Cloaca Melodia

Wetlands, New York, NY sorry, I haven't yet written about this show... feel free to post your own recollections if you were there! photos

Lonestar Roadhouse, New York, NY sorry, Mike has not yet written about this show... add your own comments if you were also there!

Max's, Ithaca, NY.... This concert was part of my friend Kathy and my "Fall Rampage," as we dubbed it, an impulsive roadtrip to see King Missile twice on successive nights. Since I lived in Ithaca as a college student just a few years prior and Kathy had a friend then attending Cornell and could (presumably) bum rooms for the night, this show was the primary reason we made the trip. The Buffalo show was just icing. Had a great time as usual during KM's set; I remember particularly great versions of "Wuss" and one of the few covers the band ever did, Hank Williams' "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry." After their set, I had a conversation with drummer Roger Murdock. We talked about the dance remix of "My Heart Is a Flower" that got a lot of airplay earlier on alt-rock and college radio. The dance-beat versions (by producer Ivan Ivan ) were labeled "The Against Our Will" remix on the single and showed the band bound, gagged, ...

The Icon, Buffalo, NY.... My friend Kathy and I decided to go on a weekend King Missile road trip. We drove from New Jersey to Buffalo for this show and then continued on to see them in Ithaca the following night. All I recall from this show is a memorable version of "Jesus Was Way Cool" and this venue had an odd way to separate the under-21 audience from the drinking crowd. We didn't talk to the band at this show, since we knew we were going to be seeing them the following night, so as soon as it was over, we headed across the border at Niagara Falls and stayed at a hotel on the Canadian side.

CBGB's, New York, NY Fairly sure, but not 100% certain about the date.

Rutgers, New Brunswick, NJ This is probably not the correct date for this show.

WHTG, Eatontown, NJ An in-studio performance by Hitchcock, Andy Metcalfe, and Morris Windsor. Interview by Brian Billy. Songs performed: Ultra Unbelievable Love Alright Yeah Silence of the Damaged Rays Child of the Universe Raymond Chandler Evening

Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ   This was one of the most fun concerts I've ever attended. I've been to perhaps better concerts, on a number of criteria, but rarely have I enjoyed myself more at a show. post continues.... This was an outdoor concert at Deiner Park, a lawn built over Route 18 and overlooking the Raritan River. It was beautiful September night, with that sort of coolness which, when mixed with activity, is neither chilly nor hot. Mick Jones' B.A.D. II's album The Globe had just connected with the cultural zeitgeist in a way that he hadn't managed since his days with The Clash (and, at this writing, he was not to do so again). Fueled by the big-beat dance-rock sound that was soaring to ascendency during 1991 (in what was also to be effectively its swan-song, as the hammer was even then being cocked to fire grunge's gun square at American musical tastes), "Rush" was just then becoming Jones' only U.S. post-Clash Top 40 hit;...

Fastlane, Asbury Park, NJ..... The day of the show, the Milltown Brothers came by WHTG's studios for an interview with Matt Pinfield. A photo from that visit later turned up in trade magazine Radio & Records (misspelled my name, dammit).  

Tramps, New York, NY This was a showcase for Hitchcock's new album, Perspex Island . Most of the audience was radio people, journalists, A&M Records staff, various music industry types, and 25 members of Hitchcock's fan club. As a radio DJ, a former A&M employee (mail room), an a bona fide Robyn Hitchcock fan, I was in my element. Prior to the show, A&M's promotions staff had a dinner for radio guests at a restaurant up the street from Tramps. It was the first time I was able to see some of my former A&M co-workers. I saw Wayne Isaak there, who ran the New York A&M office (then located in the Fuller Building, at 57th Street and Madison Avenue) and who reluctantly had to fire me when they had budget cuts. I was able to tell him with absolutely no rancor, "Remember when you let me go, you said 'This might be the best thing that ever happened to you'? Well, it was! So thanks!" And it was true, since my firing at A&M indirectly led to...

Waterloo Village, Stanhope, NJ.... Lollapalooza I Jane's Addiction setlist: 1. Up the Beach 2. Whores 3. No One's Leaving 4. Ain't No Right 5. Thank you Boys 6. Three Days (11:50) 7. Been Caught Stealing 8. Pigs in Zen 9. Ted, Just Admit It 10. Then She Did 11. Mountain Song 12. Stop 13. Classic Girl 14. Ocean Size

Danceteria, New York, NY [UPDATE: I finally tracked down the date and venue of this show!] I don't recall the exact date nor the venue, but it was a late show with King Missile as part of the New Music Seminar. My friend Kathy and I drove into the city and, naturally, there was a guest list problem. Earlier that evening, we had gone to an unusual performance space called The Gas Station (at Avenue B and 2nd Street), a barely-renovated abandoned gas station with an ample outdoor space surrounded by chain-link fence. The place was being used as a showcase for Baltimore-based record label Merkin Records. They had their bands Monkeyspank, Buttsteak, and Antic Hay performing but I didn't include an entry on this blog for them because I honestly don't recall which, if any, of the bands we saw play. I primarily remember someone going around with a basket of loose cigarettes labeled "have a cigarette, leave a cigarette, need a cigarette, take a cigarette" and a chair f...

Melody Bar, New Brunswick, NJ Actually, this was a Miles Hunt solo performance not the whole band. A noteworthy one though, since it was filmed for inclusion in the group's documentary Welcome to the Cheap Seats .

Fastlane, Asbury Park, NJ..... Gang of Four was touring in support of their latest album Mall .  Add your own comments if you were also there!    

Fastlane, Asbury Park, NJ..... This was the first of many times I saw King Missile live. We had been playing "My Heart Is a Flower" as a single advance of the band's Atlantic Record's debut CD The Way to Salvation , and I loved the song but didn't know anything about the band. When the full CD arrived around it's mid April 1991 release, I looked at the pictures of the band and release that I had seen frontman John S. Hall do spoken word performances in the East Village when I lived in Chelsea in 1990. So I was even more intrigued to see the band perform.  At WHTG, a summer intern named Kathy just started and it turned out she was enthusiastic about King Missile as well. By then we had started to play a dance remix of "My Heart Is a Flower" (by Ivan Ivan). She told me that she had seen people dancing to the song in a club with their arms held high up in a sort of a "U" shape so that they looked like giant bouncing flowers. (I know: very...