#Bob Bert

[jgthirlwell]

JG Thirlwell has contributed four pages of exclusive new graphics for the new edition of Pioneer Zine. This issue was curated by Bob Bert (Pussy Galore, Sonic Youth, Chrome Cranks etc) and features contributions by JG Thirlwell as well as Thurston Moore, Lee Ranaldo, Lydia Lunch , Jasmine Hirst, Reuben Radding and Mark C. You can pick it up here

[omegaremix]

Omega Radio for October 26, 2013; #34.

Daydream Nation

"Death Valley '69" (f. Lydia Lunch)

"Get Into The Groovey"

"Starpower"

"Kotton Krown"

"Expressway To Yr Skull"

"Halloween"

"Tuck N' Dar"

"He's On Fire"

"Kool Thing" (f. Chuck D.)

"Disappearer"

"TV Shit" (f. Yamatsuka Eye)

"Bull In The Heather"

"Little Trouble Girl"

"My Arena"

"Skip Tracer"

"Diamond Sea" (alt. end.)

interstitial: selections from Silver Sessions

Sonic Youth tribute celebrating Daydream Nation's 25th; and the first-ever full-album play.

[iamdangerace]

Sonic Youth, Death Valley '69 (With Lydia Lunch), from Bad Moon Rising (1985).

Coming down, Sadie I love it Now now now, Death Valley '69

[thatrickmcginnis]

PUSSY GALORE, Toronto 1988 & 1989

If most people who lived through the '80s made a movie of their life, they'd probably soundtrack it with, I don't know, U2 or A-ha or Tears for Fears. My '80s biopic would be scored to Pussy Galore - probably my favorite band of the decade, and one whose three albums and four EPs bring me back to the first years of life on my own, post-college, making a precarious living as a writer and photographer. They were another major enthusiasm of Tim Powis at Nerve, and he made the rest of us fans (my then-girlfriend had a maddeningly not-so-secret crush on PG front man Jon Spencer), though they didn't actually show up in town until the magazine was effectively defunct. I was without a steady gig then, but I begged a portrait session with the band during their two-night stand in April of 1988 at the Silver Dollar Room on Spadina. My big memory of the weekend was that Philadelphia rapper Schoolly D was playing the room in the basement under the club, and that Jon and the rest of the band were more enthusiastic about catching his show than doing their own gig.

Jon Spencer formed Pussy Galore at college in Washington, D.C. with Julie Cafritz, added guitarist Neil Hagerty then moved to NYC, adding Cristina Martinez on guitar and ex-Sonic Youth drummer Bob Bert on drums and junkyard percussion. Cristina had left and Kurt Wolf had replaced Neil Hagerty by the time I did my first shoot with them, while they were touring to promote their first LP (and - to me - undisputed masterpiece, Right Now!). They were cultivating a bit of a bratty reputation, so most of my two rolls of 120 film from the session are the band goofing around, pulling faces, and making it as hard as possible for me to get the sullen, iconic group portrait I hoped to take. I did, in the end, get two decent frames right next to each other, but decided against shooting the gigs in favour of just enjoying their cacophonous (but deceptively tight) show.

My friend Chris Buck also shot the band that weekend and ended up with some really nice portraits; my shots were harder to work with - beyond my meagre darkroom skills at the time - and would remain unseen and unpublished for at least twenty years until I posted one on my old blog a few years ago. I would, however get a second chance to shoot the band live a year later, when they were on tour again after releasing their Dial 'M' for Motherfucker record.

When Pussy Galore returned to Toronto in August of 1989, they'd had another lineup change, with Julie Cafritz leaving the band and Neil Hagerty returning. They played the Apocalypse Club on College Street and I ended up putting the band up in my Parkdale loft - the first of several times I'd give Jon Spencer and his bands a place to stay on tour. For some reason I was in an on-camera flash mood, and shot the show using a big new Metz potato masher flash fitted with a big bounce reflector. I also asked the band if we could do a quick portrait session in the dressing room, just as they stepped offstage, and I set up a light stand and umbrella, finishing off the last half of four rolls of Ilford film with the group.

Pussy Galore would be reduced to a trio with Spencer, Hagerty and Bert when they released their final posthumous album, Historia de la Musica Rock, in 1990. Jon and Cristina Martinez would found Boss Hog around the time the band was falling apart, and he would form the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion with Judah Bauer and Russell Simins just after Pussy Galore broke up. Jon continues to record and tour, and I'd end up with him in front of my camera again, but that's a story for another day.

[spilladabalia]

Sonic Youth - Justice Is Might (Live in New York City, 1984)

[weneverlearn]

TOMORROW! Thursday June 20 — I’ll be singing on this Suicide tribute show, along with a mass of hep noisemakers. Not to mention, it’s the book release party for the brand new Alan Vega biography, Infinite Dreams, written by author Laura Davis-Chanin with Vega’s wife/collaborator, Liz Lamere. Lamere will be reading at the show tomorrow too.

[kdo-three]

Sonic Youth - Hallowe'en (1984) Kim Gordon / Thurston Moore / Lee Ranaldo / Bob Bert from: “Bad Moon Rising” (CD) (CD Bonus Track)

Noise Rock | No Wave | Experimental Rock

JukeHostUK (left click = play) (320kbps)

Personnel: Kim Gordon: Vocals / Bass Guitar Thurston Moore: Guitar Lee Ranaldo: Guitar Bob Bert: Drums

Produced by Sonic Youth | Martin Bisi | John Erskine

Recorded: @ The Before Christ Studios in Brooklyn, New York USA during September - December of 1984

Released: in March of 1985 Blast First Records (UK) Homestead Records (US)

[bitter1stuff]

My official song of the holiday week rush with all its promises to keep.

Countdown Love

[dustedmagazine]

Wolfmanhattan Project — Summer for Ever and Ever (In the Red)

Summer Forever And Ever by Wolfmanhattan Project

Wolfmanhattan Project marshals a considerable amount of garage punk firepower. Its three members are Kid Congo Powers (of Gun Club, the Cramps, the Bad Seeds, Pink Monkey Birds, etc.), Mick Collins (Dirt Bombs and the Gories) and Bob Bert (the original drummer for Sonic Youth, also Pussy Galore and bands led by Lydia Lunch and Jon Spencer), all cult icons in their own greasy, fuzz-busted, rock and roll way.

In 2019, when the first Wolfmanhattan Project album surfaced, it seemed like it might be a one off. After all, how often would these three guys’ calendars clear long enough to add to the catalogue? And yet it was worth hoping for another helping of something so good. My review of Blue Gene Stew asked “Who knows what possessed Mick Collins, Kid Congo Powers and Bob Bert to hook up for the Wolfmanhattan Project? But good thing they did, because here we have giddy garage contraption which combines Collins’ sci-fi obsessions, Powers’ hallucinogenic visions and Bert’s power-house pound—along with a hefty helping of fuzzy r ‘n r mayhem.”

With the first album it was possible to discern which member birthed which songs—there were cuts that sounded like the Dirtbombs and songs that sounded like Kid Congo Powers and one barn-burning punker that clearly belonged to Bert. That’s true again, but not as definitively. “Countdown Love” bucks and wallops in a Bob Bert like way, and “H Hour” has Collins’ distortion crusted, dirty, catchy mark on it, and “Very Next Songs” is equal parts mystic and rocking, as Kid Congo Powers often is. And yet, these songs sound more cohesive, more like each other, than on the previous album. It tastes like a good stew on the next day, all the flavors distinguishable but melded somehow. Could we dare to hope that Wolfmanhattan Project has turned from an occasional goof into an actual band?

Summer for Ever and Ever has its feel-good pop ragers (like the title track), its banging, raging, jungle-drumming pipedreams (“Respectable Pigs”), and its weird sound sculpted intervals (“New in the World” with its distended chords, its wandering piano and its dying rattlesnake tambourine)—that is, all the irregular pieces that made Blue Gene Stew, so fascinating. But the pieces fit together this time in a worn-in, practiced way.

You might look for wisdom from this trio of guys who’ve been at the rock endeavor for this long, and indeed, “Very Next Song,” contains a couplet that defines longevity in the arts or life or anything else. “We make the work…” chants Powers above a thrash of noisy guitar play and thundering beats, “And the work makes us.” Amen to that, and more of it.

Jennifer Kelly

[coffeeandcinemaandmusic]

In 1963 photographer Bert Stern photographed some of the top actors/actresses at the height of their fame playing their dream roles for a photo series in LIFE magazine's December 20, 1963 issue.

Cary Grant as Charlie Chaplin's Tramp / Audrey Hepburn as Pearl White in 'Perils of Pauline' / Tony Curtis & Natalie Wood as Rudolph Valentino and Vilma Bánky in 'The Sheik' / Paul Newman as a Douglas Fairbanks Sr. swashbuckler / Frank Sinatra & Dean Martin as Judah Ben-Hur and Messala from 'Ben-Hur' / Bing Crosby & Bob Hope as 1930s gangsters / Jack Lemmon as a war pilot / Shirley MacLaine as one of Busby Berkeley's showgirls / Rock Hudson as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

[madmensideblog]

Mad Men + The Major Arcana (Part 1)

[saturdayisover]

[bleedingcoffee42]

"'For Easy Company...,' Captain Speirs drew his words out for emphasis, 'The winner is.....serial number one, three, zero, six, six, two, six, six....Sargeant Darrel C. Powers.' His voice rose like a radio announcer as he said that last part of my name. The captain, known mostly for his fearless and killing ways, musta had a softer spot to him after all." - Shifty Powers, Shifty's War

[retropopcult]

Sesame Street debuted in November 1969.

[oldpersonnewspaper]

New transcript of a phone call from Head (1968) pre-production discovered!

“Hi Mike, Micky, Davy, and Peter! It’s Bert and Bob here. We’ve finally decided on a plot for the new Monkee movie! It’ll be about the psychological torture. Hugs and kisses!”

[spilladabalia]

Sonic Youth - Brave Men Run Live Mojave Desert 05.01.1985