Reviving San Diego's Rock Renaissance
First fruits of the Che Underground Rock-‘n’-Roll Weekend: Days after we posted about a video featuring “Prison Walls” from the Injections’ seminal 1980 single, the DaveFest Four put its own spin on the song at Lestat’s Coffee House on San Diego’s Adams Ave.
Dave Fleminger, who provides vocals and guitar on the track, describes the inspiration for the DaveFest Four’s version of “Prison Walls”:
You asked for it, you got it: “Then and Now” reporter and Che Underground veteran Kristen Tobiason has obliged us with downloadable PDF versions of the flyers she prepped for the Che Underground Rock-‘n’-Roll Weekend July 30 and 31!
Just click on the thumbnails below for pure, print-ready chewing satisfaction:
Here’s a recap of the weekend’s haps:
(Charisse Sciuva and Dave Rinck describe hot times at Lestat’s Coffee House. The featured act: a warm-up for the Che Underground Rock-‘n’-Roll Weekend July 30-31 and a Che Underground supergroup that will feature San Diego music legends Dave Doyle, Dave Fleminger, Dave Klowden and Dave Rinck.)
On July 19, the DaveFest Four (actually two, Dave Rinck and Dave Fleminger, plus an “honorary Dave” — Lou Damian on harmonica), shut down a packed house at Lestat’s Coffee House on San Diego’s Adams Ave. after just two acts. The occasion was the second weekly night of the Monday night warm-ups at Lestat’s, the venue for Night One of the upcoming Che Underground Rock-‘n’-Roll Weekend on July 30 and 31. Due to an unplanned event that could be called a “mishap” by some, their performance set the standard for what is certainly going to be the event of the year!
Why “DaveFest Four”? Read Patrick Works’ history of Dave Fest!
After an intro by the master of ceremonies, the DaveFest combo took the stage in what was truly a Che Underground moment. Upon pulling in, a painfully loud intermittent reverb-laced blast was heard!
It’s not just for bands any more: The pending Che Underground Rock-‘n’-Roll Weekend will also celebrate two photographers whose work has captured San Diego music for decades.
The first night of the event — Friday, July 30, at Lestat’s Coffee House in San Diego — will feature a joint exhibit of concert photos by Dave Doyle and Sean McMullen. I caught up with each of them to learn a bit more about their respective photographic visions and how San Diego has shaped them.
(David Rinck cuts the ribbon on a late-July musical extravaganza in San Diego!)
How could we let a year go by since the Che Games for May? It is high time to do it again!
Ladies and gentlemen, fasten your seatbelts and get ready to experience the Che Underground Rock-‘n’-Roll Weekend. Here’s what we have in store for you:
Friday, July 30, at Lestat’s Coffee House (3343 Adams Avenue; $10; doors open at 9pm)
Plus a photo retrospective of San Diego Underground Rock ‘n’ Roll by Dave Doyle and Sean McMullen.
Saturday, July 31, at Bar Pink (3829 30th St.; free; doors open at 9pm)
Plus, dubstep deejaying by the P Man
(In which Clairemont High School alum Dave Fleminger strikes rock ‘n’ roll in a back issue of his alma mater’s paper.)
January 1981: Imagine the trepidation felt by young Clairemont High news reporter Alan Graham about this front-page assignment.
He has been given the responsibility of unveiling the “punk-rock lifestyle” in the pages of the Arrow, the school paper. To do so he will be interviewing Clairemont High School’s best-known proponent of the movement, Wendy “Pyro” Gaines. Perhaps he could have also gone undercover, like Cameron Crowe had done at Clairemont High a couple years earlier, but that could have gotten a little rough, and Wendy has graciously granted Alan an opportunity to stay within familiar CHS territory and still learn about a mysterious group whose meeting place (?) was at a Lions’ lodge in far-off North Park.
Going into the final stretch before next Saturday’s Che Underground showcase at the Casbah, here’s a handsome commemorative flyer created by David Klowden, suitable for framing or Scotch taping!
The roster of special guests is growing, as San Diego music history is revisited and made on Saturday night.
To recap the lineup so far:
Cooler and cooler: As if the Town Criers, Manual Scan and the Blues Gangsters weren’t enough to fill out the next Che Underground showcase at the Casbah, San Diego’s legendary Unknowns have joined the bill as special guests!
Guitarist Mark Neill, bassist Dave Doyle and drummer Craig Packham will round out the evening with a short set, their first gig in more than five years. If I had any question about getting my plane ticket’s worth, this answers it definitively. Don’t miss it!
Read moreThe Unknowns join the show!
Jan. 30 at San Diego’s Casbah
Courtesy of Mikel Toombs, here’s a joint artifact of two hugely influential forces in San Diego music: an interview of the Unknowns that Dan McLain conducted for Issue III of his Hobogue ‘zine, dated February 1982.
“I interviewed the Unknowns 2 years ago for Snare magazine,” McLain writes. “In retrospect, I found our previous outing so incomplete that I simply had to do it over again.
Che Underground archivists are frankly embarrassed by the riches rendered from the Che Games for May festival May 29-30 at San Diego’s Casbah. Twenty-five years or more later, the shows offered a great opportunity to showcase beloved material — and capture it with 21st-century technology.
While few early-’80s performances have survived, this event was immortalized from every angle with digital audio, video and photography; our biggest challenge now is to collate and edit this wealth of material.
In other words: I hardly know where to start!
I’m proud to get the photographic ball rolling with the camera work of Unknowns bassist/ photographic powerhouse Dave Doyle, who took some beautiful shots of the Mirrors, the original San Diego Wallflowers, Noise 292 and Hair Theatre on the second evening of the show. (Stay tuned for a gallery of Friday night’s superstars: Everybody Violet, Manual Scan, the Gay Dennys and the Answers!)