Scene Less Podcast
Jerm from the Union and Metro Podcast ,discusses art, music and life with San Diego artists ,musicians and influential people who are working to bring the arts and music scene together. This podcast is a way to document the scene and The people in it. Jerm is known for being an artist , musician and skateboarder who booked and ran club SOMA in San Diego, California from 89-97 .Jerm also has been in bands such as P.O.U.R.,MEAT, cockroach! , URINE , Sin Sin 77, Tribe of fallen dreams, black, widow, prophecy, Morningstar, off with your head,Graveyard Dogs and many other projects as a bass player , vocals and primary song writer as well as an artist since early youth and owner of Red Rum Skates as well as sister companies with wife Miss V. Red Rum Skates was all hand painted skateboards and also had skate wax , wheels and more .
Currently in The Waste Aways .
Scene Less Podcast
Tim Erdmann
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
I chatted with an old friend Tim Erdmann and we go way back to his arrival in San Diego through his years at Music Trader to today and his band Sea Base !
Lots of memories and fun stories !!
https://www.instagram.com/timothyjerdmann?igsh=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==
https://www.instagram.com/seabaseband?igsh=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==
https://www.instagram.com/gamerastudio?igsh=NTc4MTIwNjQ2YQ==
#punkrock #punkrocker #sandiego #jermaddams #thewasteaways #musichistory #punrockscene #punkrockhistory #podcast #podcaster #Diy #jermwarfareproductions #skateboards #artist #redrumskates #halloween #mars #museum #haunted #oddities #bassguitar #bassplayer #unionandmetropodcast https://youtube.com/@jermaddams?si=4bjqYtyh3tUaPCUd https://open.spotify.com/album/6WxUfbKnAAtKiNDphjHvmT?si=hM7myq-RQ0qtRIvskClG8A https://www.instagram.com/jerm_addams?utm_source=qr
Okay, yeah. Alright, cool. See, I'm already flubbing it. This is Germ, and I'm here with how actually do you say your last name so I don't fucking that's totally fine.
SPEAKER_01It's Tim Erd Erdman. That's what I thought it was. It was Erdman. Erdman, whatever. Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00But okay, so Tim Erdman.
SPEAKER_01It was the one I got the shitty nicknames when I was a kid, Tirdman, Birdman.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_01You know, all sorts of stuff like that.
SPEAKER_00Well, it's like me. I got goofy and the the one thing someone had brought up somewhere, I don't remember it was, but I said, Yeah, when a kid, I hate it because people call me Germany. And I had no relation to Germany. You know, this is like in the early 70s, mid-70s. And I'm like You grew up here? Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I'm from Obi, and then we moved to Miramesa.
SPEAKER_02Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_00So, oh, I remember because I was telling someone where I had gotten my nickname Germ from. But yeah, and then they would call me Jeremiah. Then they would sing that fucking song, and I hated it. Jeremiah. Jeremiah was a bullfrog.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I mean, that's not that could be worse.
SPEAKER_00It I don't know, but back then I was really, really sensitive when you're a kid.
SPEAKER_01You don't, you don't know. People are picking on you. They could be saying something, it's completely harmless.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01But it you're being picked on, so that's like weird.
SPEAKER_00Well, I was starting to be the tough guy, and you know, I was an artist and I was already in my head. I knew I was different. Meaning, born on Halloween, Redhead. Born on Halloween? Yeah. Oh, you were so like perfect. Like I mean, you are you. Out of all these years, I haven't been faking it.
SPEAKER_01Well, I never said you were faking anything. It's just funny that of course you were born on Halloween. It makes perfect sense.
SPEAKER_00I know, and then hence the house and all the coffins and everything. And speaking of, so let's let's go way back. Where where are you from, actually? Because I don't know if well, you probably told me. I probably probably a long time ago.
SPEAKER_01Born in New York City, raised grew up in Massachusetts. Okay. My parents born in New York City, my parents split. My mom's family was living in Massachusetts. So I grew up mostly there. And then when I was 21, 21 or 22, I moved to San Diego. I basically was like looked at the map and said, and I was playing in a band out there. Right. And the band broke up, one dude. Oh my god, I'm spacing on his name. Aid head guitarist.
SPEAKER_00Was it BJ? BJ. Okay.
SPEAKER_01I was in a band with BJ on the East Coast. And BJ moved out here. And like seven months after he moved out here, he called me and he's like, hey, my roommate moved out. I need a roommate.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_01It's 250 bucks a month. It's California. It's awesome. Yeah. There's tons of bands that need bass players. Blah, blah, blah. Yeah. So I'm like, literally thought about it for 24 hours. Um, gave my notice. I was waiting tables at a restaurant. Yeah. And gave my notice. Sold all my shit except for a small pallet of stuff that I put at a shipping company. Okay. Had them hold it, bought a round trip ticket just in case. Came out here with my base and a backpack.
SPEAKER_00I think I remember that.
SPEAKER_01I met you the first, probably the first night I was here. Because I literally landed. BJ picked me up at that airport right there. Yeah. He was living on Menlo and El Cahon Boulevard. Okay, yeah. So kind of like the V Little Vietnam area. Yeah. And what's the supermarket that's near that supermarket that's right there? And literally, he gave me a loop going out to PB, Mission, OB, through downtown, around and back.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01That was my f tour. Yeah. And on that tour, I'm like, what? I'm not going back. I'm like, fuck this. I can curse on this thing, right? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00No, of course.
SPEAKER_01And then, yeah, and then basically that night we went to Soma, downtown.
SPEAKER_00Okay.
SPEAKER_01Metro Street, which was the best version, I think. And it was Hate Head was opening up for Stone Temple Pilots. Oh. Before their record came out. Right. And I met you while we were loading in. Vaguely remember, like I didn't know you yet, but I was introduced to you because you were running around doing shit.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And I just remember sitting on the back steps. It was me, BJ, like Rich Friend, the rest of Aidhead and Rolling Stone was there interviewing Scott Wyland. Like with that back staircase that went up to the office. Yeah. We were sitting on the low half of the staircase. Halfway up the staircase, Rolling Stone was interviewing Scott Wyland. Wow. And we were like, why the fuck is Rolling Stone here? Like, who fuck who? I know. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Anyway. Welcome to San Diego.
SPEAKER_01And I was, yeah, and I was just like, I'm not, why would I go back?
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_01You know, I mean, not that there's anything wrong with New York, Boston, whatever, but having grown up on the East Coast, snow and all the other stuff, I was like, California. I was just like, I'm gonna try this.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So, and literally met a couple people that night, tried out for their band like two days later, and was in a band with them for, and that was the that was a band called Grindhouse. Yeah. And that was the first band you booked me. You booked us at the dungeon at Soma. Okay. The first band I was in that I played at Soma in 19, I guess it was 1992.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. That was when that was. I do I have my books over there from that time period. So I'm gonna have to look that up because I can do little like shots in the documentary and things as we go.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and like an idiot, I never I I talked to Zach, Goldsmoon Zach, a bunch, and it's it's amazing. I don't know if it's him or someone else that saves all saved all those flyers. Yeah, like he's got so many flyers that I like. Why did I not save them?
SPEAKER_00I think not Jason drummer Jason, but guitarist Jason saved actually. You know what? Now at this point, I don't know.
SPEAKER_01I don't I don't think he was well because at first there were four piece.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, it was Dougie, Jeremy, Marcus, Marcus, and Zach.
SPEAKER_01Zach, yeah.
SPEAKER_00When they came, they again it was they came over from Hawaii, and yeah, I was impressed. They did the what'd they do, sailing on by Bad Religion? I mean Bad Brains.
SPEAKER_01Yes, they did do that, Tom.
SPEAKER_00So, you know, and that just you know pulled on the heartstrings for me. I think it was that one as well. Correct on that one, but yeah, I don't you know what it might be Zach because he kept the um the fanzine. What was it, San Diego Source?
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah, that was one.
SPEAKER_00There's a few people that have really, really good collections. I believe Brent Marks is another one of them. I've heard of people who have literally so much stuff that they're you know archivists at this point. Me personally, I kept things like this is my jacket from the day, I have my very first docks, I have my beanie from the early days, my books of all the shows, but I don't have like flyers and stuff. And a lot of the stories at this point are eluding me because I'm starting to forget like what I had for dinner, let alone what bands I was in.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I mean, it didn't help that in your twenties in in our twenties, right? You weren't exactly abstaining from smoking weed and drinking and whatever, whatever other recreational things were going on.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, there was Bud Light and Coors Light, and Guinness owe me a coupon. A coupon. Yeah, some sort of a you know, an enticement to drink it again.
SPEAKER_01I mean, I it's funny because I like live that same night that I first got here. I did I mean, I had smoked weed. That was probably the extent of anything I had ever really done drug-wise.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_01And I remember we were we after that first tour around San Diego before we went to Soma, we stopped at the liquor store. I think it was one of the quick corners. It was on like 10th, probably 10th or 11th. We stopped there to buy beer in order to drink beer in the parking lot, which you're not supposed to do in the parking lot of Soma. And somebody was like offered to sell me heroin like the second I got out of the car. And I was like, holy shit, this is crazy.
SPEAKER_00And you have to wait for the second guy, because then the third guy comes around for the first guy and offers you the same dope, but a little bit discount. Yeah, but that the funny thing about the drinking in the parking lot is as adamant as I would be stern about, don't fucking do this. I also in the back of my mind, I'm like, this is all still kind of like graduate from from high school sort of mentality. So 100%. I mean do it, but don't get caught. Be responsible, you know, and so is the whole idea of all of us learning to be responsible and evade the law sort of thing, goes along with the rock and roll lifestyle and I suppose justifying it at this point. Well, going going that direction, one of the main things that I wanted to focus in right now, and again, I hope to be able to bring you in. I want to do these. I have an idea of doing record parties where I have four or five people come over and we go through like here's a bunch of local seven-inch records. I gotta add more, but it's just a start because, like I said, we're retaking over my daughter's room. Okay. But I got my little record player there, and I want to, you know, do reminiscent where everyone kind of chimes in. We film it and get different angles. But the importance of record stores and how it helped bond not only the scene, there's of course, you know, certain restaurants everyone would go to, and there's many places, but the record stores kind of in my eyes get overlooked a lot, even though a lot of people cut their teeth and became an influential part, either band member, artist management, promotion, whatever, but it was through record stores, and it was, you know, such a huge part of the community.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I mean, that was one of the first record stores I just I saw stopped in here. I think we I think on that first tour we stopped for like a second, slash and crash records on in Mission Beach. Yeah. I remember stopping there. I didn't have a job for the first three month three, four months I was here. Then it was Christmas season, and I got a a gig at I want to say it was called Tape World in Horn Plaza. I got hired as like Christmas help. I had to wear a tie and shit. Oh. But the dude who was in my band, Ken Overton, he was working, he had just got hired at Music Trigger. Right. Okay on at the I don't know if it was the first first one, but it was the ones on Elkhone Boulevard. Oh, yeah, yeah. 58th in El Cahon Boulevard, across from the Navajo Lodge Motel, which was a slightly infamous motel.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I think it is.
SPEAKER_01Which is also famous. It was in that TV show Veronica Mars. Oh, it was? Yeah, they used that as a load shooting location for the CD motel to hide criminals in. Just gotta was. Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_00I mean, it's still you drive, there's some things up and down Alcohol and Boulevard that are the same. Yeah. Unfortunately, off the record, and neither of the buildings, it's a tire shop and I think a nail salon.
SPEAKER_01Oh, oh, yeah, yeah. I know the Hillcrest one's gone. Yeah. But yeah, so he worked. My guitar player worked. I just got hired at that music trader. And he's like, hey, we need somebody else. I had literally worked at this tape world where you had to wear a tie. Yeah. Like, like, seriously. I was there maybe two weeks, and they're like, you want to? I came down, I met the owners of Music Trader, Jeff and Debbie Clark.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And they fucking hired me on the spot, and I quit the tape world and had a job at this small hole in the wall, like dingy record tape shop. It was mostly CDs and tapes. I don't even think they sold records. Yeah, no, there wasn't records until.
SPEAKER_00Was that the one that was literally because it was it was two doors?
SPEAKER_01There was one side that was records and tapes. Okay. Other or no, record, or sorry, sorry, CDs. And the other side was cassettes and video tapes, VHS. Yeah. Okay.
SPEAKER_00I think I think I remember that one uh Dan. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And I think I started on the tape and video side, and then moved ended up moving over to the CD side. But it's basically the it was basically a pawn shop for music. Yeah. You know, people would come in and sell their collections for to pay bills and whatever. You know? Yeah. I remember the fur one of the first days I was working there, they're teaching me the value, like how much to pay for CDs. Right. You know, and I had on the East Coast, I actually worked at a record town, which is kind of the same as the Horton Plaza one, you know, a corporate record store. Right. And but that was brand new stuff. You know, we had records there as well. Like I remember unboxing Metallica and Justice for All when that album came out when I was on that at that store on the East Coast. But this is different. This is like a used CD shop. And so you had to pay, we paid between we advertised one and five dollars per CD. It's really, really, really good. Something we know we can sell five bucks. Shitty, we would pay a dollar. We wouldn't really ever go lower than a dollar, maybe 50 cents for like CD singles, but I think that was more of just an accounting, an ease of accounting. Right. Make it one to five bucks.
SPEAKER_00Right, right, yeah.
SPEAKER_01And I remember the first test that the owner gave me, Jeff. He's like, price these. And I put them in stacks because that was what we did. Yeah, yeah. Made the five dollar stack for each. I remember that. And I remember putting a Bell Biv DeVoe CD in the five dollar stack. Because I mean that was a huge record. Right. Sold a ton. And he was like, no. And he took it off the five-dollar pile and put it in the one dollar, one dollar pile. And he was like, basically explain to me, generally speaking, not a hard rule. If it was a hit record where it sold millions of copies, it was worth a buck. Because there's a shit ton of them out there. Right. Everyone's selling those. We have too many. And so he would take me next door to the surplus area, and there's a stack of a hundred copies of the Bell Biv Devo. But then I learned that for lack of a better term, cool music was worth more money.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01You know, a Fugazi CD came in, that's five bucks. Yeah. And I was like, oh okay, this is kind of neat. So it was it was my first introduction really to more of an indie record store. It's in it wasn't indie in the sense of like, you know, punk rock record store. Like Slash and Crash was off the record was a punk rock indie record store.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Singly focused. Like Blue Mini was more metal for the longest time.
SPEAKER_01I think I would I would have categorized Blue Mini as a 1960s and 70s record store. Yeah. It was just still going. Yeah. Pretty much.
SPEAKER_00They were so rad.
SPEAKER_01Even when Norm had them up record stores. But yeah, so I yeah, I started working there. And then it was the one there was that one store, and they had just opened a second store in Chula Vista, right next to the Wiener in the shopping center by the Wiener Schnitzel. Oh yeah, yeah. On H H in Broadway, I think. But I mostly worked at the El Cone store. Yeah. And at the time I think there was just those two stores. And then you know, I mean, I don't know how in-depth you want to go, but they pretty much then they opened, and this is probably not in the right order, a Miramar store. Mm-hmm on like distribute it was I want to say it was like it's on Miramar Road. Kind of near the where the beginning of the naval base was. Yeah. In this little shopping center, there was a strip club in the corner.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I forgot about that. I knew there was one there, but Pete Cocker and I went, tried to go through the list, and then he got the list of all of them.
SPEAKER_01So, okay, let's see if I can get I'll just do them all.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, let's see.
SPEAKER_01Elchone Boulevard, which is 58th in El Chone Boulevard, Chula Vesta by the Wiener Schnitzel, Mirmar, El Cahone. I didn't really go to the El Cahone one much. Frank Frank can't remember saying. Frank something was the manager there, a big dude. So Elka El Cahone. Then there was Ocean Side, Sports Arena. There was a downtown. This is not an order. There was a Coronado for a minute. There was a OB for a minute.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Encinitas. And then there were two. There was one in Vegas. Oh wow. And then there was one in Reno, Nevada. Oh wow. Those were like franchise, the Reno and the other. Oh, okay. That makes sense. Yeah. That wanted to franchise it. But when I so I started at El Elcome Boulevard, I was bouncing between Miramar, Tulubista, and Elcone Boulevard as sort of the fill-in guy. And then they asked me to open up the store in Oceanside. So this is also at this time I don't have a car. I just moved here.
SPEAKER_03Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_01So I they asked me to open up Oceanside. Basically drive me up to the location, gave me a phone, a checkbook, like there was like a landline phone.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_01A checkbook. And with their help, I like opened the store for them, hired the staff, filled it, decorated it, got the stock in there, trained all the people, hired and trained all the people. I was thinking I was maybe there three to six months, I forget. And then and the place was kind of humming along. Yeah. And then they called me up, like, all right, we want you to open up a sports arena. So then I went over to Sports Arena, which I think is a tire shop now or something.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Yeah. Actually, I think it switched over, but yeah.
SPEAKER_01I remember it because there was a tire shop there, then it something else took it over, and then I don't know what's going on. Yeah. I mean, I drive by it all the time, so I should know.
unknownI know.
SPEAKER_01Open up, yeah. So open up that one. And this whole time I'm telling them you should open in PB. You should open in PB. You should open in PB. And they're like, no, no, no, no. And then I feel like I did Oceanside, Sports Arena. And I think the next one was they called me up. They're like, show up at this address. And it was 1084 Garnet Avenue. And they're like, show up here on Monday. And I'm like, oh you're opening a PV store. Cool.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So yeah, so ended up fucking opening up that store in PV on Garnet and Dawes. And pretty much I stayed at that store for the next, so that was probably 94. Maybe, yeah, probably 94. And I was there 94, 95, 96, like 90 from 94 to 98, I would say.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01While there, they opened up Escondito and I would go help with some of them. Yeah. But then they also had me fly to Reno, Nevada, and help open the store there. And I was in Reno for I don't know, like a week or two. Oh wow. I stayed like the guy who was opening it, who franchised it, I stayed at his house. He drove me to the thing every day, and I just helped him open the record store, and then I flew back. That's so crazy. I pretty much stayed at the PB store all the way through until I started talking to Jeff about the internet and said, hey, we should open up an online store. And he was like, no, no, no, no. The internet's a fad, blah, blah, blah, whatever. And then one day he comes into the store. He was had just been on a business trip. He's like, I read something in the magazine about the internet. I think we should open up an internet swell. So I'm like, okay. So basically got a computer and worked with my friend Joe, Joseph Garcia, who are he's an artist. He was in Joseph from oh my god, I'm totally spacing on the name. Stymie's first band. Subsociety? Subsociety. Oh wow. I don't know why Joe is gonna kill me for Joe and Chris and DJ are all gonna kill me for spacing on the name. All right. So Joe and I worked together to like build a website.
SPEAKER_00Wow.
SPEAKER_01You know, I knew that he'd was doing something like that, but I didn't he's mostly a graph, mainly a graphic designer, but at that time, there was no, it was called a webmaster.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it was bizarre for me. I did not know. I was way not I still have a hard time with computers. Let's just put it that way. So I was not accepting of you guys were weird.
SPEAKER_01I didn't know, I didn't know much about computers except for the fact that we ended up getting a computer system near that near that end of my time at Music Trader, right before this the internet thing, we got a comp a computer inventory system. Yeah. So and I had a computer in the office there that I would use to order. Because I would order, because that was one of the things that I did in PB was initiate actually having records in the store. Finally, yeah. Started with used vinyl, then I started ordering new vinyl, then I started ordering new CDs. We did bootlegs for a minute. There was like a dude who would show up once every two weeks with he would bring in a box of bootlegs.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Like literally, you know, this is early 90s, so like SoundGarden, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, live at whatever club, live at this place, live at all these crazy bootlegs. Um which we sold at the store.
SPEAKER_00In hindsight, are worth a ton now.
SPEAKER_01Well, probably you can't sell them anywhere. Because like eBay, or I mean you I'm not saying you can't sell.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, collectors will find them.
SPEAKER_01Disc dog disc dogs or disc. How do you say it is it disc hogs?
SPEAKER_00Discogs.
SPEAKER_01Okay, it would be because it's discography. For some reason, I always say disc dogs.
SPEAKER_00It sounds better. It sounds better.
SPEAKER_01Disc dogs.
SPEAKER_00I think of diamond dogs when you say that too.
SPEAKER_01And then eBay, like you can't sell that shit out on any of those platforms. Yeah. But yeah, we did have we did those. So I brought new CDs, new records, new, new, all the new stuff. Started like literally an electronic dance music record thing because we also went down that road at the PV store.
SPEAKER_00That's right. Which was becoming quite popular. So you guys were kind of a yeah.
SPEAKER_01Well, we also had, I was doing the another story for another time, but the band I was in, we had slowly morphed the new band. Oh, that's right. I was in, I was in after the Grindhouse band split. I had a band called Jackseptic. Yeah. With these three dudes I met that were fish literally fishermen in Alaska. They would fish in Alaska, like literally the deadliest catch shit. Yeah. And then they would finish their season, they'd come back to San Diego and spend all the money they made. And so we started had a band. Yeah. And then that band went for a little bit. We recorded a set. I think we did a compilation CD called West of Five. It had like I think I remember it. Jack's it had us on it, Downs Family, the Neighbors, Sprung Monkey, Buck O9. Was it a cargo or no?
SPEAKER_00It was we started our own tried to start our own label, didn't really go anywhere. We had to do that with Sin 77 to put out an EP and an LP. Stoney did that. But because back then the labels, so actually, I don't think cargo was really cargo was Cargo was around at the time. Were they is this the time of that they were trying to push Blink and uh or was this before I'm trying to think. Well well about the same time, wasn't it?
SPEAKER_01Because that was uh in that time frame is when Cargo had Blink, the first the Cheshire. Yeah. That is when they add that. Anyway, it's but yeah, cargo was around, that's for sure.
SPEAKER_00And I don't I'm just trying to remember the label and give them credit.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well, Cargo definitely did the first blank. We called ours deluxe record.
SPEAKER_00Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_01Deluxe records. We put out like a cassette, like the our Jackseptic cassette was on that record. This compilation we did. I can't remember. We I'm sure we did at least one or two other things. Okay. Didn't really go anywhere. But this was deluxe records that it was it was basically me, Von Avakin from Custom Printing, who now is superstar DJ Von Vacen. Um and Joe Garcia from Sub Society. Okay. Because he was doing his zine, he had his little zine plus magazine that he was doing at that time too. And we sort of tried to put this label together. Oh, okay. Cool. Anyway, so that our band, Jackseptic, morphed. We changed our name. We started using synthesizers and stuff. Yeah. And we changed our name to the Jack to the Jackseptic Spaceworm. The Jack Septic Spaceworm and the Analog Warriors. And then we sort of ended up dropping everything to just becoming the spaceworm.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Singer didn't like it, quit. Then we sort of got our friend Bill McMullen to like come in and do sampler keyboard stuff. Played a few shows with him. And then I think the drummer eventually quit. And then Dave from Homeless Sexuals was our singer for a minute.
SPEAKER_00Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_01So we he joined us for, I don't know, it wasn't really very, very long. I think one of the few shows we played with him was at Joe and Andy's Homewall. That I think Matt Anderson played drums. I was playing bass, Vaughn was playing guitar, and Dave was singing. I just remember sitting on the bar. I had to sit on the bar at Joe and Andy's in La Mesa because the place was so tiny.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Anyway, Spaceworm and I was getting into like electronic rave scene in the 90s, basically. So I started bringing that into the PB music trader as well. And then eventually, like Insomniac and all the raves come and sell tickets in our store, which Soma also ended up doing tickets out of all of the music traders eventually.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So yeah, so I mean I pretty much was at the PB store doing that until like this Jeff, the owner, wanted to do this internet thing. And then I we had a what was it called? Movie? Movie trader. Yeah. It was down the street in PB from the music trader. And I went there to work in the back there on the computer running the internet store. Oh, okay. Where we would basically get all the rare shit that came into all the other stores. So basically, we would have a list of stuff people were looking for. And it's literally, we would list it. So I would type out everything we got for the week. Right. Post it on this website. Super rudimentary website.
SPEAKER_00Like it sounds like something that I would understand though.
SPEAKER_01You would, because it was just like four pages. It was like, here's the greatest the greatest U C D store on the planet. Yeah. Was the Music Trader logo uh or motto or slogan or whatever? Because yeah, the the logo was a di a CD with the world's globe in it. Yeah. And it said Music Trader, the greatest U C D store on the planet. Which it kind of was. It was pretty much.
SPEAKER_00No, it was hugely influential. And that's the thing is with how many stores the growth. And then so coming back to that with the flyers and everything that I was bringing in, Len would bring in. I don't think we had, yeah, I'm pretty sure. Because eventually he had me doing the majority of everything. Yeah. But those stores.
SPEAKER_01Remember being Len at first.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. He we had it split where he was doing all the the coastal line and I was doing all the East County and then working my back my way back to OB.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00And but there were so many stores that we could put up flyers in, and for the most part, I don't know, it might have been someone in a bad mood or anything, or I might have been too hungover, but it was very friendly where some of the other stores that I didn't frequent as much weren't as hip and you know, oh fuck, they're here to take up more space in our window.
SPEAKER_01Because for the younger traders or just other records stores, just other record stores.
SPEAKER_00Because there, you know, there was quite a few, but I think for the younger audiences, because I'm gonna document everything from the late 60s garage bands till modern day. Yeah, you drive by, you know, we both go by the Soma there and where it's at now. They don't even have the flyers up on the front window. Right. So it's supposed to look, you know, just whatever, just kind of blend in.
SPEAKER_01We all, you know, dude. It used to be a bloodbath on our windows and at the bulletin board at the back of the store where because we had a whole wall chunk. We had one of those, we built a shelf, it leaned against the wall, it was almost floor to ceiling, and you know, as high as you could reach.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01For literally only for show flyers. Yeah. Whether it was somebody for Bill Silva Presents coming in and doing, you know, the national touring stuff, or if it was, you know, Swindle coming in and dropping off their flyers, you know, the little PB local band. Yeah. Coming to drop, and it, but it was the place was a disaster. And I just remember employees being like so upset that they had like one, I'd give them the task, go straighten up the flyer wall. Yeah. Like, and they'd be like, okay, it's like a mess. But yeah, I mean, I remember you guys coming in and our whole front window that's a plaster, and pretty sure we gave preference preferential treatment to sola's stuff, you know. I mean, you guys also had like a distinct flyer, yeah. You know, the the the primary colors, the same shape every time.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, the same font.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And then, you know, well, we also had to pay our way in, and it was understood. I mean, these were all principles that Len had came up with, the passes to every single show to getting prime real estate and being able to manage the flyers. Granted, um, at times there was too much shit, and then yeah, there was competition, and then the the local bands and all that, but the importance of just trying to deal with that in in hindsight, it was a mess, it was organized chaos, which is brilliant, but it was such a mecca. I mean, people knew, so there was a give and take. You know, we're taking up all your window space, but we're also bringing people in here because you look in the reader, and you know, you get it, you don't really get it from the radio, so you have to go to the record stores.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I mean, the the reader was one source, but it didn't have everything. I mean, I guess it kind of did. It had at the time it was pretty much Soma, Casbah. There was a few other clubs that would try to Bodies was the place we play. Yeah, there wasn't other places.
SPEAKER_00Well, like the Velvet or Crowbar or whatever would be in that formation at that time after Casbah moved, yeah. And then for a small period of time, there's you know, like World Beats Center Beat Center when it was when it was over here on Hancock. I saw Radiohead there, which Neurosis was a rad show.
SPEAKER_01Oh my god, I was totally at that show. That was insane.
SPEAKER_00And Buzzcott.
SPEAKER_01I just read a an article recently about neurosis.
SPEAKER_00Drum roll.
SPEAKER_01I and it totally talked about that specific show.
SPEAKER_00Oh, really?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I can't remember if the article was about neurosis or just about that scene in general, but I remember them talking about it, and it was a scene where they had, you know, the drum, the tribal drum parade thing started where they came in and they had the tray, or like the we call the thing that people carry where there's a person at a yeah, I can't name for it. The thing like job of the hut, we get carried out or whatever. Or a pharaoh, if you want to be stick, stick to real thumb.
SPEAKER_00Crash worship did did that often too.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, but they had the oh, maybe that was the crash worship show I'm thinking of. It might have been where they had like I think it was like a woman on the top of it covered in fruit.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, that would be that would be Crash Worship.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, never mind. Sorry, interruption. So that was Crash Worship. That's the show. But that that yeah, but World Beat Center was that show there was ratchet.
SPEAKER_00I got something for the insiders insiders, but yeah, I I know they were how should we put this? They were gifted their festivities for the evening. Hmm. So it was it was yeah, it was it was it was lively, so it made it it helped with our nerves at that show, yeah. But it wasn't anything really illicit.
SPEAKER_01He was probably got sick from the vibrations or something. Oh wow, I was gonna say from some reason I'm remembering some story about because they always neurosis always tried to do that the tone.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, I did that with urine as well.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, to me to you get I never got sick from that, but you can definitely feel that frequency, yeah. Brown sound, I suppose, is what it's known as.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I was thinking that it was like a Mikeda Dread show where so much pot that he got sick. I I tend to put up with a lot of those, but yeah, that was uh any leak at a Makeda Dredd reggae show?
SPEAKER_01I wouldn't I mean I guess maybe, yeah, maybe.
SPEAKER_00I mean, I haven't seen him in years. I know he's still around, but I need to I grew up with him. Oh, yeah, him and Jeff Winfrey. Oh, okay, and uh Jim Napulanoah, and then if we go way back, there was another cat, Clay. But yeah, we all grew up in Mara Mesa.
SPEAKER_01Oh, deluxe records, we did a neighbor's cassette, too.
SPEAKER_00Oh, you did is that the 28 teeth or whatever one that they put on the seven-inch? I got it up here somewhere. Might have been. Oh, that's awesome.
SPEAKER_01I vaguely remember that one being one.
SPEAKER_00It's the really nasty mouth. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, okay. So I'm definitely Rob, but it sounds right to me.
SPEAKER_01Again, it's hazy trying to remember a lot of stuff. Oh, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00That's why I'm I have to have you guys come in to remind me.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_01Well, I mean, you're the thing I think that's cool. One thing I think that's cool about this is it's is that it is jogging my memory. Yeah. Like I forgot about that neighbor's record. Yeah. I forgot about like the Naropesha show, the crash worship show. You know. Yeah. It's yeah, it's just for me.
SPEAKER_00So, okay, let's try to really jog it. What would be your favorite show that you played, either here or just anywhere? And what's the show that I played? Yeah. And what band? Again, it's fuzzy. Yeah, that's fine. Well, it's as long as it's a running memory, we'll work with it.
SPEAKER_01I really liked the the one of the shows that was the most fun was when we were the spaceworm. We might have been the jackseptic spaceworm at this point before we just went spaceworm. We ended up right so we ended up doing a bunch of acid. Me and another friend did a bunch of acid and watched 2001 of Space Odyssey. Oh wow. And watch which is great to watch. Right. Except for the last 30 minutes, there's this the last, it's like the third act, yeah, where Frank is or Dave, it's Dave, sorry, not Frank, is getting transported to God or whatever, whatever it is that he wherever he ends up. And it's basically a close-up of his face with the mic in his helmet, like hearing him breathe. Yeah. And then the music is oh, for like 30 minutes, and like lights red and green, and then like video of like flying over the desert, which is supposed to be like the Mars landscape or something.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_01And it's like 30 minutes long, and we were just like, I remember just being like, oh my god, this I can't handle this. But it gave me the idea let's rewrite the music to it. So basically we set up in the living room of because we were living like Linda Vista, we had a house in Linda Vista where the whole band lived, the living room was our practice space.
SPEAKER_00Nice.
SPEAKER_01We had the TV up, we had 2001 of Space Odyssey on, and we wrote a 30-minute long piece that synced as synced as best as you could in 1995 or whenever this was to the last half hour and recorded it with Matt Anderson at his studio that was up on Bankers Hill and played it live. Like we played it live, like I think once at Bodie's, and then we played at this SRH dance music club event thing at some like seafood restaurant in like Mission Bay. Oh wow, like some weird, it was it was literally like a restaurant, yeah. And downstairs was like dance music at a DJ, and then upstairs were bands, and we brought a projector, we had we would put up a sheet, and we would project the last tower, Jupiter, where it starts, Jupiter and the infinite beyond. Yeah, and we would play our piece of music over the top of the thing.
SPEAKER_00Speaking of neurosis, that's I have.
SPEAKER_01I have two cassettes of it really on video somewhere.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, but the full can you get the full backdrop and then?
SPEAKER_01So the one I have is like a high eight cassette from bo I'm pretty sure it's from Bodhi's from up the balcony at Bodhi's shooting down. But then the other one is at this fish restaurant or wherever it was. And it's some dude we had met that was into like video guy, and he's like, I want to do a broadcast filming of it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01So he like set up a solid camera on us and then like walked around with another camera and recorded us. Um so I have that on VHS somewhere. The problem with that, which I need to I keep reminding myself to do this, and I haven't yet. He took, so that's when Bill McMullen was playing synthesizers and samplers with us. Vaughn was singing and playing guitar, I was doing bass, and then our Tommy, Tommy Paul, which is such a drummer name, um, was playing drums. And for some reason, the guy doing camera was like, Oh, I want to take the audio feed from your mixer over here, because we had our own mixer for all the synths and samplers and stuff.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Because we had sampled the movie, so we were playing samples of like Hal 9000 and stuff during it. It goes directly into the camera. Our mic sound vocals, drums, bass, guitar, were not going through that mixing board. So he was grabbing the audio out of the synth mix, right? Not the house mix. Right. So it's got the synthesizer sounds are crazy, crazy, crazy, crazy, crazy loud. And you can barely hear the rest of it. But I have a full thing of our full show. But now, now with technology the way it is now, I could probably re-digitize that and edit it and make it and fix the audio somewhat.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. There's magic things you can do.
SPEAKER_01But it just I just remember doing that, and that was like super fun to do. It wasn't like a rich. I mean, we opened as the spaceworm for other like electronic acts.
SPEAKER_00Did you guys always do a visual? Did you have a visual guy? Because my buddy Will, my own light guy did that. He did one for Neurosis, but they're like, no, we like our guy, but thanks for he did a lot of videos for me, which someday I gotta dig up.
SPEAKER_01We did we did our own at first. I think there might have been one or two shows you we did where Greg Lieber, I don't know if you know.
SPEAKER_00That sounds really familiar.
SPEAKER_01He was like a lighting guy, he was more in the ray, the rave dance scene, but he was very much into visuals, and I think he did a couple things. But we ended up actually buying one of those 1960s oil lights, yeah. Where it's literally like a spinner thing with red like colored oils in it and like clear liquids, yeah. And you would tack it onto this light and it would so it would shine like old school stage lighting through this thing, and we would put it on the floor and have it spin slowly on us. We stole the idea from Caius. Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_00I was gonna say because they did it, they got it from Sabbath, I'm sure.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, they did it at it was actually a Soma show. They were so I wanna say it was it was in '92. It's the first time I'd ever seen Gaius or even heard of them. I wanna say they were playing with prong, maybe, maybe, and we went to see prong at Soma, and we sat for we Kaius hadn't even started yet. We sat up above the upstairs behind the barbed wire, yeah, that rook bench, yeah, dead center behind the drummer, and we sat and like looked down, and Caius started, and of course, everyone was like, What the fuck?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I believe that would have been the blues for the red sun, it was, yeah.
SPEAKER_01But I do remember going down and around a watch because they also came to for Sky Valley. The Sky Valley tour was at Linda Vista. Oh, okay. They played with Ween. Okay. And you got you, I actually went backstage with you. Oh, I got backstage? That's so awesome.
SPEAKER_02No, you were one of the show, dumbass.
SPEAKER_01You're being funny. Anyway, you got me back, and Scott Reeder, bass player, signed a poster. No way. It was my birthday. So he signed a poster for me for like my birthday. He's the only one I talked. I don't know why I didn't talk to anybody else, but Reader was the only one I talked to. Um, but yeah, they had the oil light at that Soma show. Okay. And I that's where I originally got the idea, and it was like three, four years later that we used it in our thing.
SPEAKER_00So awesome. Yeah. I still loved it. Queens of the Stone Age, Josh, whatever he's doing. They Caius was doing a reunion.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, the Caius Lives thing.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, there's that one, and then what's his face? Singer. Okay, I'm blanking on the singer's name. I followed him with John? John Garcia? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01I followed him with like uh bunch of bands.
SPEAKER_00Slowburn.
SPEAKER_01Slowburn, Hermano.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I man, if if I could play bass, if I could just do like let Scott do lead bass, and then I do the backup bass.
SPEAKER_01I tell you, I tell I would tell you that you can't have more than one bass in a band, but I'm in a band with five bass players or four bass players. So see? There's that.
SPEAKER_00And I am available. I did that with see when did we start doing that? We did that with meat. We had the two bases, and then oh, Melvin's. Yeah, Melvin's dude. I think I got the idea. Mike Green and I from Sheller, we started Meat. I think I was in not it was either Jesus Jones or Ned's Atomic Desbin. I think it was Ned's Atomic Desbin that had two bass players. And I'm like, Did he really? Yeah, remember they played the club back in the day. I think it was them. I don't think it was Jesus Jones, but that's a different story. But and then at that time, you know, me just we tuned everything so low, so it just and then urine for a small point of time. Actually, no, it yeah, urine. We had two bass. I like doing two bass.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00I like it depends on my mood on what bass I'll play, and then whether I want to play dirty and what pedals, and and how exactly dirty I want to make it, but I just like I love playing right now. And because Neurosis just put out a new album, yeah. Which I love Isis, and that slow drony stuff. Yeah, I just I you know, ever since I hate God is the one that really that turned it for me when we played, I don't remember which one of my bands, but we opened up for them, and that made me go like, oh, this is Sabbath, but punk and you know, doomy enough for me and sludgy enough because I like Flipper too.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I love Flipper.
SPEAKER_00So, you know, that's just reminding me.
SPEAKER_01I feel like I may be hallucinating, but I feel like we opened up for Iron Butterfly at fourth and v once. Uh, which band? I feel like it would have been it would either have been Spaceworm or Jackseptic, one of the or some incarnation of that. I don't remember. I might be wrong. I feel like I would have written that down somewhere.
SPEAKER_00Never know. Well, nowadays we just look up stuff on the Google machine.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, honestly, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Oh, boogie. You gotta go, babe? We're just podcast. It's okay.
SPEAKER_01We can edit this out.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, we just edit it. We're not gonna, it's gonna be in. We're not making any money. He's angry already. Oh, yeah, that's right. He loses his mind when she leaves. And I usually go out on the porch and hold him, but like wave goodbye to mama. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Wow. Yeah. My cat just pouts and turns away and walks away from and then doesn't talk to me when I get back.
SPEAKER_00Oh, he'll he'll lose his mind too. He senses when she's coming home for sure. All right. Well, you know what? I let's revisit this. We're gonna see a boogie off, and then I'm gonna show you the rest of the house and we'll hang out and chat. Yep. So for the sceneless documentary part of the documentary and Pugsley barking, Tim, thanks, dude. Um, we're we'll get more on video, and like I said, we're gonna have to have you back. And um, I want to do some record listening, and um, I'll give you the rest of the tour and we'll go through it. But for now, Sceneless, a San Diego documentary. I'll figure out the title. We're out.
unknownAll right.
