Keep Music Evil

Jesse Valencia

Description

Compiled from over one hundred interviews and years of in-depth research, KEEP MUSIC EVIL tells the full, unexpurgated tale of the infamous psych-rockers The Brian Jonestown Massacre.

‘They didn’t know what to do with us. Anton was drinking, like, a gallon of vodka a day, and he wouldn’t go to sleep … he was just pumped on adrenaline, and we were going, How are we going to get through this?’ Frankie Emerson

‘We were all young, and it wasn’t just being high or anything—it was ego and aloofness.’ Jeff Davies

‘It’s hard to remember the timeline, ’cause in those days there was no time.’ Joel Gion

Fifteen years after Ondi Timoner’s film Dig! shot The Brian Jonestown Massacre to international fame comes the first-ever book on the controversial band and their leader, Anton Newcombe, who together have been at the forefront of the resurgence of psychedelic rock in recent decades—and become one of the most infamous and controversial bands around in the process.

Drawing on years of extensive research and personal interviews with more than 125 people connected to the band—including former and current members Joel Gion, Matt Hollywood, Jeff Davies, Rick Maymi, and Frankie Emerson, as well as The Dandy Warhols, Miranda Lee Richards, Dave Deresinski, and Ondi Timoner—Keep Music Evil: The Brian Jonestown Massacre Story digs a little deeper into the history of the band and the making of the film.

Presented as a personal narrative that evokes the New Journalism of Tom Wolfe and Hunter S. Thompson, Keep Music Evil sets the record straight once and for all, providing close insights into the band’s origins in early 1990s San Francisco, their record-making process, and the full, unexpurgated tale of Dig! and its impact. Featuring rare, candid photographs of the band from throughout their career, this is the first comprehensive study of one of rock’n’roll’s most enduring sagas.

Sujets

• Musique
• Histoire de la musique
• Music
• Rock
• Genres
• Styles

Informations

• Publié par: Jawbone Press
• Date de parution: 16 avril 2019
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781911036487
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 9 Mo

Extrait

A Jawbone book
First edition 2019
Published in the UK and the USA by
Jawbone Press
Office G1
141–157 Acre Lane
London SW2 5UA
England
www.jawbonepress.com

ISBN 978-1-911036-47-0
Volume copyright © 2019 Outline Press Ltd. Text copyright © Jesse Valencia. All rights reserved. No part of this book covered by the copyrights hereon may be reproduced or copied in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in articles or reviews where the source should be made clear. For more information contact the publishers.

Jacket design by Paul Palmer-Edwards, www.paulpalmer-edwards.com

CONTENTS
Introesque
Part One: Notes From Tepid Peppermint Wonderland
1 Godspell
2 The Way It Was
3 Who Put The Bomp?
4 The Compound
5 Just Beneath The Floor
6 Bag Of Tricks
7 Straight Up And Down
8 A Beer And The Tape
Part Two: Dig! A Little Deeper
9 Move On Over, Dandy
10 I Dedicate This Chord To…
11 Tragical Mystery Tour
12 Wear White And Come When I Call
13 Going To Hell
14 All Things Great And Small
15 Open Heart Surgery
16 To Tear You Apart
Part Three: Your Side Of Our Story
17 Tomorrow’s Heroes Today
18 Here It Comes
19 DIG!
20 Play Until The Dope Is Gone
21 Strange And Wonderful
22 Unofficially Uninvited To Our Party
23 The Lantern
Outroesque
Acknowledgments
Notes And Sources

INTROESQUE
‘ You . Right there ,’ the man says as he points into the audience from the stage, teardrop guitar at his waist, blue eyes piercing through red stage lights. I thought he was looking at me, but he’s pointing to someone just past me who had his phone up above everyone’s heads with the flash on. ‘You fuckin’ hold that light in my eyes one more time, I will have you bounced on your fuckin’ head. That was annoying as shit. How would you like it if I came to Taco Bell, where you work, and shined a light in your fuckin’ eye?’
There is a mixture of cheers and groans from the crowd, as one might expect at a Brian Jonestown Massacre show, but what a way to close a song like ‘Anemone.’ Around the musician’s neck is a wreath of holy beads. Sweat stains them against his white tunic, and he’s dressed from head to toe in white, like an old desert prophet. A shaggy haircut and impressive sideburns frame his expression, which is quickly losing patience.
This man is Anton Newcombe, multi-instrumentalist, singer-songwriter, and leader of the psychedelic rock band known as The Brian Jonestown Massacre, though band may not be the right word. Rogues gallery might be more fitting.
They play on for another hour and a half. Then, at the close of ‘Yeah, Yeah,’ a drunk throws his half-empty beer can directly at Anton. It hits him in the back, leaking beer all over the stage and the people up front. Anton snaps angrily to the crowd and points in the general direction of this second assailant.
‘Don’t throw your fuckin’ beer at me, you piece of shit. Why don’t you come up here like a fuckin’ man, you dickhead? Yeah, I asked you. Why don’t you fuckin’ come up here like a man? Don’t throw your fuckin’ beer can at me with my back turned to you, like a fuckin’ pussy, but not even a pussy that does something good, like give birth to a nation. You’re a fuckin’ piece of shit. Don’t throw your shit at me, you piece of shit. Have some respect for yourself, you fuckin’ monkey. Thank you. There’s ladies right in front of you, you know. You could hit them in the head. I don’t care if you don’t care about yourself, you fuckin’ idiot. Have some respect for women, ’cause I can defend myself, you fuckin’ asshole.’
There is applause as a minute or two passes, and then Anton addresses the audience at large. ‘So, the guy who threw the beer can, you can thank him,’ he says. ‘We’re just gonna wrap this show up.’ Now there are boos and hollers. ‘That’s how people get beat up, basically,’ Anton continues. ‘By random mob violence.’
The show seems like it’s about to end up in a riot, and for the better part of the twenty-five years leading up to this moment, that’s exactly what would have happened. 1
* * *
I witnessed my first Anton heckler at the band’s show seven years earlier at the Clubhouse in Tempe. It was my first BJM show; Flavor Crystals opened. After they were finished, Anton and guitarist Ricky Maymi ran a Chang Fo Ji—a small plastic box with a speaker inside looping Buddhist prayers, given to them by Flavor Crystals’ Josh Richardson—directly through the pedal board.
A half hour later, the BJM emerge from the green room. Anton is first on, tampering with quarter-inches and wires, sporting a denim jacket with the words ‘The Kingdom Of God Is In’ painted on the back—made for him by Icelandic multimedia artist Jón Sæmundur Auðarson, his collaborator for much of the album he’s just put out, My Bloody Underground . The others walk around him as they make way to their places: organist/guitarist Rob ‘The Cop’ Campanella (so named for his constant wearing of aviator shades), then Ricky, then guitarist and former bassist Matt ‘Good Times’ Hollywood, 2 guitarist Frankie ‘Teardrop’ Emerson, bassist Collin Hegna, drummer Daniel Allaire, and, lastly, ‘Spokesman For The Revolution,’ percussionist Joel Gion. The band fiddle around with cords, knobs, instruments, and mic placements for another three minutes or so. Once they start playing, everyone loses their minds because they are just fuckin’ ripping through these songs. I make my way to almost the front of the stage when, after one song, the band are apparently taking too long to tune for one fan. He shouts ‘ Fuck you, Anton!’ and throws a water bottle in the singer’s direction, but because there’s nothing in it, it just flops through the air. A last few drops of water sprinkle over the crowd like a trail of comet dust.
Security make their way toward the perpetrator. All the real fans—the ones here for the music—single out the asshole trying to escape. The band ignore the incident until whatever song they’re playing is over, at which point Anton reaches over to pick up the bottle.
‘What is this ?’ he says. ‘This is pathetic. Throwing shit at me?’ he continues, not caring whether anyone can hear him or not. He scoffs and tosses aside the crunched-up plastic bottle as two beefy security guards drag the man away and throw him out the door. The band carry on into the next tune like nothing has happened, expressionless, except for maybe a ‘here we go again’ collective eye-roll, now that Anton’s stopped the show.
Anton would not address the crowd again. He wouldn’t even face us, but instead stood far off to the side, facing the band like a conductor. Another riot dodged, but throughout the set, he looked like he was pining for energy. Prior to this tour, he reportedly drank a liter of vodka a day before quitting drinking cold turkey, right before the first show. The next day, the band played Coachella.
I left that night feeling for the first time that I’d been a part of something greater than what my small mountain hometown of Show Low, Arizona, could offer. As everyone walked out of the venue, dazed and starry-eyed, I staggered into the parking lot to wait for my ride. My legs hurt a little, as I’d been standing too long, but at the same time I could feel every cell in my heart, mind, and soul bursting with sound, and it helped things hurt a little less.
* * *
Former guitarist Jeff Davies once described Anton as the ‘father’ of the band—he is both itself and its master. There is a general consensus that if there’s anyone who truly knows the band’s story from start to finish, Anton would be that person, because he is The Brian Jonestown Massacre, and the only consistent member throughout their decades-long history. One would therefore naturally assume that as such he is the only one who can really tell it from start to finish, and maybe one day he will. Until then, here we are.
Anton is not present in this narrative to any personal degree, beyond the few brushes I’ve had with him at BJM shows. Most of his quotes are from personal interactions I’ve had with him online; quotes from interviews across different media; or secondhand accounts by his bandmates and associates. Where relevant, I’ve drawn quotes from Ondi Timoner’s 2004 documentary about the band, Dig! , but I must stress that Anton’s absence in terms of participation should not be misread as a book incomplete, because at the same time it has opened up the possibility for other individuals in the band’s history to express themselves freely. Some of them passed away before I could talk to them, and others passed away after I talked to them. Most are still here, at time of writing.
That’s why this is not an unauthorized biography so much as it is a portrait. If Anton is sitting in a dark room, each voice is a different light on the subject, coming from a different angle. With enough of these lights, once you place them in the room a certain way, the picture becomes clearer and the portrait takes form.
I decided to write a book about the band because I fell in love with their music, and Anton’s abrasive but charismatic personality, after seeing Dig! ten years ago, as I realized that all the bands I loved as a teenager in the early 2000s were in one way or another directly influenced by what the BJM and their friends The Dandy Warhols were doing the decade before. I also wanted to study Anton, learn from his craft, and apply what I took from the band’s story to my own band and recording process, and then share what I learned with others.
I identify more as a musician than a writer, but writing this book has made me better at both. There is no point to art if it doesn’t share with the world the roots of its inspiration, and that’s something I feel Anton has achieved, greatly and consistently. In that way, its become a sort of duty to pass on what I’ve learned from this experience, as best as possible.
Dig! is now a cult classic, and it remains helpful with regard