Performance History | The Che Underground

Sonic Love Affair: “The Dirty Kids”

January 1, 2011September 14, 2008 by admin

(Che Underground prodigy-turned-full-grown rocker Dylan Rogers tells the San Diego story behind the music.)

Unlike most people on this blog, I will be starting from the end, not the beginning.

Sonic Love Affair recorded “The Dirty Kids” summer of 2006 at Wally Sound in Oakland, California. This is one of the 12 songs recorded for a second album, which was not released. Soon after the band split.

Rob Alper (guitar); Curtis Franklin (guitar); Jerry Fiore (drums); Rudge (bass); Dylan Rogers (vocals). Produced by Wally.

I had written these lyrics about eight years earlier in my apartment in Brooklyn, New York, only to toss them aside for years.

I had been thinking a lot about my childhood in the neighborhood of Ocean Beach. I was not just thinking about myself but all the kids who grew up in O.B. Kids who led a fast-paced life at very young ages, dealing with adult situations and too young to cope.

Three Dog day afternoons

January 1, 2011September 13, 2008 by admin

Courtesy of Rockin’ Dogs drummer and band archivist Cole Smithey, here’s a collection of photographs from the band’s last phase, when it became a trio with the departure of founding guitarist/vocalist Dave Ellison.

In addition to Cole, these pictures from late 1984 and early 1985 feature Sam Wilson (guitar, vocals) and Jane Bunting (bass, vocals).

“I’m with the band.”

April 23, 2012September 12, 2008 by admin

Time for belated public acknowledgment of people who aided and abetted those of us on stage.

I’d suggest that performing with a band required a mix of artistic impulse, personal ambition, exhibitionism, a desire for recognition and a need for affirmation. (Your mileage may vary on which traits were dominant.) Most of us had a major assist from folks who didn’t seem to need the limelight so desperately but were there for us: other kids who were known as roadies; managers; girlfriends (and boyfriends); or never had an “official” label but still exerted tremendous influence.

Who carried your amp and fixed your strings? Who drew your flyers? Who second-guessed the sound man and argued with the promoter? Who stood down front on an empty dance floor when everyone else huddled 40 feet back?

Let’s give credit where credit is overdue!

Noise 292: “Mr. Pumpkin”

January 1, 2011September 11, 2008 by admin

Here’s a late but significant contribution to the Noise 292 set list. “Mr. Pumpkin” by guitarist David Rives appeared on a four-song demo we recorded at Mira Costa College, I believe in April 1984.

The driving metalwork percussion is classic Wendell Kling, and I’m under the distinct impression that the drums on this session were generously contributed by the multitalented Sergio of Hair Theatre. Dave sings lead, and I’m on bass.

Listen to it now!

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!!!

The Gravedigger V in flyers

January 1, 2011September 8, 2008 by admin

Another Che Underground archivist joins the ranks, as dancing fool-turned-Spain-based sail stitcher Tom Goddard weighs in with a disc of fabulous flyers and photos from the Tell-Tale Hearts, the Morlocks and more.

Today’s installment marks the first flyers in our collection from the Gravedigger V, the short-lived but hugely influential group who tore it up in 1984, recorded one great album and presaged the Morlocks. (I like the flyer dedicated to Tom’s sister Suzie by GDV drummer Dave “Peter Criss” Anderson, who also created both flyers.)

The Tell-Tale Hearts: Go east, young men!

January 1, 2011September 6, 2008 by admin

(Ray Brandes’ account of their Midwest tour, undertaken in January of 1985, originally appeared on the liner notes to the Tell-Tale Hearts’ “Live Volume II: Later That Same Night in Springfield” album, released with Volume I in 1997 on Corduroy Records, Australia.)

“Mad” Jon McKinney, tour promoter extraordinaire and proprietor of the Primitive A–Go-Go, Springfield, Missouri’s, first- and last-ever sixties garage-punk nightclub, had a dream: to turn Downtown Springfield into Swinging London. He called, and we answered.

Though I had long ago learned the secret of keeping my expectations low in order to always be pleasantly surprised, I must admit that my first real journey beyond the confines of California (which began ominously with the rear-view mirror vision of my sleeping bag flying away from the luggage rack somewhere near Gila Bend, Arizona), tested the limits of the depths to which those expectations could sink. In January of 1985, in the midst of one of the worst winter storms on record, a rented Dodge Caravan containing little more than two guitars, a Vox Continental organ, several harmonicas, a few broken maracas, a tambourine and five young travelers made its way east towards its destination: the mythical Midwestern city of Springfield, Missouri.

The Answers: “Annual”

January 21, 2018September 2, 2008 by admin

(Answers guitarist/vocalist Dave Fleminger discusses the genesis of another crucial track made more poignant by the years.)

The Answers, “Annual,” recorded at Ewing’s SoundTech studios, one of 13 songs recorded one day in February 1983.

I originally wrote this song in advance of receiving my high-school annual. Even before I got the book I didn’t want to read it … I was already trying to form a picture of how my connections with my friends and classmates would last over time and how I would view that period of my life in retrospect … And now in retrospect, I see this more as a way to disassociate rather than feel and experience the process.

Hair Theatre: “Rolling Soul”

June 30, 2009August 31, 2008 by admin

From the same 1983 Lab Studios demo that brought us “Nightfall,” here’s Hair Theatre performing “Rolling Soul,” another signature number and staple of the band’s early-’80s repertoire. This track showcases the clean confidence of Hair Theatre’s early years and highlights the sophistication and charisma that vocalist/ songwriter Sergio demonstrated by age 18.

It also commemorates the collaborative skills of Sergio and Answers co-founder Dave Fleminger (demonstrated elsewhere with a recording of Sergio’s “He’s Calling You Tonight.”) “Sergio and I wrote that song one afternoon at [original Hair Theatre drummer Howard Palmer’s Carlsbad] shack,” Fleminger recalls. “The song was part of the expanded ‘3 Daves’ Answers sets, including our ‘Painted Sun’ gig opening for the Unclaimed at the UCSD Rec Gym” April 14, 1984.

Read moreHair Theatre: “Rolling Soul”

The Rockin’ Dogs: “Bye Bye Bye”

January 1, 2011August 26, 2008 by admin

“OK, now we’re diggin’ into the archives!” writes Rockin’ Dog Dave Ellison of “Bye Bye Bye,” the latest stellar Dogs single and earliest Dogs recording to join our hit parade.

“This is from the historic Rockin’ Dogs San Marcos Sessions, featuring the earlier lineup of Sam Wilson on guitar/vocals; Dave Ellison on bass/vocals; Jim Meisland on guitar; and Scott Nichols (a k a Scott Slob) on drums.

“In 1982, we had a rented practice room in a metal building in San Marcos, which was owned by Vietnam vet auto mechanics. They used to work on cars in that building all night long. We used to practice until late at night, and they gradually grew tired of our racket and evicted us.