My favorite time in Philly’s music history was ’79 to ’83 or ’84. The city was a mess then. It was bankrupt and every other building was boarded up. The entire city was coated with fliers for shows. A lot of them were really creative, and you could generate buzz and excitement overnight. Because Center City was so shady, you could put on shows at the drop of a hat, and nobody really gave a damn. The police were enforcing the liquor laws, so you’d just hand them a hundred bucks and they’d go away. There was no radio support, […]
JOHNNY THUNDERS: You Can’t Put Your Arms Around A Memory
This one goes out to Rick D. Because at least he tried.
POPPED! FEST PREVIEW: Pattern Is Movement
NOTE: Throughout the week we will be sharing the responses of Popped Fest bands to our Mad Libs-esque questionnaire. 1. We are called Pattern is Movement because it sounded better than Passionate Moments. 2. No, that is not a stupid name for a band and it is awesome of you to say that. 3. We are a band because God told/commanded us. 4. If we were not a band, we would be working for Ride The Ducks. 5. People say we sound like Julie Andrews meets System of a Down. 6. But really we sound like Julie Andrews. 7. A […]
EARLY WORD: Pop ‘N Fresh
Standby for our daily Popped Fest preview…
BREAKING: Tritone’s Rick D. Killed By Heart Attack
SARA SHERR REPORTS: I’m shocked to even type this. Just found out through Paul Dellevigne that Rick D co-owner of Tritone passed away from a heart attack just a few hours ago. I’ve known Rick D for over a decade, first as a music journo, back when he booked The Firenze, JC Dobbs, and Upstairs at Nick’s. He was an early supporter and adopter of all kinds of punk bands, most famously booking Green Day at Dobbs pre-Dookie. He also ran a label called Black Hole and was in a band called the Newbyles. He probably has a history pre-bar […]
Rick D: Barman And Booker Extraordinaire, Beloved Inventor Of The Bob & Barbara’s Happy Meal
BY BRIAN HOWARD The crowds have changed since [Nate] Wiley first began playing at the bar in 1983 with the Joe Whalen trio. Back then, Bob and Barbara’s drew primarily black crowds as one of the last of South Philadelphia west-of-Broad’s jazz bars. (Many nearby establishments had closed or vacated in the ’50s, ’60s and early ’70s due to the long-planned-but-never-realized crosstown expressway, which eventually became the Vine Street expressway.) Bob Port, who had owned the bar since 1978 with his friend Barbara Carter, retired to Kansas City in 1995 and sold the bar to Prince, who used to own […]
We Know It’s Only Rock N’ Roll But We Like It
I AM THE RED MAN: Mike Patton’s Peeping Tom, TLA, Saturday Night BY S. FITZGERALD LODWICK I arrived on South Street shortly after nine and, after straightening out some unpleasantness with my press credentials, headed across the street from the TLA to enjoy a beer with the Mike Patton fanatics. One young woman had been to the Peeping Tom show just two days before, in Baltimore, MD. This is not wholly uncommon as, truth be told, Mike Patton fans are more of a cult than an audience. More intelligent than the Moonies, and far less frightening than the Scientologists, yet […]
Write Clever Caption, Win Tix To See The English Beat!
The City of Philadelphia’s photo archive contains over 2 million images that date back as far as the late 1800s, i.e. the last time a Republican won in this town. In all seriousness, this is an INCREDIBLE visual record of the city’s evolution and a relatively new web site, PhillyHistory.org, is making it available for online consumption and purchase. To date, some 22,000 images have been digitally scanned, at a rate of roughly 2,000 images a month. So, if you’ve been wondering why the line at Kinko’s is so goddamned SLOW, well, now you know. Phawker will be showcasing images […]
THE EARLY WORD: Girl, Kill Your Boyfriend
[Click image to activate Internet]
DEVO, Even Better Than The Real Thing
BY ED KING, ROCKIST The great thing about Devo was that you didn’t have to listen to their music to love them. Their appearance on Saturday Night Live, where they performed “Satisfaction” and “Jocko Homo” [see below] — complete with robotic choreography, the Booji Boy routine, the yellow HazMat jumpsuits, and a fuzz box mounted directly on one of the guitar players’ guitar — was the atom bomb of the rock ‘n roll age as we knew it. With that appearance, the release of their debut album, and their spectacular, absurd videos, they were the first shots fired in the […]
All Of This Happened While You Were Sleeping
EXCUSE ME WHILE I KISS THE SKY: Albert Hammond Jr., TLA, Last Night [FLICKR] BY JONATHAN VALANIA FOR THE INQUIRER Perhaps the meanest thing you could say about Yours To Keep, the solo debut by Strokes guitarist Albert Hammond Jr., is that it’s all craft and no personality. This is often the case when a background member of a popular band steps into the foreground with a solo project, armed with long-dormant songs but minus the compelling narrative a band like the Strokes has worked so hard and long to establish. And because we know so much — too much, […]