Misfits, Gruesomes Reunions and Shows # 612, 613 & 614

Misfits to Reunite for Riot Fest 2016

After years of legal battles, a surprise announcement was made that the Misfits would be reuniting for two live shows as part of Riot Fest 2016. Billed as “The Original Misfits”, the reunion will include Glenn Danzig, Jerry Only and guitarist Doyle. Glenn Danzig formed Misfits originally in 1977 in Lodi, New Jersey with a different line-up. When bassist Jerry Only joined the band shortly after, he and Danzig would be the only consistent members in the line-up until they split in 1983. Doyle Wolfgang Von Frankenstein, the brother of Jerry Only joined the Misfits in 1980. Misfits released several EPs, singles and the full-length albums, Walk Among Us in 1982 and Earth A.D./Wolf’s Blood in 1983 during their original incarnation. Following the split, Only continued with Misfits and Danzig went onto a solo career. The tagline for the reunion shows is “They Said It Would Never Happen”, but the Misfits will be playing again. The reunion shows will take place in Denver, Colorado September 2-4, 2016 and in Chicago September 16-18, 2016. No word on whether future dates will be added.



The Gruesomes Reunite for Anachronik Music Festival

Another reunion of sorts took place in May 2016. Montreal garage band The Gruesomes played a few live shows. Named after the scary neighbours from The Flintstones cartoon, the band formed in 1985 drawing heavily on early 60s garage and R&B influences. The band featured Bobby Beaton (guitar/vocals), Gerry Alvarez (guitar/vocals), John Davis (bass) and brother Eric Davis on drums originally. The band’s first full-length album Tyrants Of Teen Trash was originally released on independent Canadian music label Og Music in 1986. This resulted in a growth in popularity and led to an underground following in Europe, the US and Canada. The band split in 1990. They reformed in 1999, releasing Cave-In! in 2000 and have performed live shows sporadically. They played in 2008 to coincide with the CD release of Tyrants of Teen Trash via the Ricochet Sound label and again in 2009 as part of another music festival in Montreal. On May 6th, 2016, The Gruesomes performed as part of the Montreal Anachronik Music Festival. They also played a smaller show in Ottawa on May 7th.



Below are the playlists for the three most recent episodes of Revolution Rock (Download links are below each playlist):

Playlist for Show # 614 (Originally aired on May 21st, 2016):

1. Deja Voodoo - Swamp Of Love
2. Kid Congo And The Pink Monkeybirds - Magic Machine
3. Teen Challengers - Doin’ Me-In
4. King James & The Royal Jesters - I Get A Feeling
5. The Bell Peppers - Negative Creep
6. Thee Mighty Caesars - Thee Trickster
7. Traditional Fools - Stronger Than Dirt
8. Frenchy And The Punk - Fe Fi Fo Fum
9. Vic Godard & The Subway Sect - Vertical Integration
10. Tom Waits - Talking At The Same Time
11. Stompin' Tom Connors - My Stompin' Grounds
12. MIck Farren & The New Wave - Lost Johnny
13. Art Bergmann - Live It Up
14. Alex Chilton - Sugar, Sugar/I Got The Feelin'
15. The Smiths - Is It Really So Strange
16. The Stranglers - Hey! (Rise Of The Robots)
17. Parks At Night - I Don’t Mind
18. Hooded Fang - Vacant Light
19. Kitten Forever - Static
20. Actual Water - Carolina Ave.
21. Terminal Sunglasses - The A.M. Story
22. Young Rival - Lucky
23. Pow Wows - Do The Splash
24. Holy Wave - Magic Landing
25. Holy Wave - Western Playland
26. Crushed Butler - Its My Life
27. The Replacements - Basement Jam
28. The New Strychnines - Dirty Robber
29. The Kinks - Milk Cow Blues

To download this weeks program, visit CJAM's schedule page for Revolution Rock and download the file for May 21.

Playlist For Show # 613 (Originally aired on May 14th, 2016):

1. Damaged Bug - Gloves For Garbage
2. The Lonely Parade - Window
3. Misfits - Cough/Cool
4. Devo - Don’t You Know
5. Nervebreakers - Why Am I So Flipped?
6. Nervous Talk - Nothing To Say
7. Greys - No Star
8. The Black Angels - Young Dead Man
9. Johnny Bell - Flip Flop And Fly
10. Ding Dongs - She’s A Tiger
11. South River Slim - Bang Bang
12. The Pogues - Waxie’s Dangle
13. Shotgun Jimmie - Join The Band
14. Cold Warps - Everywhere I Go
15. Sloan - I’m Gonna Give It A Try
16. Alexander Zen - She Is Soul
17. Bipolaroid - Beauty
18. Jack Wood - So Sad
19. Motor City Bonnevilles - Make Up Your Mind
21. The Sonics - Don’t You Just Know It
22. The Stones - Fad World
23. The Gruesomes - Tell Me How You Feel (Live)
24. The Gruesomes - My Dad's A Ho-Dad (Live)
25. The Special Edisons - The Road To El Dorito
26. The Lime Spiders - Out Of Control
27. The Rolling Stones - Prodigal Son
28. Iggy Pop - Vulture
29. The Famines - I’ll Save My Sympathy
30. The Velvet Underground - Beginning To See The Light (Live)

To download this weeks program, visit CJAM's schedule page for Revolution Rock and download the file for May 14.

Playlist For Show # 612 (Originally aired on May 7th, 2016):

1. The King Khan & BBQ Show - Hold Me Tight
2. Light Bulb Alley - I Only Got Two Feet
3. Sheer Mag - Can't Stop Fighting
4. Downtown Boys - Wave Of History
5. White Lung - Kiss Me When I Bleed
6. Radiohead - Burn The Witch
7. Hooded Fang - Tunnel Vision
8. Wire - Numbered
9. The Soft Pack - Answer To Yourself
10. Laura Sauvage - Rubberskin
11. Plants And Animals - Stay
12. Johnny Cash - Blue Train
13. Sturgill Simpson - In Bloom
14. The Sadies - Postcards
15. The Decoys - In Our Blood
16. Teenanger - You’re My Baby
17. David Bowie & The Lower Third - Can't Stop Thinking About Me
18. David Bowie - Liza Jane
19. Beat Happening - Bewitched
20. Lost Patrol - You Just Care About Looks
21. White Zombie - Gentleman Junkie
22. PJ Harvey - Chain Of Keys
23. The Traditional Fools - Surfin’ With The Phantom
24. The Traditional Fools - Black Water
25. Ty Segall - Lovely One
26. Neil Young - Opera Star
27. Modern Lovers - Astral Plane

To download this weeks program, visit CJAM's schedule page for Revolution Rock and download the file for May 7.

The Misfits Static Age & Show # 376

Following the release of the “Cough/Cool” single by The Misfits in August of 1977, The Misfits would head into a studio to record a full length that would be titled Static Age, but it would not released in its entirety until 1997. The road to the recording and release of Static Age is one that like The Misfits in their early stages from 1977-1983, had many changes. The Misfits began in January of 1977 in Lodi, New Jersey. They were formed by lead vocalist and song writer Glen Danzig who named the band after the final film to feature actress Marilyn Monroe, one written by American Playwright Arthur Miller titled The Misfits. Initially Danzig also played electric piano and sang along with Jimmy Battle on guitar, Diane DiPiazza on bass and Manny Martinez on drums to complete the first line up of the group. Not long after practicing together, DiPiazza and Battle left the group. Jerry Caiafa was recommended by drummer Manny Martinez due to the fact that he received a new bass for Christmas of that year. The new line up featuring Caiafa on bass, practiced for a couple of months as a three piece minus a guitarist. Their first single “Cough/Cool” backed with “She” was released in the summer of 1977 on Danzig’s own Blank Records label and featured no guitar, instead hammering synth-like electric piano. When the single was initially released bassist Jerry Caiafa’s name was spelled incorrectly, he suggested that in the future his name would be spelled “Jerry only, Jerry” which led the stage name Jerry Only, which he would soon adopt for the rest of his musical career. The single displayed the band in their embryonic stages, sounding almost like a New Wave band, but the imagery that was provided by Danzig and later identified as Horror Punk can still be heard in the singles A side “Cough/Cool”.

Not soon after the release of their first single, The Misfits added Franche Coma (real name Frank LiCata) as the bands guitarist. With a guitarist now in the group, Danzig dropped the electric piano and focused on vocals while at the same time launching the band into a more Punk Rock sounding direction. Soon Mr. Jim Catania replaced Martinez on drums and The Misfits found themselves in a very unique position. Mercury Records wanted to use the name Blank Records for one of their subsidiary divisions, so they offered Danzig thirty hours of studio recording time in exchange for the name Blank Records, he accepted. In January of 1978, The Misfits entered C.I. Recordings in New York City with producer Dave Archelis and recorded seventeen tracks, fourteen of which were mixed with Archelis. Due to time restraints the band recorded the songs live in the studio, only doing a few takes of each song and minimal overdubs. The proposed fourteen track album was to be titled Static Age, but the band were unable to find a record label that was interested in releasing the album. The band then opted to release four tracks on the Bullet EP in June of 1978 (“Bullet”, “We Are 138”, “Attitude” and “Hollywood Babylon”). These songs were released on Danzig’s new label titled Plan 9 Records. The remainder of the material from these sessions were not released for some time, the band would release a remixed version of “Last Caress” on the Beware EP in 1980 and “Teenagers From Mars” was re-recorded and used on the 1979 “Horror Business” single. “The Horror Business” single also featured a design that would become that bands infamous skull logo. The logo was based off of a poster designed for the 1946 Horror film The Crimson Ghost, it has been used on band releases ever since. It should also be noted that the Beware EP also contained the songs “Horror Business” and “Teenagers From Mars”.

The Misfits would go through another set of line up changes, but Glen Danzig and Jerry Only would remain constant members in the group in their early days of The Misfits. The band leaped more in the horror themed direction lyrically and visually. On stage they changed their appearance to suit their new brand of Punk that would be brandished as Horror Punk. Lyrically the songs subject matter would be drawn from films of the Horror genre, but more specifically the B-Horror movie genre. The band slowly built up a following releasing more singles and EPs, in 1982 they released the full length album Walk Among Us, which is often regarded as one of the greatest Punk albums of all time. The Misfits began to take their music to more extremes musically going into a more Hardcore Punk direction. It was also around this time that Danzig grew unsatisfied with the band, he began working on a new project and after the release of one more album, Earth A.D./Wolf’s Blood in 1983 which displayed the band in a more Hardcore and Heavy Metal/Rock sense, the band was pretty much over. Following a show on October 29th in Detroit, the band went their separate ways. In 1985, nine of the tracks from the Static Age sessions were released on the Legacy of Brutality compilation album. The nine tracks from these sessions that were put on the Legacy album featured overdubbed bass and guitar parts by Glen Danzig himself, which were done following the bands break up in 1983. In 1995, several more tracks from these sessions were released on the Collection II album including the then unreleased “Return of the Fly”. In 1996, The Misfits Box Set was released. This set is notable for its large collection of early Misfits studio material (minus the album Walk Among Us) and outtakes, but also for being the first place in which fans could acquire the fourteen track Static Age album as it was originally intended. In February of 1997, a single disc version of the Static Age album was released featuring additional tracks that the band had recorded during the albums sessions back in 1978, but were never mixed.

Static Age embodies everything that The Misfits stood for, it displays all of the elements which made up The Misfits. The album addresses issues and subject matter in an intelligent defiant way, not unlike classic albums by bands such as The Ramones, The Clash and Buzzcocks. Static Age gurgles with an intense ferocity that has caused many fans of the band to choose this as their favourite release by the band, despite the fact that it was released over a decade too late. Songs such as ‘Static Age”, “TV Casualty”, :Attitude”, “Some Kinda Hate”, “Angelfuck”, “She”, “Hybrid Moments” and the Rockabilly groove of “Hollywood Babylon” all add to the albums aura. Along with the musicianship, the vocals are howled out by Glen Danzig like some kind of Elvis/Jim Morrison hybrid. Static Age is simply, some would argue The Misfits at their best.

Since the release of The Misfits first single and the recording of the bands first album, their status has grown to enormous proportions. During their break up in the 80s the bands cult like status grew so large that copies of the bands material would constantly go out of print. The band who drew their name from a film and took much of their inspiration from B-Horror films built up a new genre of music, creating a large fan base not unlike the large B-Horror movie fan bases that exist now. The road to the release of Static Age in its entirety as it was originally intended took eighteen years. Like the movie, The Misfits band initially received mixed reviews, but are now highly regarded among Punk music fans. Currently The Misfits continue to play and release albums, Jerry Only is the only remaining member in the group from The Misfits early period of 1977-1983. Although the group remains popular, The Misfits have not reunited with Glen Danzig. Danzig has had successful post-Misfits careers in his bands Samhain and Danzig, which musically reflect a heavier Rock/Metal direction.

This Week's Play List:

1. Deja Voodoo - Monsters In My Garage Got Married
2. Miesha & The Spanks - Night Danger
3. The Sphinxs - Time Above Me
4. The Okmoniks - I'm On My Own
5. The 5.6.7.8's - Harlem Nocturne
6. The Frogmen - Underwater
7. The Specials - Too Hot
8. Arkells - On Paper
9. Promises - Valerie
10. Chandells - One Track Mind
11. Rocket From The Tombs - I Sell Soul
12. Brazilian Money - John Wayne
13. Rah Rah - Ghosts
14. Beastie Boys - 14th St. Break
15. Talking Heads - I Feel It In My Heart
16. Pearl Jam - Ole
17. Ramones - Do You Wanna Dance?
18. The Nils - Freedom
19. Joe Strummer - Don't Tango With Django
20. Girls - Alex
21. Destroy All Monsters - Nobody Knows
22. The Fays - Self-Centretown
23. The Cramps - Goo Goo Muck
24. The Misfits - Cough/Cool
25. The Misfits - Teenagers From Mars
26. The Misfits - Hybrid Moments
27. The Misfits - Static Age

To download this weeks program, visit CJAM's schedule page for Revolution Rock and download the file for November 1. Or subscribe to Revolution Rock as a Podcast.