Che Underground: The Blog

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”

How I spent my summer vacation

January 1, 2011August 29, 2008 by admin

OK, here’s a seasonal palate-cleanser to help connect the dots between then and now: A while back, I asked what the you of 1983 would have to say about the you of 2008 if you could meet. As we close in on Labor Day, what would You 1983 think of the way you spent summer 2008?

Thanks to abundant free-lance opportunities, I was able to enjoy real summer flex time for the first time since I started working office jobs 20 years ago. We explored New York neighborhood by neighborhood and capped off the summer with a trip to the Smoky Mountains in Tennessee, home of Dollywood. (My younger self would appreciate the urban cool of the former and the camp appeal of the latter, but he’d be amused at the planning it takes to orchestrate forays for a family of four. Don’t you just, like, get in the car? And if he could hear me scolding the kids, he’d probably want to kick me.)

Your turn: We want to know what you did this summer!

Rolling with the Nashville Ramblers

March 27, 2019August 28, 2008 by admin

(Gravedigger V/Nashville Ramblers bass player Tom Ward peruses the Cyndie Jaynes Photo Collection for stories behind the photos.)

Among Cyndie Jaynes’ photos, I recognize a subset of black-and-white images from the Cavern Club, Hollywood, in 1985. My old band the Nashville Ramblers is featured in the pictures. These particular photos show us in our earliest phase.

The lead photo of the subset captures a once-ever moment: [guitarist/vocalist] Carl Rusk and me onstage with Claudia Brandes. She made a guest appearance with us to sing—as best Carl, [drummer/vocalist] Ron Silva and I can recall—a cover of Manfred Mann’s 1964 pop hit, “Do Wah Diddy.”

The equipment we are using is our 1985 gear, and you can just barely see a Vox Essex amplifier peeking out of the photo. Carl is using the first of several Hagstrom guitars that he would employ, a pale blue one that may have come from or gone to Ron Silva. My bass here is a 1966 Framus Star bass.

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.

Opening Kings Road Cafe

January 1, 2011August 25, 2008 by admin

Jason Seibert’s generous donation of early-’80s San Diego flyers offers a prime opportunity to open discussion of the Kings Road Cafe (née the International Blend), a small venue that played an enormous role in fostering and showcasing an eclectic mix of bands.

The Seibert Collection represents a slice of life at Kings Road in the summer of 1982, starting in June when the club morphed from the I-Blend under the management of Peter “English” Verbrugge. Other artifacts, including a July 1982 calendar (with membership card offer!), highlight the variety of performers that visited 4034 30th St. that summer, both San Diego regulars and up-and-coming out-of-towners.

Dubstep and grime in San Diego

March 29, 2019August 25, 2008 by Paul.Howland

(Wallflowers bassist Paul Howland extends an invitation to experience his current avocation.)

Matthew Rothenberg keeps encouraging me to talk about new music on here, so here goes:

Anyone in SD even mildly curious about dubstep and grime should check out MRK1 at the Kava Lounge this week. Read more here. See you there.

P.S. if you do make it down, hit me up for one of my mix CDs.

— Paul Howland

The Jam at Perkins Palace

December 13, 2017August 23, 2008 by admin

(San Diego mod pioneer Dean Curtis recalls the impact of this seminal band’s 1982 California visit.)

It was in the spring of 1982 when I realized the Southern California mod scene was growing by leaps and bounds. Many of us in San Diego made the day-long trek up Highway 1 to see The Jam at Perkins Palace in Pasadena. Few of us had highway-legal scooters (mine was a 125cc Lambretta), so we had to take the scenic route along the beaches. We were harassed a bit by the Marines in Camp Pendleton for not wearing proper footwear for motorcycle riding, but they eventually let us through.

Our asses were aching by the time we got to Long Beach, and the drive along PCH through all the South Bay beach towns seemed endless. But it was all worth it, as we showed up at the theater the next day on a rumor and got to see the band run through their sound check.

Then and now: Adams Avenue Theater

April 14, 2012August 21, 2008 by admin

(Roving correspondent/ photographer Kristen Tobiason revisits and documents the scenes of our youth. Today, the Adams Avenue Theater meets “Project Runway”!)

No one could have imagined that this hallmark of our glory days, the Adams Avenue Theater (3325 Adams Ave.), would metamorphose into something so random as Discount Fabrics. I don’t think it’s as humiliating as it is simply bizarre.

The humiliation occurred in the late ’80s, during the venue’s brief reincarnation as the Purple Rain Club. The transforming of a theater into a fabric store has a thread of irony that keeps San Diego “weird.” Frankly, I prefer it to the gentrification that has sucked the charm out of other neighborhoods.

Discount Fabrics never remodeled. Outside of the merchandise, everything looks the same as it did. A quarter-century later, there is still a reflection of the building’s punk-rock roots. Shadows still linger, and I can imagine an entryway streaked with the scuff of Doc Martens and cigarette butts; blood, sweat and spit in the hall; the pit, a cluster of motion, like hornets, swinging fists and bodies, a stage bomb, a swan dive from the balcony …

“Tourist, go home!”

January 1, 2011August 20, 2008 by admin

Detail: San Diego population growth chart I heard that a lot when I moved to Leucadia from Milwaukee in 1976 to start seventh grade. (I was born in Manhattan, lived in upstate NY for third and fourth grades, then moved to Wisconsin for fifth and sixth; the license plates on our VW station wagon advertised our status as new arrivals.)

I got a later start in SoCal than many of you, but I know I’m not the only transplant among our ranks. In fact, I believe our social scene was created in large part by the influx of young families that arrived in San Diego County in the ’60s and ’70s, literally reshaping the sprawling landscape and introducing a booster shot of youngsters to the region just as the nation’s post-war baby boom was giving way to Generation X.

Those all-ages clubs opened their doors to us for a reason, and our suburban anomie was prime territory for “Lord of the Flies”-style social experiments.