it was nearly twenny yeers ago
the cherch made that record in l.a.
that one with that song
that song about the whatsisname
the song that got used in that tv show
yeah ya know the one i mean
1987
out of nowhere
after being dropped by warmer brothers
and capitol punishment
we were signed up by a-wrister records n tapes
who insisted that we come to l.a.
so they could keep an eye on us
they say why dontcha work with waddsy wok-tell
and grog lady-ani
we thought
ok
why not?
that sounds ridiculous
so we turn up in la
and we get put in the oakwood apts on sepulveda, west la
ploog n i in one apt
mwp n pk in another
swimming pool
barbeque
underground carpark
locked gates
the whole deal
first time i heard rap music
i lying in bed the 1st morning
i hear this ‘orrible ‘orrible loud noise coming up the street
i thought it was the end of the world
a car pumping out rap at a mighty volume
a revoltin’ way to wake up
we go down the studio to meet our pro-ducers
grog is a rude talentless macho buffoon
he owns the complex
the studio we’re recording in
he thinks we’re small fish
and he dont bother hiding his contempt
hes “worked” on jackson browned
and dong hen-lee
so boy hes a big-headed turkey
waddsy is a lot nicer n friendlier
they both snorting cokey-dokey like fiends, fiendss
all the time
it dont seem to affect ww too much
hes pretty affable
he can see we aint too bad
grog on the other hand is a mess
when hes just hadda snort
hes clammy n enthusiastic …for about 5 minutes
he wants to listen to everything at top volume
thru these huge speakers
i cant even bear to be in control room
its louder than a gig!
so anyway we go to this soundstage
in santa monica
where we rehearse all the life outta the songs
for 4 tedious weeks
they start wearing down ploogys confidence immediately
they try to start picking on me bout my voice
but im untouchable in my self-confidence
but they hurt pks n ploogs feelings all the time
grog especially treats us like second rate time-wasters
“look at this” he screams out to ww one day
“that fucking blah blah got a gig doing springsteen..”
“and youre stuck here with these useless australian nobodies”
i said….
grog looked at me searchingly and he cracked an ugly smirk
“thats right…..thats fucking right…!”
grog n waddsy didnae think much of u.t.m.w. neither
it was a kind of addendum to the rest of the album
i did most of it on my own
in a little programming studio
ploogy didnt play on it
they didnt wanna waste their time putting real drums on it
waddsy even tried to dissuade me from putting it second on the record
“you want em to hear some good ones before they get to that one!”
he said…
meanwhile we all had our own cars
and were getting into our own adventures
particularly ploogy who brought a constant stream
of hippies, druggies, ratbags n rastas round our apt.
we ate mexican food a lot
and roamed venice beach
grog sent me n pk for singing lessons in hollywood
we hadda crazy singing teacher
a guy whod played hercules n sampson in some b-grade flicks
he talked about sex non stop between singing instructions
hey steve do the girls in australia like to give head?
he would ask every week between la la la la las
hey steve i had a girl in here last week
she said ” im the queen of head jobs”
i said get down on yer knees and win the title
etc etc etc
in the middle of a c scale
he’d interrupt to tell me
of his latest conquest
and then straight back to the lesson as if nothin’ had happened
i didnt learn nothin’
but grog insisted the lessons were helping my hopeless voice
he hated pks voice even worse than mine
and made him feel real bad about it
one day waddsy stumbled on a huge cache of very very cheap cocaine
the boys bought a small mountain of it and started sniffin’
i had one line of that stuff n i felt sick for 3 days
grog made a pig of himself with it the first day
and stayed home for a (blessed) week
when he finally reappeared his skin was grey
and he lay on the couch softly moanin’
but not saying much
gee i didnt have a lotta sympathy for the olde wanker
waddsy on the other hand just piled in harder
he seemed fucking indestructible
with his diet of coke, winston ciggies, hamburgers, n sodapop
he was always alert n on the ball
3 months we were there
spending so much money that we’d never recoup
(we still probably havent)
day in day out of insults n abuse from these 2
driving round la scoring pot n getting into trouble
ploogy screaming out at the merry barbequers at our apts
“i dont dig your fucking altar!”
arista pouring money into the record
hey its sold almost a million in u.s. alone
but we’ll never see any money
cos it cost so much to make
days n days wasted buggering about
moving all over l.a. to other money eating studios
our stupid manager dont care
hes already commissioned the huge recording advance
now he dont care or know …
if you listen to the record
its actually flat lifeless n sterile
great songs, sure
but the performance, the sounds are ordinary
we coulda got that in australia in a week or 2
for a 20th of the money we spent
but what did we know
these were the ex-spurts
big shot american hard-assed turkeys
they knew best!
anyway
the rest is history
utmw accidentally became a hit
and everyone said
“whatta great record!”
is it really?
it aint a patch on heyday or priest
it was successful despite of grog n waddsy
not because of….
so there ya go
dont expect me to be all excited about sel-fish
it was purgatory having to cope with grog
waddsy i gotta bit of a soft spot for
he does know a bit about music i guess
not the kinda music i like, mind ya..
you dont hear much about grog these days
i mean i dont think his “producing” career went much further
he turned up at a gig after utmw wassa bit of a hit
trying half-heartedly to ameliorate it with me
but i just fucking smiled at him like
are you fucking serious… i fucking hate ya!
waddsy we worked with again
that was gaf
ha ha
lets all sing it now
“i shoulda known better!”
anyway
theres the short sordid history about our big one
too much money…tho none for us
too much cocaine
too much argy-bargy
just too much
can ya believe it was almost 20 years ago?
seems like only last century…
more tails tomorrow!
sk