My favorite Fleshtones tracks on 2 discs. Liner notes from the AOTM post last year:
Super Rock: "Super Rock is taking the best, most exciting elements of rock & roll, and exaggerating and amplifying them beyond proportion, with no apology whatsoever." Bill Milhizer, Fleshtones Drummer (1980-present)
It all began in 1976 in Queens, New York, when roommates Keith Streng and Jan-Marek Pakulski discovered that a previous tenant had left behind some instruments in the basement of their apartment building. Not knowing how to play, they started teaching themselves by playing along with their favorite 60s rock songs by such artists as the Kingsmen, the Raiders, the Coasters and the Kinks. Originally, their ultimate goal was to become a rockin' party band. Streng, on guitar, and Pakulski, on bass, were soon joined by neighborhood friends Peter Zaremba on harmonica, keyboards, and vocals, and Lenny Calderon on drums. The Fleshtones quickly became famous locally for their basement dance parties fueled by *Blue Whale cocktails.
Possibly their greatest recording was the classic "Hexbreaker", my first and still my favorite Fleshtones disc. The "Hexbreaker" lineup was, in my opinion, their very best, with Keith Streng (guitar & vocals), Peter Zaremba (lead vocals, harmonica & organ), Bill Milhizer (drums & vocals), Jan-Marek Pakulski (bass, vocals), and Gordon Spaeth (sax, harmonica, organ, vocals). I remember encountering this album at Rasputin Records in Berkeley in 1985. I bought it on a whim, took it home and couldn't stop
playing it. That record was hugely influential on my developing tastes in rock 'n' roll, and I am forever indebted to them for recording it.
The Fleshtones put on what was probably the best live show I've ever seen, at the DNA lounge in San Francisco in the early 1990s. At one point in the show, they jumped off the stage and (wearing wireless mics) kept playing while they danced with the audience and started making their way around the club. I was on the upper mezzanine (which wrapped around the upper floor) and they came up the stairs, still playing, while making their way around the mezzanine and back down the stairs. Soon after that we lost sight of them, as they'd left the building briefly, played out on the sidewalk for a few minutes and then came back inside to cheers and thunderous applause. That was one rockin' show-- but the thing that stuck with me the most was what they did afterwards. They all stood outside the door and thanked their fans for coming. I went home that night pumped with adrenaline and beaming from ear to ear. Nothing in the world quite beats the Super Rock!
32 years later, their lineup has gone thought several changes, but they are still channelling the spirit of every great rock 'n roll party band that ever existed, and have rightfully taken their place among them. Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to present one of the hardest working bands in Rock 'n' Roll: The Fleshtones!
* The Blue Whale
1 can frozen lemonade concentrate
Fill can once with blue Curaçao
Fill can twice with Vodka
Add lots of ice
DISC ONE:
1 Take a Walk With the Fleshtones
2 Shadow-Line
3 One Less Step
4 All Around the World
5 Hard Lovin' Man
6 I've Gotta Change My Life
7 Push On Thru'
8 Cold, Cold Shoes
9 Psychedelic Swamp
10 The World Has Changed
11 Legend of a Wheelman
12 Girl From Baltimore
13 Hope Come Back
14 Alright
15 Right Side of a Good Thing
16 Chinese Kitchen
17 Let's See the Sun
18 Beautiful Light
19 Ride Your Pony
20 This House is Empty
21 Accelerated Emotion
22 She's My Baby
23 Whatever Makes You Happy
24 New Scene
25 Roman Gods
DISC TWO:
1 I'm Back Again
2 Stop Fooling Around
3 What's So New (About You)?
4 Outcast
5 American Beat '84
6 Want!
7 We'll Never Forget
8 Can't Get Enough Of Your Love
9 Double Dipper
10 I Was a Teenage Zombie
11 Screaming Skull
12 D.T. Shadows
13 Deep in My Heart
14 Let's Go
15 Hall of Fame
16 Destination Greenport
17 Pickin' Pickin'
18 Burning Hell
19 Good Enough For You
20 BRAINSTORM
21 R-I-G-H-T-S
22 A Motor Needs Gas
23 Feel The Heat
24 The Dreg (Hexbreaker-77)
25 Super Hexbreaker
