Skinny Floot, of the Hampton Floots, proposed to his girlfriend Helter Zelda onstage at a Hamilton’s punkfest last week. She declined the offer and spat in his face. Since spitting in Skinny’s face is something all his fans have done at one time or another, and since the band is known for outrageous put-ons (remember Zelda as the Virgin Mary, giving birth to Santa Claus in a basement show a few months back?), there were unanswered questions long after the set was finished.

Of course we hit up both S and Z for details, and of course neither of them are to be trusted. So we took this off the bandstage into the real world found out their real names, knocked on a few doors, and even visited the county courthouse.

Shocking upshot: the engagement was fake… Because they’re already married! Tied the knot, and probably whipped each other with it, three years ago… before they started the band. The Hamilton’s antics took place on their anniversary.

Now don’t we feel like we should move over to the investigative reporter desk at this rag?

There’s some semblance of punk-pop bill at Hamilton’s Thursday, with Nuts for Fair, The Pickestaffs, La Za Za, Patsy Pancake, Kiddy Katty Korner, The Gazzwatts and Kelly’s Kumquat Farm… The Bullfinch is alarming quiet again, not just tonight but tomorrow. Next up, night after next: Overflow Meeting of Memories, Watching the Old Order Crack and The Slouch Hats. D’ollaire’s is doing the nostalgia thing with three bands who had minor hits several years ago, touring on the way down: That’s My Pop, Phool Phan Phables and Banana Oil. Oh, how the world has changed since then…

Our new grown-up friend Jer has jury duty. Took us all out to lunch. When he got up to go back to court, we all thought he was going to skip out of paying, but he didn’t.

To the coffeehouse crowd of the early ‘70s, Phoebe Snow was cool. To the punk throngs of just a few years later, she was a blizzard of yuck, the kind of artist whom new singers such as the same-initialed Poly Styrene were put on earth to destroy.

Both singer-songwriter Phoebe Snow and X-Ray Spex frontwoman Poly Styrene died this week.  I never saw X-Ray Spex live, but their singles were in every self-respecting punk’s record collection, and I know from some of my young-adult friends that those old records still awe and inspire, especially the empowerment anthem “O Bondage Up Yours.” The British obituaries depict Ms. Styrene as amiable and down-to-earth.

Phoebe Snow, as I noted, was the enemy to my chosen pop culture, but in the ‘90s I found that I’d been wrong about her. I went to a charity concert at Irving Plaza in New York to see one of my all-time favorite bands, Cheap Trick, perform with one of their own idols, Roy Wood (of The Move and Wizzard fame). Al Franken was hosting, Annie Haslam of Renaissance had put the show together (to benefit Bosnian orphans), and the roster the gamut from artists I respected (Tony Visconti, drummer Steve Holley, Procol Harum’s Gary Brooker) to those I actively disliked, like Justin Hayward of Moody Blues… and Phoebe Snow.

I grinded my teeth through Snow’s set, thinking about the orphans. But then Al Franken came out and reminded Snow of a bit they’d worked on together in the early days of Saturday Night Live. And Phoebe Snow performed the theme song for the fake high-fiber cereal Colon Blow.

“Colon Blow and you-oo-oo-oo in the morning…”

Not a far cry from the Poly Styrene catalog, which advertises “Germ Free Adolescents.” If there’s a soft-pop-‘n’-punk heaven, they may have a hell of a duo.

By Artie Capshaw

Note to the short leashes: don’t change a note.
The SLs debuted a slamming new song Thursday at the Bullfinch. Were in a good mood these days—Spring fever, you could say—and like a lot of the new songs we’re hearing. But we’re not a pushover. Wouldn’t steer you wrong. (Hence the leash.) If you show up for the Short Leash show next Tuesday (two gigs in three weeks! A new local band downtown record!) it’ll be worth your while. We’d offer to buy a round of drinks, but someone equally excited, but more flush, than us has beaten us to it. Come on time for the Short Leashes’ 9:30 set and your first beer is on the house (or, rather, yours for a penny: “a coin must be passed,” as ye olde state drinking code stipulates).
The song? “Stinker Sue,” a real hogswallop (if that’s a good thing) of a rave up, an anecdote wrapped up in a blues riff wrapped up in the absolute opposite of an enigma–a party singalong chorus. The party numbers were lacking last week, which is why we’re helping grease palms with ale. Honestly, we should be in the band promotion racket. Instead, we prefer to just listen to ’em.

Invented liquor flavored taffy.

Archies Comics Publications likes to publish letters from its young readers. The letters section in Archie & Friends (one of dozens of different titles chronicling the adventures of Riverdale teens) is called “Pep Talks,” presumably in honor of the now long-defunct Pep Comics, which in its 22nd issue (released in December, 1941) hosted the very first appearance of Archie Andrews, Betty Cooper and Jughead Jones. (Those stories can be savored in a new hardcover collection, Archie Firsts, from Dark Horse Comics.)

Reggie Mantle, Veronica Lodge, Moose Mason and others came along soon afterwards. The first regular black characters in the Archie gang—Chuck Clayton and his dad the school sports coach—were on board by the early ‘70s.

Anyway, the letter:

Dear Pep Talks!,

I heard that you be adding a new character that is gay. You are making a huge mistake!

Archie and his friends are good kids and wouldn’t hang out with a gay person. Please don’t do this!

N. Withheld,

Washington

The editor’s response (written in the voice of Archie Andrews himself):

Well, gosh…sorry to hear you feel that way, Mr. Withheld. Kevin’s a classy guy and I think I’ve got great taste in friends (Reggie excluded). But I think you’ve forgotten the nicest and bestest trait about Riverdale: we’re all pals and gals here! No matter what your skin color, orientation, religion, or even if you’re a teenage witch—everyone’s welcome, loved and respected in our town!

“Reggie here. ‘Bestest’ isn’t a word, you thimblewitted, carrot-headed gherkin.”

Well…some of us are respected, anyway…*sigh*.
I once went through a similar editorial moment at the New Haven Advocate, publishing a homophobic letter to the editor, fully aware of the tumult it might cause, and ultimately gratified by the positive debate it inspired. Archie Comics knows its market extremely well, and has been ramping up the diversity of Riverdale for years now. This was a well-tuned and useful response.

The gay character, Kevin Keller, by the way, has been granted his own four-issue miniseries as part of the comic named for his best friend, Veronica.

If you saw a Yale Rep ad or poster or something and are looking my review of Robert Woodruff/Ingmar Bergman’s Autumn Sonata, it’s over here.

Thanks for stopping at scribblers.us

The Illegal Briefs got signed! It helps if you have a lawyer (Flint Gennessee) as bandleader/saxophonist, though only when it comes to assuring the deal’s for real and not one of those screw-the-newbie specials. We’ve seen the IBs three times now (beyond overhearing several rehearsals at Gennessee’s offices in the old Modern Practice Building, where bandmates Connie Nash and Hoff Eukis also work), and can think of few local bands more deserving of a snatch at the wider-appeal gold ring. In fact, The Illegal Briefs play with another of our personal faves, The Rock Pirates (who are not really called The Rock Pirates), Thursday at Hamilton’s. Sure to be a packed house. If you get jostled, call a lawyer—there’ll be plenty in the house—unless the lawyers are the ones doing the jostling.

Still dark days: cold rain, few signs of spring. Hence: Among the living, Colt Comrades ad Crack in the World making you feel ever colder and creepier at the Bullfinch… The Air Raid Wardens, Bar 20 and Beware of Ladies helping taking the chill off at Hamilton’s… The beguiled, The Big Cats, The Beloved Bachelors and Three Big Show-offs (what’s with all the Bs? And both those Bigs) in another world altogether. A B-movie world, perhaps…

Invited the neighbors over for a taffy pull. They insisted on making a civil war play about it. We were concerned since it seemed like doing a taffy pull was more than enough.

A new issue of Ugly Things is a beautiful thing. Number 31 of Mike Stax’s encyclopedic garage-rock periodical is just out, 200 pages of gut-churning historical curiosities and fanatical opinions.

Never cared much for Hendrix (for me, what punks were really fighting against were long guitar solos), but even I can’t resist an article (by Tim Earnshaw) entitled “Dead Hendrix and the Last of the Hipster Mohicans—The Jimi Hendrix Albums They Don’t Want You to Hear.”

It’s actually unusual to see a story about such a well-documented rock star as Hendrix in Ugly Things. This is a magazine that hides in the dark corners, discovering shortlived bands,  tangential projects of the later-famous, and bands which were so hugely derivative of the trends of their time that they alchemized into originality. Ugly Things readers know where to get their Beatles stories; they want stories about bands they’ve never heard of. (Even the most intent student of ‘60s music will be stymied by many of the references in a typical issue of Ugly Things.) The mag does have some mainstream heroes—The Pretty Things, for starters, which gave the publications its name and aim; Iggy & The Stooges also pop up with regularity (in this issue it’s “Now I Want to Be Your  Dogumentarian—An Interview with Robert Matheu”), as do Them. But the lesser-knowns are the real show: The Coba Seas, The Sentinals, The Missing Lynx.

Why write about the Rolling Stones when you can exclusively interview Stones hanger-on Prince Stash Klossowski de Rola? Remember Suzi Quatro/ Well, Ugly Things interviews her sister Patti, about the tough girl they both were in, The Pleasure Seekers. Ugly Things singlehandedly rescues unsung bands from needless obscurity. The Masters Apprentices were a popular Australian band of the late ‘60s/early ‘70s. UT concludes a three-part, eight-chapter, dozens-of-pages series on the group in this issue. Another beneficiary of a multi-issue profile is Ollie Halsall, who ghosted Eric Idle’s bass lines in The Rutles. Still-active Stiff Records icon Wreckless Eric, misconstrued by many as a one-hit wonder, earns a comprehensive overview of his entire recorded canon.

Unlike a lot of scenes, Ugly Things  shows respect for other obsessives doing similar work. In this issue, there’s a celebration of 25^th anniversary of the garage-digging label Norton Records, which has reissued scads of  ‘60s relics. Their review section tips hats to scores of avid reissuers, publishers and rock historians.

The Ugly Things empire includes a website, a monthly radio show (broadcast on www.realpunkradio.com, then retained as a podcast) and a lively blog forum, but that thick thumping magazine is the centerpiece. It’s only published once or twice a year tops, but I keep each issue at the bedside until the next one comes along, and it takes that long for me to really feel I’ve absorbed all that wondrous garage noise.