Interview with Don Bolles of The Germs

Drummer Don Bolles chit-chats about his music projects over the years, his recent book on Darby Crash and the L.A. punk scene, and the sounds of "psychedelic torture" at his club gigs.

By Mark Prindle

Don Bolles is the former drummer of The Germs, Vox Pop, .45 Grave and Celebrity Skin (among thousands of other smaller bands), co-author of Feral House's Lexicon Devil: The Fast Times and Short Life of Darby Crash and the Germs, and a major collector of such wonderful musical subgenres as "song-poems," "celebrities at their worst," "corporate musicals" and "vanity pressings."

When he agreed to an interview, I had totally forgotten about his weird musical interests (which I share) and found myself wondering, "What the heck am I going to ask the drummer from the Germs?" The stress became so intense that I had to drink two shots of vodka before making the call. But much to my surprise -- he was as interesting and friendly as any human being I've ever cared to meet in my life! As a result, we spoke for 90 minutes. NINETY MINUTES! Granted, I had taken four more shots and was eighteen sheets to the wind by that point (as was my wife, who sat next to me and thus became part of the interview tape), but NINETY MINUTES? Good old alcohol -- the finest social and anal lubricant available. Read on and watch how drunk, interruptive and embarrassing I become through the course of the conversation.

My words are in bloodshot black; his are in friendly plain.

---

Hello?
Can I speak to Don?
Eeeeyes.
Hey! This is Mark Prindle calling to interview you.
Oh! You're calling to interview me?
Yeah!
Okay. About back in the day?
Yeah! Well, or now -- in THIS day!
We can do that too. How long is this gonna be? Do I have to go get something to drink and then come back, or --
Nah, it's really up to you -- as long as you wanna chit-chat.
Hold on a second. Let me get rid of our leader on the other line.
Okay.
(days turn to minutes and minutes to memories)
Hello.
You say you were talking to our leader?
Yes.
George W. Bush?
No, not Bushypants. I was talking to Dan Kapelovitz, the producer of our television show The Threee Geniuses. He's the titular head of our --
What's that all about? What is that show about?
You know how Seinfeld said it was a television show about nothing? Our show actually IS a television show about nothing. It's truly non-representational television.
Is it only on in L.A.?
It's hardly even on in L.A.!
Ha! What do you do on there?
Umm, nothing. We don't do anything. And we make a show of it. It's pretty insane. What it is, is just one big chaotic psychedelic mess, but unlike all the people making chaotic psychedelic messes that are supposed to be chaotic psychedelic messes, this is not like those.
How long have you been doing it?
We've done 180-something episodes. One of our stars was murdered, so we've sorta not been doing it as much since he was murdered.
Murdered? Why?
Shot point blank in the chest. Instant death.
What was involved?
He was involved with the wrong person, I guess. He got involved with a lady who had a weird birthmark all over her body -- she looked like a palamino or an appaloosa, you know what I'm talking about? The one with the spots?
Yeah.
And she was doing methamphetamines and she had an ex-husband who, I guess they hadn't quite figured their thing out yet to the degree of where they were cool with everything. So the guy would come around and he'd call the guy on his cell phone and go, "HOW DO YA LIKE SCREWIN' MY WIFE?" It was really fuckin' scary, but the guy didn't take it all that seriously. And I guess my friend was over screwin' the guy's wife, and the guy showed up at her apartment and knocked on the door. The guy opens the door -- BLAM, right in the heart. Dead. Then this other guy goes in and shoots the wife in the kitchen and then he shoots himself. It was quick. There was no torturing of them or anything. I guess.
That's not a feel-good story.
No, it's a kind of fucked-up play.
What else are you up to these days?
Well, I do the television show, like I said, and we're also taking it live now and doing it in public in different venues where we can do the thing. We can't just do it anywhere; we gotta have video projectors and all that kinda shit that no one can afford.
Do you have any scripting?
No. There's all sorts of things that we don't have that other shows tend to have. Never a script. There's no plan for what we're gonna do. We don't even talk about it before the show or anything. We have nothing. It's completely improvised from nothing every time.
Is it more like comedy?
No. Well, sometimes it's funny, but it's not comedy. It's just....it's...a...a television show.
Had you been wanting to do a television show for a while?
Well, I've been doing one for a while. I don't think I want to anymore. It's just -- there it is. We've been doing it for years. Since probably like '98 or something.
Wow.
Yeah, 1998 or something. I don't know; it doesn't seem like that's a long time ago, but it's like six years.
Do you play drums anymore?
Not for the show. I do play drums. I played the other day. I was doing this one band that was really good, except we had this fat idiot with a butt crack that wrote stupid songs with stupid titles that I wouldn't -- I mean the music was great, but then he'd put in his dumbass lyrics that he'd sing like Homer Simpson all over the thing. Like we're doing this beautiful shoegazer psychedelic Sonic Youth meets fuckin' And You'll Know Us By The Trail of Dead or something. It was just incredible stuff! Like King Crimson and Neu and fuckin'... insanely beautiful and good.
What was he singing about?
Ugh. He'd write songs like -- what was his stupidest one -- oh yeah, "Idiots On Parade." What are you thinking? "Idiots On Parade?" He had another one called "Blind White World."
Oof! That's hideous. What was the name of that band?
Well, he wanted to call it Molecular. I told him, "Dude, okay. I'm not in a band called 'Molecular.' I'm not in a band that does a song called 'Blind White World' or 'Idiots On Parade.' And I'm not in a band where the singer has a butt crack and sings like Homer Simpson over our hippy music, okay? None of those things am I in a band with. Now, when you want me in the band, we'll change those things!" So we changed the 'me being in the band' thing instead.
How many bands have you played in?
I don't even know. A lot?
Okay, how about this -- how many bands have you been in that have put out records?
Oh.... Well, now there's more! Because I put out stuff of things that never put out things now, you know? I'm just like everyone who's realized that they're still alive and people have started to think they're cool, and there's all this backlog of great stuff. So it's like, "Dude, if you like THIS, you're gonna love all this crap that you've never heard because it never saw the light of the day because there was no interest other than me and my friends at the time, and now you guys are fuckin' drooling for it! It's crazy -- here it is!" So I've done a little of that. Unfortunately there's not really a whole lot more unreleased Germs stuff that's anywhere. Stuff like that would bring in a lot of money.
How long were you actually in the Germs for?
From when I joined until there wasn't any Germs. He [Darby Crash] tried to get Rob Henley to -- well, you read my book [Lexicon Devil from Feral House], right?
Yeah, I did.
It's all in there.
That was such a great book though.
It was a good book! You know how people say, "It was just a great little movie," you know? Like when something is on HBO or something and it wasn't big, but it was a perennial secret great thing, you know? That's how the book kinda is.
I didn't realize how little I knew about Darby Crash and about all the stuff you guys went through.
You and me both. I learned a lot. I'm still learning a whole lot. There's gonna be another edition that's gonna come out with -- well, so far we're planning on releasing the last show at the Starwood [December 3, 1980] with it on a high-quality -- I've got the actual master tape. I finally got it back from the guy who recorded it. Well, I recorded it, but --
Got it back from yourself?
Well, I recorded it but my friend had the tape. He did sound that night. He was Johnny Mathis's soundman. But he was a good friend of mine, so we had him do sound for the Germs. And he did sound for like Vox Pop and .45 Grave. Pretty cool guy named Phoenix. Now he goes to Branson, Missouri, and does sound for a Hanson dinner theater or something.
How long was .45 Grave around? Because I've heard a lot of great things about them, but then I've only heard one song -- from that Hell Comes To Your House compilation.
Well, that's a good song, that "Evil."
Yeah. But I've never actually seen the records. Were there other records?
We had an album [Sleep in Safety, 1983], we had singles, we had EPs, we had an interview album, we had a live album, we had an album of oddities and stuff that I unearthed from a bunch of cassettes that were -- well, they weren't actually under the earth, but they were uhh.... I un-bedroom-floored them. They were just laying around -- all this stuff I had laying around, .45 Grave-related stuff. We put that out on Cleopatra; it's called Debasement Tapes (1993).
Was that band one of the first death rock goth-type bands out there?
Yeah, it was, even though -- that was just kinda part of what we did. I mean, we started out as a sort of improvisational sound thing. Sort of like AMM or something, and then the Germs -- I don't know -- and then we started doing these pop songs, because we were really good musicians. It was me and all my favorite musicians -- Paul Cutler and Rob Graves, who was an amazing bass player. And my girlfriend [Dinah Cancer] had to sing. Actually there's a whole big thing coming out about .45 Grave -- a DVD with this huge interview. It's really good.
Oh really?
Yeah, it kicks ass. It's a really good live show.
And what was the deal with Vox Pop? Was that the one where you pissed off Darby Crash because you were wearing a dress or something?
It wouldn't have pissed him off except for I was always in drag and stuff, because you know -- Well, I still kinda do that. I look fuckin' hot in drag! I have this whole teenage rock star body even though I'm almost 50 years old.
How do you maintain that?
I don't know. I have no idea. I eat a lot of ice cream and pizza and --
You have good metabolism, I guess.
Something like that. I don't know. It's pretty cool though. I always have foxy girlfriends and I can fit into all the skinny rock star clothes that no one else can fit into.
Cool!
Yeah, it's just one of those things. I don't know. If it took any work, it wouldn't be that way.
Which of these bands do you think really were your vision of what music should be?
Well, like... uhh, I don't know.
I guess you liked all of them; you were in all of them.
Yeah, do you mean like, what's the ultimate musical thing that I've done that's closest to my personal whatever? I don't know.
Well, you traveled all the way from Arizona to join --
There's too much to be done. And that's why I just keep doing what I can do. I just try to do what sounds cool, and I think I've done that.
Why were you so excited over that Germs single that you moved?
It wasn't like anything else. Now there's a bunch of stuff that's really inept like that, but at the time, it just sounded like a record by people who just do not care about any of it. It seemed really random, more than anything else. And I thought it was great. To me, it was amazing. It just seemed to me that these people did not see things quite the same way that everybody else does. Even everybody else that was being different wasn't like this. It was like a different world.
      And then I called these guys, and they were into Yes and Queen and David Bowie, and they didn't care about any other aggressive stuff. This was like 1977, and that was unheard of. I couldn't believe it. I thought they were just fuckin' with me, you know? And they really were into those things. They were not interested in most of the music that I was interested in. I was mostly into pretty odd shit. I mean, I had just met the Residents, and seen Devo's first show in California. I guess I had some pretty weirdass tastes myself. I was into like Half Japanese.
       There wasn't much punk -- there really wasn't any. Anyone interested in anything had to -- you had to be a little eclectic because there wasn't gonna be enough punk to get you by. And if you were only into punk, you had better not have been born yet. It was not a good time for that. You would've starved if you were on a strict punk diet, because there was nothing. I had to come to L.A. I had to come to L.A. to get any kind of records.
When punk first came out -- you know, punk as we now know it --
The Sex Pistols and all that, right?
Did you foresee that it would be so cherished and at least in some form still alive 25 years later?
I guess the blues cats didn't really think about that either, but it didn't stop it from happening. I think it's precisely that part of the aesthetic that gave it one of its main qualities that has contributed to its longevity -- it was real. It was not contrived. Even though it was contrived, it was totally real. That was what was great about punk. Because punk was made to sell out, yet it was pure. Even as tainted as you could make it, it was generally still pure. But it's funny -- just like a lot of '60s stuff.... The music I was listening to in the '60s, a lot of the Pebbles stuff -- I don't know. I listen to a lot of stuff now that I wouldn't have listened to then that's FROM then.
Well, you wouldn't have known it was around then.
No, there were so many things that were regional. Now it's not really as much like that, because now you've got the Internet and you can find anything.
Yeah, but there's too much. You can't figure out what to choose!
Yeah, exactly. And it all kinda evens the playing field for a lot of things that are really not equal.
Yeah, exactly. It must be impossible -- like hopefully maybe in 20 years, someone will start putting out a series of -- you know, like Pebbles is now, putting out singles you've never heard -- hopefully someone will dig through all this MP3 shit to find the good stuff.
There must be SOME, you know?
I know! I know, but how are you gonna know? With these bands who never tour --
Yeah. It's like the D.I.Y. thing really kinda got out of control.
Yeah. So there's all these bands who try to sound like their heroes and that's it.
I think everybody kinda has always done that.
Yeah, that's true, but --
Except for the Germs, who at first were just trying to -- well, at first they didn't even sound like a band.
Ha!
Barring that, I think the band was trying to sound like Bowie in a lot of ways.
That's something I wanted to ask you about, actually. The idea that you always hear about, "Oh, the Germs couldn't play their instruments," but the album certainly doesn't sound like you couldn't play your instruments.
Pat [Smear, guitarist] was an incredible musician right away. He was really good.
Yeah! So what was --
He never had a lesson or anything, but he sure could figure stuff out. He got really good; he played a lot.
Did people just say that because the early shows were so messy?
No, they really weren't that good. They weren't even trying to be that good. They played to the top of their abilities, but it just wasn't enough to get through a song. They wrote some okay songs, but they really couldn't play them very well. Their first shows, they were just messy. They were messes. Every show was a mess.
Peanut butter and everything?
Literally, they were thrown off the stage! I don't think anyone had ever seen a band thrown off the stage literally. With their equipment and everything.
Wow! Was that when you were in the band? Or before?
That was before, but I've heard all about it.
Who was the original drummer? I remember you mention it in the book --
Donna Rhia. Did you read the liner notes from that reissue of the, uh --
A long time ago.
-- Germs Live at the Whiskey?
Oh, I don't know Germs Live at the Whiskey. Is that the one called Rock And Rule?
No, that's the one that Geza X wrote the liner notes for where he lambasted me.
Yeah! He said --
How I got everyone in Hollywood strung out on heroin.
"The little scamp."
The little scamp. Yep! And I think he sort of meant that affectionately, but I was pretty livid about it. It was just so patently untrue, it's ridiculous. It's like (a) Everyone in Hollywood -- I mean, first you would have to prove that everyone in Hollywood was strung out on heroin, which is unprovable even if it's true. I don't think it's true. And then you'd have to prove that -- after you proved that all the people in Hollywood were strung out on heroin -- you would have to somehow find a way to prove that it was I that had gotten them all started.
Why did he write that? Did you get like one person strung out on heroin that he knew or something?
Maybe. I think I got one or -- Well, you know, when people were wanting to do heroin, I wasn't slow to point out that I could sure go get it for them if they'd give me some. You know?
So basically it could have been anybody.
Sure! I wasn't that into heroin. I enjoyed doing it myself because it was fun. It kinda made the world easier to take.
What's it feel like? I've never done it.
Well, it feels different now. You're in New York, so it's probably similar to how it was. But here in L.A., the heroin's completely changed. I did it again a couple of years ago to see how it was, and boy it was awful!
Oh yeah?
Oh man. It was too strong and ugly, and now it's like extreme heroin. It just sucks! I never once nodded out back in the days when I was doing it. I mean, it affected me like speed affects people. It was like a mild dose of speed. Kinda like an anti-depressant or something. It just made me feel kind of better. And I didn't hate everything and everyone quite as much. It really helped! And it really got me motivated. It got me to focus a little better.
       It helped a lot, but the problem with heroin is that it's highly addictive. And so after a while, it's just a maintenance thing and you're doing what amounts to paying rent on your own body. You know what I mean? And if you don't pay the rent, the landlord will make things pretty uncomfortable for you. And in your body, it gets pretty uncomfortable if you don't pay rent.
       If you're a heroin addict and you don't do heroin, you feel really bad. Because you've used up next week's endorphins today. You're on a deficit of your body's natural painkillers. All heroin does is trick your body into releasing more of your natural painkilling endorphins, so you feel this mild euphoria and you feel no pain. You feel pretty much nothing except kinda good.
       But when you do that a lot, you have to up your dosage to trick your body even more into releasing endorphins that aren't built up yet. It hasn't built up a supply yet and now you need it to release more of them, so it's a bad way to go. Eventually it takes such ridiculous amounts to get high that you could probably die just getting normal. I never got to that point. The most I had to do to get high was pretty much where a lot of people start out their drug habits now. But back then it was a lot less trendy.
But you did the shooting up and everything?
Yeah. Well, people tried to get me to shoot up when I was a kid in Scottsdale, Arizona. It was the most confusing thing. I was in grade school hanging out with the older kids and they had these eyedroppers that had needles at the end of them -- they would call them "Vinkies." And they would try to --
What's it called?
Vinkies.
Vinkies?
Vinkies. V-I-N-K-I-E-S. It was a vinky! A vinky they would call it. And then they'd just put the needle in the end of the eyedropper, pull up the stuff from the spoon and inject it -- they'd just shoot it up with that. And what I was wondering was, "If they can get the needle to put in the eyedropper, why couldn't they get a friggin' syringe?"
Yeah, that's strange. Where did they get the needle from?
I never really got a good answer for that one. But I didn't really care, because I didn't shoot up until I was already in the Germs. I'd been in the Germs for about a year. I was 23.
So it made you feel no pain, you said? Made you more sociable?
Yeah. And I was kind of asthmatic and it helped me breathe better. It helped my endurance.
Oh wow!
Yeah, you could fuck for like twelve hours! No problem. And it was like, "What? You're tired already, honey? Aw geeze! Come on! Let's do it some more!" You could really impress the ladies. A lot of people had a different reaction and couldn't get a boner, but it hits people different ways.
       A lot of people that I knew when they'd do it, they'd get this psychotic whine in their voice and they'd nod out a lot. Probably one of the sounds I remember the most from those days was Rick Wilder, the singer with the Mau Maus. He was the guy with the definitive heroin whine. Him and his girlfriend Charlotte. It'd be like "WWWARRRLETTTTE!" "RIIIICK!" It was like -- have you ever seen that movie Fondo And Lis?
What's it called?
It's a Jodorowsky film -- Fondo And Lis?
Mm-mm.
Well, Jodorowsky was a really strange director. He did Holy Mountain and El Topo. But anyway -- well, there's not much of a point to that if you haven't seen it.
No, but maybe people who read the interview will have seen it! So it's not just me you're talking to -- it's everybody!
Yes, I guess you're right. Hi everyone. I didn't see you all there.
Was it hard to get off of that? When you finally said, "Wait a minute."
I've seen people go through some pretty heavy convulsions trying to escape, but I've always found the best way to stop doing something is to just not do it anymore. So that's what I did.
Cold turkey?
Kind of. Well, I cheated a little bit. This girl I knew who was a meth dealer thought it was a noble thing, me getting off heroin, and she donated a quarter-ounce of meth to me to help me get off heroin.
Well, you're still alive, so I don't think --
Yeah, I was injecting that for like a week and a half, and I was seeing glowing parrots flying around the room and everything was kinda glowing a little bit. Then I finally passed out and went to sleep. When I woke up three days later, I was cured. Everything was still kinda glowing blue, but I was over the convulsions. I didn't even notice them.
What period was that? Like what year was that?
I guess it was like... oh... let's see, I was 21 when I st -- I'm 48 now. I turned 48 July 30th so --
Hey! I'm a July birthday too.
Leo?
Nah, actually I'm a Cancer. Which is a pretty grim astrological sign.
Yeah, it really is. Most Cancers are pretty boring. Real nice though! Real honest.
Yeah. HEY! NOBODY CALLS ME BORING, YOU LOUSY --
Oh, okay.
I'm mainly just concerned about the, "Hey, I'm a -- I've got cancer!"
Heh heh heh! Well, there's always that most fabulous of all punk rock names, Dinah Cancer.
Oh yeah. What band was she in?
.45 Grave.
Oh, was that your girlfriend?
Yeah, I thought of the name too.
It's a good name. It's a GREAT name!
Yeah, Dinah Cancer. It's a good'un. A lot of people didn't get it either; they'd be like "Diana Cancer."
Kinda missing the point there. Oh hey! My wife wanted me to point out to you that she's wearing a Germs shirt right now.
Really?
Yeah, it's got a umm..... It's got a dog on it.
A dog?
Yeah! It's a patch -- a Germs patch -- with a dog on it.
Why?
We wanted to ask YOU that! Why would a Germs patch have a dog on it? It's cute!
You know, somehow I don't think I'm getting any royalties from that one.
You didn't design the little dog? We also a few years ago had a Germs, umm --
I've designed a few small animals, but no dogs.
Aww. Yeah, we had a Germs lightswitch cover a few years ago.
I have one of those!
Yeah, that was cool! Except one of our friends pointed out that it's in the wrong font.
Yeah it is.
Ha! It's not something I would have noticed, but --
Yeah. I had one like that for a long time. I got it on eBay, I think.
Yeah, we did too! We did too.
That's where those come from all right.
He's some scumbag. You're not making money off any of this!
I am making money off a couple of things, but not that one. I made a few thousand bucks once off of a --
Are you strumming the guitar while you're on the phone with me?
Yeah, I just learned "Ecstacy To Frenzy" by Rodd Keith.
God, I love Rodd Keith. Aww man, Rodd Keith is the best.
Yeah, I did sensitive singer-songwriter thing a --
OH THAT'S RIGHT! YOU DID ONE OF THOSE MSR COMPILATIONS, DIDN'T YOU?
I sure did! I'm one of the main --
Oh my God. That is the greatest music that I've --
Oh, I have tons of it if you ever wanna know about that. I have the album with "Beat Of The Traps" on it -- the real one.
Damn! What's it called?
Oh, it's like uhh Variety Fun -- it's called The MSR Singers Out Front.
I guess you must know Gregg Turkington then.
Of course!
Oh yeah, he's a friend of mine. He helped me get into -- man, that stuff is so good! You know, I got it just on a whim! I got one of those, and you just can't -- once you start, you can't stop!
Right. True! I found my first Rodd Keith singles in a thrift store in Santa Barbara for a nickel. They had a whole stack of 'em.
God. He still finds them cheap places. He found some for like a quarter in Australia. I've NEVER seen one in a store!
Yeah, I've seen tons of them. I have a bunch of acetates that Nervous Norvus did when he was doing song-poem stuff.
Really?
Um-hm. Got a stack of those for a quarter each. They're on the Film City label.
The only thing I did -- a friend of mine who's really good with MP3s -- I had him go onto that ASPMA site that Phil Milstein runs --
Yeah yeah yeah! My writing is all over that site.
-- and get me all of that on MP3. And then a guy sent me the single of Norm Burns doing "Vote McGovern." That's a good one.
Oh yeah!
How did you discover that stuff?
Accident. I guess it wasn't a total accident -- there was a guy that I knew who discovered some of that too. And he's the guy that turned me on to "The Saddest Story Ever Told."
That's the best ever.
And Boyd Rice, who's also a good friend of mine -- I guess he's gonna be playing at our club next week. We have a club called Club Screwball.
The three of you own it?
It's me and Darcey Leonard, and we do like variety stuff and a weird cabaret kinda thing. Weird performance things and a lot of video -- crazy stuff on video, mixing, and a total psycho dance party. It's pretty insane. We have underground bands, but the bands only play like 20 minute sets. But Boyd Rice found the lyrics to "The Saddest Story" blowing across a playground when he was a kid.
Wow. Really!?
Yeah. They've been around a long time. And Milstein -- if you go onto the ASPMA site, Milstein found another version of it. Apparently there was this sort of racist poet guy who --
Yeah. You know, I've been wondering why there were two versions of that.
Well, he wrote -- there were two versions of it, and also there's a --
But why are there two versions with the same exact melody? The racist guy wrote the melody too, I guess?
No. There's other versions of it that are almost the same from a long time ago, but Phil's got a totally different version of it. A lot of the lyrics are different.
So is Boyd the one who got you into those?
No. It was this other guy that got us both into them. We didn't really know what it was, but then we figured it out. So I'd been listening to this stuff anyway and was totally shocked and amazed by it, and then I saw this Tom Ardolino thing later.
Oh, the compilation?
Yeah. And then I found out that there were sort of other people who were into it. And then those people, I guess people had heard that I had a collection of this stuff. And so someone -- Phil Milstein, I think -- contacted me about it. And then that was it!
Are you into other types of that weirdo music that --
Yeah.
Like Gregg got me into uhh, well what are those -- I forget what they're called but the albums where it's like a corporate presentation --
Oh yeah! Yeah, yeah!
-- made into a musical?
I have a good friend in New York who's really into that stuff.
I bought one on eBay that's just hilarious. What are they called? What do you call those things?
Industrial show tunes.
Oh, okay.
But which one did you get?
I got one for a company -- a Canadian-based company called something like Texas Oil Refinery Corporation? Or something. Something like that? The whole time they'll do these songs and then they'll talk a little and it's apparently for people -- they're trying to attract salesmen to come work for them?
Right.
And after every song, this woman goes, "But do you have a retirement plan?" And then they'll go on further, talk and sing and then she'll go, "But do you have a retirement plan?" And then finally at the end of the record, they talk about the retirement plan, and the record ends with her going, "Wow! You DO have a retirement plan!"
Ahhhh.
It's really s --
Yeah, I have a pretty impressive collection of those too.
And I got the, uh -- I only know about those because of that CD that I guess Gregg -- Did Gregg put that together?
Yeah, he did.
God, that's -- And then I got the CD of Recordio discs.
Yeah. I have a lot of those too. Pea Hicks did that, right?
Yeah.
Yeah, that's really good. Vinyl Communications. "Lucas & Friends Discover a World of Sounds"? Is that the one?
Oh, no! I don't know that one! The one I've heard is called --
He did one of those Dish recordings.
The one I've heard is called "One Of One."
Yeah. That's not that good.
Oh really? The other one's better?
Much.
Oh cool! What's it called again?
It's called "Lucas & Friends Discover a World of Sounds." It's on Vinyl Communications.
All right. I'll have to pick that up.
You have to look up Vinyl Communications. That guy's amazing.
What else have they put out? Because I recognize that name.
They've put out a bunch of stuff. You'd have to look at his site. It's all good.
Okay. Alright. I keep buying a bunch of crap that's put out by that uhh... Computer God --
Yeah, yeah! Well, some of that crap is -- that's actually my label.
That's your label!?
Well, yeah. I put out all those "Celebrities At Their Worst" and did all of that shit.
I buy everything I can find on that label.
I don't tell everybody because a lot of that stuff is sort of less than legitimate.
Yeah. You know, I've always hated Van Morrison until I heard that CD.
Yeah, that's a real good one, huh?
Hilarious! And the one -- I got one of your religious ones with the devil inside the --
Yeah! You need to get "Crying Demons." That's the good one. "I Am Lucifer" isn't as good as "Crying Demons."
Oh, "I Am Lucifer" is the one I have. Okay.
That's like Volume Two with all the leftovers.
Are you still putting out stuff? I haven't seen any --
Yeah, not really that much right now. Michael Shephard is the main guy now, and he's -- I kinda lost interest and I really haven't been doing it that much, so -- He's pretty cool.
I can't get over that damn, uh -- that guy who sent the tape to Keith Richards?
Oh, you mean Paul Super-Apple!
Oh my goodness. That's -- that's insanity! He's insane.
(sings) They call me Apple, Apple Love!
Yeah!
(sings) They call me Apple Love!
Ha!
Yeah, he's kinda like is George Harrison was Jerry Lewis. (in Jerry Lewis voice) HEY LADY!
He just sounds so, you know, SICK, as it were.
I think the guy interviewing him is Jim Goad.
Yeah, that's what I read somewhere. Oh actually, maybe the liner notes.
Well, I wrote the liner notes.
Oh, okay. I didn't know that was your -- well, obviously I didn't know that was your label.
Yeah, I did a lot of those liner notes. A lot of the "Celebrities -," the ones that weren't done by Nick Bougas, I pretty much did. And then like Volume 2, I guess 3 and whatever. I did the "Radio Anomalies" one; that's a really good one.
"Radio Anomalies."
Is that the one with Paul Super-Apple on it?
Yeah! Yeah, okay.
There's a lot of really good stuff. I used to have a pirate radio station in Phoenix called KDIL, and a lot of that stuff was stuff that we'd put on.
What was that show called?
It was a station. A local radio station.
"Volcano," okay.
It was "K-D-I-L." Named after a book that Freddy, the owner of the house and the transmitter -- he found a book, not unlike Boyd found the lyrics to that "Saddest Story" song, Freddy found this book at this rummage sale or something, or at his school -- I can't remember where he got it, but for some reason I guess I thought he found it on the playground or something, but it was called "Dildo Torture."
HA!!!
You know, some sleazy porn paperback?
Yeah, that sounds really nice.
It was written by Arthur Fox -- I'm sure his real name. And he didn't know what a dildo was -- he was in grade school and thought it was just the most hilarious word he'd ever seen. And then he found out what it meant and he couldn't believe it. So he named his radio station "KDIL."
The other thing that was just incredible -- I'm blanking on what the letters were -- Something like "J & H Productions"?
Yeah, J & H Productions.
That's another insane man!
"Pertainin' to the shows -- " Yeah, he's great. He uses a lot of United Negro College Fund words in that.
"-- in the production of J&H Productions for the, uh, pertaining to J&H Productions...."
"Pertaining to the labels -- "
That is the -- Seriously, congratulations on having one of the best labels in the world. I buy everything I find on that label.
Yeah, it's pretty good.
Judy Garland going crazy.
You know, the Judy Garland stuff -- I think that was when I was kinda like -- That was at the point where I wasn't as involved anymore and this guy was like letting his gay friends -- just getting whatever he can out of his gay friends in San Francisco that have the weird tapes, and just --
It takes forever to get going, but once it does, it's pretty funny.
I also really liked that stream of black racism stuff on -- what was that album?
Oh, the.... Lena Horne?
Yeah. Was it Lena Horne or --
It wasn't Lena Horne.
Was it uhh.. Michelle N'gdacello?
No, I have it right here. Let me pull it out. But yeah, yeah. She really goes off -- and continues going off!
My friend came up with the Paul Anka stuff for us, because he had toured with Paul Anka and -- oh wait, I shouldn't talk about that.
He taped that!?
I'd better not give away any secrets where that stuff came from, but it's pretty much all real as far as I know. None of it's fake, as far as I know.
So getting back to -- trying to think of uhh -- so what other -- well, forget the other topics. What other types of crazy music may I not have heard of that you're really into? This kinda thing? Like I wouldn't have known about song-poems if --
Well, I'm really into vanity pressings a lot.

CONTINUED ...

Interview with Don Bolles of The Germs
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