Review in Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Category: News and Politics
Music Preview: Power rock legends Blue Cheer hit the pub -- bring earplugs
Still loud, still proud
Thursday, April 12, 2007
By Scott Mervis, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
..>
Blue Cheer -- then, Dickie Peterson, Leigh Stephens and Paul Whaley -- took its name from LSD and a love of the blues.
Blue Cheer
With: An Albatross, Midnite Snake.
When: 9 p.m. Monday.
Where: 31st Street Pub, Strip.
Tickets: $10; 412-391-8334.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
..> In the San Francisco rock scene of the Great Unwashed, Blue Cheer were like the dirty punks no one wanted around.
Once billed as the "Loudest Band in the World," and some added "the dumbest," the metal pioneers pounded out heavy, primitive, fuzzed-out acid rock that didn't have a lot to do with peace-and-love revolution vibe of the late '60s.
"On a musical level, we had some problems," recalls singer-bassist Dickie Peterson. "The San Francisco scene was primarily folk-rock-based. We were a blues-based band. There was no way around it."
Blue Cheer, which plays the 31st Street Pub Monday, formed in 1967 as a power-rock trio with an obvious affection for Cream and Jimi Hendrix. The similarities and virtuosities ended there, though.
"We idolized those guys," Peterson says, "but we had absolutely nothing in common other than three people in the band. They were consummate musicians that had been around the block. Hendrix had played with James Brown; Clapton was in -- what was that band? -- the Yardbirds. We were just young kids trying to break loose."
To Peterson, the band's name was a double entendre that suited its blueprint of psychedelic blues. Blue Cheer was the name of a potent brand of LSD, while also relating to the musical legacy that spawned the band.
"It was named after acid and named after the fact that we liked the blues. The blues is generally thought of as sad music, but there's something called the jump blues, and it has nothing to do with being sad. It has to do with party. That's sort of where the name came from. And, we did indulge in quite a bit of Owsley's Blue Cheer acid."
Technically, Blue Cheer was a one-hit wonder, reaching No. 14 in 1968 with a bombastic cover of "Summertime Blues" from its debut album, "Vincebus Eruptum." Although its members were contemporaries in the Haight-Asbury scene with the Jefferson Airplane, the Grateful Dead and Quicksilver Messenger Service, the sound was much more akin to Detroit rockers MC5 and The Stooges.
"Primarily, we were a loud, straight-into-you rock 'n' roll band, man. Our whole goal was to make music a physical experience as well as an audio experience. We played the Grand Ballroom -- The Stooges, the MC5 and us. I can't recall a power rock concert that was that full of power rock."
Peterson remembers the band having a rough time with the music industry and the rock press, not just because of its sound and image, but because of its lifestyle. For one thing, their manager, Gut, was a former Hell's Angel.
"We were in a large part ignored by a lot of the rock upper echelons at the time," Peterson says. "We were pretty wild, so we scared a lot of people. We hung out with bikers, smoked dope and did stuff, and we got in a lot of trouble for that. There were a lot of people in the music scene that had a problem with us. A lot of people dug what we were doing; otherwise we would have never done what we did. They saw what we were doing. We were angry young men. Now, we're angry old men."
Although the Grateful Dead did share a blues bent with Blue Cheer, Peterson doesn't harbor any good feelings for the kings of the SF scene.
"We always had problems with the Dead," he says, "'cause once the Dead got on stage they never got off. Every other band on the bill waiting to get on stage, your show was over, 'cause the Dead weren't going to leave. There was more than one time I just wanted to go up and start throwing their stuff off the stage. We were in the Dead's face all the time. We were taking their old ladies out and all kinds of stuff."
Blue Cheer released six records between '68 and '71, toning down the heavy amp-age toward the end of that run to reveal more dynamics and even a little of that once-dreaded folk-rock. During those years, though, there were numerous changes in the guitar slot, due to Leigh Stephens' departure after the second record. They split in '71, reformed in '88 and have been active, one way or another since then.
The current lineup finds Peterson with original drummer Paul Whaley and 20-year veteran Duck McDonald on guitar. Volume is still paramount and while there's been new material during the '80s and '90s and a new album on the way, they know what the fans -- many of them young worshipful punks -- want to hear.
"We still have a lot of volume, a lot of punch. We also use dynamics. We did back then, too, but nobody paid attention to that. But we're wise enough to know that most people who come to see us want to hear a lot of the old stuff. We always have to keep that in mind."
It's worth noting that the 60-year-old Peterson, sitting in the back of a van heading for Philadelphia, doesn't once say "huh?" or ask for a question to be repeated.
"Actually, my ears are pretty good," he says. "I went to a doctor for a physical. He looked at my ears and said, 'My God, what have you done?' I said, 'What do you mean?' He said, 'You have callouses on your ear drums.' I said, 'I've been standing in front of stacks of bass amplifiers for 35 years' [at that time]. He said, 'Guitar players rip their ears, and bass players, if they're lucky, develop callouses.' I guess my eardrums resemble my fingertips."
Of the blue cheer acid, he says, "It's hard to tell when you're the damaged one how much damage is done."
www.postgazette.com/music/7:35 AM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment
Randy
Interesting blog and hadn't thought much about the fact that we (Savage Resurrection) shared some of the same problems. We were a hard-edged, blues-R&B tinged band from Richmond across the bay and didn't jell well with some of the folk-rock vibe in S.F. We also found the Dead kind of a pain in the ass to play with, but for it was that they were really unfriendly and stuck their noses up at us. Of course, I would like to have shared that problem too of having a smash hit.
Randy Hammon - Savage Resurrection
Posted by Randy on Friday, April 13, 2007 at 8:55 AM