stiv bators

So as a person with an extremely limited disposable income, I am unaccustomed to experiencing so much high quality entertainment in a short period of time.

A family member tripped across some kind of free trial TV subscription service and I keep binge-watching music flicks-witnessing one marvelous show after the next, kind of glimpsing how so many of my former peers are able to stay apolitical, apathetic, suitably sedated in their consumer hypno-spells.

This autobiography by American pop-cum-punk-rock guitarist Frank Secich is a charmer. It’s big on warmth and doesn’t dish the dirt.

Its vignettes sometimes run to less than two pages apiece and are served canape style rather than in large chunks. Its 200 or so pages won’t suck up more than a few days for most people to consume.

Polite charm and gentle humour shine through.

You’d never guess its author spent two years touring with one of America’s most notorious punk bands.

Frank Secich cut his musical teeth in a bunch of Mid-western garage and teen hop bands in the ‘60s, almost cracked the big time with major label signings Blue Ash and was a sideman on bass for the latter-day Dead Boys, with his good mate Stiv Bators.

Secich worked with Stiv in his time as a solo artist for Bomp Records, retired and went on to a second career with Club Wow (with Jimmy Zero) and garage rockers Deadbeat Poets. He’s paid his own dues and those of several other people.

This is the last musical will and testament of Stiv Bator. Let’s talk about who’s not on this album.

Dee Dee Ramone and Johnny Thunders had convened at Stiv’s Paris flat in 1990 to work up a supergroup, The Whores of Babylon, with the ex-Dead Boys frontman. Contrary to widespread belief, neither of them made it onto the album.

"This room becomes a shrine thinking of you..." - Jesus & Mary Chain

People with money really do start thinking they can take it with 'em, don't they? Ya see the value they put on Shit, mere stuff, and also on just their own most basic climate control, the channel changer, controlling the room, and even the ideas allowed to ever enter their big ceilinged, oversized, white, spartan, multiple empty spaces. I got a song lyric that says, "now all I do is write obituaries", cause all my ole rocknroll friends keep dropping dead, and man. 'Gets weird.

One of my teenage brothers offed himself a couple years ago, and his family wrote some real blunt obit for the smalltown newspaper to publish, I'll paraphrase, but basically, it was like, "He was drunk and depressed all his life and committed suicide". Yeah, so that was grim. I knew they never liked the kid to start with, but according to his side of the story, they were hiding and covering up abuse.

Electric Junk - Jeff Dahl (Iwannabeahoople Records/Ghost Highway Recordings)

Jeff Dahl w,as born in Stuttgart, Germany in 1955 and then relocated to Hawaii in 1960. He moved to Los Angeles and the rest is SoCal punk rock history.

This most underrated singer-guitarist has released about 26 albums, serving time in the wonderful Angry Samoans and going on to play with with Cheetah Chrome (Dead Boys) ,members of The Germs and 45 Graves, and collaborating with Poison Idea. Not a bad rap sheet. He's now living back in Hawaii. 

Receiving Jeff's new album, "Electric Junk", I was very exited to hear some new tunes from this living legend. Let me tell you: It just rocks with those songwriting and guitar playing skills shining like a harsh Hawaiian sun.