Family MAN with your family WAYS with your... CHRISTMAS lights already up and... stuff...

cool as Fuck!! Rockin Rod Strychnine said:

I do like one thing by them when they teamed with Motorhead to do this Johnny Kidd and the Pirates cover, but this could have easily been done by the Pandoras, Brood, or Runaways as well.

girschool covered emergency.not black flag.As the black sabbath thing you are right.After some years they started playing sabbath style songs.This was the downfall. ratoonie said:

wow!!! dont evenknow whhat to say about that!

Giannis KRI said:

Yes i think i heard them covering emergency too.Probably they liked motorhead.But who doesn't?Maybe me,but joey ramone does.

Rockin Rod Strychnine said:

I do like one thing by them when they teamed with Motorhead to do this Johnny Kidd and the Pirates cover, but this could have easily been done by the Pandoras, Brood, or Runaways as well.

"Nervous Breakdown" is one of my favorite songs ever.

I'm still going, but I'm definitely a lot LESS enthused about this than I was originally. While there are a ton of great bands playing (and, hell, it's FREE), the thing is, you're not going to see most of them. Take the headliners at each venue as an example... you'll be able to catch one, but that might be it. No way you're going to be able to leave, say, King Khan and get in to see the Oblivians. It just ain't happenin'. Same w/ the Gories. Go to see them and then leave and try to get in at the Granada or Liberty Hall for one of the other shows? Good luck!

But even so, it's FREE, and I'm sure it'll be fun just to be hanging around downtown Larryville with all the garage freaks and bands and stuff. Should be pretty wild.

WOW!! Great lineup. Won't make it there but WOW!!!!!!!!!! kopper said:

Yeah, my wife and I used to live in Lawrence. I miss that town!

How did they handle the free admission thing last year in Portland? I'm just curious how they're going to make this work w/ free admission and a ton of bands all playing on the same day...

Alex Patton said:

God Damn! I went to last years in Portland and it was a real good time. Lawrence KS is a cool town too.

If anyone drifts into Lawrence a night early looking for something to do, The Replay is hosting a rockin' pre-party. Not that anyone here is into, y;know, going to rock shows or anything, heh heh.

here's mine: http://twitter.com/BeatleChick

http://twitter.com/brad0022

http://twitter.com/BabylonStreet

We're here... http://twitter.com/AcidFascists

TWITTERPATED!! http://twitter.com/LaDamaDemente

thanks Gunther Toody said:

Ask Jeff Jarema, he compiled and wrote the liner notes for both volumes (I think! The 1st for sure). He may be on facebook.

Ask Jeff Jarema, he compiled and wrote the liner notes for both volumes (I think! The 1st for sure). He may be on facebook.

Help! Does anybody have any info about a band called The Wanderin' Kind? They appear on the Best Of Dunwich Records Vol. 2. Did they ever put out a full-length album or anything? I absolutely love the track on the compilation & would love to hear more. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Just wanted to say hellow to everyone and introduce my radio show.

Gotta "remember the ladies"! Whether they are singing, playing an instrument, dancing, or just plain looking good, we all know that music would be dull without the female counterparts, and hell, sometimes it sure does "motivate" men. As humans, we can't resist the movement...

Hey Gunther, Cool that you got to see that notorious Pistols/Nervebreakers show. The issue has now been out for a few months. You can order it at www.ugly-things.com Cheers, Mike Gunther Toody said:

That is so cool that you are doing an article about the Nervebreakers. I used to see them all the time back in the day, including their infamous warm-up for the Sex Pistols and subsequent photos in ROLLING STONE of Barry Kooda and that fish. Guitarist Mike Haskins is one the coolest nicest guys ever...not to mention a great guitarist.
Also looking forward to the Jon Savage interview with Ray Davies!

Mike Stax said:

Thanks for the UGLY THINGS shout outs. I'll try to check in here more often. The new issue (#30!) will be out next week. It's a KINKS special including an extensive interview with Ray Davies by Jon Savage (done in '83/'84 but mostly unpublished before now). Also featured: the Masters Apprentices, the Hysterics, the Nervebreakers & more. Order it at www.ugly-things.com

That is so cool that you are doing an article about the Nervebreakers. I used to see them all the time back in the day, including their infamous warm-up for the Sex Pistols and subsequent photos in ROLLING STONE of Barry Kooda and that fish. Guitarist Mike Haskins is one the coolest nicest guys ever...not to mention a great guitarist. Also looking forward to the Jon Savage interview with Ray Davies! Mike Stax said:

Thanks for the UGLY THINGS shout outs. I'll try to check in here more often. The new issue (#30!) will be out next week. It's a KINKS special including an extensive interview with Ray Davies by Jon Savage (done in '83/'84 but mostly unpublished before now). Also featured: the Masters Apprentices, the Hysterics, the Nervebreakers & more. Order it at www.ugly-things.com

Just paypaled you for an ish.... Screamin' Danny Dodge said:

GET DORKED! Zine is my zine. you can order from:
http://www.myspace.com/GetDorked
or
http://getdorked.tumblr.com

Jeez.....either "Rocks Off" or their version of "Come On"

Stampy said:

Anything from 1964 to 1968. Once Brian Jones was sacked it wasn't the same!

Great interview/article!!

I can still remember when i first played that very first Barrence Whitfield and the Savages LP...BLEW ME AWAY!!! Absolutely nobody was doing anything even remotely like that at the time!!!

We didn't get to see Barrence until 1988 when he first came up to Canada....not quite the same, but still a CRAZY man on stage!! And a GREAT guy to hang out with too!! He was into all of the same crazy music that we were into!

It's great to hear that he's gonna be recording w/Peter Greenburg and Phil Lenker cause that was the ULTIMATE lineup of the band!! OW OW OW!!!

Barrence Whitfield, the R&B belter from Boston, reunited for the first time in 24 years with two of the original members of his band The Savages for three shows in New Mexico this weekend. I caught the one in Santa Fe last night and it was a pounder as MR. Kaiser would say.  Here's a phone interview I did with Barrence last week, with some photos I took last night.

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
September 17, 2010

When I heard that Barrence Whitfield & The Savages were coming to New Mexico, three words immediately came to mind:

“Ow! Ow! Ow!”

That particular exclamation has become something of a trademark for Boston soul shouter Whitfield. It is the name of one of his albums, and he often uses it to punctuate the messages from his Twitter account. But most important, you can hear him scream, “Ow! Ow! Ow!” when he really gets going onstage, pounding some song into submission.

Fans can expect to hear it more than once when Barrence and his band rip it up at Santa Fe Brewing Company on Friday, Sept. 17, and at Low Spirits Bar & Stage in Albuquerque on Saturday, Sept. 18. (They also played Taos Sept. 16.)

His New Mexico shows represent the first time in nearly a quarter century that Whitfield will play with original Savages guitarist Peter Greenfield (now a Taos resident and guitarist for a garage band called Manby’s Head) and bassist Phil Lenker.

Back in the early 1980s, Whitfield and his Savages were known as one of the wildest acts ever to hit the East Coast. Whitfield’s music draws upon the unfettered rock and R &B of the ’50s — think of an endomorphic Little Richard — even more than the sweaty Southern soul of the ’60s.” According to the All-Music Guide, “Whitfield was a dervish onstage, working himself into such a frenzy of screaming and running around that he would occasionally black out.”

Whitfield verified that in a recent telephone interview. “Some nights my clothes would get ripped to shreds,” he said. “I blacked out a few times. In Baltimore one time I was trying to run up the walls in this club. I ended up kicking a hole in the wall.”

Ow! Ow! Ow!

“Afterward, the manager came up, and I thought he was going to tell me we couldn’t play there anymore. But he handed me a pen and asked me to sign the wall where I’d kicked the hole.”

Whitfield was born in Jacksonville, Florida, and moved to New Jersey when he was about 3. His birth
certificate gives his name as Barry White, but when he began performing, he took the name  Barrence Whitfield to avoid confusion with the ’70s soul giant.

Like so many American kids in the ’60s, he listened to AM radio. “It was a great thing that they played so much variety back then,” he recalled. “You’d hear Frank Sinatra, James Brown, Paul Mauriat (“Love Is Blue”) —
all on the same station. Now everything is so controlled.”

The first 45 rpm record he bought was “I’m Losing You” by The Temptations. His first album, he said, was something by Paul Revere & The Raiders. But his first band, he said, was a Funkadelic tribute band called Funkasonics. Whitfield, in high school at the time, played the drums.

He moved to Boston in the late ’70s and set out to study journalism at Boston University. But he got a job at a record store and soon fell in with a crazy crowd of rock ’n’ rollers. “A friend of mine had heard me singing, harmonizing with records we played in the store. He said, ‘A friend of mine is looking for a black rock ’n’ roll singer.’So I met Peter [Greenberg].”

Greenberg had been the guitarist for Lyres, a Boston neo-garage group that is still in business today, as well as Lyres’ precursor, the punk band DMZ. “He asked if I could sing like Little Richard and Esquerita,” Whitfield said. “I said, ‘Who’s Esquerita?’ ” (Answer: Esquerita was the stage name for R & B maniac Eskew Reeder Jr., who some say was a big influence on Little Richard.)

Whitfield credits Greenberg with giving him an education in a musical form that is a huge influence in his music: rockabilly. “I didn’t listen to it much before I met Peter,” he said. “Oh, I knew Jerry Lee Lewis and some others. But Peter made me listen to a lot of old rockabilly like ‘Wild Hog Hop’ by Bennie Hess.” Whitfield then imitated Hess’ hog snorts that grace the song.

Thus were born The Savages. They burned it up with obscure songs like “Mama Get the Hammer,” “Bloody Mary,” “Whistle Bait,” and “Georgia Slop.”

The original Savages had broken up by the mid-’80s, after Greenfield decided to go back to school and study environmental engineering.

Whitfield kept the band’s name for a few more albums.

In the early ’90s, he decided to stretch musically —to show that he wasn’t just a crazy guy who could shout like Little Richard and James Brown. He wanted to make a country album. A friend introduced him to singer-songwriter Tom Russell, who collaborated with Whitfield on two records.

“When we were recording the first one, I realized it wasn’t really country music anymore,” he said. “I said it was turning into something else like voodoo. And Tom said, ‘Hillbilly voodoo.’ ” Hillbilly Voodoo became the name of the album, and Whitfield said it’s still one of his favorites.

But R & B and soul are in Whitfield’s blood, and he’s still making some fine records, such as last year’s Raw, Raw, Rough! And he, Greenberg, and Lenker have booked time later this year in a Cincinnati studio to do a new Savages album. The band’s first album, with a bunch of added live tracks, is soon scheduled for rerelease.

“I really think this is the start of something great,” he said of his renewed partnership with Greenberg. “And it’s starting in New Mexico, of all places.”