Don't Bring Me Down

Today's missive is entitled Don't Bring Me Down...

It's named after the Jeff Lynne composition...but really it's about so much more...

Later this week I'm headed down to Nawlins, and i'll do a post before I split featuring some of my faves from that area. Louisiana holds a special place in my heart, even though I was never raised there, and have only passed through a handful of times.

for some reason the crescent city just connects with me, maybe it's just a romantic illusion, and if I didn't already love San Francisco so damn much...Methinks I'd have split for New Orleans a long time ago.

anyhow...

The first time I was in town, I was there on tour with a band who were opening for J Church at an all ages community center in the Fauborg Marigny.

As many of you know, the indie music scene lost a hero & compatriot last month with the untimely passing of that band's frontman, Lance Hahn.

Last Sunday i was privileged enough to attend a memorial held for him in San Francisco. In attendance were a few dozen people, some who'd come from across the country to attend. We shared stories, drank, ate, commiserated, watched vids of his band J Church, and even saw some hilariously poignant home movies of Lance as a young child.
It was his summer of 69...

spent in a baby carriage on Oahu...

Most of all though, we reminisced as to what Lance held dear, what we had in common, and why we held him dear as well.

Our main connections surrounded the criss crossing of our ideals, our anti-establishment fervor of youth, and our total slackerdom...

Not that we weren't hard working... we all seemed to work hard at not working...

or we worked on lost causes, and flew our freak flags upside down etc.

Lance Hahn was true to his anarcho punker roots most of the time, but at the same time, he was a great smart ass & shit talker and never ashamed of any hipster's perception of his perpetual bad taste.

Tommy Strange recounted in his memorial epitaph of Lance's punk cred being in question once when he was spotted carrying around some sacrilegious Steely Dan records around the mission...and people actually wondering "what did it mean?"

I recall us both sharing an unabashed fondness for Poi Dog Pondering, Lance going as far as covering them on one release. He was just as captivated as I by live footage of the awesome Freddie Mercury in action, and wasn't afraid to be derided in a small minded lil scene for appreciating New Order alongside his Crass and Rudi Peni records.

Another band he apparently dug was Electric Light Orchestra, and I thought I'd end this post today with one of his spunky brash lil' covers of their work.

J Church - Don't Bring Me Down

It's an appropriate tune, because I refuse to let this guy's death bring me down. Tommy Strange put it right when he wrote that there's no hole left in this world because Lance has left, the world is actually just so much more that he was here...

If anything, I hope his death helps me take life a little more seriously, time becomes a little more precious, and i'm able to learn, grow and accomplish something from this sad lil' lesson...

I guess i'll never be as prolific, or as heroic, or as determined as Lance might have pushed himself to be...

But at least so far I haven't had as much bad luck as he seemed to get...

I certainly will get around to pursuing my passions a little more furiously, knowing that his were sidelined so sadly...

We really never know when the ride is over baby...

so let's ride!!!!


In the meantime though, I thought I'd do a little update on what's new this week in music...

and maybe some stuff that's been out for a bit, but is just sorta new to me... and perhaps to you.

Fair enough?

Anyhow...

I've been neglecting making any updates here this month as i've been pretty busy, and a guys gotta focus I suppose. We can't spend every waking hour updating this silly lil' website.

I think I've just got enough time to concentrate on a blog post here at 10pm, with work finally subsiding to a low roar...

Anyhow...

This week saw some new stuff dropping onto the scene...

Os Mutantes have returned... and David Byrne's Luaka Bop is the stateside source for for their first fresh recordings in years. Recorded in London on that 2006 reunion tour, here's a classic track delivered with typical jubiliant Os Mutantes flair...

Os Mutantes - A Minha Menina from the release : Mutantes Live - Barbican Theater, London 2006

I've seen them twice since they reunited and each time was a delight... I have a feeling if you get the DVD version, you might not quite feel the magic in the air... but it should still help explain their universally psychedelic appeal.

Os Mutantes Live - Barbican Theater, London 2006" Os Mutantes
"A Minha Menina" (mp3)
check out more from from "Mutantes Live - Barbican Theater, London 2006"
(Luaka Bop)



Also this week... those bad boys of central valley snark rock in Cake deliver up a set of goodies they humbly entitled uh, the clever B-Sides & Rarities...

The first track of note was previously issued on Cake's Wheels EP awhile back, and it is the classic 70's country jam known as "Ruby, Don't Take your Love To Town"...

It was one of Kenny Rogers big early scores when he discovered the silver haired solution to success on the middle of the road...

but unlike most sappy middle of the road chestnuts, it's got bite within it's sweet syrupy packaging...

It's a tale of a war vet coming home with no legs, who watches his woman getting all dolled up on a Saturday night, and our vet knows he's doomed to staying home in the wheelchair for a lonely night of drinkin, cussin & crying ...

It was a twisted sort of AM radio classic of my childhood, and with so many maimed gulf war II veterans filling up our vet hospitals & rehab centers...

I'm more sad than proud to say it's relevant once again...

enjoy this one from Cake's own Upbeat Records label...

Cake - Ruby, Don't Take Your Love To Town


as a bonus... I'll throw in the delightfully tacky electro-lized instro cut known as Conroy...

But the rest, you can go get yerself...

info below:

CAKE
"Conroy" (mp3)
from "b-sides and rarities"
(Upbeat Records)

More On This Album

End of Line For Lance Hahn of J Church

I was having a near perfect day, wasting an afternoon watching a friend and his band rip through a set of great tunes for a small audience at a local radio station studio showcase gig. Outside the sky was crystal clear, and the sun was shining over the bay. An hour later, I made the mistake of opening my email to discover word filtering in of a distressing development for the The Coalition of Aging Rockers.

Indeed we had lost another comrade, and this was no OD or drunken misfit debacle, in fact he likely was the cleanest liver of a bitter bunch, the least alcoholic and most studious, but still it was gone too soon at the age of 40.

Billy Joel & later Me First & The Gimme Gimmes have reminded me musically that "only the good die young", and indeed that seems true, as we have sadly lost another one of the good guys.


Longtime local SF musician Lance Hahn, who lovingly named his punk rock band after his favorite Muni streetcar line has died after long battles with kidney ailments in an Austin Texas hospital this past weekend. Best known for fronting his band J Church, Hahn operated out of San Francisco from the early 90's for almost a decade until he relocated from a flat near 16th on Valencia St to Austin in 2000.


pic courtesy Fat Wreck Chords

He had originally come from Hawaii circa 1990 with a scrappy trio known as Cringer, which played shows at venues like The Women's Building, Komotion & Berkeley's Gilman St Project. Eventually he formed J-Church which released literally hundreds of recordings on tiny indie record labels all over the world including his own Honey Bear imprint. While not a technically gifted singer, he parlayed a vast array of musical influences including everything from Crass, Radiohead, Adam & The Ants to ELO, into a blend of pop infused punk that became uniquely identifiable & influential, remaining well regarded in the underground music scene. He had no shortage of themes & subjects, composing improbable rock titles like "Leni Riefenstahl's Tinder Box", "The Dramatic History Of A Boring Town" , or "Socialist Newspaper", all the while delivering each song with an overall emotional sincerity rarely heard in a jaded age. One memorable release to check out would have to be his Mission District opus "Camels, Spilled Coronas & The Sound of Mariachi Bands". For those who'd like a broader overview, perhaps the compilation of rare 7" tracks called "Nostalgic for Nothing".

From 1993's "Camels, Spilled coronas & Mariachi Bands"

J Church - Misery


In addition to fronting Cringer & J-Church, he toured as a guitarist in Beck's band in 1994-95. He is survived by his longtime girlfriend Liberty, they had no children.


A man with friends, fans & admirers literally all over the world, there's a chance Hahn left behind much more here on earth than a prolific discography of obscure vinyl 7" singles. For a spell in the latter 1990's, he was known to be supplementing his meager income with visits to a certain Berkeley sperm bank...

Watch out world... who knows for sure, perhaps lil' Lance's may indeed be sprouting everywhere...

If there are no biological heirs, there are at least many "logical" heirs. Tons of kids too young to have ever seen J-Church or Cringer at their peaks, but who've been influenced & touched ever so remotely by this guy's music, writing & inspirational D.I.Y influence abound.


Aside from his handy presence at the local sperm bank, Lance worked just as hard behind the scenes helping others as he ever did at the mic, and was known for his writing in Maximum Rock & Roll & Giant Robot magazine, as well as working at indie record distributors like Revolver, Blacklist Mailorder and Epicenter Records. His overall "situationist "viewpoints didn't preclude a little capitalist wage slavery and you might've seen him behind the counter at Lost Weekend video in SF or later on at Sound Exchange in Austin. His final job was working at Austin's Vulcan Video store, before he went in for dialysis one day earlier this month, and fell tragically into a coma.

I believe the next time I play that damn J-Church "Kittums In A Coma" single, It'll have a whole different resonance for me.

J-Church had a rotating line-up, with Hahn being the sole consistent member & songwriter. They had some good tunes, and their share of weak ones and were never my favorite band, but Lance was a dmaned good guy really, who wore the heart on the sleeve and you really can't fault a guy for being himself...

His presence was worth so much more than a hundred better bands, and that's because his heart was iin his music & his music not the plastic kind of syrupy crap you see in the tunes used advertisements and on TV...





A tribute album had recently been organized amongst 5 labels to help raise dough to pay some of his mounting medical bills, as the uninsured musician fell into declining health. There were operations, bleeding sockets left in him, and numerous agonizing dialysis sessions that made bleak his final year. The Vulcan Video website still has a link to help pay his medical bills, which remain a huge burden.

The Lance I remember meeting in the dawn of the 90's had a swift wit and great sense of humor, and we could trade barbs at empty venues during soundchecks and in dusty record filled warehouses for hours. He had a great spirit, took music & politics seriously and was always indefatigably willing to play a benefit show for a lost cause. Over the years, I sensed him getting more solemn, distant, deeper & more internally driven, and perhaps he instinctively knew he would not be long on this spinning orb. He pushed himself on tours across continents in a real race against time, left a creative trail of entertaining intellectual crumbs, gave it his all, and truly delivered. And ...he is gone...

One of a kind...

R.I.P Lance Hahn 1967 - 2007

Here's a track from the 2004 release Society Is A Carnivorous Flower

J Church - Keep Smiling America

Here's one from 1996's Drama of Alienation LP

J Church - Secrets

A Video of Lance performing his song "My Favorite Place", which incidentally was also the subtitle of the band's website...



From 2007's "the Horror of Life"

J Church - Vampire Girl Prefers Me Alive

Beck w/ Lance backing him - Nightmare Hippy Girl recorded live in Japan, more at Honeybear website

Visit the J-Church or Honey Bear website for a complete discography and a peek into this guy's mind that was ever active until the end

http://www.j-church.com

http://www.myspace.com/jchurch

http://www.honeybearrecords.net