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

Picked up the first issue of Bananas Magazine at Academy a couple of months ago. Dug it, hope they press more issues soon. http://www.facebook.com/#!/bananasmagazine?ref=ts

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.”

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

http://twitter.com/eddiesmith1960 ifs the link kopper, i believe i'm already following you

Stampy said:

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

I liked the early Stones. My favorite is probably, "Get Off of My Cloud" "Gimme Shelter" and "Can't You Hear Me Knockin'" Pretty good too, tho, I have never really been a Stones Fan or even The Who for that matter. Played out.

I dig so many bands on here, but all in one day at 4 venues is kind of ridiculous. Been to some of the Scion events in Brooklyn and even that seemed a tad disorganized... the staff didn't really seem to know what they were doing. I'm a crotchety old lady though. Grab some of those Scion socks if they have them, they're good socks.

The Jackpot's tiny, smaller than the Bottleneck. If anyone wants to see the Gories you will have to camp there well before hand no matter what the attendance is like or what it was like last year in Portland. Anyway, it will be fun, can't wait! kopper said:

Yeah, man... it's the same as Off Broadway here in St. Louis. That's actually an all-ages venue, too, but they only promote shows there as 18 & up, mainly to keep it from getting overcrowded with kids. But if you ever wanted to go see a show there and take your son, you'd be able to get him in.

Recordgrooves said:

Scion website now says that the Jackpot is all ages, didn't it use to state that it was 18+up before?

http://www.scion.com/garagefest/index.html

Anyone know whats up with that?

Yeah, man... it's the same as Off Broadway here in St. Louis. That's actually an all-ages venue, too, but they only promote shows there as 18 & up, mainly to keep it from getting overcrowded with kids. But if you ever wanted to go see a show there and take your son, you'd be able to get him in. Recordgrooves said:

Scion website now says that the Jackpot is all ages, didn't it use to state that it was 18+up before?

http://www.scion.com/garagefest/index.html

Anyone know whats up with that?

Man, good question! Anyone know how easy it will be to navigate from one venue to the other? Will there be long lines for each all night? I'd just hate to leave one venue, expecting to go see another band at one of the others, only to get stuck in line and miss half the set. Know what I'm sayin'? So it'd be cool to hear from anyone who saw last year's fest in Portland to get an idea of how to attempt this without missing too much action.

What will be your picks?

LIBERTY HALL
(644 Massachusetts St., All Ages)
4:00 - 4:40pm Rooftop Vigilantes
5:00 - 5:40pm Gentleman Jesse and His Men
6:00 - 6:45pm Times New Viking
7:15 - 8:00pm Best Coast
8:30 - 9:15pm The Ponys
9:45 - 10:30pm The Greenhornes
11:00 - 12:00pm The Raveonettes

GRANADA THEATRE
(1020 Massachusetts St., All Ages)
4:40 - 5:10pm Natural Child
5:30 - 6:00pm Garotas Suecas
6:20 - 7:00pm Cloud Nothings
7:30 - 8:10pm Digital Leather
8:40 - 9:25pm Hunx and His Punx
9:55 - 10:50pm The Clean
11:30 - 12:30pm The Oblivians

THE BOTTLENECK
(737 New Hampshire St., All Ages)
4:30 - 5:00pm Bad Sports
5:20 - 5:50pm Nodzzz
6:10 - 6:40pm Gaye Blades
7:00 - 7:40pm The Lamps
8:00 - 8:45pm Tyvek
9:15 - 10:00pm Thee Oh Sees
10:30 - 11:30pm King Khan & The Shrines (featuring Gino Washington)

JACKPOT MUSIC HALL
(943 Massachusetts St., 18+)
4:20 - 4:50pm Sex Beet
5:10 - 5:40pm White Wires
6:00 - 6:30pm Teenanger
6:50 - 7:30pm Cola Freaks
7:50 - 8:30pm Human Eye
9:00 - 9:30pm Happy Birthday
10:00 - 11:00pm The Gories

It doesn't matter, basically ABC can inspect bars at any time so it's no big thing for a bar to have 18 and over shows one night and be 21 and over on another. They will check your id at the door and if you're not 21 then they will put an additional bracelet on you so that the bartenders and wait staff won't serve you. Jackpot is a hole in the wall, but I love it anyway, tin ceiling, velvet wall paper and all. So, be sure to stop by, the bar keeps are awesome, especially if you tip high on the first round. Recordgrooves said:

Scion website now says that the Jackpot is all ages, didn't it use to state that it was 18+up before?
http://www.scion.com/garagefest/index.html Anyone know whats up with that?

Scion website now says that the Jackpot is all ages, didn't it use to state that it was 18+up before? http://www.scion.com/garagefest/index.html Anyone know whats up with that?

Hey everyone, just picked up my wristbands, and the schedule, which should be updated on the website by now. FYI when driving into Lawrence on I70 please be aware that the Lawrence east exit is closed from both the east and the west. Use the Lawrence west exit, or the Lawrence/Lecompton exit. I recommend using the west exit. If you are driving in on I70 from the west and you miss the Lawrence west exit then hello Kansas City!
For those of you driving in on I70 from the east: due to construction I70 goes down to one lane each way shortly after Bonner Springs in addition to the east exit being closed.
Well, this will probably mean nothing to everyone save Kopper, but at least I tried. Most important thing: if your directions have you getting off at the east exit get new directions from I70 getting off at the Lawrence west exit instead.

Not to be too hard on the interviewer but his questions remind me of the Chris Farley interview sketches. "Remember when you did that thing? It was awesome." Great point, too - Heavens To...is the best place to start

Doc Sanchez said:

SCxMS said:

You should track down the interview with Phoning It In. It is awkward and brilliant equally.

Yeah, indeed the Phoning it in session is great. I like how the interviewer seems to drift off all the time, and Billy asking "Are you still there?" Here's the link: http://phoningitin.net/shows/73-Billy-Childish What do you guys think about the Vermin Poets, Childish's new band? And John, if you like Billy Childish, you definitely should check out Armitage Shanks!

SCxMS said:

You should track down the interview with Phoning It In. It is awkward and brilliant equally.

Also, Thee Headcoates "Heavens to Murgatroyd" LP is pretty awesome. Alex said:

You pretty much can't go wrong with any Childish record. I love every record I have so far, and definitely need more. I have:

Thee Headcoats- Beach Bums Must Die
Thee Headcoats- Earls of Suavedom
Thee Mighty Caesars- Thusly, Thee Might Caesars
Wild Billy Childish and the MBE's- Thatcher's Children
Wild Billy Childish and the MBE's- It Should Be Me b/w Loray Head 7"
Wild Billy Childish and the MBE's- Daddy Rolling Stone 12"
The Pop Rivets- Fun in the UK

The Chatham singers and The Singing Loins- At The Bridge.

You should track down the interview with Phoning It In. It is awkward and brilliant equally.

Shirts Off with Armitage Shanks beautifully captures to demeanour of the average resident of the medway towns, they remain basically as thuggish as that to this day.

my favorite tune is probably The Chatham Singers - the man with the gallows eyes

YES!!! Michael Kaiser said:

Gadzooks, all of them!

One of my best long time friends, being a big fan, introduced me to the music of Billy Childish many years ago. We have been in several bands together and covered several BC songs that I think are outstanding. In "Hippie Repellent" we have played "The Man With Eyes Like Little Fishes" and "Want Me - Win Me" both from Thee Headcoats - In Tweed We Trust, The Spoken Voice (Pop Rivets), Pussy Whipped (Thee Mighty Caesars - Caesars Remains) and probably a few others that I've forgotten about.

I'm also lucky enough to be playing rhythm guitar for the Armitage Shanks (all good friends of Billy) on their upcoming brief American tour. They have a few of Billy's classics in their set list to rotate: Kray Twins (Pop Rivets), It's You (Milkshakes), and Every Day (Thee Headcoats - Beached Earls).

The Milkshakes - 19th Nervous Shakedown is a good primer.

LOL! Ruby Soleil said:

ahhh, but the conspiracy theorist in me was just begging to rear its paranoid visage!

ahhh, but the conspiracy theorist in me was just begging to rear its paranoid visage!