Blue

Pretty much every author on the history of punk rock writes books that chronologically go from like MC5 to Black Flag then from Nirvana to, I don't know anymore, the present, My Chemical Romance? Fall Out Boy? Skipping most of the nineties as if nothing happened. Arguably, that is when a lot of punk went metal and punk rock (which was always dead) broke up into a million different genres. There were a bunch of labels with great bands like Amphetamine Reptile, Touch and Go, Wax Trax.

I went to college in Philadelphia so a lot of great bands like The Jesus Lizard, The Cows, Butthole Surfers, The God Bullies, etc. would come through town and there were a lot of great Philly bands during the nineties. I didn't realize until I left Philly the only bands anybody has ever heard of from that time period are the Dead Milkmen and G. Love and Special Sauce. I don't know how this happened but I sat at the bar and cringed with my PBR at the Khyber Pass every time I saw G. Love open.

Here are a couple of songs from Blue. Two from the Angels on Hogs / Evil Snake 7" and their "hit" song, Big Black Boots which is not on this seven inch. Blue never played Big Black Boots live. I think it was because they always played everything different and either they could never play that song live the same way they recorded it or they weren't very good musicians and they forgot what notes were in the song.

Sharpie, the lead singer / guitarist would never use a pick so by the end of the second song everybody in the front would be covered with spatters of blood from his fingers because he would be flicking it all over people as he played. They played at the Khyber Pass this one time and (all of this information may be wrong because this was like three life times ago but...) somehow somebody in the band started knocking the acoustic tiles out of the drop ceiling which were being stacked up and stuck on the sink in the back by the door. My friend Andrea was dressed in some kind of Goldie Hawn / Laugh-In Ghett-outfit throwing raw fish at the audience which prompted fish fights and everyone in the bar is covered in raw fish. The lead singer decides after his set to take a bath in the sink so the acoustic tiles get stacked up blocking the back door. Someone calls the cops, probably because it was too loud in there after all the acoustic ceiling tiles get knocked out. The cops show up. The rear exit is blocked which is a fire hazard. The bar gets shut down by the police for a couple weeks.

The raw fish clogs the drains at the bar. My friend Mike is hired to replace the pipes and gets dysentery.



Angels with Hogs


Evil Snake


Big Black Boots