KSU Memorial May 4 2010

I traveled to North Eastern Ohio for the 40th anniverasary of the Kent State Massacre. There was a good turnout and I saw a lot of old, familiar faces. Genral Jackett and Jerry Casale from the DEVO days. Bill Zorn and Chris Butler from even farther back at Guido's Pizza. Thanks to Patty Taylor for the photos

Genral, Jerry and yours truly.


Jerry gave a stirring speech at the Memorial, while still managing to plug DEVO. Bobby Seale also spoke and was touching and funny and righteous.

There was a counter demonstration protesting the Arizonia Immigration law...Interesting?

Genral, Bill Zorn and Jerry solving the World's problems.


Chris Butler...Discuss.

His Hip Highness

Lord Buckley was laying down the synchopated jive long before any of today's auto tuned, metal teeth rappers were thought of , by about fifty years.
Video

Tighten Up

"Tighten Up", by the Black Keys, not Archie Bell, is the latest release from the duo's new collection Brothers.

A clever puppet video suits the greasy groove. Akron's own does it again.

http://www.theblackkeys.com/videos

BruceApalooza 2007

Harvey Gold (Half Cleveland), Paul Long (the Riotous Bros), Patrick Sweany (Mars) and Martin Birch (the Riotous Bros.) do an A.C. (after cake) jam out at the end of the evening.



Friday night February 9th, 2007, about 75 people helped me celebrate my 60th birthday…a scary male milestone. It was my idea to put a broad crossection of my musical friends on stage and see what would happen. It worked out really fine. Shot the entire four hours of music on 2 Betacams and recorded to 24 track Fostex. The DVD may be out in the fall.
Joe Galdo, Joe Lala, Joe Foglia, Tony Battaglia, Chi-Pig, the Riotous Bros., Half-Cleveland, Patrick Sweany, Ken Hatley and Peter van der Sande all contributed to the festivites. Check out Dolli Gold’s photo essay on the party at:http://www.tinhuey.com/news.htm
or more photos at:

Harvey in the Hall

Early in August, I spent three days at the home of Harvey and Dolli Gold in Bath Ohio. The purpose of the visit was to try and record a few of Harvey's songs in a relaxed home environment. Harvey and Dolli live in a restored turn of the century school house in the woods. It sounded great!
Harvey played guitar, keyboards and sang all the vocals.
Debbie Smith of Chi-Pig played bass and "Bongo" Bob Ethington on drums rounded out the trio. Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys played guitar on two of the songs and brought us that modern vibe.
Harvey and I will be finishing the tracks and mixing in Orlando in November.

TheJames Gang Rides Again!

Bruce Hensal, Joe Walsh and Joe Lala

Joe Walsh, Jimmy Fox and Dale Peters have reunited as the James Gang, after 30 years to tour the U. S. this summer. I caught the show on Sunday August 27 at Ruth Eckerd Theater in Clearwater. It was smoking! With a psychadelic light show straight outta the Fillmore, the music took me back to the smokey basement of J.B.'s on Water St. in Kent, Ohio circa 1969. They rocked the ususl hit's, "Funk #49", "Walk Away" and "Rocky Mountain Way" and reached way back to cover Freddie King's "Going Down". Excellent.
Joined by a keyboard player and three female singers/dancers, the band stripped down to a trio for several songs, and even a couple of acoustic numbers including a solo acoustic song by Walsh.
He is still one of the best guitarists in the business...a true tone monster.
It's great to see these old fogeys rocking. Anyone got a Walsh story?

True Pioneers

Jim Mothersbaugh and Gary Jackett

"Jungle Jim" Mothersbaugh and "Genral" Jackett were both early influences in the entire Devo aesthetic. Jim was the band's first drummer and virtually invented electronic drums with his Barcus-Berry pickups mounted on drum practice pads. The output fed a synth module and the hihat pedal controlled a white noise generator!
Gary was an early experimental guitarst and graphic designer with some early incarnations of Devo. He was in an early Devo video playing a guitar plugged into a wall heater, if I remember correctly. He also produced one of the first digital multi-media Cd-i discs, the forerunner to DVD.
Cutting edge guys.

Photo credit: M.Pilmer-www.devo-obsesso.com

Chris Butler Annual Wrapping Contest

2/3 Chi-Pig and 1/2 Half Cleveland

this from our frienf CB:

yo all you cats & cittens...

the OFFICIAL BEGINNING of the Christmas season ain't Halloween (sorry, LW3) or Thanksgiving (sorry, all you Big Box retailers)...it's when your's truly announces that the competition for the coveted WRAPPIE AWARD has officially begun!

the WRAPPIE goes to the FIRST person to email me about 'sighting' (er..obviously 'hearing') The Waitresses' version of "Christmas Wrapping" in a public space or on the radio. (nb: shoe stores/malls/college radio all count - playing the tune in you home don't).

every year (2005 being the event's 10th Anniversary), the winner gets $100 donated in their name to the Hoboken Library's Children's Book Fund. (the Library will send the winner a confirmation letter, if requested.)

the other rules: none...

merry pre-sale/non-sectarian holiday wishes to one and all, and may the best set of ears win!

cbutler

ps - feel free to forward this/blog it/etc...

Keep Listening!

Miami...1979

Bruce Hensal and Robert Mittelman at Criteria Studios

Check here for the inside story

Pigs and Half Cleveland

Chi-Pig and Half Cleveland (Harvey Gold and Chris Butler of Tin huey) will play the Beachland Ballroom August 29 th and Devo will be deconstructing things at the Scene pavillon Aug.19??? all dates approximate. Debbie Smith will be doing double duty on bass for both bands...Spuds Forever!

Circles

Today I attended the memorial service of a man I knew through church and work. He was born in Kansas, raised in Africa, lived, worked and taught in Hungary and California. He passed on in Florida, was buried in Ohio, and now lives in Heaven. He was a faithful servant of God, the son of missionaries who served in Rhodesia(Zimbabwe). Mark Bloom was on staff at Campus Crusade for Christ for nearly twenty years. He will be buried in the town of Twinsburg, where my wife Carol attended high school.
Most of my family still live in Ohio, and my parents are buried there.

On September 11, 2001, I was in Kenya, working on "The Jesus Film for Children" for Campus Crusade and Carol was in Florida.

Small world, no?

New Blood

I just wanted to take up a tiny slice of cyberspace to give respect to a nu generation of AkroClevKent musicians. The Black Keys and the Patrick Sweany Band, along with many other players and bands are representing rock in a modern way. Great singing, great playing,
and great songwriting.

"Keep up the good work Men, and remember, Rock marches on..."
Coach Mann

bh

J.B. R.I.P.

from Chris Butler:
fyi.

cbutler

From: David Giffels To:
Sent: Wed, 8 Jun 2005 12:34:19 -0400
Subject: heaven has better restrooms

Joe Bujack, RIP:(owner and namesake of J.B.'s in Kent)

Any good Bujack stories out there?
bh

May 4, 35 years later.

Chris Butler sent me this:

Spent all last week back in Ohio for the 35th anniversary of the Kent State shootings. Sparsely attended, not much media play either...but oh so life-affirming for the geezers that were there. And it felt different from the other reunions…calmer, deeper…something. Dunno why…age?...wisdom?…just living? It really struck me this time how much May 4th has become a part of me/my life. The anger is still there (goddam...i hate those bastards), but also a sense of it being as much a part of me as an arm or a leg. When one is confronted w/ something so terribly wrong, it becomes a moral absolute. Not in the sense of how those right-wing Christians are glomming onto Biblical teachings as 'the only way'…more like as a way of judging all parts of your life. I ducked - my friends didn't - and so I'm living on borrowed time = make each moment count. Don't sweat the small stuff/save your freak-outs for the real crises vs. the day-to-day bullshit. Be happy now/pay yourself off now/joy now…'cause life is short and flimsy. Don't tolerate injustice & unfairness & hypocrisy…if life is unfair, change it/don't be surprised at the pettiness of human nature, but don't succumb to it. Those old idealistic hippie/political values have turned out to be valid and enriching - solid..and practical. In short…I am never lost as to 'what to do'…that single event has become a tool for parsing right & wrong.

Old Folks Boogie

Akron rocked for two straight nights early in April, when the Nicked Up Huey Rock-A-Thon Benefit Weekend hit the Lime Spider in downtown Tire Town.

After the money raised for Mark Price and Michael Aylward, the second best news of the weekend was the reunion of
Chi-Pig after twenty five years,following the release of the “lost” Miami album in 2004. The band rocked, the Poor Girls Plus2!

From the Black Keys to the Numbers Band, from the youngest to the oldest, Akron/Kent music shined in the night on Main Street.

Space and Beyond

A recent Google search on Jan Naftulin turned up www.difinity.com .
Jan is a Jewish drummer/artist/salesman/marketer from Cleveland who found the Lord 12 years ago and now lives in San Francisco.
He currently works with Jews for Jesus and many other sales and celestial ventures.
BTW the restaurant that he has worked at for 26 years burned down several months before
he got the JFJ job.

Check him out!

Where Are They Now ?

I received this email from Patti Taylor:

Bruce,
Da, I forgot about the site. I checked it.
That is my old friend Danny, we have sent several emails already. You are
now my offical time travel pilot. Now there is only one other person I have been looking for. I think you might know him Jim Luby, he lived with
Patrick one time above I think a barber shop. They moved to DC and
haven't been able to find them for about 10 years.

Anyone know the whereabouts of Jim Luby or Jim Ryan or Jim Greathouse?

Kent Reunion

This was passed along by Chris Butler.

Hi Everyone,

Some folks from Kent asked me to send an email around to see what kind of response there would be for a reunion at Kent this May 4th.

Dan Miller plans to show his documentary there this May. He'll have about 60 minutes of the feature-length video he plans to air on public broadcasting and at Sundance about Kent State SDS and the struggle there after SDS was kicked off campus --from about 1964 through the 70s.

So...it's a great opportunity to get together as always. At the 2000 reunion, we spent a day with a sound system in a Kent restaurant telling each other our stories and eating wonderful food. It was an exhilarating experience. I'd love to do something like that again.

I'm in Oregon-- in fact we're all so far away from each other that it's a bit hard to feel the pulse of the group...but...let's talk about this. Remember to "reply all" so everyone on the list gets to read everything everyone writes. Also....take a look at the email list. If you know the addresses of people who should be included there, please let me know and I'll send those addresses out to everyone as well. Of course, some folks don't have email (I have numbers for George Huffman, Vince and Carolyn Modugno, Terry Hynde, Ruth Gibson --if you have others, let me know. A volunteer will be needed to reach them).

Love to you all,
Candy (Erickson) Knox

Carolyn Knox, Ph.D.
Center for Advanced Technology in Education
1244 Walnut Street Suite D.
Eugene, Oregon 97403
541-346-3543 voice
541-346-6226 fax

Dan Miller's Kent State Film

Dan Miller, a former Kent State student, has been working on a documentary about the history of Kent State and the people who were there during the 1960's to the 1980's. He is going to debut it publicly in Kent on May 4th 2005. I haven't seen it yet, but several people who have seen it in various forms over the years say it is very good. Dan has been working with the University of Oregon in recent years and he heads up the Oregon Documentary Project for student filmmakers, good stuff.

The Coop

The home to Bill Zorn...the Z Man.
Back in the day Bill lived in the Coop, a converted chicken coop with a metal working shop on the ground floor, and Bill's living/performance space in the loft above.
Filled with bullwhips, firearms, electric erotic art, and extremely psychadelic lighting performances, it was accompanied by loud rock.
I'm sure you all have stories.
Mine's about Zorn bullwhipping a cigarette out of Gerry Casale's hand, in the parking lot outside the coop, behind Burgners.
Talk about art meets politics.