Interview with John Bailey, October 7, 2016

[OFF MIC CONVERSATION]

CHIP NOLD: All right, I'm recording this with John Bailey at his home in Louisville on October 7, 2016. John is a guitarist for The Afters, Your Food, Big Ben and the Liberty Bells, and The Bulls.

JOHN BAILEY: I played clarinet for Big Ben and Liberty Bells.

CN: That's right. I did -- I couldn't envision you with that. At any rate, okay. So like I say, I'm going to follow my questions somewhat. When and where were 1:00you born?

JB: I was born in Lake Forest, Illinois, which is a suburb north of Chicago. But I actually lived in Lake Bluff, they just didn't have a hospital.

CN: All right. So when did your family come to Louisville?

JB: 1974 in July.

CN: And you were born what year?

JB: '63.

CN: So you were 11. And where'd you go to school?

JB: I went to Kammerer Middle School and I went to Country Day for high school.

CN: All right. Where in Louisville did y'all live?

JB: We lived in Brownsboro Farms, which is a subdivision near the corner of Goose Creek and 22. You want to hear a funny anecdote my mom told me about our house?

CN: Yeah.

JB: Our house was actually a model home in one of the -- I think the '72 or '73 State Fair. And then they took it apart. Have you been to -- you've been to my home.

CN: Yeah.

JB: You would never think like, "Oh, that's the home of the future."

CN: All right. It was a nice house. What did your parents do for a living?

JB: Well, my dad, when we moved here, was a quality control person at Thomas Lighting -- or Thomas Industries I guess is what it was called. And that was -- he did something similar in Chicago, and then in around 1980 or '81, he switched 3:00careers and became a corporate headhunter, specializing in and finding engineers for companies that needed engineers. And my mom was just a stay-at-home mom.

CN: So how did you get interested in music?

JB: I guess I started -- I would listen to the radio when I would read science fiction books in middle school, so it was mainly WAKY. Whenever I think of the Time Machine, reading that, that song "You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet" comes into my head. And what happened is when I was in high school, my sister had a huge 4:00record collection. So I would go up and visit her and her husband when I was 15 or 16 and she started to tell me that I could take whatever records I wanted. And I bought this book at Hawley Cooke called The Top 200 Rock and Roll Records of All Time. And I forget the name of the critic, but one of them was a critic from London. I guess they had, however many critics rate their top 100 albums. This guy was focused on punk rock more than others.

So what happened is the number one record was Sergeant Pepper's, the number two was I think Highway 61, number three was Exile on Main Street. But I think number 10 was The Velvet Underground, The Velvet Underground [I meant the Banana Peel record] and then in the top 20 was the first Clash record. So my sister had a copy of that Velvet Underground record, which I would have never noticed except that it was in this book, so I grabbed that. Then I forget where I bought the first Clash record.

CN: So this is when?

JB: This would have been 19 -- well, getting The Velvet Underground record probably would have been right around 1979 or '80, when I was 16 or 17. And then gosh, Clash record was released in the US, like '80 or '81. So it would have been right around that. Because Wolf and I were friends since middle school, so he started -- we met at a church youth group. And we realized we got along well, we had a lot of similar musical interests. Wolf was much more into bands like Kansas, and we used to talk about -- I mean, I'm sure you felt the same way how lousy FM radio was. And I remember we had this discussion where I was like, 6:00"There's got to be some new bands out there." He's like, "No, man. We need the old bands to carry us through," talking about Kansas, like Jethro Tull, Styx kind of stuff, which I was sort of listening to at the same time. It wasn't like I thought that was complete crap already.

But then-- gosh, we started to buy records like that or like the Clash record, the first Pill record, and then-- God, I can't remember when it was. Wolf got his mom, he -- Arrot does these study-abroad things, where she teaches for a 7:00month and a half. Well, Wolf did that and just completely blew off the whole curriculum, just tried to find as much punk rock stuff in London as he could. So he wrote me a couple letters, like remember, introducing me to Pig Bag and stuff like that. So anyway, we -- gosh. So 1980, '81, I think he and I started to try and play musical instruments, around then. That's when we started The Afters. Wolf was -- first he played guitar and I played guitar, and then he switched to bass. And that's how that whole thing got started.

CN: Do you recall why that happened?

JB: I think initially I was probably a little bit better on the guitar than Wolf was and we needed a bass player, so I'm pretty sure that's how that decision got made. You know, Wolf -- are you going to talk to him?

CN: Yeah.

JB: So he's a very interesting person musically, because I think he was gifted mathematically. And I think me sitting back and looking at it, I think that's sort of -- I mean, obviously music clicked with him at a very emotional level, but I think his way to process it was mathematical. So I remember when we were at his mom and dad's or his mom's at that point living room practicing and he said, "Well, I came up with a new lick," and he played it, it was Heart and Soul, which I don't know if he'd ever heard it before or not, I just said, "Wolf, that's Heart and Soul," because it was [starts humming]. But anyway, so he had a knack for kind of pop licks like that. But anyway, I play guitar because I think I was better back then. And I think I maybe even taken some lessons, because I think Dave Grubbs and I had the same guitar teacher, I think 9:00this guy named John Gramer. We both went to -- he had a little space in Holiday Manor, I want to say.

And obviously Dave is a gifted musician and I'm not. I mean, I could practice eight hours a day, couldn't get that kind of facility. So anyway, that's why I was playing guitar and Wolf was playing bass, and then classic thing was trying to find somebody who could drum. Am I jumping ahead too much?

CN: No, I might go back, but just tell it however you want to.

JB: So I remember Wolf maybe when he was in London and we're writing -- oh no, I know what it was. He also spent a summer working on his uncle's I want to say ranch in Colorado. And that's when -- what happened -- I should also mention that -- so I went to high school at Country Day. I did not dig going to high 10:00school at Country Day. Wolf was my best friend at that point, and he was going to Atherton and then transferred to the Brown School. So I started hanging out with all those guys. And that's where I met Janet Bean. So we would hang out. The three of us became pretty fast friends. And that's when I would do my record buying, coming into like here, this part of town [The Highlands], like Pyramid records. And what was that record store near the corner of Taylorsville and Bardstown?

CN: Was that Karma, or--?

JB: That could be it. I remember the lead singer from [Melusian] was one of the record clerks. That was one of the first punk rock shows Wolf and I went to was 11:00I'm pretty sure it was at the Red Barn. I know it was at UofL, so it was probably there. Is there a Bigelow Hall?

CN: Yeah.

JB: Bigelow Hall. And it was Melusian, The Blinders, and maybe Strict-9. And anyway, so I kind of recognized her, but that's where I would buy the punk rock records. And so anyway, Wolf and I started hanging out. We played with some guy from the Brown School named Jeff Stewart drummed with us, and gosh, I'm trying to think. I know how we got in with the punk rock circle in Louisville. What happened is back when I think when I was a freshman or sophomore in high school, we were friends with these Brown School kids, a lot of them -- I never ran across Jenny back then, or Alec and Cathy. But Jane and Jerry [Tyrrel]. I think 12:00Trisha Lister, who's now a lawyer, lives up the street, and some other people. And some of them would talk about going to see punk rock shows at The Windmill because they could get in even though they were 16, 15 years old.

And then Wolf and I were playing together more seriously, and we knew about the punk rock house at 1069, and it always -- I mean, this is ironic now that we all know what the personalities were the people that were living there, but just thought God knows what happened inside those walls. We were just so scared of approaching them. I mean, we all -- like I said, your normal late teens' 13:00anxieties and stuff like that. I'm sure there were all these apocryphal stories about-- not orgies, but just what kind of weird stuff must be going on. And it was very low-grade weird stuff, as it turns out.

So, the way we got introduced is Wolf had this huge fight with his mom, which was not an infrequent occurrence between the two of them. I think it was about raking the leaves. And it got so heated that he left the house and was so mad that he just said, "Fuck it, I'm going to go knock on the door of the punk rock house." I think I'm remembering this correctly. So he -- I don't know if it was Charles or Tari that he was talking to, so all of a sudden the level of fear of the inside of the punk rock house dropped precipitously. So I think we all went over there and started hanging out .

I remember when Kathy first met Janet because Kathy found out -- somehow she got it out of Janet real quickly that her middle name was Beverage, and Kathy just started laughing and giving her the business about that. So you can imagine.

CN: What a great origin story of of Freakwater, great.

JB: So we started hanging out with those guys, and then I guess you guys were set up to practice in that center room, and I think Tari was kind of drumming. The Dickbrains had broken up. Doug was in New York, so Tari started drumming with the three of us, with Wolf and me, and then that's when we took all this time to figure out what name. The name was originally going to be Orange, Orange. That's how desperate we were. And I can't remember another name that we 15:00were bouncing around. I think Terry always had Vogue magazines, there was an ad for a bra that said the "unexpected under wires" was one of the names we were tossing around. And I think we just wound up saying Your Food, and I can't remember if it was just because none of us hated it.

CN: Keep talking.

JB: So Wolf and Tari and I started playing, and I think I was singing at that point. And then I think we even played a couple of gigs, maybe, when I sang. I couldn't imagine that that would go on too long, because I didn't think I was very good, and I could barely sing and play guitar at the same time. So anyway, 16:00we were doing that, and I think Doug came back into town. And I remember coming in like -- I guess we had heard a little bit about Doug. And I just remember walking into the living room and he was sitting there with this cigarette looking really bummed out to be back in Louisville. But anyway, obviously Terry and Doug were friends, and I think she suggested maybe he start singing. And so that happened. And gosh, I think from the start of -- like a [baffle].

CN: Let's see.

JB: That happens when we try and watch movies. Sometimes it'll be just how do we get her in what position. Come on Bubs. [I'm talking about trying to get our dog 17:00Bubbles to stop snoring while Chip is recording.]

CN: So you were saying Doug had come back from New York?

JB: And I was just thinking we broke up in early 1984. And I think we started in 1982. So when you look back on this stuff, it seems like it should have taken 10 years to get from point A to point B, but it was probably 22 months or something like that. So Tari and Doug and Wolf and I were playing, and we played out a little bit. And what had happened is Tari started to date Michael. And obviously he and [Wink], you know, very musically interesting people, she was having less and less time to practice with us. And also, when we weren't practicing with Tari, it was me, Wolf and Charles and Doug just sitting around hanging out, 18:00watching the A Team and Remington Steele on Tuesday nights, TV party.

And finally, I think we were talking about it and we asked Tari, like, "Well, I know you're doing stuff with Michael. Do you really want to keep drumming?" It was one of those things where we all were dancing around a little bit. And we agreed that she didn't want to be in the band anymore. Charles was right there, so that's when he started drumming. And Charles was -- at that time, I would say he was a better drummer than Tari. Tari was much more of a -- I don't know how would you describe, like a Tom-Tom type of drummer, like [drum beats]--

CN: I remember that.

JB: Charles had a little bit more of a repertoire of drum stuff he could do. And I remember Wolf and I were talking about this when I was up -- Lauren [John's 19:00daughter] lived in Brooklyn, so I would visit her and stay with Wolf. And he was like, yeah, remember we -- there was just never anything to do, so we practiced all the time. So he goes even though the songs weren't that complicated and we weren't great musicians, we finally got to be pretty tight with what we were doing. And so yeah, we just were hanging out on the porch, like, "Well, you want to go practice? There's nothing else to do." So that's what we would do. And so we -- like you guys, finding a place to play was always difficult. Hopefully 12 people would show up, that type of thing. I think it was always difficult getting a gig at Tewligan's, it seemed like, probably because they knew 12 people would show up.

And I can't remember -- in terms of making the record, if that happened before, after the Beat Club showed up. I remember all the sudden somebody saying, "Yeah, one of the strip clubs downtown on Third Street is being turned into a punk rock club," so immediately we went down there and met Joe and Joe's brother. I can't remember -- Joe Gayles. I can't remember what his brother's name--

CN: Tony, maybe?

JB: Possibly. And he was setting it up, he was gung-ho to have punk rock shows. I don't think he did that much décor-wise to change the place over. I think he and his brother inherited it from his dad. I think the stage we played on may have been the same stage that the earlier performers were performing on {AKA 21:00strippers}. And so now with the record, what happened is -- I think I had been washing dishes at Myra's. Wolf and I moved in together at that apartment across from Kroger, and so I think the rent was something like 230 bucks a month. I remember my share; my half was 115 bucks a month. So I was washing dishes. I was sometimes going to U of L, sometimes not. What had happened is Wolf had started dating Kate, and she had moved in with him at 1069. So the way the record got made is--

CN: Wolf or Doug was dating Kate? Wolf was dating Kate?

JB: No, sorry. Did I say Wolf? Doug was dating Kate. So Doug and Kate were living at 1069 with Charles, and I think Tari was on the top floor. Wolf and I 22:00were living at that apartment. Wolf was going to U of L and he got -- this may be one of those things where after Wolf is dead, you know -- Wolf got a Pell Grant. The second he knew he got a Pell Grant, he called me up and said, "I got a Pell Grant. Let's make the record." I was like, "Really?" and he's like, "Well, yeah." Kate chipped in some money. That's why the back, the record, one of the credits is the US Department of Education. So anyway -- and I chipped in -- I think I chipped in some money, maybe 200 bucks. Wolf got like $1100 or $1200. And then I want to say Kate chipped in 500 bucks. It could be more or less than that, but Doug would probably remember. So we went -- Circle X had just recorded. Not Circle X, Falconetti. You know, Bruce Witsiepe's some art 23:00band with Pullen, and I want to say Carl Martinez. I forget who else would have been in that.

CN: Ricky was in it.

JB: Yeah. So they recorded out at Gary Falk's studios. So we made arrangements with him. And I remember we fit everything in my parents' Chevette, including the drum kit, the speakers, the instruments, me -- I think I drove, Wolf and Charles shared the front seat. And Doug was so skinny that he just tucked himself into a free spot in the back somewhere. And we drove out to Falk Studios and recorded the record.

Gary was nice. I have no idea what was going through his mind. But at least Falconetti was there first, so we weren't the craziest thing that he probably ever tried to record. So that's how the record got made. Then the big tours we 24:00went on was -- what happened is I bought my brother-in-law's 1969 Chevy van for 250 bucks. And Sue and I, I think, drove with my parents to visit them in Springfield, Missouri and drove the van back.

And we got halfway home and I got gas and went to turn the van on and it wouldn't start. So we got this -- this guy pulled up and gave us a push start in the van. He's this very effeminate guy, like high school kid with his very beefy 25:00high school best buddy. The guy who was more effeminate, dad owned a bunch of oil wells in Southern Illinois somewhere. He had this huge pickup truck. They had been camping. We couldn't push the van fast enough to get it jump-started, so this guy just got behind us and started pushing us [using his pick up truck], and it finally started right before we got to the entrance ramp onto the highway. So anyway, that's how we got the van. We did -- God, I want to say the first tour we did was to the 930 Club in DC, and I think it was just to play there. And I think maybe we played there and then came back, and we all had headaches. And every time the van hit a pothole, it sounded like somebody was hitting the back of it with a sledgehammer.

So we got back, and that apartment was right next to Augie's Car Care. Do you remember that place? So Augie was this old guy who ran -- he kind of talked like this. So I think I was going to U of L at the time. So where we parked the van 26:00was right next to the garage, so I just asked him if he could -- I told him what was wrong, like we were getting headaches and there was this noise. So I went to class, and when I got back, he goes, "There's two reasons you ought to be dead," he goes, "The first one is the left rear suspension leaf has snapped in half. So how the rear axle didn't snap in two is beyond me." And he goes, "Also, the exhaust system is full of holes. You all should have been killed by carbon monoxide poisoning." So I remember he put a used rear leaf on for 75 bucks, and then I just went to some auto store and got a straight pipe and a Cherry Bomb muffler and put that on the van.

The van would burn through about two quarts of oil, a quart of oil every 50 miles. So when we did that tour where we went to-- my God, I guess it was the tour where we went played at Maxwell's and then the Ratskeller in Boston. Maybe that was the one where we broke down and broke up on the way back. But when we did that tour, I asked Augie to save all the used motor oil from people that would get their oil changed because we were blowing through it. So we had about 13 gallon milk jugs of motor oil we had in the back of that van.

CN: We used to buy it by the case, same deal.

JB: Yeah. You guys had that thing in. You guys had an extension van, right? So anyway -- yeah, we had to buy lead for the gasoline. So gosh, I'm trying to 28:00think -- what other kind of questions?

CN: While you're thinking about that just real quickly, just to peg them down, so you went to the 930 Club. When do you think that was?

JB: That was probably '83, I want to say. We had incredibly bad luck touring. We played -- and also not very good booking strategy. I think we played on a Tuesday, a weeknight at the 930 Club. And it happened to be a weird snowstorm hit. And seven people showed up. We played another place. God, we played some -- oh, and we also played -- okay, I'm getting these mixed up. Maybe Wolf will 29:00remember. We did two trips to DC. One was for the 930 Club show and then a show near DC, but there was a traffic jam and we couldn't make the gig, if I remember correctly.

And then another time we played at just a gig somebody arranged, and I think Barbara Ann Rice, she was a DC punk rock figure who Wolf got to know. And I forgot how he got to know her, maybe just through correspondence. She arranged a gig where a hall was rented and we played with The Nuclear [Crayons] or some other bands. We played last, we were the headline, and we were actually going over pretty well. But the power -- there was some deal with that venue where the power was shut off at 11 o'clock, and two-thirds through our set, the lights and the power went out, and that was it. And I just remember walking down the 30:00stairs. I think it was on the second floor of some building, and some guy had his back to us and was just, "Yeah, there was a band with those four walking skeletons from Kentucky." And you know, we also got the thing like, "Have you ever met Colonel Sanders?" I'm sure you can relate to that kind of stuff.

CN: I know some cousins of his.

JB: So yeah, I would say that would be '82, '83, because I know by January of '84, we weren't together anymore. I think that's when Wolf and Mike and everybody -- I know that's when Wolf and Mike drove to Vermont. And I can't 31:00remember if they hooked a ride with Tim and Tara or if that was a separate little exodus.

CN: I think it was, because I think Tim and Tara left in November of '83, because we were talking about that on Facebook and she said they were there by Thanksgiving, she thought. So clearly, Mike and Wolf stayed through the Super Bowl of the next year. We know that.

JB: I slept through that, actually.

CN: Tell the people who might listen to this what we're referring to.

JB: I forget if it was known as the Super Bowl party or not, but what happened is we were watching -- Wolf's dad had given him some money for Christmas, and this isn't the only time Wolf's dad would do this to Wolf. He would give him an amount of money and say this is for this specific product. So Wolf was to buy a 32:00color television set with this, and I remember we went down to I think it was at Mad Man Max on Broadway. It was me, Wolf and Jenny [Catlett] and Sean [Mulhall]. So we were sitting there, and the guy's dressed like Archie Bunker if Archie Bunker were Jewish, like you know Dennis the Menace dad's glasses, a big round guy, white shirt, black pants. And he was talking to Wolf and he goes, "Well, what do you do?" And he goes, "Well, I'm a student at U of L." And he goes, "What do you take up there, space?"

So anyway, Wolf was doing the paperwork for the TV purchase, so Jenny, Sean, and I went to the fried chicken place next door. They had just washed the doorway glass. We're sitting at this booth, Wolf walks in, turns to us -- it's similar to what you did at that house in the south end, like didn't realize there was a glass there and just walked, bumped right into it. Everybody behind the counter and us started roaring with laughter. Let me see who that is [checks phone]. So 33:00anyway, Wolf had this TV. So we were going to have a TV party. And by this time, I think Sue and I -- I know Sue and I had moved in together at an apartment next door to the place Wolf and I had, and Sean was sharing the apartment with Wolf. And so we were starting to watch the game, and I don't know how much we were drinking. I'm one of those people that if I drink too much I just get sleepy. So I can't remember if I just fell asleep there or if Sue and I went back to the apartment and I fell asleep.

But the way I heard it was Doug was sitting next to the plaster wall and was just picking on the plaster. And I think some of the -- I want to say maybe Todd 34:00Fuller was there, maybe some of the south end guys, Wolf, maybe Janet. I know Charles was there. And things just escalated I guess when they saw that there was a hole and they knew that they were not going to be there that much longer, just tore the place, got to the point where they had knocked holes in the side of the building from the inside of the second floor, just completely trashed it.

Actually, I think Wolf may have been living in that space at that point, because it may have been the next day when I went over there and I could see the top, maybe had already heard that this has happened and I could see the holes from the top -- and you know, you could get to that second floor from the front of the building through an interior stairwell or the back of the building through that exterior staircase.

So I just I remember I opened the door in the front, and it was opened up to the second floor apartment and I knocked on the door, was like, "Is there anybody in here?" And there was this pause and I heard both go, "Yeah." I was like, "It's me, John." I just heard this, "Fuck!" So they had trashed it, and I think they were -- maybe it was that day or within a couple of days they were out of there. And I guess this is another reason that this will be released upon Wolf's death. Because the printing company next door owned that property, they were looking for those guys. And I wouldn't be surprised that they also owed LGE some money, 36:00probably the water company some money, maybe the phone company. I don't know. But that's what happened with that. So from my understanding, that started with Doug picking plaster off, and pretty soon, they were looking -- somebody had some baseball bats and they were just banging on the inside until they had made it through the other side.

And it's funny. Years later, I worked at the Southern Baptist seminary prior to [Mohler] coming in, and I was the director of their publications department, basically an art director. And I did a lot of print buying. And one of the print reps was this guy named Riley Creed, who worked for Cardinal Printing when it was there. Somehow, we got over to that conversation -- I can't even remember, it's like, "Yeah, that was my best friend that -- " I don't think I would have 37:00said, "Yeah, I know exactly who did that," but I think it's like yeah, used to be in that punk rock house. "God, that place was nuts," like, "man, they tore that place up." I was like, "Oh, yeah. I heard about that."

CN: Well, this might be a good place to pause and go back -- I have questions throughout. Starting back with you said you got The Velvet Underground and the first Clash album, and I guess what did you make of those? How did you react to them when you heard them?

JB: The first time I listened to The Velvet Underground record, I thought, "What in the hell is this? This doesn't even sound like music." And then I thought well, it's got to be rated so high for a good reason, so I listened to it again. By the second and third time I listened to it, it started to make more sense. And that really sort of changed how I thought about music quite a bit, because 38:00like I said earlier, Wolf and I used to really like Styx and all these bands that were really incredible musicians. And then that started to bore me. But there was this gap between being bored by that stuff and finding punk rock. And then when I found punk rock --the Velvets were sort of a doorway into that whole -- I mean, it made it by listening to that, it's like, well, anybody can make music. Maybe if you're not burdened with this virtuosity, something more interesting will happen.

I guess you could almost call it the equivalent of the folk craft art movement, self-taught artist. And sometimes that stuff's more interesting. I was going to 39:00the Louisville School of Art, and a professor I didn't like but he said something that I found really interesting is if you go to a high school art exhibit, often there it's really dull. But if you go to an elementary school art exhibit, those kids have not been screwed up by thinking that they need to make artwork in a certain way. And there's also this guy going to Louisville School of Art, this was such an unlikely person to be there. He was an old-school-- I don't want to say this guy must have been from the south end, because I think that's putting -- that may be a little politically charged, but you know, 40:00classic Louisville accent, real heavy guy.

He would show up with a Blue Foam UK cowboy hat that you'd wear at a baseball game or a basketball game. And he was really -- remember those brothers that lived next to us on Eastern Parkway at all? Do you remember those guys?

CN: Not really.

JB: I guess my point is this guy may have been clinically a special needs person, and I think Louisville School of Art at that time, I didn't know it, but must have just been desperate for tuition money, so they enrolled this guy. And remember Moose, that big guy?

CN: Vaguely, yeah.

JB: Have his intellect but in with a much smaller guy who probably weighed 400 pounds and was just kind of like -- should not have been an art student. But 41:00what this guy, the artwork he was producing, I remember the first art critique, the drawing professor said, "You know, this didn't follow the assignment, and classically critiqued, this is not what I wanted produced. But I almost feel like I shouldn't tell you anything, because this is so interesting, what this stuff looks like." So that kind of made me -- that's just an example, like starting to think about well, maybe if people that really didn't know how to play their instruments picked them up, something more interesting would happen than Carry On My Wayward Son or something like that. And I think also at that time, Wolf and I had gotten into -- what was the Talking Heads album? "Letting 42:00the days go by," Remain in Light. And also My Life in the Bush of Ghosts that David Byrne did with Eno, I think. And I remember kind of writing letters -- he must have been in London. It was either that or when he was in Colorado -- one summer he was in London for a month, one summer he was in Colorado for another summer.

And we just started thinking about -- when we started playing, our inclination wasn't to play punk rock like the Circle Jerks or the Sex Pistols or anything like that. Musically or at least tonally we were much more influenced by those Talking Heads records or Joy Division or Pill, that kind of thing. So that's 43:00sort of what our influences were, at least best as I can remember then. So anyway, when I got the Clash record and the Velvet Underground records, that stuff started to appeal to me more than the Joy Division records. I never got into Echo and the Bunnymen as much as I think Doug and Kate were in, The Psychedelic Furs. Got also into stuff like The English Beat and The Specials.

And I'm trying to think if there were some -- Wolf was much more of an audiophile about that stuff than I was. I think actually, Pyramid Records hired -- they didn't really hire him but they asked him to recommend stuff they could 44:00get in, because I think Wolf was subscribing to NME at that point. And so I think what happened with him is he would do that, in return he could buy records from them at half price, which was probably just a little bit over what they were paying for the records. So instead of buying a record for $4, you bought a record for $2. So that's how we went from -- because when we first started to play together, and this would have been The Afters, we were doing cover songs like we would cover "Wild Thing," but we would also try and cover "Waiting for My Man," that kind of stuff. God, I haven't thought about that stuff in a long time. I'm trying to remember what else. We were probably coming up with some of our own stuff.

And so I guess my point is that's the stuff I was listening to. I think Wolf was 45:00probably listening to a little bit broader range stuff. I remember he had got me into Cabaret Voltaire, and he also was into stuff that was a little bit noisier like, Pig Bag. God, some of the other names will come to me. I'll have to think about that for--

CN: Stuff like Rip Rap and Panic--

JB: Yeah, yeah. Einstürzende Neubauten which I think is German for collapsing new buildings or something like that, you know, some stuff that you would just put on like Flipper. Which I remember we were at a party at that house on Payne Street and Pullen was there. I think he may have been living there. I thought it's like, "Wow, you've got a copy of Metal Machine Music," which was I guess I 46:00didn't know it at the time but I guess that was Lou Reed's record to get out of his record contract. And so Pullen goes, "Oh, you want to hear it?" I said sure and he's like okay, so he puts it on and he puts the needle down. It's like [sound effects] and he goes, "No, here's what it sounds like halfway through," and then he picked it up and put it down. It was just the same wall of white noise. Not that that influenced us, but we weren't-- like that song "Order" on the second side of the record, that came about with Wolf just kind of creating this thumping bass line and just well, we can just-- I think I was playing the strings below the nut of the guitar. You know what that -- so it sounds almost like if you're plucking a violin, and then Doug just would start singing with 47:00the microphone next to the speaker monitors and getting just all these crazy sounds.

So I guess those influences, as far as we were concerned, it was open season whatever we wanted to do so we could do something that lasted 15 minutes, sort of descended into semi-coherent, chaotic noise, shouting and stuff like that, or some of this stuff. Actually, the stuff we were going to play for -- if we ever-- were going to try and make a second record, but then we broke up before that happened, some of that stuff is a lot more pop, not like anything if anybody heard would say, "Oh, that's a pop song." But it didn't sort of devolve into screeching stuff.

And Wolf was also getting into time signature stuff, like 5/4. That song Foriegn 48:00on the record, I think was in 5/4. And actually, I blanked out. There's one song on the record where Wolf's bass line was in 6/8 and my guitar part was in 4/4 so every, what, four measures they would sync back up. I think it was [cool cow town]. Actually, no it wasn't. It'll come to me. [It was Corners!]

But anyway, so you were asking me what I thought of that stuff. So it took -- it wasn't like the second I heard the punk rock stuff, like a light bulb went off. I just had to listen to it probably a little bit longer. I remember Charles telling me, I think that I'm getting this right and I'm sure they'll correct me if I'm wrong. I think he and Kathy and Alec bought a Dead Boys record because 49:00they were going to make fun of it. They had heard about the punk rock stuff and just thought it was ridiculous, and they played it. And then, well, "Sonic Reducer,' that was like, "Oh, it's a great song." But they'll have to speak to that. But that just made me think of that.

CN: So did the Afters gig or play parties or anything like that?

JB: I don't think we did.

CN: I know I remember seeing a tape that you might have been at practice or maybe--

JB: It probably was at practice. But actually, I think we were still the Afters 50:00when Wolf wrote this song. He did this baseline where he's playing two strings at the same time. And that may have been right around when we first met you guys, because I think part of it was that he was strumming the bass, and my guitar part was kind of dense. Part of it was just because it was overwhelming the tape deck. And I remember Tara said when she heard it, she couldn't believe that was just two people playing. And that may have been the tape you're talking about. And I forget what that song was called but it was like [humming] [Dismal] but he was playing two bass notes. And he was hitting them really hard. We probably had pretty shitty amplifiers. Like I said, between that, the amps, and the cassette deck, which was probably 1978 Sears miniature cassette deck, it 51:00just makes it sound a little bit more impressive than if you'd been in the room with us. But that may have been the tape you were talking about.

CN: Just you touched on it, but I thought it would be interesting. You mentioned the Beat Club. Just talk a little bit more about that. That was a really interesting venue. I mean, up to that point, at that point Tewligan's was the only venue in town I think, except for the odd--

JB: Yeah. With the Beat Club, I just remember that opened up, and pretty soon they would let us in. Gosh, in '82 I would have been 19, and in '83 I would have turned 20. So they were letting us in before we should have been let in. Now, 52:00when we were playing, that was okay. But if we weren't playing, we weren't supposed to be there. It was pretty great because it was a venue specifically for that. I wanted to say that maybe Joe either would play punk rock music over the PA system between sets or -- I can't even remember if they had a jukebox.

CN: I think it was a sound system.

JB: So you could go and hang out. There's a chance likeminded people would be there. Sometimes it would be really packed. I mean, it wasn't always like crickets chirping when you would play there, because I remember there would be times there when Sue and I were dating, hanging out with Mary McCarthy. I remember being there and just being a lot of people there. But it was kind of hit or miss. Sometimes you would play and there would be a lot of people there and a lot of people dancing upfront. It was a long, narrow space, and the stage was in the back of the bar. And then there was that little brick courtyard behind it.

And God, one time I remember Tara and I were back there, and Wolf had to leave because the cops came and -- somehow I'd gotten down there without my moped, but Wolf's moped was there. And somebody just said, "Wolf had to run out of here, he told me to tell you to ride his moped back to 1069." Tara and I were in the back, and we were getting pretty drunk. And so she had like a half pint of something, bourbon. I remember she passed it to me, I spilled a bunch of it down the front of my shirt, and I was like, "I've got to go." Like I'm pretty bombed driving down Broadway at two in the morning on Wolf's moped. So I was thinking, 54:00"Here I am, probably can smell me a block away because I'm soaked in bourbon, pushing this moped down the sidewalk at two o'clock in the morning," because that's when Wolf and I had those mopeds.

But yeah, the Beat Club, I just remember we could go there and it was something to do on even a weeknight. And Joe tried to do the best he could. I have no idea what his financial situation was. It couldn't have been great because I'm sure he wasn't earning a ton of money there. And I remember, I think his wife tended bar there--

CN: Tammy.

JB: Yeah, Tammy. And I think sometimes -- I think there got to be a little bit 55:00of tension between Joe and maybe some of the people by the time it moved from there to when it opened in the market.

And I can't remember if that was maybe not getting as much money. I mean, we should have just been grateful that there was some guy letting us play, but like anything, like well, we're drawing people. Maybe it was when we got to the new space because that new space was huge. But I think REM didn't -- The Zoo Directors opened for REM.

CN: On Third Street.

JB: Yeah, on the Third Street. And I think Tara got a little upset at us because we didn't -- Sue and I, I think they played on a Sunday night, and I think we had gotten back from going somewhere that Sunday and were just too exhausted to 56:00make it. But it was a big deal. It was before I think they really exploded, obviously, or they wouldn't have been playing in the Beat Club. Because you guys played with them, and I went to that trip to Athens. And that was before their -- was that before their 12-inch EP had come out?

CN: Before or right around, right around the time they had the single.

JB: Because I remember it was like you guys played a relatively small place, but when you opened up for them, it was like -- I mean, it seemed like a pretty -- like there were a thousand frat people there. It was really weird for me because it was like a punk rock gig. But everybody there seemed to be frat people from University of Georgia.

But anyway, I guess back to the Beat Club, it great to have a place -- gosh, I think I saw Bad Brains there, Get Smart-- shit, what was the name of that band 57:00that had that real asshole for a lead singer that covered the Credence Clear -- the CCR "Run Through the Jungle"?

CN: Is that the Gun Club?

JB: Yeah, Gun Club. God, I'm trying to remember who else we saw there. DOA played there. And I'm sure there were other bands that played there that I didn't go see. But that was a great venue, and then it moved to another -- I don't think it was an ex strip club. I think it was an ex adult bookstore, 58:00because Joe hired some of us to help clean it out, and I remember I found this stack of Polaroids. And I wish I could remember the circumstances better, but it was like this guy, it was pictures of this naked girl with -- it was almost like that girl in Boogie Night she was wearing roller skates and she was naked. And I think either the guy that owned the place got murdered or murdered her. There was some sort of heavy-duty criminal activity involved in the past with this place. So we found this stuff. I just looked at it, said, "God Joe, look at this."

And I remember that was the -- I was pulling -- I think we were getting these two four-by-eight sheets of plywood, just all this garbage. So Joe hired me and Rigot, and a classic example of Steve trying to pretend he wasn't a very large, 59:00strong person. So I was trying. There was this three quarter-inch by four-by-eight-foot sheet of plywood that I was trying to get from point A to point B, and of course Rigot shows up in an olive-green mechanic's onesie and these rubber boots that came over there and these big gloves. And he just came up and picked it up with two hands and walked off, and as he was walking off he turned to me and said, "Pussy."

But, so I remember Joe got that place -- like we were talking earlier, that's where I met Kenny Ogle for the first time, out in front of that place. I don't remember Your Food gigs there because my -- I remember the Big Ben and Liberty Bells and the Falconetti gig there, where we both sounded surprisingly good. I 60:00think there may be a tape recording of that around here somewhere. I'm sure the Poor Girls played there. And then I forget. I think he just couldn't make a go of it. And just -- I forget if for just one day it was closed or what. I think Joe has passed away, hasn't he?

CN: I believe, so yeah.

JB: Didn't he live in Madison, Indiana? Is that where he wound up?

CN: I can't remember that.

JB: Somebody was telling me something along those lines. So anyway, that closed down, and I can't remember where we would play after that. That may have been very close to when we broke up.

CN: The other thing I wanted to ask -- well, a couple other things I wanted to ask about, and then we can start moving forward. One is I think sometimes in a 61:00band there is a moment where either it starts to click or you start to see that you're doing what you want to do, in a way. I wonder if you remember that with Your Food or just sort of how you experienced the history of the band and the progress of the band.

JB: Well, it really took off when Charles started drumming, because I think what happened there is, like I said, and I'm sure Tari would take no offense to this, Charles just was a more accomplished drummer. So that helped quite a bit. The other thing which I talked about earlier is we went from hardly ever being able to practice to being able to practice all the time, so we became kind of as a unit and better musicians individually.

And I'm trying to think. I remember when we played at the Crimson Lounge -- not 62:00with the Crimson Lounge; it was some other place on Fourth Street. I've got a tape recording of that gig that I realize that everything's going -- like we're really tight. I'm sure it would have evolved in practices, because we would experiment around with stuff. Doug has--I'm sure you'll talk to him--he's got the archive of everything. He's made a double CD called Your Food: The Real Meal Deal, I think, where it's--God bless him for doing it--it starts out with the very earliest stuff that maybe he and Tari and Wolf and I were doing, all the way through to some very experimental things we were doing right before we quit playing together.

Because when we played at Maxwell's, I wasn't nervous because I didn't think we 63:00could play well together. I was just nervous because we were playing at Maxwell's. And Kate went with us to that show and she said we got through the first song, which I think was "Leave," and she said it was so funny it was like you guys made it through that song and there's this collective [sighs] -- like you just -- I'm sure you know sometimes you're up on stage and you have absolutely no idea how any of this is resonating with the audience. And being what we were doing, like what you guys were doing, some people were going to dig it and some people were not going to like it at all. And it was not going to make any sense to them or it just wasn't their cup of tea and better than I probably, they could get really hostile about that stuff or [slow claps] you 64:00know, that kind of stuff. "What did I just listen to? I know I didn't like it," that kind of stuff.

So there got to a point where we knew what we were doing, we were doing it well; it's just whether somebody liked that type of thing. I don't want to say we were groundbreaking, but some of this stuff we were making was new to us. And I think that goes back to what I was saying earlier is you get some people that aren't necessarily trained musicians and stick them in a room, and after a couple of years, the stuff is going to become cohesive and well executed. But it's probably not going to be along the same linear track as, "Oh, I'm going to start a blues band," or I'm really into The Stones," you know what I mean?

So it's interesting. I was-- it may have been when we went to South Carolina. We 65:00took this trip to South Carolina with Sean and his wife Kara, Jenny Guy, and Arrot and me. William went with Jenny and Guy. They drove separately, and Sean and Kara, Arrot and I drove--

CN: So we're talking about recently, in the last year or two?

JB: Last July. And Garrison played I think "Leave," and he said, "This is really original." And then he played something else. I think it was "Don't Be." And he goes, "Now, here you're just trying to sound like Gang of Four." And I was like, "Well, that's a valid observation."

CN: This is something -- I'm stepping away for being the objective oral historian here, but I just wonder what you -- I would hear bands later, like the 66:00one that sits in my mind is say [Beat Happening]. And I would think, "Well, it sounds a little bit like Your Food but not as rocking and not as interesting, maybe."

JB: Boy I'd have to listen to that.

CN: But I don't know if you ever would hear things -- I guess what I'm just saying is when you hear things in later years that you think, "That was kind of like what we were doing."

JB: When I say no, it's not because I consider what we were doing unique but that-- I guess it's more like my mindset is such that it would -- okay. I read a review of Poke It With a Stick where some guy said this is a really great record. Anybody could lock themselves in their bedroom with a guitar and probably figure out how to play every note of these songs in less than 60 minutes. So it just never -- it was something that I never really listened to. 67:00And of course, sort of like what Garrison was saying is one song would sound like this and another song would sound like that. I don't know if they're -- I guess I never thought that we had a sound, "sound," other than maybe the sound of Doug's voice.

Bubbles is being very punk rock [Dog continues to snore throughout the interview]. Other than the sound of Doug's voice, maybe the one thing that sort of carried through to everything, because I would change the sound of my guitar a lot. And Wolf sometimes would be strumming his bass and sometimes he would be plucking it, and sometimes he'd be playing something that we thought was funky and something that we thought was hardcore and something that we just thought was some sort of stew between Pill, Joy Vision, and what other --

I guess sometimes the bass would be playing one-- like with a band like The Rolling Stones, the songs are constructed so the bass and the guitar are on the same track. So it kind of creates this one sound.

And with bands like us, the bass would be doing like [sound effects] and I would be going [sound effects] or something like that, where it wasn't like, "Oh, let's make this wallf of sound." It was like we'll do these things that are -- they're in the same key, but he's not just driving an A chord with his bass; he's playing some sort of crazy lick and then I may just be playing one note or just the same chord over and over again to kind of stay out of the way of the bass line.

I guess maybe if I was noticing bands where the bass lines seemed to be driving 69:00the melody, and the guitar line seemed to be sort of dancing around that. Maybe that's what I would say could possibly be something that we were doing. But that certainly wasn't unique to us.

CN: How did songs get written in Your Food?

JB: What would happen is it always started -- unless I'm mistaken. And this isn't from an ego point of view, but I think it always started with Wolf and me coming up with the music. But Doug usually had lyrics on hand or an idea for what he wanted to say in a song. So it was never where -- it wasn't often where Wolf and I were playing together, Wolf would like, "I've got this bass lick," and he would play it and I'd sit there and try to come up with a guitar part or vice versa. I came up with this guitar lick, what about this? And then we would go back and forth, and then we would--this sounds formal--we would present it to 70:00Charles and Doug, which would mean oh, we came up with this new lick, here's how it goes, and then Charles would start drumming and try and come up with something that he thought sounded good with it. And then like I said, Doug would have -- actually, one time he said, "I've got a song I want to write called 'Corners,'" and that's the song I was talking about where Wolf's bass line's in 6/8 and my guitar part's in 4/4.

So Doug had already written this, but it just so happened that Wolf and I came up with this music that what Doug had in mind fit perfectly. I'm not sure if it 71:00was hand in glove, but however -- he may or may not have needed to modify the lyrics, it worked. So Doug always had a notebook, and I'm sure he just had a zillion ideas for things he wanted to say, because he's very prolific lyrically. Because Sue was in a band with him years later, Trim, and he would have two or three new songs a week, it seemed like to her. And then I know he's been in Hal Dolls and has written a bunch of songs with them, and he's been in a few other bands. So I don't think it was ever a point where Doug was like, "Well, I'm just not sure what I have to say for this particular song." It's like, "Oh, I've got this well of ideas I've been thinking about and writing notes on. I'll just use this set of ideas and lyrics that I've got." So that's how the songs were constructed.

I don't know that there was ever something where -- I think we covered the Dickbrain songs, so that would be--

CN: Did you do laundrymat?

JB: Yeah. So that's how the songs were constructed.

CN: So sort of -- this was kind of the way the dance band did it. Somebody would have some music, and then everybody's responsible for his part. And unless there was something that was really you thought was wrong, you wouldn't really say, "No, do this." Is that sort of the same way?

JB: Yeah, I don't remember -- there were a couple songs where I may have figured out what I wanted Wolf to do on the bass, but those would be in the far 73:00minority. And I can't remember Wolf ever saying -- this could just be, in so much distance between now and then, ever having something specific he wanted me to do on the guitar. And I think that's probably because we were kind of in sync. Like if he came up with a certain bass line, I kind of had an idea of what type of song he was thinking of. Like that song "Don't Be" on the record, that's the one where Garrison was talking about it sounding like a Gang of Four song because the bass line's like [sound effects] just that over and over again. And my guitar part is just [sound effects] and like syncopating that but almost not 74:00even playing a chord, just barely holding your hands on the strings and just making this sort of machine chunky sound.

And then Doug actually -- you could call it what he was doing rapping to an extent. So when I heard that bass line I was like, "Oh, want we don't want the guitar mirroring that." I'm not going to be playing [sound effects] because I thought it would sound terrible and probably-- it was kind of the vibe I'm getting about where the song may be going. So that's how something like that would work.

CN: All right. So talk about why Your Food broke up. You mentioned when you 75:00broke up.

JB: Well, I think basically what happened is Sue and I were going to have a baby, and I was not going to be able to be in a band anymore. And I think the only reason Wolf wanted to stay in Louisville is to be in that band. So when that happened, we knew that -- actually, we knew that that was going to happen, and we did that last tour date, which is when the van broke down twice. And the second time, my dad had to come and tow us back from Huntington, West Virginia or something like that.

So that's basically -- we did that gig. Not long after that was the Super Bowl party, and within days after that, Wolf and Mike moved to New York. And I think Doug and Kate -- I think all four of them may have gone up at that point. 76:00Because I know Doug and Kate were up there, and I think what happened is maybe Wolf and Mike dropped them off.

I don't know how else they would have gotten there because they didn't have a car, I don't think. But I could be wrong. But anyway, Wolf and Mike didn't move to Hoboken; they moved to Wolf mom's place in Vermont. And that's how Mike started dating Arrot, because Wolf was delivering pizzas at that point. So that's how Arrot wound up back in Louisville. If it hadn't been for Wolf, we wouldn't have our associate dean at Bellarmine, which is kind of crazy to think about.

CN: Okay. I've just got to ask. How did your dad feel about -- dad to dad, how did your dad feel about towing you back from Huntington, West Virginia?

JB: I think it was just my kid's stranded-- gosh, Charles -- I've got a newspaper article somewhere that--

CN: I've read that, yeah. It was in the cardinal, maybe. It's on Doug's website.

JB: Dad was a trooper about it. He came up and -- I think there wasn't anything for him to say. I was stranded there. I think we were going to get married within three weeks. We needed to get back to Louisville, and we rented a tow bar and dad drove the station wagon up. He drove us back from West Virginia. I can't even remember if we were on this side of the mountain. I'm hoping we were, because that would have been pretty precarious.

CN: So your dad always struck me as a really nice guy.

JB: Yeah, and I think he probably knew that I felt bad enough about the whole thing that he didn't need to say anything. There's some times when things go sideways so badly that the event itself is enough of a cautionary tale that a lecture -- he didn't lecture me or anything like that.

CN: That's good. Two other things I wanted to ask you about in this time period. One is just because she was such an original character, the namesake of your record label, Mary McCarthy. Just tell me about her. I think she's a part of the story.

JB: Well, Mary-- Mary had some real things not in her favor. She wasn't particularly attractive. She was diabetic. She was adopted. And she was really, really, really smart, which I don't think a lot of people knew how smart Mary was. So she was angry, but she was also really funny. So Mary -- before Sue and I were dating, Mary and Sue would show up at 1069 with the boom box, and Mary with this booming laugh. And of course I never was exposed to the Mary boob flash phenomenon, but she did pin me to the front of Sue's car. And I'm not the only person she's ever used this line on. And the drunker she got, the more her wandering eye would go kaflooey. So she's got her face right next up in front of mine and was telling me, "You're the most -- " gosh, how did she phrase it? 80:00"You're the most handsome man I've ever seen at this moment in time."

She goes, "Do you have a girlfriend?" And I said--I lied, "Yeah. And as a matter of fact, I've got to go." So I jumped on my moped, and I think I jumped the curb and just got out there absolutely as quickly as I possibly could. I know Alice Neff has stories about her stealing silverware from Dizzy Wizz. Pullen's got some pretty classic Mary stories if you really want to go down that rabbit hole. [Crosstalk]

Well, the funny thing about, funny thing about -- one of the odd circumstances 81:00when Sue and I -- so Wolf and I were best friends. Sue and Mary were -- I guess you would say best friends. So Sue and I started dating, and I think in Mary's mind, it just was like a given outcome that she and Wolf would start dating. And I just remember Sue -- we had the apartment. So Wolf and Sue and Mary and I were there, and I don't know if Sue and I were making out on the couch, or we may have just been sitting there talking or drinking or something. Mary goes into Wolf's bedroom, and after about 45 seconds I just hear, "I just want to lay here and read my Doc Savage."

CN: Should we note that you're imitating Wolf?

JB: Yeah. And I don't know what happened after that. That's all that stuck in my mind. God, I remember one time-- all right, so we were all at our apartment, 82:00that apartment and-- Jerry? Remember Jerry from Lexington?

CN: Right. Drummer?

JB: Yeah, he and Mary may have had something going on periodically. So he was there -- no, wait a minute. This was a different time. Mary and Doug and Sue and Wolf and I and maybe one or two other people were there. And Doug did this thing where I guess he -- Doug always had a little bit of inner acidity, like a little angry about stuff. So he's sitting by the window, he had finished like a Hudepohl and just decided to knock it off the windowsill and it broke on the 83:00sidewalk. This is probably at 1 o'clock in the morning or something. And a cop just happened to be right there. I don't think the cop was standing under the window and it almost hit him, but -- so the cop made us come down and clean the whole thing up. And of course I had always been taught to say like, "Oh, sorry officer. We'll clean this up right away." And Mary wanted to tell them to fuck off and stuff like that.

And I forget who it was that was in charge of keeping Mary away from the policeman while we were trying to do all this stuff, or just clean up the broken glass. But she was starting to throw the F bomb around towards the cop. You know, would have just ended really badly. And of course we weren't 21 yet, so it could have gone from bad to worse.

I'm trying to think what-- the screaming whore dog, her nickname came from a lot 84:00of stuff that Sue and Mary said happened had to be apocryphal, well -- remember the house Sue and I had when we first got married out in Lagrange? You'd pick us up there on the way to practice [I'm referring to later in the 80's, when Chip and I were in the Bulls]. Well, she and her brother rented that from her stepdad about the time that we were all hanging out, but maybe before Sue and I started dating. And apparently, I think it was there where they said they -- Mary thought she saw a warthog but said I just saw a whoredog. And I think that's where that term came from. So that -- and of course what was implied to her was the screaming whoredog because Mary had that laugh that you could hear for blocks.

She also -- I think she did something else, the "you're the best-looking man I've ever seen at this moment in time" to somebody else. I forget if it was John Armstrong or somebody else who probably had the same deer in the headlights 85:00reaction that I did. Oh, the best Mary McCarthy story is -- are you going to talking to Dreisler.

CN: Not sure.

JB: If you do, you may want to just ask his end of the story for this. So the Necros were playing in Indianapolis. So I think Sue and Jenny Catlett and I drove up in Sue's car, and I think -- maybe Wolf drove with us, yeah, Wolf. I think it may have been Wolf and Jenny were dating, which was funny to think about. And in the other car, it was like-- I want to say it was Sean and Britt Walford and Steve Dressler and Mary McCarthy. And Mary McCarthy wound up in the back seat with Dressler, and I guess that was very tense for Steve. I have no idea what happened there.

But anyway, we all got to Indy and we go in the hall -- oh, the Malignant Growth was opening. So of course, Mary was never in great physical condition. I forget there was something wrong with her foot at that point. So she's drunk, and of course in the middle of the Growth set, like between songs, of course she had to scream at the top of her lungs, "Ugly Mark A., my garbage man," because she always had a thing for Mark Abramovich.

So I think Sue's drink of choice at that time, which she called outie town juice, was just vodka and orange juice. So there was probably a big jug of that. And Mary was drunk on this stuff. And for some reason, there was a rocking chair sort of towards the dance floor part of this venue. So Mary's sitting there and apparently had spilled orange juice down the front of her. And some of these 87:00kids are like 12, and she's like, "I got something sticky between my legs, boys. Stick your head there, you'll never get it out."

And the other classic thing is she misheard that the headlining band's name was the Necros, and she goes, "The Negros? Who the fuck would name their band The Negros?" But she wasn't upset because she also had a thing for black men. God bless her heart.

CN: Yeah, I mean what you said is absolutely -- I mean, when I think of Mary, you remember there was a famous bootleg of The Stones' Liver Than You'll Ever Be? She just had such an energy, and it was hard to take it. I was certainly -- 88:00it was one of the early objects of that. But at any rate--

JB: Were you there when Diane uttered her classic phrase, like, "Oh, not those old tits again"?

CN: I don't know. You know, my bachelor party, it was co-ed, but yeah, the--

JB: Did you guys play That's When the Shirt Came Off or something like that?

CN: I think it was somebody else, actually. But at any rate--

JB: Well Sue and Mary had a huge nuclear fallout, and they didn't speak to each other really after -- I forget what Mary had done. I think maybe she was demanding Sue take money out and buy her cocaine or something like that. It was just -- Mary, I don't know if you ever saw Mary -- I don't know. Now we would 89:00say she had borderline personality disorder, which means either most of the time she was really up, up, up, up but then when she would get in these moods, just anybody in her crossfire, she would just tear into them. And I think she did that to Sue, and then Sue never really spoke to her after that. Because Mary and Sue used to be able to just sit at a table and they'd start giggling, and pretty soon they were just rolling with laughter. Mary like, "Ha, ha, ha!" Not a word had been said. It's just like, I don't know, it's like infectious laugh. That's Mary McCarthy.

CN: Well, so I guess a question that's sort of on my list I haven't been following very closely, but it was sort of the way somebody else wrote this, I think, but it was-- who were your local influences? Who did you look up to in 90:00the scene? But maybe even more broadly, who are the characters that stick out in your mind? You talked about your personal history, but when you think back to that time, who were the people that stick out?

JB: Well, obviously you guys. I should say the Babylon Dance Band. So I think I saw you guys at the Potato Festival playing with the Monsters before I knew any of you guys. And the acoustics for that were such that I wasn't sure -- I knew Tara was doing something pretty crazy on the guitar. But if you asked me to hum it, that was never going to happen in that particular instance. And then of course the Monsters. How on earth you guys -- I guess I shouldn't do role reversals. But the fact that that was a lineup at the St. Matthews Potato Festival, it's pretty crazy.

CN: I think Alice was responsible for that. Her dad was in charge of it at the time.

JB: Okay. That makes sense. Let's see. Character-wise, Rigot obviously was sort 91:00of a looming presence at that point, not really musically because I wasn't really familiar with that stuff. Of course, Wink. I mean, part of it was for his kind of surly personality, but he would talk a lot about music. And I think he and Michael were putting out that fanzine. Some of the local bands besides you guys that I thought were interesting was when Bill was in that band with Ricky Lee and Becky aka Venus Phlebogram ,The Mind Pods, and with Pullen drumming. 92:00Because I always though Ricky Lee's bass style was so interesting. And Bill knew how to play guitar, but music-wise, I never -- I don't know that I would say there was anybody that was an influence because there was no way in hell that the four of us could ever do what you guys were doing.

And there weren't like -- bands like Strict 9 and The Blinders were not my cup of tea. They were much more of a hard-driving pop interpretation of punk rock, I guess. And that wasn't anything that I was necessarily that interested in. So that's why a band like The Mind Pods would have appealed to me much more than 93:00some other bands-- and I'm not singling out saying they're a bad band. It was just something that didn't necessarily resonate with me. I mean character-wise, just the strong personalities, obviously Ricky and Diane, because Sue and I lived with them for about six months. I still -- every now and then I remember Kit Luthie, Carlos.

CN: Well, say -- any of these people, just sort of what you remember about them.

JB: Kit was exotic because he was British, and he and Tari were dating and he was very chatty. Carlos, he was a very flamboyant gay black man who was very 94:00nice. And that was -- I just didn't know any of those types of people. Rigot, I don't know where to start with Steve. He's just such a character to himself at that point.

CN: Talk about -- I was kind of leading towards that. I'd love to hear because you were friends for life, basically.

JB: I was intimidated by Steve when I first met him because I didn't know him that well. And for some reason, I thought he thought that I didn't like him because he was so flamboyant. So I thought he -- I thought he didn't like me because he thought -- because I thought he thought-- I thought he didn't like me or something like that. So but then once you got to know Steve, he's like the 95:00nicest guy, one of the more entertaining people you'd ever talk to, a great conversationalist. There aren't too many people that combine that personality with that physicality. I guess since this is an audio recording, has anybody described Steve?

CN: Not so far.

JB: So 6'4", 6'5", kind of heavy but also just naturally really strong person. I think if Rigot had had a different personality, he could be a starting lineman for an NFL team. He had that kind of latent strength Incredibly effeminate.

CN: I'm going to pause for a second. Resuming. And you were sort of talking about Rigot--

JB: Well, Steve, he was a very physically imposing large person who was also extremely effeminate. And the thing about Steve and I'm -- but if you talk to Bob, who I would assume you're probably going to chat with, I think given present-day politics, maybe Steve would almost -- I mean, he never considered himself a male, as far as I know. So in his mind, he was a female that just happened to be trapped. He may have said trapped, because I know when Sue and I 97:00were dating, it was when Steve was taking hormones. And I think I want to say he was considering a surgical solution to this problem or what maybe he thought of as the situation. But so, that kind of like lays the groundwork for what Steve looks like physically. And he was very chatty.

He was very funny. He had sort of a vocal tic that was very -- he would say something and then gasp, you know what I mean? He would say something like-- I want to think of what he would say without something that would be too blue. He 98:00would just say something that I thought was mildly outrageous and then go [gasp], that kind of thing.

He was an artist, he was an incredible performer on stage. Michael Dwyer once commented that Steve's the most graceful, light on his feet person he's ever seen of that size. An incredible physical comedian. I made a couple movies with him and there's been other films where he just is really hilarious. Incredibly sweet. If you consider the obstacles or the hand Steve was dealt, like was an incredibly nice guy and incredibly seemed very happy, very thoughtful, but he 99:00was a very large gay man that grew up in Southern Indiana at a time when that wasn't anything that -- that for any place and time, to be that person, I think he would have been happier present-day, which is sad because he passed away two years ago.

CN: Is it two?

JB: I think -- because gosh, Michael's service was about six months ago, and hadn't Rigot died -- maybe it's-- gosh.

CN: You could be right. I'm much better on dates 20 years ago than I am--

JB: Same here. I'm sure other people can speak to all the bands and things that 100:00Steve was in, but The End Tables being seminal little punk rock band, right? I mean, it was No Fun.

CN: No Fun, I Holes, Us, End Tables.

JB: So did The Babs form before The End tables?

CN: Yeah, just before. Maybe the third time, we played we did a party at Mark and Tim's apartment and The End Tables also played. It's at least the first time I saw them. I think it might have been the first time they played out. And that was when they had -- was it Joe, Will and Brink [ask Chip -- Will and Brink is actually someone's last name. Willenbreck?]? And Alice was on the stage. It 101:00seemed like a bigger aggregation than The classic End Tables.

JB: I can't remember the first time I laid eyes on Steve. It may have been at that show at the Crimson Lounge where you guys played and Tom Carson read a passage from Twisted Kicks, and then Circle X got up there and did that thing that Public Image had done at the Peppermint Lounge three weeks before and tried to pass it off as their original art idea. And I remember Wolf getting incensed because I think he had already read about it in the Village Voice or something like that.

CN: It was in the Courier, I believe, because it was such a riot caused by the PIL thing.

JB: I remember we all were just sitting there and -- was it Tony Pinotti the "lead singer" that finally said, "Do something, you fucking cheap"? And I remember not long after that Ricky walked by and cleared his throat, spat over the sheet. So I think he had even had enough. But Steve was there in a red jumpsuit, like a red onesie -- not like a leotard. But I remember his presence 102:00very vividly and I remember somebody coming up to talk to us about rock against racism. Remember that thing? Wolf and I were there. I think Janet may have gone with us. We didn't know a soul.

CN: What about Ricky? As far as talking about a character that you knew well.

JB: I think the first time I laid eyes on Ricky was probably at the Potato Festival. And of course you didn't get really his personality from that performance. And gosh, I'm trying to remember. So he was in the Monsters, and then that wasn't going on. And then I got to know Ricky a lot better when Sue 103:00moved into their place. I forget if she was already living there or if she moved there when -- I don't know if she was living there when we started dating or she moved there after we had started dating. But it was a like a second or third floor apartment on 4th & Hill, and it was -- Sue had a bedroom, and then Ricky and Diane had a bedroom and there was a kitchen. Did you ever go to that place?

CN: I have a feeling I did.

JB: It was huge. So that certainly gave me a more eyes on the ground experience with Ricky and Diane, which they would maybe even admit it was like if Tennessee Williams were a punk rock dramatist, like Streetcar Named Desire part two, never 104:00a dull moment. Ricky is one of the funniest people you're ever going to run into. He was always cracking jokes.

There would be some tension between Diane and Sue just because of their personalities. They're very type A. And Ricky at that time, it was pre-Bodeco, so when he would do the guitar thing, it was still just noisy stuff that I could not listen to it and try and fit -- and this was given that I was in Your Food at the time, it wasn't like noisy stuff was lost on me. But what he was doing sounded so random that I just didn't -- and so discordant. It was almost like-- 105:00I mean, there were bands I guess, maybe Pig Bag or like even what Borgodameos (sp?) just make as much discordant sound as you could get away with.

And so anyway. But Ricky, I've got his narrated life story on tape, so maybe that would be a better testament to a flavor of Ricky's personality. Did they digitize stuff at Luna? Actually, I've got to be careful about that because he got mad at me. I mean, I just said I'm going to write us, Eric Stoess putting out this -- I think it was Eric's publication, and, "Why don't you tell me your 106:00life story for us?" So he did, and then I transcribed it and it got printed, like all 14 copies of it or whatever. But he named the names of people who were not straight, who -- anybody who knew him knew weren't straight but they were not publicly out of the closet. I guess they got mad at him.

CN: Right. I know about that.

JB: I guess I wonder if you were singing with -- no, I don't think the Bulls had formed at that time, although I wonder why--

CN: Maybe around that time, I think.

JB: Maybe it was John Armstrong's. I don't know. I've got the transcribed piece of paper down in the basement somewhere. But Ricky, are you going to talk to him?

CN: Yeah. I mean, I just -- it's just I think it's good to get people's 107:00perceptions of other people.

JB: The thing about Ricky is he's another one of those guys that is sort of secretly really, really intelligent. And really quick, really quick with the one-liners. I remember Bodeco shows were half the fun would just be what he would say between songs, and it'd just bring the house down. It's interesting that he's such a Stones fan because I think to me, Bodeco is one of those classic bands that they're most interesting was their first recording, because Sue and I were living in that apartment on Wallace. And I guess he and Brian and 108:00Steve -- what's his name? Steve, their guitar player--it'll come to me--had just recorded the first Bodeco thing, and it was just like Ricky on guitar, Steve on guitar, and Brian playing drums and Ricky singing. And it blew my socks off.

And it's funny that now, if you hear them, it's so much more traditional Rolling Stones, White Bluesy stuff. And I think that's just because part of it may be 'cause there was personality clashes with all the people that -- I know he and Brian had, a tough time operating together, and then he and Mike. I know Bill played with them.

But Brian played drums just like Bo Diddley's drummer played drums, and they're 109:00not that many people that do that. And I remember when Ricky got the drummer after Brian left, Ricky told me about it, he goes, "I had to keep taking pieces of this drum kit away from him until he had maybe a snare, a tom, a hi-hat and a ride cymbal." And that was it. So anyway, I don't know if I should tell any anecdotes.

CN: Yeah. I'm not so interested in gossip at all.

JB: Ricky wasn't a big musical presence to me at that point because I saw the Monsters once. And then the next thing he did that I thought was interesting -- 110:00I mean, there was Falconetti, but it wasn't until the early Bodeco stuff that he came to be something different than a local. When I say local character, I just mean somebody in the scene who's really interesting and really funny and fun to be around.

CN: I guess that's why I do bring up people like Mary, and as you say, Ricky before he really had his major musical thing. My experience was that there were people in the scene who were just personalities. Another one you mentioned is Jenny. Jenny Catlett was never in a band, to my knowledge.

JB: She played -- you'll have to ask her. She played something, was something the Grubbs was doing at one point, like at a show for five minutes or something 111:00like that. But yeah, Jenny could care less about the music part of any of this far, as I could tell. She just liked hanging around all the people -- her best friend was Kathy, still is. She and Wolf dated for a while, and she and I had been close friends since God, I was 19 years old.

CN: You've always been good friends.

JB: Yeah. So Jenny, very petite, could be very loud and another one of those -- I wouldn't want to get in a contest with her about who could one-up the other with one-liners, because she would just fly circles around me.

The first thing she ever said to me, she said something -- she was in her cups, so to speak, and we were at -- I forget, it was a party at 1069 or somewhere else. She was dating Will Crawford. She said something a little incendiary. I 112:00can't remember what it was, but I kind of took issue with it. And she turned to me and said, "You go to the Louisville School of Art. What do you know?" And I did not see that coming. I had no idea what to say to that. I just stared at her. I think I just -- I don't know if I said anything back or just went somewhere else.

But I remember she and Sue and I drove up to Chicago. I think Sue and I were going to my family's Thanksgiving thing. We dropped Jenny off to stay with Laura Lee Crawford. I remember her saying like it's just so ridiculous to form an opinion about somebody about what kind of music they like. And of course that's all I did.

CN: Of course. But I guess the other thing I wanted to talk to you about in that time period is Big Ben and the Liberty Bells.

JB: Well, that was just sort of like your classic side project, where John Armstrong, he was hanging out with us. He wasn't a musician, but he was a true music devotee. And God, Wolf had a [Casio] that had a drum machine component to it. And I played clarinet in high school up until I got in a car wreck when I was a junior and it knocked my teeth out. But it had only been a couple years since I was playing that, so I could still play. And-- God, was Wolf playing saxophone or was he playing keyboard? We would just build kookie songs around 114:00the drum tracks.

And I think one time we sounded like a semi-serious band, and -- when we played at the Beat Club. But the worst thing we ever did was we were very -- I would have no patience for myself if me at 19 walked through this door and started going off about what kind of music sucks and what doesn't. But at that point, if I heard--

CN: I'm doing it about myself, not--

JB: Yeah. I would just rather slit my throat than listen to reggae. That had just really run its course in about 45 days for me two years earlier, and I just -- there was something about just the whole hippie vibe of it. And we were playing after -- I don't know if it was like an open mic night or what. But we 115:00were playing after this reggae band, and the lead singer was going on about love and Jah and all this stuff, stuff that I'm very politically sympathetic with now, but back then it wasn't like I didn't want people to love each other but it was like hippie bullshit, that kind of stuff. And so I remember we ran back to 1069 and got a cassette that nobody wanted, like it was ruined or something, we pulled all the cassette tape out of it and gave me fake dreadlocks and put a cap on. And then we'd get on there, and the first thing we do is -- I think I was singing at that point. I said, "This first song is called 'Try Reggae,' with 10 116:00inches of Jah." And then it just devolved into the worst-case scenario of doofus 19-year-old with the mic and a couple beers.

CN: If it will make you feel better, Aleta Shirley thought that was brilliant. The Aleta Shirley who was definitely the most talented person in that room, probably.

JB: I remember Aleta. I remember she -- you had something at your house on Fernwood, and Max was six months old. And somebody said he -- maybe you said, "Yeah, he looks a little bit like Otto Preminger, and she burst out laughing and it startled him so much that he started crying and just like [mock crying]. Didn't max have like a perfectly round head? He hadn't formed his head of hair yet.

But yeah, Big Ben and the Liberty Bells was just sort of a side project because I said we had a lot of time on our hands. So if we wanted to -- and it was really great in retrospect that we all hung out right next to the practice spot. So if we felt like going in there -- and I think probably what part of that was is that, like I said, Wolf had that Casio, and we had these amps and guitars at the ready and I probably had my clarinet with me and was like, "Well, let's just go fool around and do this." I think maybe it was Sean.

CN: Possibly. What did John Armstrong do?

JB: I think he played the Casio at some point. Wolf may have also played the saxophone, because Wolf -- I had my alto sax, and he tried to teach himself how to play saxophone. He actually got better. But I just remember those first couple of -- he was playing that thing like he was trying to blow up a balloon. 118:00It was just like if somebody were trying to pretend that they were being funny playing a saxophone so poorly, that's what he was doing. But of course, anybody who has tried to play a woodwind instrument, you really do need somebody to say, "This is how you hold your mouth," what they call your embouchure. This is how you blow into it. And he was just having at it. I remember Sue and I went somewhere, I looked up and he was -- I could see him framed in the window just honking on this thing. And we came back three hours later and he was still at it, like man. Luckily, we didn't really have any neighbors at that point. So is 119:00there anything else you want me to touch on?

CN: I don't. I mean, unless there's anything -- like I say, we're sort of at a -- kind of at a halfway point. Obviously, the other subject which is weird that I'd be interviewing about it is The Bulls, but I do kind of want--

JB: Well, that's fine. I probably should call my mom back and see if any works popped up and get to some chores if it hasn't.

CN: All right. Well, man, thank you so much.

JB: It's my pleasure./AT/es

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