Wallflowers | The Che Underground

UETA and the Beathogs: Live at Underground Express at Dass, Nairobi

January 1, 2011April 5, 2009 by admin

(Wallflower Dave Rinck files an update from Africa.)

March 19 the Underground Express rolled on at Dass in Nairobi. We had a particularly awesome night out, largely due to a rare visit from my own very favorite Kenyan rock band, UETA.

Consisting of three brothers and a cousin, UETA is one of the hardest-rocking bands on the local scene. They mixed heavy metal with a mini-set of acoustic numbers to create a really dynamic show that left the audience (literally) screaming for more.

Son of Che: Underground Express at Dass, Nairobi

January 1, 2011February 19, 2009 by admin

(Peripatetic Wallflower Dave Rinck extends the Che Underground to East Africa.)

Somebody called me on the phone … They said, “Hey! Is David home?” It was Gilbert Barthe, lead guitarist of my current band the Beathogs. “We’re all down at Dass. You wanna come down and play a show in about 45 minutes?” Well, sure, I thought. Why not? I was always under the impression that Dass was just this sort of funky Ethiopian restaurant located on the second floor of a grim concrete building on this crazy street of bars in Westlands (a part of Nairobi near where I live). But anyway, I was at this lame party, kinda bored, so I though well what the hell … it’d be more fun than staying here. So I grabbed my guitar and headed on down.

Next thing you know, I found myself climbing this narrow cement staircase up to the second floor of this dusty old building. I knew the place on the first floor was Havanas, a nightclub and restaurant that a friend of mine named Zelalem deejays at, attracting huge unruly mobs some nights that spill off the sidewalk out front and into the street until all hours. I myself had frequently held court over plates of fish almondine on linen tablecloths and huge carafes of wine in the backrooms of that place well after midnight. But I’d never made the haul up to the second floor. Well, that was all about to change …

A message from the Wallflowers

January 1, 2011February 2, 2009 by admin

As the Titans of the Che Underground suit up for their 25-year reunion at Che Games for May (May 29-31, 2009, in San Diego), vocalist Dave Rinck and bassist Paul Howland of San Diego’s original Wallflowers took time out to videotape their personal invitations to the event.

Be sure to catch the Wallflowers along with the Answers; the Gay Dennys (featuring members of the Tell-Tale Hearts and the Crawdaddys); Hair Theatre; Manual Scan; and Noise 292 at the Casbah May 30, 2009!

Got Che? Check out David Rinck, Dave Fleminger and Paul Kaufman’s musical promo!

RIP: The legendary Ron Asheton

December 13, 2017January 7, 2009 by admin

(Wallflower David Rinck remembers the man who pulled the Stooges’ strings.)

Everyone who grew up rocking to “T.V. Eye” and “No Fun” should pause for a moment of silence tonight: Legendary Stooges guitarist Ron Asheton was found dead in his Ann Arbor home. Another sad day for underground music. This guy was seriously one of its real giants, possibly the greatest underground guitarist of all time…

Okay, on second thought, forget the silence! Silence and Ronny Asheton do not go together. Instead, throw that dog-eared old copy of the first Stooges album on and reverently play “1969” with the volume turned up to 11!!! I think that’s way he’d want to be remembered.

This We Dug: Johnny Thunders

March 29, 2019December 26, 2008 by admin

(In this installment, Wallflowers vocalist Dave Rinck puts his arms around a memory.)

Last Saturday night, Dave Ellison and I took our wives out for dinner and a show in Los Angeles. We had a great time, and what a show it was!

Well, first there was some sort of ridiculous country/New Wave band that sucked. I don’t know why they let these guys in the door. They were called Cracker or something. They had some stupid song about taking skinheads bowling. I mean, why should I have to hear about that?

Anyway, the headlining bands were X and the New York Dolls. Obviously X was great. I mean, wow: Billy Zoom has become such a guitar virtuoso, really like a sort of punk rock Chuck Berry. Has anyone here noticed that Gretsch is releasing a re-issue of the amazing Billy Zoom Sparkle Jet guitar? BTW some guy is running an online petition to get X into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Please go and sign it — it would be so cool to see a real authentic underground band like this get in.

Ché Games for May: Musical Promo 2

December 13, 2017December 22, 2008 by Paul Kaufman

(Once again, Manual Scan/Lemons Are Yellow veterans Paul Kaufman and David Fleminger bang the gong to promote the Ché reunion. Except this time, they get some help from a very special guest.)

Last week, the planets aligned — I was in San Francisco, visiting Dave Fleminger at his house; this led to the first musical promo for the reunion in May 2009 that was posted recently. Little did we know that our musical universe was about to explode.

Someone was calling on the phone. A voice said, “Is Dave Fleminger at home?” It was Dave Rinck, the iconic lead singer of the Wallflowers, visiting from Nairobi. Soon we’re all in the studio, and here’s the result. Considering the last time I had seen Dave Rinck in person was when he was onstage in 1984, this was an especially big thrill for me.

Ché Games for May: Musical Promo

December 17, 2017December 16, 2008 by Paul Kaufman

(Manual Scan/Lemons Are Yellow veterans Paul Kaufman and Dave Fleminger put the jangle in the world’s first Che Underground jingle!)

Hey Ché fans, Dave Fleminger and myself have put together a little musical promo for our much-anticipated reunion at the end of May at the Casbah in San Diego.

Here are the lyrics, so you can sing along at home:

All you Rockin’ Dogs on the blog,
Meet us there.
The Wallflowers still have raw power!
You can see them there!

The Wallflowers: “TV Eye”

December 31, 2010December 4, 2008 by admin

The night I met the Wallflowers, the Stooges’ “TV Eye” was playing on the stereo. I know it was the summer of 1983, when I met so many of you, and I believe my introduction was brokered via Rockin’ Dog Dave Ellison.

That moment forged a lasting connection in my mind between the Wallflowers and the Stooges, an impression that was reified by the Wallflowers’ blistering interpretations of the older band’s oeuvre — including “TV Eye,” presented here in all its synapse-rattling glory.

Per vocalist Dave Rinck, “‘Walldrugs’ and ‘TV Eye’ were recorded in a ‘studio’ at Music Power; ‘Raw Power’ was, too, but not until a little later than the other two.”

This We Dug: Iggy Pop

December 11, 2017October 3, 2008 by admin

(Wallflower Dave Rinck explains how an Iguana bested the Lizard King.)

Look, let’s talk about five words that loom large in the history of the Che Underground … Or OK, well … To be more precise, five words that loom enormous in the history of all underground: Iggy Pop and the Stooges.

I guess everyone knows this story, but it apparently goes something like this: Sometime in the late ’60s (as the legend goes), in some gritty-poor Detroit neighborhood, a bunch of really bad-ass white-trash dudes left their trailer-park homes one night and went down to the University of Michigan gym and caught a show by the Doors, who happened to be on tour at the time.

Well, as fate would have it, Jim Morrison was drunk, and most of the crowd didn’t get it, and they ended up pissing him off, and he ended up getting into a bit of a shouting match with the audience, and you know how those college jocks are. But apparently one guy in the audience did get it — one of those trailer-park bad asses — an upstart little punk by the name of James Osterberg.

Then and now: Rock Palace

December 14, 2017September 9, 2008 by admin

(Roving correspondent/photographer Kristen Tobiason surveys the remains of Rock Palace, which enjoyed a brief mid-’80s run of all-ages fun. “The stretch of El Cajon Boulevard sandwiched between I-805 and the I-15 is a desert of boarded-up, abandoned buildings dotted with a few small neighborhood repair shops or used-car lots. The Rock Palace structure has been dead since the ’80s, when completion of I-15 isolated the neighborhood.” Wallflowers frontman Dave Rinck recalls its heyday.)

Someone, somehow, sometime about 1984 or 1985 discovered what must have been an old ballroom above some dingy retail shops on El Cajon Boulevard. [Editor’s note: Contemporary flyers tell us the address was 3465 El Cajon Blvd.] In its day, it must have been a grand olde place, for it had a really high ceiling; wonderful wooden floors; and this really huge, creaky old stage at one end.

Detail: Rock Palace exterior, early ’80s (collection Jeff Benet) And what? Yes, we also noticed that a couple of guys were starting to promote rock-‘n’-roll concerts there in that grand old ballroom. Dubious? Yes, it reeked of money laundering. Manuel Noriega, the Cali Cartel, some Burmese generals, and the Taliban were probably running the place jointly. Of course before you could say “Lose sleep, baby, and stay away from bed,” these dudes had demo tapes of various Che Underground bands in their hot little hands, and the era of the Rock Palace was on!!!