. President Gas
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6. Sleep Comes Down
   Play Video
7. The Ghost in You
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8. Heaven
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9. Only You and I
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10. Sister Europe
    Play Video
11. Alice's House
    Play Video
12. Heartbeat
    Play Video
13. Forever Now
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14. Imitation of Christ
    Play Video
15. Into You Like a Train
    Play Video
16. India

Cocteau Twins DON'T do cherubs!

  Here's how I remember it:

My girlfriend at the time, whom I will refer to as Ms. Polly Purebread, and I got together partially over a mutual love of The Cocteau Twins and Kate Bush, among other bands contemporary of those times. Skip forward a few years and Ms. Polly heard that The Cocteau Twins were playing in Chicago. Sadly I had to decline seeing them at that time due to work, school, and financial commitments, but I enthusiastically encouraged her to go. Her best friend was living in Milwaukee at the time so Polly was to take a Greyhound from Minneapolis to Milwaukee, then go with her friend on to Chicago and to see her favorite band. 

In the time that she bought her ticket for Chicago and the time of the actual concert a Minneapolis date was announced and we bought tickets for that show.

The time came for Ms. Polly to depart for Milwaukee, and slightly disheartened that I wasn't able to go with, saw her off on her whirlwind bus trip. 

She and her friend attended the Chicago date of the tour, and had a great time. She said the band was better than she could have hoped them to be. Miraculously, or not, after the concert she was able to get backstage and meet the band. When she returned home she regaled me with tales of meeting the band and being allowed to hang out back stage. She told me I just had to meet the guitar player, Robin, as he was a grumpy man far too old for the time he'd been on the planet, and she thought that we'd get along famously. On top of that she had gotten permission from the band members themselves to photograph the Minneapolis show the next night (Nov. 28 1990 for you nerds that need details).

Showtime rolls around and we were standing in line in front of the Orpheum Theater. Ms. Polly had her big, clunky, 35mm film camera. I had an even bulkier cassette recorder with me in a vain attempt to surreptitiously record the show (for the life of me I can't remember if the show got recorded. I'll have to check the vast archive vault at Fort Stench and see if it indeed exists). Mazzy Star opened, and they were phenomenal. We had their debut album and I really liked it a lot, and I had been a passing fan of the band they grew out of, Opal, but seeing them live, recreating their sparse sound perfectly, was amazing. Then the Cocteau's came on and were even better.

After the set Ms. Polly and I took our place by the backstage door and soon enough she was recognized and were invited in. There were about 15-20 goth kids milling around, some "industry" people, and other general liggers (as the Brits call them, we don't seem to have a word in American for these people). There was a couch at one end of the dressing room, and a television tuned to Warner Brothers cartoons. Robin Guthrie was ignoring all the people vying for his attention and was just enjoying his Porky Pig. I sat down on the couch next to him and said "Sorry to interrupt your cultural edification for the evening, but I've got you figured out." He slowly eyed me up and down and said gruffly "Whaaat tha FACK are you talking about?!?" I said "I got you figured out... your a fat scruffy guitar playing bastard from Scotland. Admit it, you're really Big John Duncan from The Exploited!" Robin got a big, shite-eating grin on his face and said "You fucking bastard!!! You're alright! I like you!" Then he continued "I used to be at a lot of the same parties as John, and I pissed in his beer once, He drank it down without even noticing it!"

Robin Guthrie

Big John Duncan

He then said "Go ask Liz (Elizabeth Fraiser, lead vocalist for the Cocteau Twins and one of the most quiet and reserved people [on the surface] that you'd ever meet) about her Exploited tattoo!!!"

I excused myself and made my way over to where Liz was holding court with the earlier-mentioned goth kids. I interrupted and said rather boisterously "Hey Liz, Robin told me to tell you to show me your Exploited tattoo!" She turned beet red and walked towards me, and pulling me away from the goth gaggle by my jacket sleeve. She whispered "I DON'T have an Exploited tattoo, but I do have this" and she pulled down the collar of her shirt exposing her back shoulder blade where she had a very crude, homemade stick-and-poke tattoo of a safety pin and 'Sid Vicious'. She then turned back to me and said "You'll never see a photo of me sleeveless." and with that she returned to the crowd she had been entertaining.

I made my way back to the couch where Robin was still just watching cartoons and ignoring everyone. 
He got a good chuckle out of me getting to see Liz' evidence of her misspent youth, and then we started talking about Sesame Street. Talking of our love for the mis-understood psyche of Oscar The Grouch, and how The Count was the ultimate goth and how Dave Vanian from the Damned ripped him off. As we were engaged in such deep intellectual conversation a very young, lone goth boy approached carrying 2 gold colored angel statues.  The boy handed one to Robin and stammered "Mis... mis... Mister Guthrie, could you sign this for me please?" Robin took the statue, looked at me and winked, then turned back to the kid and shouted "FUCK OFF!!! I DON'T DO CHERUBS!!!"

The kid looked like his puppy was just shot in front of him and dejectedly walked away. Robin looked at me and smiled and said "I don't do fucking cherubs!"

After about a half hour more Ms. Polly Purebread and I were escorted out of the dressing room as management was taking the band back to the hotel. We made our way home happy as two little goth kids that actually got their cherubs signed.

The next day Ms. Polly got her film processed and printed at a one hour photo mart. When she got home from work that day we were going thru the pictures and she noticed that there was an extra print of one of the shots. She got really upset and accused the kid working at the photo mart of printing an extra set of her pictures for himself. I told her it wasn't that big of a deal but she wasn't having it. She finally calmed down enough and we went about the rest of our lives.

HOWEVER... years later I was at a party, or bar, or some kind of gathering where I was forced to be social and interact with others, and I was telling the same story I have just related in this post, but I didn't say anything about Ms. Polly accusing anyone of stealing her photos. Without any prompts the person I was talking to said "Yeah, I couldn't go to that show, but the next day some chick dropped off film at the photo hut I was working at, and she had taken some really good shots at the show. I printed an extra copy and kept them." I replied "Well, you kept most of them. You left one in with the prints she picked up, and when she figured out what you did she was PISSED!!!"

EGFC MPLS

It all started a long time ago...
Ed Gein died on July 26, 1984. To commemorate the great loss to society I took a white t-shirt and a black Sharpie(tm) and inscribed the words "Ed Gein Fan Club" on the front. I wore that shirt everywhere.
At school one day a friend asked me if that was my band.
"Yeah, of course it is!" I replied. I had thought about putting together a band at some point, and thanks to this forgotten friend I decided to dub it "The Ed Gein Fan Club".

All I needed were some songs, some people to play the songs, and a place to rehearse said songs.

No problem...

I started dating Emma Rotgut, and one of the things she told me on our first date (seeing the Dead Kennedys, which she slept thru) was that she kinda played bass. The next day I gave her my bass and told her she was in my band.

I called up an ex-girlfriend, An(gie) Archy because she bashed out noise on her step-dad's drum kit. I told her she was now the drummer in my band. She said "cool, we can practice in my basement". I said "cool".

Then I called up an old friend from Jr. High who went by the name of Nails Johnson. He had a guitar and an amp. I told him he was in my band and to meet at An Archy's house the next Saturday.

"Cool", he said.

We had out first practice and it sucked.
None of us knew how to play at all, except An(gie) who kind of knew how to keep a slow beat on the skins. After 6 hours of bashing out an excruciatingly slow version of Black Flag's version of "Louie Louie" we called it a day.
And made plans to get together the next weekend.

We were'nt any better the next weekend, but we did write our first original song after An(gie) started playing some fucked up surfer beat and Nails faked his way thru a chord progression that was nothing more than "Wipeout" played backwards. Emma followed Nails' guitar line and I spewed out a tale of an afternoon spent at the beach, and all of the wonders to be seen there. Camel Toe, dead fish, big tits, white foamy shit at the shoreline. With the genius and originality that was the Ed Gein Fan Club we decided to call this song "The Beach Song".

Emma and I had been telling (badgering) Randy Elvis from No Life Music about the band. He was our first fan without ever hearing us. He gave us the encouragement to keep working at it to get the band off the ground.
He wouldn't have been so kind if he had actually heard what we sounded like!

At the next practice, our 3rd, we wrote another song (which I can't remember right now, I'll have to dig thru the vast Plainfield Archives(tm) to see if I can come up with the song), played The Beach Song about 47 times, and our old standard Louie x2. Nails had brought along a friend of his, and if I remember correctly this guy jammed with us as well.

We had the bright idea of calling up Randy Elvis on the phone and giving him a private performance of his favorite band. I dialed the number for No Life and got him on the line. I hit record on the boombox we were recording with (we recorded several of these early rehearsals for the good of mankind) and An(gie) counted off. We launched into our 3 song set. When we were done I grabbed the receiver only to head a dial tone.
I knew Randy Elvis would be sorely disappointed when he finally heard us... (he used the excuse that he was really busy at work and didn't have the time to listen to us)

The next day Nails called me up and said he was retiring from the rock and roll lifestyle, it was just too intense for him.

The ED GEIN FAN CLUB was far from over. In fact this was the first of what was to become an on-going scenario within the band, that of replacing members who lost the vision, the faith, the drive to be in the only REAL punk band in Minneapolis.
I think

After X-mas break Emma cornered me in the lunch room at school and said that there was some new mohawk kid in her class. She talked to this new kid Tom, and he claimed to play guitar. She told him of our search for a guitar player and he agreed to come down to jam with us.

Tom met us at An Archy's house the next weekend sporting a brand new Les Paul and Fender Twin Reverb. "Rich fag" I thought to myself, but who cared, the Ed Gein Fan Club was back on track. Tom also taught us the Eddie Cochran/Sid Vicious opus "C'Mon Everybody", which was immediately added to the growing repertoire.

At one of these rehearsals we recorded our first release, "The Ed Gein Fan Club: Music For Killing Children". C'Mon Everybody was on side A, complete with sound effects of orchestras warming up and a chainsaw, and uproarious applause at the end of the song, The B-side contained "The Beach Song" and our version of Black Flag's version of The Kingsmen's version of Richard Berry's "Louie Louie"
12 copies were made at an exact cost of nothing (I simply recorded over some old data tapes my dad had sitting next to his computer and I ran the sleeves off on the photocopier at the place I was working), and sold for $2.00 each exclusively to NON-punk rockers. Why the fuck did we want to preach to the converted? The only exception was our old friend Randy Elvis.
Randy did us good by listing it in his Top Ten for the month in the No Life Newsletter. So did Ryan, the manager of the store. Then Randy did us a better solid by listing it in his Best Of The Year list, just ahead of Iron Fist's Crucify Me tape!

Tom lasted 3 or 4 rehearsals, when he realized that his ideas about Punk Rock were vastly different from my ideas about punk rock. He then got An(gie) smoking pot and dropping acid (HIPPY drugs!) with a little bit of bed-bobbing in there as well, thus creating a rift within the ranks of the Fan Club.
In what was to become the norm rather than the exception, I had to replace the guitar player and the drummer.

I decided to follow the Punk Rock credo...
that of "D.I.M.", or Do It Myself. In the spring of 1985 (2 months after Tom and An(gie) bailed on me and my rock and roll dream) I took a crash course in electric guitar at the local Schimtt Music Center. If I couldn't keep a guitar player I'd learn the fuckin' thing myself!
I learned how to play a power chord and a pentatonic scale. That's all that was needed for punk rock so I was ready to rock out with my cock out.
Whilst this was going on Emma and I had told her brother, Fatt Matt, about needing a drummer. Jokingly he stated that if we got him a drum kit he'd play. He had never even touched a pair of drumsticks in his life, but this was punk rock, you didn't need to know how to play.
We scrounged up a drum kit the next day.
The only problem with this proposed line-up was that I couldn't sing and play guitar at the same time. This was rectified with the recruitment of Yermom as the new singer. Yermom had played drums in various metal bands. Yermom assumed that we were gonna have Yermom play drums, but I told Yermom that we already had a drummer. We kept Fatt Matt hitting things even though Yermom was a much better beater. Because I was no longer singing, I decided that this would NOT be called The Ed Gein Fan Club. With the newly-christianed line up, Snotty and the Boogars, we stormed into my parent's garage and proceeded to piss off all the neighbors by writing a new song. Since it was the first song that I wrote on guitar, the first song that Yermom sang, and the first song of Snotty and the Boogars, Yermom named it "The First Song".
Snotty and the Boogars lasted 3 rehearsals. I kicked Yermom out after Yermom missed a practice because Yermom was sleeping.
I was still taking the shitty money-grubbing Schmitt guitar rip-off lessons, and there I met not one but two new guitar players...
Sex Pistols and Clash fans Otto and Hugo Chevelesky.

THE ED GEIN FAN CLUB WAS NOW
almost a force to be reckoned with. I had talked Otto (or was it Hugo? I could never remember who was who) into coming down to a rehearsal in my garage, and he brought Hugo (see above aside) with him. Otto didn't want to join the band but Hugo did, so we rocked out on The Beach Song, The First Song, Louie Louie, C'Mon Everybody, and a new song I had written about some fake friends of mine called "Y.F.S." or "You Fucking Slut".

After a hard afternoon's rocking the other Chevelesky couldn't hold back any more. The next practice saw both Otto and Hugo holding rock sticks.

The neighbors, all of whom had it in for me, complained to my folks that their dogs were going deaf and that we needed to find another place to rock. Otto came to the rescue, saying that his mom owned an abandoned house that for some reason still had the electricity hooked up to it. No heat, but juice at least. It was mid-February in Minnesota, where the high temp of the day was a balmy -4 below. We got to the house after a tumultuous bus ride and loaded all our gear into the living room of the empty house. Fatt Matt checked the flue of the fireplace, deemed it somewhat safe, and proceeded to bust up cupboards and doors to stoke a fire. Soon we had a roaring blaze going and the rock was flowing.

Whilst at "The Ol' Gein Farm" as we named the house (well, actually I just named it that right now) we worked on new songs like "Pig Fucker", "No More Wheels", "Hey Headbanger" as well as covers of "The Great Rock and Roll Swindle" by the Sex Pistols, and the Clash-ified version of "I Fought The Law". We still sucked to Jah's high heaven, sloppy as shit, slow as hell, but that was the idea in the back of my head, even though I hadn't realized it yet. I wanted the Ed Gein Fan Club to be the ultimate punk band, the idea that ANYONE can do it, all you need is the balls to actually DO IT. It was the idea of attitude over ability. Who cared if you couldn't tune your guitar? If you had the guts to get up on a stage then that's all that mattered. It's something that I still fervently believe in to this day.

The Ol' Gein Farm lasted about 2 months, then we were booted out and the Man took it over and turned it into a HUD home. Once again the search was on for a suitable home for my rock and roll dreams. Finally Emma and Fatt Matt's folks said we could use their basement when they weren't around so the gear was moved once again.

By now it was November of 1985. We still sucked musically, but with some fine-tuned finagling I got us our first gig. It was gonna be at someone's house for Yermom's 19th birthday. Only problem was that in the past few months The Ed Gein Fan Club had somehow made a few enemies. Maybe it was my loud mouth that got us in trouble, maybe it was the name of the band, or the fact that I was proclaiming to all within ear shot that The Ed Gein Fan Club was the best fucking band ever and every other band ever created sucked ass in our presence. Because of this, The Ed Gein Fan Club's debut to the world was actually played under the name The Cheveleski Fun Time Family Show Band to avoid getting our asses kicked by those who hadn't seen the Fan Club light.

Before we played Yermom had the bright idea of taping the set for it's historical value, which I must admit was a brilliant idea. However, Yermom is such a fucking moron that Yermom placed the boombox right under the snare drum. You can kind of hear what's going on, but mostly all you hear is snare.

Now, keep in mind that Emma and I were strictly sober people. We were NOT straight-edge, as we didn't preach it, but we made damn sure to avoid drunks and rope heads. We thought them all to be stupid sub-human slime. Fatt Matt and the Chevaleskis were know to pop a beer once in a great while, but were far from being drunk at any point in this great story.

We played all of the songs we knew (except for The Beach Song, which Fatt Matt couldn't play): No More Wheels, Pig Fucker, Y.F.S., the Great Rock and Roll Swindle, I Fought The Law, the Batman Theme, C'Mon Everybody, and probably a few more that will remain nameless.

GODDAMN DID WE SUCK!!!!!!!!!!
But it was beautiful! The fucking drunk-ass headbangers and stoned hippy dirtbags that were assembled didn't have any idea what was hitting them. Insults were hurled to and from the "stage", we ran thru our set and high-tailed it out of there after telling everyone to fuck off and that they were fucking morons.

With the world now exposed to The ED GEIN FAN CLUB
we decided that it was time to preserve our unique take on rock and roll by recording a demo/record.

We booked 3 hours into a studio that was owned by a friend of some old hippie I knew. It was to be on my 18th birthday (for all you rock geeks out there it was the same day that Phil Lynott died - coincidence? I think not!) We had saved about $200 to pay for the session and we were hoping to record and mix as many songs as time and our meager savings permitted. We all showed up at the studio door and waited for the hippie's friend to show up.
Then we waited some more.
After 3 hours in the freezing winter weather we all said "fuck it" and went home.

So much for recording our genius for posterity. Fucking hippies. And people wonder why I hate them?!?

At school the next week I was talking to a friend of mine who worked the stage crew. He said that we were welcome to come in after school and record live to the 2 track reel to reel they had backstage. We brought our gear in on the appointed day and ran thru a couple songs to get the levels right. Luckily tape was rolling for these tests, as when we went to record the first "real" song, Y.F.S, the teacher who was in charge of the stage area heard the lyrics and promptly kicked us out, saying that he couldn't believe that we thought we could get away with "that filth" on school property!

Around this same time there was another cat in a few of my classes who was starting out as a rapper. His hip-hop name was Kid Delight and we would spend valuable class time discussing the pros and cons of Sure SM58 microphones and Peavey vs. Crate PA speakers. A few years later Kid Delight gained fame as MC Skat Kat from the Paula Abdul song "Opposites Attract".

The rest of the school year was spent rehearsing at various locations that would agree to let us practice, that is until they actually HEARD us, then their offers were politely rescinded.

In the summer Emma and I graduated and moved to St. Cloud so I could go to school. Far from it being the end of The Ed Gein Fan Club, I deputized a friend, Squeaky, to take my place.

Emma and I lived in St Cloud for 3 weeks. Whilst there I don't think the Ollie-less Fan Club ever practiced.

When Emma and I moved back I immediately reasserted my position in the band, but with a slight line-up change. Emma was now singing and I was playing bass. We thrashed thru our meager set, and set up a time to rent a 4 track cassette machine. We recorded a tape's worth of joyful noise at Pete's Bunker, a buddy's basement when his folks left for the weekend. They made him promise not to have a party, they didn't say anything about recording an album!

After the Pete's Bunker tape was recorded the band fell apart. Otto, Hugo, and Fatt Matt all had to go back to school, Emma decided she wanted to fuck someone other than me, and I joined another band.

I WAS SICK and tired of relying on other people to make my rock and roll dreams come true. Three years and 7 members later and I had almost nothing to show for it.
I took a year off from music to try to reformulate my attack. As 1987 turned into 1988 I joined an established punk rock band called Iron Fist. That lasted until 1990 when I quit.
I got a job driving a courier van. I drove the van for 3 years until I got laid off. Thanks to the great state of Minnesota I was able to turn that lay-off into 2 years re-training at a local vo-tech school. I dove head first into the video class I was taking thanks to our liberal government, but something was still missing. I just couldn't quite put my finger on it.
Fed up with rock and roll but still wanting to annoy people from a stage, I decided to start a noise band with myself and 3 guitars. No strings on 2 of the guitars, just feedback. A show was set up for this under the name Clinical Psychosis. A week before showtime 2 people decided to take over the band and turn it into a crappy disco goth band.
I was well-pissed off by this and decided that the ghost of Ollie Stench needed to be resurrected.

I started prowling the bowels of the city looking for the right members for the new version of the Ed Gein Fan Club. To give it a bit more priority, a gig was set up in the Seventh Street Entry for January 1991.
The first recruit was one-time member Yermom. Yermom was found drunk in a corner somewhere, and after Yermom was given a shower and a pint of Night Train Yermom was forced to bash skins. The Ed Gein Fan Club finally had something we had always been lacking; a real drummer. To be fair, both An(gie) Archy and Fatt Matt had progressed quite far from their humble beginnings in The Fan Club, but neither could be considered virtuosos.
Johnny Dirtbag was next. No one knows where he came from, some say a Cuban refugee. Doesn't matter as Johnny Dirtbag barely rates in the story.
Skippy Friendly was the last person to be roped into the fold. Skippy was a closet record label guy who harbored secret fantasies of rock stardom. I gave him my bass a week before the show. It was the first time he had ever touched an instrument. 3 days before the gig I asked Skippy if he had been practicing at all. "No, but I've been jumping around with it a lot" was his reply. "Great, I knew you were the right man for the job".
Now remember here, that the idea of the Ed Gein Fan Club was that ANYBODY could do it REGARDLESS of talent, or lack thereof. We practiced thrice for the show in the basement of a local record store. We were to blow people's minds with the dulcet strains of YFS (You fucking Slut), Hey Headbanger, an improved noise jam called Turston Moore is a Closet Homosexual, the Peter Gunn Theme, and Fuck The 60's.
The show went off without a hitch, aside from Johnny Dirtbag not wanting to show up. After I bitched the little fucker out for 45 minutes on the phone he was at the club 15 minutes later.
We rocked hard, alienating about 70% of the audience, the remaining 30% understanding completely where we were coming from. A drunk and stoned hippy even got up on stage after YFS to sing with us. He had never seen us before, nor we him, but in the true spirit of the EGFC we gave him his 3 minutes of fame. We also got many compliments from the headlining band, some out-of-town pop punk ensemble with some kind of pedigree.
Then the band all quit on me, like so many times before.
And as usual the night didn't end quietly. After loading our gear into the back of my 1981 Dodge Omni hatchback my girlfriend at the time, Polly Purebread, and I got stuck behind a taxi cab that just sat there for 3 turns of the stoplight. When the light turned green for the fourth time I laid on the horn. The cab didn't move and the light turned red again. Upon the fifth change from red to green I laid on the horn again, whipped around the cab and flipped the driver off. He immediately gave chase and I spent the next 20 minutes trying to ditch an irate cabbie.
The chase finally ended with me pulling into the parking lot of a police station with Polly Purebread screaming at me for being such a dumbshit. The cab was right behind us and the driver followed me in to the precinct office. The cabbie was yelling the entire time while I calmly and collectively told my side of the story. Both our licenses were checked out and I was sent home. The cabbie was sent to jail for operating a cab with an expired license.

And then Ollie Stench met 2 people who were sent to resurrect the smoldering corpse of the Ed Gein Fan Club.

In 1996 I was introduced to bass playing Muncie refugee Ian Rans. I made Ian have a religious convergence and renamed him John 3:16. John 3:16 was 10 years younger than me, but he fully understood the concept of the band. With his constant urging I began the search for a drummer and a guitar player. I was playing guitar myself, but I wanted another one to fill out the sound.
A few weeks later I was eating a late-night dinner in a greasy Mexi joint when I heard one of the waitresses yelling at the cook. The cook came out and sat down with me. I had never seen him before, but when he told me his name was Johnny Dirtbag Jr. I knew the Gods of Punk were smiling up at me. I asked if he happened to play guitar, to which he replied "I wouldn't be Johnny Dirtbag Jr. if I didn't play guitar, would I?"
How could I argue with that logic?
Now we only needed a drummer.
Unfortunately it was Yermom who showed up.
I got us a gig in someone's basement for a Friday in February 1997. It was billed as the "13th Anniversary Show". With a date for the gig set I decided that it might be time to show the new guys the old tunes. In true Fan Club form, though, our schedules never matched up, and the 3 rehearsals we had were never attended by all members at the same time. But who cares? It wouldn't be the Ed Gein Fan Club if we were as tight as, say, Aerosmith, so fuck it.
The gig was phenomenal. The 13th Anniversary Show packed the place out (OK, so it only held like 50 people). The crowd hated/loved us. They had a great/horrible time boogieing down to YFS, Pig Fucker, Hey Headbanger, Prom Night Fuck, and Fuck the 60's.
After the gig the band DIDN'T quit, but for some reason we couldn't get another gig.

Just when people thought music couldn't get any worse the Ed Gein Fan Club was enticed out of the darkness for a show that could not be turned down.
A gig in honor of the 68th Anniversary of the repeal of Prohibition. The only problem was that once again the band was without a lead guitar player. I now claimed that I could play and sing well enough that the band could successfully perform as a punk rock power trio. John 3:16 nixed the idea and the search was on for guitar player #7. Lo and behold, Ollie ran into a man(?) who introduced him(?)self as Johnny Dirtbag III. Fortunately Johnny Dirtbag III introduced him(?)self to Ollie 2 hours before stage time. Plenty of time to learn the set, drink 1/2 bottle of the gratis Jim Beam and share in some controlled substances that the other bands on the bill were partaking in.
Crowd response was such that plans were bantered about (and then promptly dismissed) for more Ed Gein Fan Club gigs in the year 2001.

ALL GOOD THINGS MUST COME TO AN END...

Thankfully the ED GEIN FAN CLUB is not a good thing. In April of 2002 The ED GEIN FAN CLUB decided to enter the studio to lay down some tracks. Some of these songs have been smouldering unrecorded for 18 years and the time had finally come to record them for posterity.
Finally reduced to the punk rock power trio I had always envisioned, myself, John 3:16 and Yermom cut 9 songs in 2 days at Yermom's closet studio in St Paul, MN. The result was quite underwhelming:
More gigs were planned as the monster that I created that summer day in 1984 cannot and will not be silenced.
The joke just keeps getting more and more funny as the years drag on.

AND SO IT CAME TO PASS that 2002/2003 would prove to be the year of the Ed Gein Fan Club. Several shows, the bands first appearance on vinyl, press and radio coverage... it seemed nothing could stop the leviathan that the EGFC had become.
It started with the re-recording of "I Like The Cops [Dub Version]" for the 3xlp, 2xcd Twin City punk compilation "No Hold Back, All Attack"
We recorded this once again in yermom's closet and proved to be the last thing yermom ever recorded on tape. After this yermom was cajoled into buying a computer for recording purposes and yermom has not looked back since. A year later John 3:16 and I did some further cajoling and convinced yermom that 2003 was finally the right time to record the follow-up to the classic album "Original Punk Rock Since 1984".
Over the course of 4 weekends tracks were laid down, much beer was consumed (by the mid-90's I had seen the light and started to imbibe in the fire water, but I still have yet to smoke rope or do any other drug), and yermom produced the masterpiece "Blow Your Scene".
After a year trying to shill it out to labels it languished unreleased in my desk drawer. But take my word for it, it kicks ass.
The Ed Gein Fan Club was featured in an off-the-cuff Pulse Magazine interview in which Ms. Chelsea extolled the virtues of the EGFC in an effort to promote our appearance with cross-over sellout hardcore "legends" Dirty Rotten Imbeciles.
It was funny, but I had heard after the show that DRI thought we were mean just because I dedicated our song "Your Band Sucks" to all those bands who felt they had to change their style to keep relevant with "the kids". I never mentioned any band by name, but for some reason they felt like I was singling them out, and they called us mean. This coming from a band who had a record called "Violent Pacification".
And we played a bunch of shows that a few people witnessed.

SO SOME SHIT HAPPENED but even more shit didn't happen. There was this thing that Al Gore invented called the internet that all the kids were raving about. A few years later there was a site on the internet called myspace where all the cool kids hung out. Ollie, being at the forefront of technology, made a myspace page for the Ed Gein Fan Club. Thousands upon thousands friend requests came pouring in, only to be disappointed that we were not affiliated with that crap metal band Ed Gein. Ollie made it well know and was not shy in his berating such requests. Surprisingly, the myspace page was given the heave ho and nuked by Tom. Ollie created another page, and within 2 weeks it was yanked as well. Ollie, smelling a rat, waited a few months and created EGFC #3 on myspace, which was ceremoniously taken off-line citing "copyright infringement". Now, since there was nothing that wasn't created by EGFC that seemed a wee bit "interesting", but the band let it slide. It was quite a feather in the collective cap to say that myspace politely declined to host The Ed Gein Fan Club. In mid-2007 EGFC myspace #4 was launched, and as of January 2014 it is still up.
Another development in these wilderness years was the inclusion of The Ed Gein Fan Club in Erik Johnson's documentary film "The Middle Of Nowhere". This film is a snapshot with ample history to back it up of the long-running Twin Cities punk rock scene.
EGFC played a show for the debut screening of the movie, but yermom "forgot" about the gig. Having kept the audience at Minneapolis College Of Art & Design waiting long enough, audience member Ben Crew was pulled from his seat and placed behind the drum kit. Having never practiced with the Fan Club and not being at all familiar with the material at hand it proved to be a typical shambolic EGFC performance.
We also contributed a track to the Killdozer tribute 2xCD "We Will Bury You" as released by Crustacean and Ismist Records. Featuring Tom Hazelmeyer of Halo Of Flies and one-time member of Killdozer on lead guitar, and expertly recorded by EGFC drummer Billy "yermom" Fisk.
And the biggest news of all, in late 2007 a kid with a mohawk approached Ollie at the bar. He said "My name is Johnny Dirtbag III Jr, perhaps you've heard of me?" to which Ollie Replied "What the fuck took you so long?"

And now, 30 years later, The Ed Gein Fan Club is still chugging along.The band (featuring guest drummer Moth R. Superior) was featured on a half-hour cable access program that was doing a series on various musical styles. EGFC was brought in as an example of the punk rock.
In addition, a documentary on the band is in the works, and a few new songs may or may not be written, recorded and/or performed live.

Just like Jaws, when you think it's safe to go back in the punk rock club...