On The Skids: Interesting Stories IV

We have another in our occasional series of stories from around the musical world - some amusing, some strange, some a little sad, but hopefully all of them a little interesting. I love these stories, as they often give you a new window into how musicians work and play (and/or destruct). You can catch up with the previous editions - edition 1 edition 2 edition 3.

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The Band's Out Before Summer

It was an interesting start for what would become one of Scotland’s biggest bands of the 1980s. Following his departure from Scotland’s premier punk band, The Skids, Stuart Adamson was working on pulling a new crew together.

Initially he had his new act as a five piece, with Bruce Watson on guitar, Alan Wishart on bass, his brother and future Scottish National Party MP Pete Wishart on keyboards and Clive Parker from Spizz Energi (notable for their hit Where’s Captain Kirk?) on drums. Adamson, Watson and Parker recorded some demos for CBS in London, before the band utilised a disused furniture warehouse back in Dunfermline for rehearsals.

All that practice led to a show at the Glen Pavilion in Dunfermline and an interview with BBC Radio Scotland.

A few local gigs lead to something that would potentially give them a big opening, although it was perhaps a strange choice. For in February 1982, they were offered the chance to open for Alice Cooper on his UK tour. Bruce Watson remembered, “It was terrible. Thrown in at the deep end. There was me, just playing in local bands all my life. Then I get told my first gig is going to be at Brighton Conference Centre with Alice Cooper: I was nearly sh**ting myself….. We never went down at all, we were really terrible. Alice Cooper’s management said: ‘It’s just not working out boys.’ We just got kicked off. But I heard that the band they were going to get as support before us was Depeche Mode, so you can imagine what that would have been like.”

They got as far as the show at the Birmingham Odeon, they had lasted two whole days on the tour…..

There was a feeling it might be all over before it had begun, but the arguing Wishart brothers and Parker left, and experienced London based rhythm section Mark Brzezicki and Tony Butler came into the fold, and the band was set. 

Big Country: Fields Of Fire (Live, Barrowlands, 1983)

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Out Of the Flying Pan, Into The Firing Line

Artimus (born Thomas) Pyle didn’t necessarily seem destined to be a rock star. Born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1948, he joined the Marine Corps in 1968 - and with his eyes on a future career in avionics, he worked on various military bases, rising to Sergeant before being honourably discharged in 1971.

He was the drummer for a South Carolinian band with the fantastic name, Thickwood Lick, but got a break and got to start playing with Lynyrd Skynyrd in 1975. At first he was playing with original drummer Bob Burns, but ultimately replaced him completely. By the end of that year he had made his recording debut, appearing on Saturday Night Special, a single from third album Nuthin’ Fancy.

In 1977, tragedy struck the band. On 20 October, the band were flying in a Convair CV-240 from Greenville, South Carolina (where they had played at the auditorium the previous day), to Baton Rouge for their next gig at Louisiana State University. As they neared the end of the flight, the crew realised they were short on fuel and attempted to get to McComb Airport in Mississippi. Knowing they couldn’t even make that, they tried an emergency landing in a field about ten miles from the airport. Sadly, the plane didn’t make the field, hitting a large tree and splitting up.

While Pyle survived the crash with 'just' broken ribs, this relative good fortune was almost nullified, as he and two other survivors managed to stumble their way several hundred yards across a creek. But on entering a local farm to raise the alarm, they were fired upon by the concerned farmer, Johnny Mote. It seemed that Pyle’s rough appearance alarmed Mote, thinking he might be an escaped convict. Pyle would later claim he was struck by a bullet to the shoulder, but Mote would always state that he merely fired a warning shot.

In the end, the heart was ripped out of the band by the crash. Lead singer Ronnie Van Zandt, guitarist Steve Gaines, backing singer Cassie Gaines (Steve’s sister), assistant road manager Dean Kilpatrick, pilot Walter McCreary and first officer William Gray all died that day. Guitarist Gary Rossington was knocked unconscious, while keyboard player Billy Powell almost lost his nose and suffered deep lacerations to his leg and face.

Pyle would remain with the band when they resumed in 1979, for Charlie Daniels’ annual Volunteer Jam concert in Nashville. He would play with versions of Skynyrd, and work on solo stuff for the next few decades - and also spend three years living at a yeshiva in Jerusalem - although he would decline the chance to play on the 2018 Lynyrd Skynyrd Farewell Tour.

Lynyrd Skynyrd: Gimme Three Steps (Live, Knebworth, 1976)

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Who Wants Jello For Mayor?

Eric Boucher is an interesting person by any definition. Born in Colorado, he developed an early interest in international politics, spurred on by his parents. Despite that, his high school guidance counsellor apparently suggested he should become a dental hygienist!

He worked as a roadie for local Colorado bands like The Ravers, setting up equipment for shows (including their support slot for the Ramones). It was seeing Joey Ramone that inspired him to become a singer. Boucher formed a band, The Healers, with two high school friends, but while he started to write some songs, with limited musical prowess the band never graduated to actually playing live. His next big step would come from his move to the University of California, Santa Cruz - he dropped out early, but was now in California as the west coast punk scene was developing.

He responded to an advert in a store by East Bay Ray to form a punk band - and the Dead Kennedys were born. He adopted his new stage name, Jello Biafra, from a combination of the brand name Jell-O and the African state of Biafra (part of Nigeria).

Biafra became known for his interesting vocal style, biting lyrics, full of sarcasm and socio-political commentary - and in 1979, he took that to a whole new level. Despite stating that he has never really identified with any particular ideology, he threw his hat into the San Francisco mayoral ring! He had a great catchphrase to get behind - “There’s always room for Jello!”

He actually joined the race before he had even written his platform and wore campaign T-shirts from opponent Quentin Kopp’s previous campaign. His supporters joined in with his somewhat amusingly twisted campaign, holding up signs on the campaign trail like - “If he doesn’t win I’ll kill myself” and “What if he does win?”

Once his platform was up and running and he had the signatures to legally enter the race, his plan was revealed; businessmen to wear clown suits in the downtown area, and statues of Dan White to be erected (the man who had assassinated Mayor George Moscone and deputy Harvey Milk the previous year), with sale of tomatoes and eggs to pelt the statues. On a more serious note, he pledged to legalise squatting in vacant, tax-delinquent buildings and a requirement that police officers should be elected, and a citywide ban on cars.

He later said, “For those of them who have seen my candidacy as a publicity stunt or a joke, they should keep in mind that it is no more of a joke, and no less of a joke, than anyone else they care to name.” In the first round of voting, he finished a credible fourth, with almost 4% of the vote, but that wasn’t enough to get through to the second round, where Dianne Feinstein won.

Dead Kennedys: California Uber Alles (Official video)

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The Godfather Of Impersonators

The first thing to note about the future Godfather of Soul, is that he was due to be Joseph James Brown, but things got mixed up on his birth certificate, and James Brown was born. His family lived in poverty in South Carolina, before they moved to Augusta Georgia, initially staying at a brothel run by an aunt, before moving in with another aunt. Then, his mother, tired of being in an abusive marriage, upped sticks and went to New York.

Not an ideal childhood, but despite that, the young James Brown had an obvious talent for singing - winning talent shows, such as one at the Lenox Theater in 1944, for performing the ballad So Long. He started doing so-called buck dances for troops from nearby Camp Gordon as they traveled near his aunt’s house. He got to hear legendary bluesman Howlin’ Wolf play, and was inspired to learn piano, guitar and harmonica.

There was more to come before he was even out of his teens. He had a brief career as a boxer, before spending time in a juvenile detention centre for robbery. While there, he formed a gospel quartet, and also met the R&B singer Bobby Byrd whilst playing in a baseball game outside the centre. He was released on work sponsorship for businessman S.C. Lawson, who was impressed by his work rate and gave the courts guarantee he would keep him on for at least two years.

In 1954, Brown joined Bobby Byrd’s group, the Avons, where he would remain for seven years - and name changes to the Toccoa Band and then the Flames, and finally the Famous Flames. They got themselves managed by Clint Brantley, who also managed Little Richard, and got signed to King Records’ Federal, issuing their first single Please, Please, Please in 1956. By the late 50’s, the original band had broken up, but James Brown and The Famous Flames rose out of those ashes.

The interesting thing was that his relationship with Little Richard went further though. It seems that there were quite a few occasions when Richard couldn’t perform at a show, and so, Brown would be drafted in to pretend to be him. This is a bit of a strange arrangement, but he would dress up like him and the experience would help Brown develop his own sound. Filmmaker Alex Gibney explained; “Nobody knew exactly what Little Richard looked like. [James Brown] literally was Little Richard, when Little Richard had to go off to LA. There were a whole bunch of dates that had to be fulfilled, and James Brown was Little Richard!”

James Brown and the Famous Flames: Out Of Sight (The TAMI show, 1964)

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More More More (but please, no more porn)

More More More, written and produced by Greg Diamond, was a big disco hit for Buddah Records, as it hit the Top 5 in the US, UK and Canada, providing the ideal debut for its singer, Andrea True.

But True (born Andrea Truden) had led a somewhat different life up to that point. Born in Nashville to Slovenian immigrants, True attended a Catholic girls academy and studied classical piano, before going to Vanderbilt University to study music. But that did not last, as she married academic David Wolfe when she was nineteen, and left to follow his career, in Oklahoma and then New York City.

But then she started to appear in pornographic films, first in Scandinavia, and eventually by the end of the 1960s, in America too. In fact, by the mid 1970s she had also tried her hand at directing them too. She also got an opportunity to appear in adverts for a Jamaican real estate business. But while there doing those, she got stuck. The Jamaican government banned asset transfers as part of a tit for tat with the US government, following its imposition of sanctions for Jamaica’s support of Fidel Castro. This meant she would either have to spend the money she had earned before returning home, or pay a forfeit. 

She invested the money in the music career she had always wanted, using it to record More, More, More, a song she had already started working on with Diamond - calling themselves The Andrea True Connection. While she was still involved in the porn industry into the 1980s, she said she had had enough, “I’d rather be a waitress or a typist than make another adult film… Don’t think of me as a porn star anymore, think of me as a recording star. I just want to record and perform.” And indeed, within a year of releasing this song, she had made around 300 live appearances.

She would have several more hits, before surgery on her vocal cords effectively ended her career (except for a few live shows over the years) - but nothing would ever match that first monster disco hit.

Andrea True Connection: More, More, More (On Musikladen, 1976)

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The Star Man at the Gas Station

The Gits were a punk rock band from Ohio, who relocated to Seattle in 1989, making a name for themselves on the local circuit with the likes of Nirvana and Tad. After their debut album, Frenching The Bully, came out in 1992, it looked like things were on the up for them. Former journalist Tim Sommer, was keen to get them into Atlantic Records, where he now worked as an A&R man. They were working on tracks for the second album, and the deal was all but signed, when on 7 July 1993, lead singer Mia Zapata was beaten, raped and strangled (you can read more on this tragic story here). Enter: The Conquering Chicken, a patchwork of material, was eventually released posthumously the following year.

But going back to a happier time, guitarist Andy Kessler and bassist Matt Dresdner recalled some band stories in an interview with KEXP in late 2024. 

They recalled the band were living on $5 a day each for a lot of the time, basically scraping by for food and fuel to get to the next gig. They remembered one time where she sprayed the van with tuna juice as she tried to get every last bit out of the can. She also loved to drive, but never had a licence - she just drove and never bothered to tell anyone. 

But the story that always draws a chuckle, takes us back to L.A. on the band's first trip down there. Zapata was staying with her older brother Eric, and the band went their separate ways after a gig there, arranging to meet at a diner the following morning. They walk into the diner and Eric is laughing, but Mia is looking down, shaking her head. “Guys, you won’t believe what MIa just did and what an asshole she is!” On the drive over, they stopped at a gas station, and Eric got out to pay or something, and he said… ‘Mia, here’s a squeegee to wipe down the window. So she did that while he went inside - and apparently what happened was, while she was squeegeeing the windshield, a really fancy, posh, red convertible pulls up. And there’s this middle aged, bleach-blond guy with sunglasses, pulls up right beside Mia as she’s wiping down the windows and he says, ‘Excuse me, do you sell cigarettes here?’ and MIa looks at him and goes, ‘I don’t know, I don’t know if WE sell cigarettes here, because I don’t work here, but thank you for insinuating I look like I do!’... And the guy, and apparently Eric had come out of the kiosk by this point and had observed this happening, and the guy was just like.. Kind of chuckled and then like was embarrassed and drove away. So Eric says to Mia at this point, ‘you asshole - do you know who that was?’ And she goes, ‘who?’ And he goes, ‘that’s David Bowie!’ And the thing is that Mia had several of our 7”... and she was like, ‘Oh my god, Eric, follow him, we have to give him a single, we have to give him a single.’ So they jumped in the car and apparently, this would have been around 1990, maybe 91, as soon as they jumped in the car, Eric had a cassette of Scary Monsters, the Bowie album, and it started playing when he turned the key in the ignition, and so while they were trying to follow David Bowie, but of course they lost him.”