The Sweet: An Awkward Encounter With The Group's Onetime Vocalist Brian Connolly

Originally published in Rave-Up #11 (1986)
Interview by Devorah Ostrov

During a Rave-Up holiday in London, my friend Sara and I met onetime Sweet vocalist Brian Connolly. Sadly, it was not the wonderfully fun encounter you might have imagined.

Sweet - 1973 Bravo magazine 
(Photo: Gered Mankowitz)

Y'know, prior to this interview, someone could've told me that the guys in Sweet weren't completely thrilled with their outrageous early-seventies glam rock persona. And maybe someone could've mentioned that Brian Connolly didn't thoroughly enjoy performing all those fabulous bubblegum pop tunes penned by the team of Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman.

If I'd known beforehand how much they yearned to be a normal-looking, normal-sounding hard rock outfit, I could've prepared some earnest questions. (Or perhaps skipped the whole thing and avoided what was probably once, a long time ago, Connolly's sure-fire pick-up line: "Come sit next to me, little girl.") Instead, I blundered my way through this (as it turned out) very short and somewhat awkward exchange with the group's former lead singer. At least he was mildly interested when he heard that Sara and I were from California.

Brian Connolly on the cover of Music Star - 1974

Brian: I'll never forget the States. We had the wrong image when we went over there. We weren't doing our own material. We weren't doing rock, which the Sweet was all about. We were doing the commercial Chinn and Chapman songs. We were doing all that glam/glitter stuff.

Q: But we loved Sweet's glam image and all those Chinn and Chapman songs!

Brian: Oh, we got away with it, but we didn't think we would in the States. We thought we would shake off the glitter and the lipstick. We thought America was ready for rock, and we could be the rock band we wanted to be. We arrived in Los Angeles, got to the Sunset Strip, and there it was in huge glam rock neon: WELCOME THE SWEET!

Q: So, you guys didn't like the Chinn and Chapman tunes? You wanted to be a hard rock band.

Brian: Oh God, yeah! Well, it was mainly me. A lot of the Chinn and Chapman songs were based on me. "Little Willy" was based on me. I was a bloody alley cat. If there was a club or a party, I would never go home, as in: "Little Willy, Willy won't go home/But you can't push Willy round/Willy won't go..." Also, if you're from Scotland [Brian was born in Glasgow], they either call you Jimmy or Willy. Chapman got wind of this and said, "Hey, Blue..." That's what he called me. "Why do they keep calling you Willy?" I explained it to him, and he said, "Great! That's bloody great!" Then one night, he came up to me and said he had an idea about a song — it was "Little Willy."

The Sweet (publicity photo)

Q: What about "Ballroom Blitz"?

Brian: "Ballroom Blitz" was written during the time of the ballrooms, when they were literally going berserk in this country. We had "stomp-mania." It was us and Slade. We were literally pulling gigs to bits with people just going berserk!

Q: Would you consider working with Steve, Andy, and Mick again?

Brian: Yeah, I'd love to do an album with them again! I'm talking to them now. Steve's in for it. Andy wants to do an album, but not roadwork. I know Mick is in for it 'cause he's the only one that has nothing going for him. With the way things are going for me, I have a good chance of going out by myself anyway.

* * *

R.I.P. Brian Connolly, who passed away in February 1997 after suffering several heart attacks and liver failure.
R.I.P. Mick Tucker, who passed away in February 2002 from leukemia.

Angel: The Heavenly Band With Down-To-Earth Problems, A 1993 Interview With Frank DiMino & Felix Robinson

Originally published in American Music Press (May 1993)
By Devorah Ostrov & Billy Rowe

Angel - photo from the Sinful LP cover

Five unbelievably beautiful boys clothed in white satin jumpsuits, purveyors of pomp rock, pure pop enthusiasts, the "anti-Kiss," musical messengers sent from Heaven … Angel was all of these. No wonder it got confusing.

What emerges during more than four hours of telephone interviews with Angel's vocalist Frank DiMino and bassist Felix Robinson is the story of a band that had everything going for it, but seemingly no idea what it really wanted — except fame.

It's also apparent that they were molded (if not downright suffocated) by Neil Bogart's unwavering determination to make them as big as Kiss. Or as Robinson remarked when we asked why Angel once flirted with a Giorgio Moroder-produced disco beat: "Our record company was willing to make us do anything to succeed, and we were willing to listen to them."

* * *

Casablanca Records advert

Before meeting up in Washington, D.C. in 1974, DiMino, guitarist Edwin "Punky" Meadows, keyboardist Gregg Giuffria, drummer Barry Brandt, and original bassist Mickey Jones had all been in various semi-successful East Coast club bands including the Cherry People (Meadows), Max (DiMino and Brandt), and Bux (Meadows and Brandt).

"When we first started, we played two shows a night at a club called Bogies," recalls DiMino. "Everyone knew us from different bands around the area, so there was a lot of interest. We had a lot of people come down from record labels."

One long-held rumor claims Gene Simmons "discovered" the group at Bogies and brought them to the attention of Casablanca Records president Neil Bogart. (Kiss had released its debut album on the label a year earlier.)

"What happened was Gene and Paul [Stanley] were playing at Largo in D.C.," says DiMino. "And [rock writer] Gordon Fletcher would bring people down from Largo [to Bogies] because we were good friends with him. He happened to bring Gene and Paul down one night, and they stayed for the set. That's when they talked to us about Neil."

At the same time, Angel was approached with numerous management offers, among them Leber-Krebs (Aerosmith/New York Dolls) and Bill Aucoin (Kiss/Starz). But it was David Joseph of the Toby Organization who signed the band and relocated it to Los Angeles.

Angel - publicity photo

According to Robinson, who joined the group in 1977, Angel's image and stance were already in place even at this early stage. "The concept was a band of very good-looking young men who did more than just stand on stage and play extended jams. The effort was put into playing complete songs in four- and five-minute segments, and the band had the ability to present the songs in a more or less theatrical sense with a very aggressive stage presence."

"We wore white on stage from the start," states DiMino.

Punky Meadows - publicity photo

In LA, the record company bidding wars began in earnest, the main contenders being Capitol Records and the smaller Casablanca.

"We were really close to a deal with Capitol," says DiMino, "but we wanted to go with Neil because we liked the way he talked."

"Casablanca was the label with the least to offer," laughs Robinson. "Neil had a grand vision, but not a lot of money — only a belief in his own abilities. He said, 'If you guys will go with me, I will do whatever I have to do to make you successful.' That's something the other record companies had not said. They were offering large numbers of dollars, but that commitment was not a personal commitment. Neil Bogart was willing to put his name on the line."

And their management company was willing to put its money on the line with the then-novel idea of a self-financed album, giving the group even more leverage.

DiMino picks up the narrative: "When we finished the album, we went to Capitol, ready to sign. But we wanted to talk to Neil one more time. We put Capitol off for a day and went to see Neil. He loved the album and he matched Capitol's deal."

Angel in Japan 

Punky shows off his copy of Music Life

Released by Casablanca in October 1975, Angel's eponymous debut presented an exceptionally talented and polished (if a tad keyboard crazed: the liner notes credit Giuffria with playing the organ, piano, clarinet, harpsichord, mellotron, string ensemble, and all synthesizers) heavy pomp rock outfit.

Robinson still considers "Tower," the LP's opening track, to be Angel's "signature tune." He mentions that they kicked off every show with it "right up to the very end," and adds, "It's a great tune! Kind of an ethereal sounding lyric. What's it about? It's about the tower!"

The group's sophomore album, Helluva Band, followed the same pattern, while it racked up comparisons to Queen and fanned the flames of an imaginary rivalry with Kiss.

As Pam Brown wrote in the September 1976 issue of Creem magazine: "Here they are, kids … Casablanca's new Kiss! Five pretty faces with long, long, British haircuts. Flowing white robes, very sheik in the style of Shah Freddy Mercury. Pink Floyd orchestration and Queen operation with lots of o-o-o-o-o-o's."

"We were always compared to Queen," says Robinson, "but we never paid much attention to them."

Helluva Band (Casablanca Records 1976)
Photography by Barry Levine/Graphics by Gribbitt!

Meanwhile, the publicity machine was hard at work. Circus magazine readers voted Angel the #1 group, and Creem ran a two-page photo spread showing them applying make-up and blow-drying their hair under the headline: "Mirror, Mirror On The Wall, Who's The Prettiest Band Of Them All?"

"America's Only Rock 'n' Roll Magazine" also created a satirical running gag based around Meadows' pouting lips, which in turn prompted Frank Zappa to write "Punky's Whips."

By their third LP, 1977's On Earth As It Is In Heaven, a small but perceivable transformation had taken place in the group's music: there was less pomposity, less flash just for the sake of flash. And there was a definite move towards pop.

"It was a conscious effort," declares DiMino, before he drops the first hint of Casablanca's control over Angel. "It was one of those things where there was so much input from everyone, the label, etc., it got really confusing. We tried to keep, more or less, the style from the first two albums adding it to the pop kinda stuff."

Angel - publicity still from the 1980 film Foxes

One other change took place around this time. Between the release of On Earth and the recording of the next album, Robinson replaced Mickey Jones.

"We just had a falling out," DiMino simply states when asked about the bass player's exit. However, Robinson is a bit more expansive on the subject: "Mickey was a rock 'n' roll star, a legend in his own mind — but he was not a musician."

* * *

White Hot insert - become a member
 of Angel's Earth Force fan club for $5.00

Felix Robinson was a 25-year-old professional musician living in St. Louis, Missouri, when he met the members of Angel. And he admits that it was a less-than-auspicious encounter.

He had just acquired a priceless 1969 Precision bass for $150 when a friend called and told him, "There's a band playing at the Fox Theatre. They just put out a record, and the record company gave 'em a lotta money."

Robinson remembers, "I was told if I went down there and negotiated through Bill Schereck [Angel's tour manager] I could sell them this bass for heck, $300 or $400! After the show, I went to the Holiday Inn where they were staying. I introduced myself to Bill and said, 'I've got a bass that I think your bass player might be interested in.' I opened the case. Bill said, 'We'll buy it.' They all came by, looked at me and said, 'Who the hell are you?'"

What did Robinson think of Angel at that point — honestly? "I thought it was a pretty lame band! I thought, 'The guitar player looks good, but he's not playing music he's comfortable with. The drummer's too frantic. The singer...' Nothing was right. Of course, I realized they were playing to 3,000 screaming 16- and 17-year-old fans, and so who am I to criticize this?"

Punky applies his make-up

Robinson met the guys again a few months later when he was in LA playing with The Word, an "extremely commercial" pop band also managed by Schereck. And this time (perhaps because they knew they’d soon be in the market for a new bassist), they paid a lot more attention to him. "I had hair down to my butt and I looked like a member of Angel," observes Robinson.

Meadows and Giuffria contacted Robinson during the recording of On Earth to collaborate on material for the group's fourth LP, White Hot.

"They said, 'We're doing another record and our bass player is out of town,'" muses Robinson. "At first, I didn't understand what that meant. There's no code word there. 'Out of town' really was kinda out of town. But it also meant that Mickey was not really interested in writing songs for the next record."

Casablanca advert for White Hot

When they returned from touring in support of On Earth, Robinson officially became Angel's new bassist. Because of the timing, it's easy to attribute the night and day difference between White Hot and the albums that preceded it to Robinson's input.

But Robinson doesn't agree. "Although I think the direction the band was going in musically was accelerated because of my involvement, the change that occurred was really more in terms of lyrical content. There's a song called 'Telephone Exchange,' and it always seemed to me to be one of the transitional tunes from the third to the fourth album. It actually has some kind of a story behind it. The lyrics seem to speak toward a relationship between people, and less about some kind of ethereal concept of what's going on in the universe."  

"By the time you get to White Hot," he continues, "you're seeing a lot of songs that have to do with relationships. And Frankie, who had always been responsible for writing the lyrics, really started to blossom. He started to feel more comfortable with telling a story. Punky, who had always been more of a blues guitar player, was able to play more in that style. Barry is a fantastic drummer, but he'd been left to his own devices for three albums, therefore the songs had rhythmic parts that were just like extended jams. So, what we were doing was creating a more definable concept in terms of songwriting."

"Ain't Gonna Eat Out My Heart Anymore" b/w

"Flying with Broken Wings" - picture sleeve 45 (1977)

And they finally got the keyboards (somewhat) under control.

"Oh, Gregg was all over the place!" chuckles Robinson, who plays keyboards himself. "Gregg was always trying to play every bass line. He wanted to play along with every guitar part, and he wanted to play with every vocal part. When I joined Angel, for the first time a member of the band was able to interpret to Gregg what the keyboard part needed to be. Punky was very grateful for this. Punky and I would work out tunes, and he would say, 'This is a place for the keyboards.' I would play the keyboard part, and when it came time to work it up as a band, I was able to interpret that keyboard part to Gregg."

A veritable pop music masterpiece, White Hot was Angel's most successful LP. And DiMino says it was his personal favorite: "It was the one we put the most energy into, and actually, it was the most fun to do. Everyone was a little more clear on the direction we were going in."

Angel - publicity photo

The group's shift in direction paid off when their cover of "Ain't Gonna Eat My Heart Out Anymore" entered the Top 50. Previously a hit for the Young Rascals in 1965, it was the first time Angel had included a cover song on an album (although DiMino mentions that they also recorded a version of the Left Banke's "Walk Away Renee" at the same time).

Neither DiMino or Robinson recall precisely who suggested they record the song. But Robinson infers it was a record company decision when he states, "It was an attempt to bring in a song that could be a hit record. We needed a hit record."

Angel pose in street attire for this publicity pic

"The band had been spending a lot of money," he acknowledges, "and was barely recouping it for the record company. As a matter of fact, the band never recouped everything that it spent. So, making a lot of money was important."

(Robinson reveals one fun way that Angel threw money around: "A band like Styx — a very popular band that was selling millions of records — would pull up to shows in rental station wagons, because when you're somewhere like Flint, Michigan, there aren't any limo companies. We would have limousines come from Chicago. We would have limousines drive 100 miles to take us from the hotel to the show, which was maybe a ten-minute ride, just so 30 or 40 of our fans and all the truck drivers and roadies would see us get out of the limousine. We did that many times!")

At this point, how committed was Casablanca to pushing the group?

"Very committed," confirms Robinson. "Neil was obsessed by the desire to make Angel succeed. He wanted Angel to be as big as Kiss."

* * *

Angel On Tour - promo poster

When Angel hit the road in promotion of White Hot, they were playing the country's largest stadiums (surprisingly they only ever toured in America and Japan; also surprisingly, they never shared a bill with Kiss), and the show was an awesome spectacle.

Magical illusions conceived by Doug Henning and built by Sid and Marty Krofft (creators of H.R. Pufnstuff) got them on and off stage. And there was "George," a talking and blinking hologram in the shape of Angel's logo. (Apparently, George's face belonged to Toby employee/Angel co-manager Warren Entner).

Each performance began with several mysterious cubes spread about the stage. Then, during an opening narration that alleged the group had been sent to Earth as musical messengers from the angel Gabriel, two figures dressed in black started arranging the boxes.

The prototype cover concept for Bad Publicity

"They put five cubes on top of each other," says DiMino. "Chaser lights would go on, then a light would come on inside the cubes and one of us would appear. Then they'd build the next one, and another guy would appear. So, you had five chances to figure out how we did it."

And, no... he doesn't give away the secret during this interview! Robinson, on the other hand, is happy to tell us how some of the tricks worked.

First, he divulges the mystery of the hologram effect: "Rear projection. Face made from plexiglass in the contour of a human face. Much larger than life-size — George's face was about six-feet high and four-feet wide — on a 15-hundred-pound scissor lift that rose from behind the group. At a certain point in our show, the lights would come down and we would stop playing. This giant head would come up from behind the amplifiers, open its eyes, and speak to the audience."

Poster included in the

On Earth As It Is In Heaven LP

Making an obvious reference to marijuana smoke, George said:

"Tonight, in this place I smell the aroma of the Gods
The gates of heaven are open to all

Do you feel the music? 
Do you feel the music?"

Robinson continues, "And Frankie would scream, 'Do you feel it?' The crowd would cheer, and we would go into another song."

Then he talks us through the show's closing puzzle. "A huge recreation of our album cover would come out of the ceiling. It was about 12-foot by 12-foot and about a foot thick. It would land on a large white table, a hollow table — or so it seemed. When we finished our last song, we would put down our instruments, walk up a flight of stairs and go inside this record cover. The cover would rise up into the air and explode into about 40 pieces. The trick worked as follows: We would go inside the album cover and dive inside this white table that would be wheeled off stage as the album was rising up in the air. The album would explode, our road manager would tap on the lid three times so we would know it was safe to open the trap door, we would run on stage, pick up our instruments and do the encore."

One show from the White Hot tour made it into the rock history books, but it had nothing to do with the special effects. "Played wild gig w/Godz in San Diego, 1978," succinctly states the compendium Headbangers: The Worldwide Book Of Heavy Metal Bands. DiMino and Robinson recount the (literal) blow-by-blow events of the evening...

Angel - promo photo

DiMino: In the middle of that night's show everyone was standing up, clapping, having a good time. So, I asked them to come down to the stage.

Robinson: They had a very strict code at the San Diego Sports Arena which said: You do not get up out of your seat, and you do not go down to the stage. But of course, we were Angel! And when Frankie said, "Come on down!" about three or four thousand 16- and 17-year-old girls got up and ran to the front of the stage!

Angel headline Cleveland's Public Hall with

support from the Babys & Godz - March 8, 1978

(Thanks to Mark Chatfield for the advert!)

DiMino: The security guards decided they didn't want that to happen, and they started throwing people around.

Robinson: Frankie could see that these kids were really getting pummelled. He walked to the front of the stage and looked down at one of the bouncers who was in the midst of picking up some poor 14-year-old girl and throwing her six or eight feet through the air...

DiMino: I called out the guy's name and told him to leave everyone alone.

Robinson: Frankie said, "I invited them down here. If they wanna come down, it's okay with us!" Of course, more kids started coming down!

DiMino: The guy came up to the front of the stage, gave me the finger, and went to grab my mike stand.

Robinson: Frankie proceeded to plant his mike stand in the middle of the guy's forehead. Axl Rose would've been proud! Now, this guy was big, and he grabbed the mike stand. Frankie wouldn't let go of it, so Frankie and the mike stand went off the stage! My bass roadie, Steve Brooks, who's about 6'6" and weighs about 240 pounds, came flying from behind me, took a swan dive into the audience, and started fighting. Punky jumped off the stage with a beer bottle in his hand after one of the security guys. I took off my bass and started swinging it over my head at one of 'em. Gregg... I believe Gregg ran behind his keyboard rig.

White Hot LP insert 

DiMino: Barry kept playing!

Robinson: By the time we got back up on stage — nobody was hurt very badly, just ripped up a little bit — the house lights were up, and the Fire Marshal was standing next to my amp, giving me the cross-the-throat thing, "Cut it!"

DiMino: I told everyone we would keep playing until they turned off the power.

Robinson: We played one more song. The audience was screaming! In approval! There were still fights going on in front of the stage. The house lights were still up. There were security people all over the place. And the fun wasn't over yet; we had to get back to our dressing room — about a 40/50-foot walk. The original guy who had provoked us had gotten five or six of his friends together to jump us between the stage and the dressing room. The Godz, a very disgusting bunch of bikers from Ohio who carried loaded weapons with them everywhere they went, had been backstage cheering us on. And, I might add, they were really impressed! They had decided they were going to protect us.

Angel in Japan 

DiMino: The Godz and our road crew made a chain, and we went right in between them to the dressing room. The Chief of Police came back and wanted to arrest me for inciting a riot...

Robinson: I stood up and said, "Yes! Let's go to jail! This is great press!" Our manager said, "We can't go to jail. Frank will have to make an apology. Frank has to go out front and try to get calm restored." Frank went back on stage and said, "You gotta cool it … the show's over ... we've gotta leave … we love you all … thanks for coming … be careful … and stop fighting!"

DiMino: It all worked out.

Robinson: One of the funny anecdotes of this was, my mother — who had never seen the band before — was living in San Diego, and had come to the show with my aunt. They were both in their 70s. After this whole thing had died down, I went outside and found them. My mom says, "Is it like this every time you play?"

* * *

Foxes promo poster

In 1979 Angel were looking forward to recording their fifth, and ultimately final, studio album (a double live LP completes the catalog). And they had some quite radical plans in mind for it.

Firstly, fed up with being more known for their all-white image (and the constant press ridicule it fostered) rather than their music, they were determined to lose the costumes. (Perpetuating one old myth, The Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll maintains: "Angel was designed as the dressed-in-white counterpart of Casablanca labelmate Kiss.")

"To us, it was too much of a formula," says Robinson. "It was a little too like the Monkees; we always had to appear in character. Do you remember platform shoes? How difficult it was to walk in 'em? I wore platform shoes just about every day of my life for a year. I still have a back problem from it. One day I was getting out of a limousine, and I fell flat on my butt! I finally got on my feet and said, 'What the hell am I doing this for?' It was absurd!"

Furthermore, in a departure from the usual play on angelic terminology, the new record would be called Bad Publicity. The front cover, photographed by Barry Levine over a two-day session at the Hollywood Blvd. Hyatt House, showed them in fashionable street attire, partying with cards, booze and women. The back cover featured a collage of their negative reviews.

Frank Zappa performing "Punky's Whips"

The band were pleased with the result. But oops, they'd forgotten who was really in charge.

Robinson recollects: "When the photographs were put in front of Neil Bogart, he said, 'I can't have this. You'll have to reshoot the cover.' Our manager said, 'But Neil, we spent $50,000 shooting this cover!' Neil said, 'I'll pay for it.' And he literally wrote a check for $50,000. We had new [white] clothes made, and we reshot the cover."

The record was also renamed Sinful, but one photo from Levine's Bad Publicity photo session, which showed the group in a police line-up, was allowed to stay.

(While super rare, we're informed that a few copies with the prototype Bad Publicity cover did get out!)

Just how pervasive was Casablanca's control over Angel?

"When Kiss scored a Top 10 hit with 'Beth,' we were told to write a song like 'Beth,'" asserts Robinson. "We were told to write a song like 'Rock and Roll All Nite.' They said, 'Write an anthem song.' And we tried."

Angel - Casablanca Records/Toby Management publicity photo

At another point in the interview, Robinson seethes, "The management and the record company always had complete control over this band. There was never any time when the band had complete control over what it did musically."

Didn't that drive them crazy?

Koh Hasebe pic for Japanese Burrn! magazine

"It drove us all crazy!" he nearly shouts. "I think we all felt that we were compromising our individuality, that we were selling out. But we were perfectly willing to do it because we felt it was a guarantee of success."

With Sinful, Angel truly hit its recording stride. On tunes like "L.A. Lady" (with Giuffria pounding out a great honky-tonk piano), "Lovers Live On," "Just Can't Take It," "I'll Bring the Whole World to Your Door," and "Wild and Hot" (showcasing Robinson on an upfront vocal mix), they confidently used elements of R&B, power pop, and hard rock to create some real rock 'n' roll gems.

Robinson calls the LP "the musical culmination of the band." And in a Kerrang magazine retrospective of the group, rock writer Howard Johnson enthuses: "Sinful is without a doubt the finest slab of metal/ pop ever laid down!"

With the '79 tour — a package deal with Mahogany Rush and Humble Pie alternating as headliners — there was new management (Leber-Krebs) and an important concession by Casablanca: on non-headlining nights, the guys could wear "alternative" clothes.

Unfortunately, it was too little too late. Sinful should have fulfilled Neil Bogart's dream of making Angel as big as Kiss, but instead, for the first time, the tour found them playing to half-full auditoriums and having to cancel some gigs.

"Rock N Rollers" b/w "Mariner" 

Japanese picture sleeve issued in 1976

The explanation offered at the time blamed a wide-spread recession in the music business, which Robinson reiterates: "The price of oil had raised the price of vinyl and record manufacturing was becoming too expensive. The cost of touring became very expensive."

And he emphasizes that it wasn't just Angel's problem. "No one was doing well. Anyone who was in the music business at that point will remember what I'm talking about."

Maybe. But there's a long list of groups that sold millions of records in '79 and had no difficulty filling concert halls: Cheap Trick, the Cars, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Dire Straits, Squeeze... It's possible that new wave, as much as or more so than the price of oil, was Angel's nemesis.

Interestingly, if Angel had stayed the course in which they were headed — less complicated music combined with a toned-down look — they could have easily competed with Cheap Trick and the Cars. But Bogart was impatient to make Angel a household name, and it's likely he didn't understand and/or take new wave seriously.

Angel - promo poster

What Bogart understood was disco. Angel's labelmates included Lipps, Inc. and the Village People, as well as disco queen Donna Summer. And in 1979, Donna Summer (along with her producer Giorgio Moroder) was enjoying massive success with the album Bad Girls.

Bogart was also well aware of the power of promotion. Kiss had already made the monumentally silly made-for-TV movie Kiss Meets The Phantom Of The Park, and in 1978 Casablanca's Filmworks division received a Best Picture nomination for Midnight Express (and Giorgio Moroder won the Oscar for best original score). The idea of using films to publicize the label's own acts must have appealed to him.

You can almost see Bogart's mind at work. Angel has to make a movie, and Giorgio Moroder has to produce the soundtrack. Released in 1980, Foxes was a coming-of-age story about four teenage girls (amongst them Jodie Foster and ex-Runaway Cherie Currie). It was also, states Robinson, "a culmination of the record company's control over the band."

"We were told we were going to be in this movie," he says. "This was another way to break the band. We'll do some songs in the movie. The movie's going to be about us. It's an Angel movie! It just happens to have Jodie Foster in it."

Angel - promo poster

Evidently, in its initial conception, Foxes did focus a great deal more on Angel. "We were involved in the script," insists Robinson, "our names were mentioned, we had lines."

But somewhere along the way, going to an Angel concert became just a distraction in the girls' otherwise angst-filled lives. And while there was extensive filming of entire songs, only two — "Virginia" and "20th Century Foxes," both written by the group especially for the film — were used. "I'm sure the footage is laying in somebody's vault," reflects Robinson.

They also found it frustrating to work within the exacting confines of Moroder's trademark Euro-disco beat, particularly on the synth-heavy "20th Century Foxes." Robinson groans, "I remember the excruciating hours in the studio trying to get Barry to play on two and four. It was almost impossible to make Angel into a disco band."

R.I.P. original Angel bassist Mickey 

Jones, who died in 2009 after a long

 battle with cancer.

But when Foxes failed at the box office, it didn't seem to matter. Bogart had been diagnosed with cancer (he passed away in 1982), Casablanca was sold to Polygram, and Angel splintered. Why couldn't they, like Kiss, just switch to the new label and carry on?

For one thing, explains Robinson, "Kiss were already doing well on their own, but Angel were not yet weaned from the record company. The band had been built up to be completely dependent on Neil Bogart. We were dependent on him for our success and for our future. When Neil died, it was the death of Angel."

But there was more. "We had been used to getting a certain amount of money as an advance for each album," points out Robinson, "and Polygram was not willing to meet the same figure. So, we decided we would strike out and tell Polygram to take a leap!"

DiMino fills in the inevitable outcome: "Polygram wouldn't let us out of our contract, so we went through about a year of litigation where we couldn't play, couldn't tour, couldn't do anything. We recorded some stuff, but it was never released."

Deep in debt and unable to tour, Angel drifted apart. (Robinson notes that their contracts were used for a lesson in Entertainment Law at USC: "What can happen when a record company is willing to invest huge amounts of money to break a group. How commitments can be structured so that a band will be constantly in debt.")

Kerrang reports on Gregg Giuffria's (short-lived) revival of Angel in 1984 

Robinson quit in the summer of 1980. He later joined White Lion but left soon after the group recorded its debut LP and eventually sued them over songwriting credits and royalties. By 1981, both Meadows and DiMino were gone (although DiMino once again teamed up with Giorgio Moroder for the Flashdance soundtrack). Future Toto vocalist Fergie Frederiksen replaced DiMino for a short while, but within months Giuffria had also walked away.

"It wasn't Angel anymore," states Robinson.

* * *

Robinson possesses a tape with several unreleased songs recorded in Atlanta during the band's final tour that are "in line with the stuff on Sinful although there's a couple of harder-edged tunes." And DiMino says some footage for the rumored film Angel Live At Midnight actually does exist. However, he adds, "I'm sure they never even finished editing it. It's in a vault somewhere."

The Jars: A Not-So-Angry Band From The East Bay

Originally published in East Bay Band Calendar (August 1979)
By Devorah Ostrov

My cover story for East Bay Band Calendar

featuring the Jars (left) and the Mondellos (right)

Take a band that finds it easier to relate to the pop music of the early and mid-sixties, a lead singer inspired by Sha Na Na and Dion, a keyboardist who plays atop a shopping cart, put them in Berkeley, and you have the Jars — a sensational rock 'n' roll band!

Johnny Savior (vocals), Gary Nervo (keyboards), Mik Dow (guitar), Marc Time (drums), and Armin Hammer (bass) feel strongly about the local rock scene and formed the Jars to help improve it.

"There was nothing happening in Berkeley," states Time. "The streets were deserted after 11p.m. We wanted to help create a scene here. You really can't say we've caused the scene, but since we started playing the scene has taken off." (New groups like the Mondellos, the Young Adults, and Psycotic Pineapple are also part of the Berkeley contingent.)

The Jars at Sproul Plaza on the Berkeley campus

Photo: Clayton Call

Formed last September as the Saviors, the band began by giving performances to 75-plus crowds in their rehearsal garage in Albany.

September was also the first time the guys had picked up their instruments. "It's a great excuse," says Dow. "If they say you suck, you can tell them, 'Well, I've only been playing since September.'"

What they lack in experience, they more than make up for with spontaneous energy. The kind of spontaneity that allows them to laugh when Savior says, "Tonight was the first time we had a really good sound system so I could hear my vocals, and this was the night I forgot all my words."

Counting Roky Erickson (13th Floor Elevators), Syd Barrett (early Pink Floyd), and TV commercials among their influences, the Jars energetic set combines cover versions of classic pop songs — "Come on Down" (Every Mother's Son), "High School" (MC5), "Mony Mony" (Tommy James and the Shondells), "Time Won't Let Me" (the Outsiders), and "Hitchin' a Ride" (Vanity Fare) — with their own fast-paced originals.

Savior came to Berkeley from the Midwest last year, looking for the promised land. "We found him on Telegraph Avenue," says Dow. "He was spare-changing us. We said, 'Hey, you look like a rock 'n' roll singer. Wanna join a band?'"

Johnny Savior (left) and Marc Time (right)
Photos: Barb Wire (used courtesy of Marc Time)

Since then, Savior has developed a stage act so athletic he has to wear knee pads to protect himself. "I ripped this pair of polyvinyl chloride pants the first night I wore them," he says, "the knees are gone."

At one time or another, each of the band members has worked in record stores and radio stations, giving them a special insight into the music industry. Time was the first disc jockey in the Bay Area to play the Sex Pistols' "Anarchy in the UK." He was subsequently fired from the station for playing too much punk rock.

The Jars pose outside the "Jar House" in Albany, 
California. (This photo was used for the cover of
D. Mickey Sampson's CREEP fanzine.)

"All the stations wanna be #1," explains Hammer. "There aren't enough stations who are satisfied to be #5 and still make plenty of money. They all want to play the same 'proven' stuff and get top ratings."

"The worst thing about radio," remarks Time, "is that they don't play any of the local stuff, like the new Dead Kennedys' single." (Mentioned because of vocalist Jello Biafra's presence at the interview).

Despite their complaints about the state of radio, the Jars do plan to release a three-song single, possibly consisting of "Small Town Rock," "(I'm So) Available," and a cover of "Psycho."

"In the studio, our music will sound a lot more clean and bright," says Savior. "'Tear Jerk' and 'Available' will take on a whole other dimension." He adds, "People will just have to imagine the knee drops!"

* Sadly, Johnny Savior (J.D. Buhl) passed away in 2017 after a long battle with cancer.

* * *

A selection of flyers for Jars gigs. You can find out more about the Jars
and peruse lots more memorabilia on their Facebook page. Here's a link:
https://www.facebook.com/The-Jars

* * *

During the group's lifetime, the Jars released two 45s. The first was a 7-inch EP on Subterranean Records with "Start Rite Now" b/w "Psycho" and "Electric Third Rail." The second, "Time of the Assassins" b/w "Jar Wars," was issued on Universal Records. Both recordings featured a four-piece lineup with Mik Dow on lead vocals. Here's a link to "Start Rite Now" on YouTube:

The Dictators: Tracing The Group's History With Handsome Dick, Top Ten & Ross The Boss

Originally published in American Music Press (September 1993)

By Devorah Ostrov

The Dictators — circa Bloodbrothers

Photo: Lynn Goldsmith

Handsome Dick Manitoba doesn't think the Dictators have received the respect they deserve. "Every time they mention the graduation class of '76, I always see the Ramones, Talking Heads, Television, Blondie, Dead Boys..." Manitoba reels off the names in the trademark BOOM that makes whatever he says sound like a WWF challenge. "You never see the Dictators mentioned. Like the Dead Boys were the great punk band or something. I feel we were just as influential as them. They didn't sell any records; we didn't sell any records."

Of course, a second later and Manitoba's not sure he likes the Dictators being referred to as a punk rock band. "We were a band that rehearsed and practiced and did things in a legitimate way," he contends. "We were called 'punk' but I dunno... We were just at that place at that time. And we were snotty, know-it-all guys from the Bronx. So, I guess in a sense we were real punks!"

* * *

Top Ten & Handsome Dick Manitoba

on the cover of New York News magazine

September 19, 1976

Named Richard Blum by his parents, the Dictators lead singer was born on January 29, 1954, in Manhattan's Jewish Memorial Hospital. His formative years were spent in the Bronx.

"It was a nice place to grow up," he recalls of his old neighborhood. "I played ball, ate dinner with the family, and did my homework — like everyone else in America."

Manitoba and future Dictators guitarist Scott "Top Ten" Kempner met when they were ten years old and quickly became best friends. "We walked to Hebrew school together and talked about Marvel comics," says Manitoba.

It was the (aptly nicknamed) Top Ten who first immersed himself in the world of rock 'n' roll. "Scott became an absolute maniac for the Who," reflects Manitoba. "He saw Pete Townsend, and he went out and got a guitar and learned how to play it by himself. He had his walls papered with every band... and basically, by hanging out with him I learned about the bands."

In 1971, bassist Andy (aka Adny) Shernoff was attending SUNY New Paltz in upstate New York. He'd put together his first group (Grand Funk Salinsky), published a mimeographed fanzine (Teenage Wasteland Gazette), and occasionally contributed to CREEM magazine.

The Ramones, the Dictators, Widowmaker,
and the Nuns at SF's Winterland  

July 30, 1977

A mutual friend introduced Manitoba to Shernoff. "The guy said, 'This is my friend, rock 'n' roll Andy,'" Manitoba remembers.

Meanwhile, budding guitar hero Ross "The Boss" Friedman (aka FUNichello) opted not to enroll at Lehman College. Instead, he hooked up with a hippie outfit called Total Crudd and moved to New Paltz. An article in issue #11 of Punk magazine (which charted the Dictator's early career on an almost daily basis) claimed that Friedman aimed to "hang out upstate, drink beer, get laid and play guitar."

"Ross was one of those 'gunslinger' guitar players from the neighborhood," says Manitoba. "He was one of the guys with a rep."

Total Crudd lived and rehearsed at the Out Of It House — so named because everyone there was so stoned and drunk all the time they really were "out of it." Punk described a typical night at the house: "They'd throw wild parties for 200 people and more, handing out baggies at the door to those people they knew would throw up. The parties ended at about 5:00 A.M. Most people would pass out on the floor. At 6:00 A.M. Ross would wake up everyone playing along to MC5 records at full blast."

Shernoff, Kempner, and Manitoba all hung out there.

Advert for the Dictators' debut LP
Epic Records (1975)

Towards the end of '72, Shernoff stopped editing Teenage Wasteland Gazette and handed the 'zine over to cub reporter Manitoba. The final issue, which would have featured a Nick Toshes-designed cover, still sits unfinished in a drawer. "It's about 60 or 70% done," says Manitoba.

By '73, Shernoff had convinced Friedman to leave Total Crudd and form a band with him, Kempner, and the first of a couple of drummers before their pal Stu Boy King joined. The Dictators was one of several potential names for the new band. Other options included Fireman's Friend and Tommy the Truck. Or they could have called themselves Beat the Meatles.

During this initial stage, Shernoff was the group's undisputed leader. He wrote the songs, played bass and sang lead.

Manitoba wasn't even part of the original lineup. He'd dropped out of City College ("I took a lot of English courses, mythology, stuff like that") and was working as a mailman. On weekends he would cook and roadie for his buddies. Sometimes they'd let him sing "Wild Thing."

"I'd be like, 'Wild thing! Get on up and get my ham and eggs!'" He laughs at the memory.

All that changed when Shernoff invited the roadie onstage at a Brooklyn bar called Popeye's Spinach Factory. Punk magazine provided this narrative: "He slammed into 'Wild Thing,' giving one of the great live performances of that song in this century … Something happened. All the bums in the bar — proud to see a fellow derelict make it big — went NUTS. They liked this degenerate so much they started climbing the bar stools, throwing bottles, and screaming for more, more, more! They danced and ranted and raved..."

The Dictators circa Manifest Destiny

with bassist Mark "the Animal" Mendoza

Photo: Jonathan Postal

And Handsome Dick Manitoba was launched upon the world. The stage name came about through the band's love of flashy wrestlers. "The Valiant Brothers were around," explains Manitoba. "There was Handsome Jimmy and Luscious Johnny. I was like, 'Handsome Richard? Nah, I gotta shorten it. Handsome Dick!'" The Canadian province that became his surname was apparently Shernoff's idea, but its inspiration is a mystery. "I dunno..." offers Manitoba, "maybe he was looking at a globe."

But it took a little more nudging before Manitoba became the group's acknowledged frontman. In fact, it took a massive shove.

Handsome Dick Manitoba & the American

 flag share the cover of Punk magazine #11 
Oct/Nov 1977

A couple of months after the Popeye's gig, 600 people came to see the Dictators play a party in the Bronx. Billed as a "special surprise guest," Manitoba came on dressed in somebody's father's bathrobe. He did his usual "Wild Thing" and played Sonny to Shernoff's Cher for a rousing version of "I Got You Babe."

As it happened, Sandy Pearlman and Murray Krugman — the team who managed and produced Blue Oyster Cult — were in the crowd that night (probably brought there by rock writer Richard Meltzer who was a friend/hero/mentor of Shernoff's).

Punk magazine noted that Pearlman and Krugman were "stupefied" by Manitoba and wanted to sign the band with him as an official member.

"None of the Dictators understood why," stated Punk. "Richard could not sing. Sandy and Murray thought that the guy was funny. They thought it would be a good joke to get this group signed to a record contract. They threatened to take a bigger percentage of the royalties if Manitoba didn't join. Richard was welcomed with open arms."

Once Pearlman and Krugman were involved, the Dictators were swiftly signed to Epic Records, and the summer of '74 was spent recording their debut LP.

The Dictators circa Go Girl Crazy with 

drummer Stu Boy King

While waiting for the album to be released, the group regularly played at the Coventry in Queens. (A May 1974 Village Voice review of one such appearance showed uncanny foresight when it termed the Dictators "the first true punk-rockers of the '70s.") 

And sometimes they supported BOC and Nazareth at larger venues — although the latter told them to leave after one gig in Winnipeg. And there are references to a BOC concert where Manitoba "got the crowd so crazy they started throwing their chairs at him."

Even early on, it seemed the Dictators weren't going to easily fit into the arena rock mold their managers envisioned for them. But at the time, there were few alternatives.

In March 1975, a bit behind schedule, Epic issued The Dictators Go Girl Crazy. The record's cover might have displayed Manitoba in all his wannabe-wrestler glory, but there was still an obvious internal struggle going on for the microphone: Shernoff sang lead on most songs, while Manitoba "guested" on a few. The back-cover credits didn't even include Manitoba as a band member; he's listed as a "Secret Weapon" well below the producers (Krugman and Pearlman) and just above guest keyboardist Alan Glover.

The Dictators - punk rock trading card

"Andy resisted it," states Manitoba of his impending takeover. "I didn't really get going until he realized that the band was boring without me as the lead singer."

The Dictators Go Girl Crazy contained track after track of Shernoff-penned, humor-packed celebrations of teen America including "The Next Big Thing," "(I Live For) Cars and Girls," and "Teengenerate." Plus, there were a couple of perfectly selected covers ("California Sun" and "I Got You Babe"). And topping it all off was the group's sublime manifesto — "Master Race Rock":

"We're the members of the master race

Got no style and we got no grace

Sleep all night, sleep all day

Nothin' good on TV anyway..."

CREEM's review excitedly called every tune "an uncouth dream." And Trouser Press said it was "a wickedly funny, brilliantly played and hopelessly naïve masterpiece of self-indulgent smartass rock 'n' roll." Even Robert Christgau (who gave it a "B") grudgingly allowed: "If you love the Dolls, you'll like the Dictators. Maybe."

It's estimated that about 5,000 people rushed out and bought a copy of the LP, and Epic dropped the Dictators. But not before they opened for Rush at the Electric Ballroom in Atlanta, Georgia. Manitoba chuckles as he recollects their reception: "Imagine a 210-pound guy wearing a wrestling outfit, screaming and yelling and throwing french fries at the audience. They were agog, aghast!"

The Dictators Go Girl Crazy — inside sleeve

Unsurprisingly, the Dictators were removed from the bill after two nights of a four-night run.

The final show with Rush was also Stu Boy King's last with the band. It seems King was driving the van back home that night but was told his services were no longer required at the George Washington Bridge.

"He was so obnoxious for so long," fumes Manitoba. "He was such a fuck up, and he was so mean to us. We gave him so many chances... We finally dumped him at the bus terminal at the bridge."

With no drummer and unable to promote their album, the Dictators effectively broke-up. According to Punk magazine, following the group's demise: "Scott and Ross formed a band with Helen Wheels, Andy went back to writing, and Richard lived with his mom, dad and little sister in Co-Op City."

In an interview with Ira Robbins for Trouser Press, Kempner revealed: "That period … was one in which everyone in the band attained the lowest point in their personal lives. Guys in the band were fighting; Andy was out of the group; Handsome Dick and I were handing out leaflets on the street in Brooklyn so that no one would recognize us."

The Dictators headline the Roundhouse

with support from 999 and the Stukas

November 18, 1977

By early '76, the Dictators were rehearsing again but without Shernoff. While he continued to write their songs, he didn't want to rejoin the band. Supposedly, he wrote "Steppin' Out" to account for his absence.

"That would've been great if he did that," muses Manitoba, who has always maintained a part brotherly/part adversarial relationship with Shernoff. But he draws a complete blank on the episode. Although he's been clean and sober for over a decade, Manitoba admits to being very messed up during most of this period.

Advert for Manifest Destiny
Asylum Records 1977

"I guess that's when we got Mark..." he speculates.

If there was an interesting backstory to his arrival, it's been forgotten. But at some point, bassist Mark "The Animal" Mendoza (aka Mark Glickman) from West Hempstead, New York, started showing up at Dictators' rehearsals. One erudite member of the rock press portrayed him as a "hulking six-footer with his hair frizzed out nearly the width of his well-muscled shoulder blades..." The writer affectionately added, "Mendoza appears to be of unearthly, or subearthly origin."

"To this day, Mark has a heart of gold," asserts Manitoba. "He's a maniac tough guy, but if you're his friend, he's the best friend to have. He's got your back covered, and he's there for you."

With Mendoza installed on bass, Shernoff was finally persuaded/coerced by the management team to become the band's keyboardist. In the meantime, auditions for a new drummer yielded Ritchie Teeter. Legend has it he was turned down the first time around, but Manitoba doesn't recall the audition process. I tell him what I've read in Punk: "[Teeter] went back a second time because no one had ever had the nerve to do that to him before. When they heard him sing 'I Can't Explain' they realized they had a great drummer and the only guy in the group who could sing."

"Oh, that's great!" Manitoba enthuses. "I don't remember that."

Advert for CBGB's 2nd Ave. Theatre 

Grand Opening Week featuring the

Dictators & the Dead Boys 

Just when things were starting to look up, the Navy yard loft the group rehearsed in collapsed, destroying their equipment. The story goes that Manitoba, depressed over the band's troubles, stumbled into CBGB's and got rip-roaring drunk.

Under the inspired headline "Wayne County And Handsome Dick Manitoba: War Of The Gargantuas," CREEM's Susan Whitall reported on what happened next: "One early spring evening at CBGB's Wayne County was wrapping up his parody of Patti Smith when a disturbance erupted. All the participants will agree upon is that Handsome Dick Manitoba of the Dictators was at one time or another on the stage, that he said 'things' to Wayne, that some mention of 'spit' was made, and that Wayne nailed him with a microphone stand."

When the dust cleared, Manitoba had a broken collarbone, Wayne County was detained in the Tombs, and the Dictators were basically blacklisted in New York. "It was a stupid, drunken night," concedes Manitoba. "And when it was over, people hated us. They branded me as a fag-basher, which is bullshit!"

However, the heaps of publicity that followed "The Wayne County Incident" (as it came to be known) unexpectedly made the Dictators something of a hot property. Elektra/Asylum Records became the Dictators' new label and in 1977, they released Manifest Destiny. Six months in the making, it included many moments of outright Shernoff genius. Yet it was an uneven album that presented the group in a somewhat more mature light with mainstream inclinations.

"Heartache" b/w "Search and Destroy" 

Spanish issue single (Asylum Records 1977)

Robert Christgau observed: "... their galumphing beat, their ripped-off hooks, and their burlesqued melodrama are funnier than ever, and I admit that after dozens of playings I like this almost as much as I did their first. But I liked their first instantly, which is the way dumb jokes should work..."

But some band members weren't quite that enthusiastic about it. "I hated that record!" Manitoba shouts. He also confirms that the more serious approach of Manifest Destiny was a knee-jerk reaction to Go Girl Crazy's lack of success.

"We were bummed out because we'd made a record that we thought was the coolest record ever and no one jumped on it," he says. "We were so weird of a thing that people didn't get it, but we should have just kept being that and lived or died with it. Instead, we decided we were gonna be big stars. It was like, 'We've got Sandy and Murray and we're gonna open up for Blue Oyster Cult and Kiss and Bob Seger — so we have to be ARENA ROCK!'"

In his Trouser Press feature, Ira Robbins defined Manifest Destiny as "less tongue-in-cheek, nearly adult." And he echoed Manitoba's feelings when he wrote: "For the Dictators, the way to avoid the frustrating failure of their debut was to follow bands like Kiss into the arena — playing simplified heavy metal for teenagers that found nothing at all funny about songs like 'Teengenerate.' They hoped to produce a technically perfect, guitar virtuoso album of songs that could be played to twenty thousand Deep Purple fanatics."

Flyer for the Dictators & the Nuns 

at the Mabuhay Gardens

In the article, Shernoff states: "I think we were selling out … There was no real personality behind the second album." And Kempner says: "We didn't know there was an alternative to going out and doing the Kiss circuit."

"I remember when we were making Manifest Destiny, we had no idea what to look like anymore or what to sound like," Manitoba tells me. "It's not like we invented songs that we never would have done, but we just stopped being as goofy. We tried to write songs that would sound good on the radio with lush vocal harmonies that we couldn't duplicate live."

In May and June, the Dictators opened a dozen mostly Midwest arena gigs for Uriah Heep (the possibly more appropriate Starz, Styx, Foreigner, and Blue Oyster Cult alternated as support). And on July 30, they played Winterland with the Ramones, Ariel Bender's Widowmaker, and local punk heroes the Nuns. Nevertheless, as Robins pointed out in Trouser Press: "Despite the conscious effort to reach a mass audience, the album failed commercially."

A tour of England later that year, where they supported the Stranglers and headlined gigs with 999, reinvigorated the band, and they took a tougher stance with 1978's Bloodbrothers.

Recorded in Studio A at the Record Plant (Bruce Springsteen was next door in Studio B, completing Darkness On The Edge Of Town), the group's third and final LP took its title from a gritty coming-of-age novel by Richard Price (who also authored The Wanderers and Clockers). The album also found the group streamlined back down to a five-piece with Mendoza exiting to join Twisted Sister and Shernoff returning to bass. And for the first time, Manitoba ably handled all the lead vocals by himself.

The Dictators — Asylum Records publicity photo

"Bloodbrothers is the album Dictators' fans have been waiting for," gushed Paul Goldberg in Bomp! magazine — and he wasn't wrong. Without a doubt, it was their crowning achievement.

To start with, there were eight magnificent new tunes, including Shernoff's tribute to Richard Meltzer with "Borneo Jimmy," the heart-wrenching "Stay with Me," and the super fun "Baby Let's Twist." There was the patriotic anthem "I Stand Tall," with its litany of "lots of pizza, ice-cold cokes, Johnny Carson telling jokes, and lots and lots of American good good girls." (Shernoff told Trouser Press that being away on the UK tour made him "proud to be an American.") 

Plus, there was a crushing cover of the Flamin' Groovies' "Slow Death" (chosen over the Beach Boys' "Dance Dance Dance" at the last minute) and an uncredited superstar seal of approval from Springsteen, who joined in on "Faster & Louder."

Thin Lizzy headline the Music Hall in Omaha, 
Nebraska, with support from AC/DC and 
the Dictators — September 24, 1978

The album had so much going for it, that for a split second everything seemed possible. The Dictators could be — had to be — ROCK STARS! It was almost unbelievable when Bloodbrothers flopped.

Following a two-month-long US tour (which had them opening for Thin Lizzy or sharing a mismatched bill with Canadian prog-rockers Max Webster), Asylum dropped the Dictators.

But by then, it wouldn't have mattered if the masses had suddenly discovered them because, in the end, the group shattered apart from the inside.

"Y'know, sometimes you're watching a boxing match and the guy gets knocked out, but it doesn't seem like that hard of a punch. It's because he's taken a lot of punches, and then he just kind of collapses." It's somehow logical that Manitoba invokes the image of a punch-drunk boxer to depict the Dictators break-up.

"We had three albums out on two major labels," he continues. "We lost both of our deals, a bunch of different people coming and going... I think our spirit and drive were so diluted from taking all the knocks." There's a lengthy pause before he adds, "I was into a lot of drugs and alcohol, and that wasn't helping things. I didn't give a fuck. I just wanted to get high. They came to my house one day and said, 'We're gonna break-up the band.'"

The Dictators in London, 1977

Photo: Bob Gruen

Shernoff went into production; Teeter briefly joined Mendoza in Twisted Sister. Other bands were formed: Manowar, the Del-Lords, and Manitoba's Wild Kingdom. And sometimes the Dictators still pack 'em in for reunion shows, like the one at the Stone in San Francisco a couple of years ago.

In 1981, ROIR issued a cassette-only live recording of a Dictators reunion called Fuck 'Em If They Can't Take A Joke. Richard Meltzer fittingly supplied the tape's liner notes and summed up the group's struggles better than perhaps anyone else could:

"Rock & roll made a man out of no one (least of all the Tators) — the whole adventure didn't exactly backfire, it's just that being so obnoxious made it hard for 'em to, y'know, earn a living, particularly in a biz placing increasing emphasis on sophisticated adult entertainment. Step by step they became career-oriented semi-grownups, surrendering more than a tad of post-teen kick-out-the-etc. in process. They switched from wrestling to Don Kirchner, and finally the news. Meanwhile, a career on the burgeoning punk bandwagon had passed them by, the whole metal bizness struck a new generation of kids as so much mainstream hokum, and even their haircuts weren't quite right anymore. They fought amongst themselves (as post-teens often do) and finally … it was over."

* * *

Poster for the Dictators reunion 

at Bottom of the Hill in SF

(Artwork: Alan Forbes)

On May 15, 1999, the Dictators played at Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco, and I was able to do a couple of quick interviews with Top Ten and Ross The Boss. These interviews were never published.

Top Ten (Scott Kempner)

I understand you and Richard have known each other since you were kids.
Top Ten: Yep. Since we were ten years old. We met at Hebrew school. We got into an argument over comic book superheroes. We were both into Marvel comics, that's how it began — who was cooler than who? I think I was into Thor at the time. And he liked the Human Torch, which was a good choice. Y'know, you could go with Stingray... I could kind of understand that. I was looking at it more from a superhero point of view, and he was more: "Hey, this guy has a really cool car!"

Were you into rock 'n' roll at that point?
Top Ten: I was totally into it! That's all I've ever been into! Rock 'n' roll, baseball... Rock 'n' roll has always been the thing. I'm one of those people who saw the Beatles on Ed Sullivan, and it changed absolutely everything. For me, it's like that was the day I was born. I can play it in my head; that moment in my life is so vivid.

What was it that caught your attention? Was it the music? The girls screaming?
Top Ten: In the beginning, it was hard to pick out what it was. But as time has gone on, it was really the music. To me, any day that I can get up and play music is a great day!

Top Ten at the Stone - 1991
Photo: Devorah Ostrov

How long was it before you started playing guitar?
Top Ten: A long time. It took me a long time to piece stuff together. I really didn't start playing until I was sixteen or seventeen, right before we started the band.

Did you go to New Paltz?
Top Ten: I didn't go to New Paltz; I was a year behind Andy. I met Andy... I think it was his first year at college and I was still in high school. And I met Ross around the same time. A friend introduced me to Andy and Ross. And then I started going up to visit all my friends who were all going to New Paltz.

Did you ever see Total Crudd?
Top Ten: I saw Total Crudd a bunch of times! They were like the neighborhood freak band.

Who gave you the nickname Top Ten?
Top Ten: Actually, that was a friend of ours. He was sort of the "nickname guy" — you need a nickname! He said, "Hank Aaron." I went, "No." He said, "Top Ten." I went, "Alright."

As well as the Beatles, I've also heard that you're a big fan of the Who.
Top Ten: Yeah! The Who were the band that made me realize I actually wanted to play music myself. That was when I got a guitar.

Scott Kempner (on the right) with the Del-Lords.

(photographer unknown)

Did Pete Townshend's style of playing attract you?
Top Ten: Everything about that band lifted me out of my life and into my real, true calling. The first time I saw them, I think they were like the eighth act on an eight-act bill. And then I got to see them do a full show about a year later when I was 14. Everything about that band... I can't think of anything that I didn't... I mean, obviously, the guitar was the thing I was into, so I focused somewhat on Pete Townshend. But every single thing about that band... I guess I was a fanatic. I couldn't get enough of them. I couldn't get enough rock 'n' roll in general. Every time I got my hands on a dollar, I bought something — a magazine, a single... whatever.

Are you self-taught?
Top Ten: Yeah, I'm totally self-taught. I picked up what I could, where I could, and with whoever I could — but it was like doing a gigantic jigsaw puzzle. Y'know, you've got a little piece here and a little piece there... I made progress, but I still couldn't see the picture. It was like doing a puzzle without the picture on the cover of the box. So, it was a little bit here and a little bit there.

2010 reissue of Tenement Angels
 Scott Kempner's debut solo album

What was the first song you played all the way through?
Top Ten: "Manic Depression" [from the Jimi Hendrix LP Are You Experienced] and "Gloria." But a friend of mine who was already a great guitar player showed me "Manic Depression." I had no idea what I was doing. I just knew where the notes were. The same thing with "Gloria." I pieced it all together. I had no formal training. You think you don't need it for rock 'n' roll, but it's actually a good thing. Knowledge is actually... you don't have to use every bit of it, but it's good to know it. It would've given me that picture. It took me years and years...

Were you intimidated by Ross?
Top Ten: I wasn't so much intimidated as like, "Well, I'm not playing any solos in this band." I mean, he was the only one who could really play in the beginning anyway. I was an aspiring lead guitar player, singer, songwriter the whole time. But during the life of the band... Y'know, with the Dictators, I'm Top Ten. That's what I do. After that... Since 1982, I've been basically making a living off my own songs.

Your solo work seems to veer more towards the style of Springsteen rather than punk or heavy rock...
Top Ten: Yeah, I'm definitely more of a singer/songwriter — American rock 'n' roll. I'm not a heavy rock fanatic. I like loud, but I'm not a heavy metal fan. I like Springsteen and Woody Guthrie...

Top Ten at Bottom of the Hill - 1999
Photo: Devorah Ostrov

Dylan...
Top Ten: Yeah, those people were very important to me. I was also a Beach Boys freak. All of them helped me piece together who I was. Springsteen is my favorite artist in the world. He's an incredible musician, and I think he's painted himself in a very admirable way. He's shown people that there's another map you can follow that doesn't end in premature death, and it doesn't end in drugs or a lot of people that you stepped on.

Richard told me he felt the Dictators never got the respect they deserved. Do you agree?
Top Ten: Absolutely. What Andy wrote about on the first record... All that stuff about our lifestyle — White Castle hamburgers, wrestling, cars and girls — overshadowed the music to the point where the music was almost... I don't think people realize how good we are. I mean, we're actually really good, y'know! But the sense of humor overshadowed the band. I hate it when people say that it's a comedy act, because the music is there. Without the music, it would be a comedy act.

It also seemed like the group wasn't sure about what direction to go in. Each album seemed like a reaction to the previous one. 
Top Ten: We were children! We were 19/20 years old. And I think everyone's taste... or everyone's idea about what the band should be doing got tried. I didn't feel as close to the way the first album was received as the rest of the band. I'm not really sure; we never really talk about this.

The Dictators

Epic Records promo photo

It's one of my all-time favorite albums, but you didn't like Go Girl Crazy?
Top Ten: I love what it's about. I love that it's affected people. I love the songs. But the execution of it renders it absolutely unlistenable to me. I put it on, and I hear every mistake.

But compared to what was out there at the time... 
Top Ten: Oh, I know. That's why we started the band. It was a reaction... As much as it was something that we wanted to do, it was caused a lot by what was happening at the time. And we railed against that in a big way. But y'know, it was about the music for me. We had no intention when we made that first record of existing in some little margin of the whole big picture. We thought we were a great American rock 'n' roll band.

Is that why you signed with Sandy Pearlman and Murray Krugman? Did you hope they could do for the Dictators what they did for Blue Oyster Cult?
Top Ten: They came along before there was... anything. They were professional managers. They had a band on a major label. They said they could get us a deal. Blah, blah, blah. Sandy was connected to Richard Meltzer, who was like our spiritual godfather. And we didn't know anybody else who could tell us what was a good idea and what wasn't. Anybody that would help us pay our rent and enable us to be in a rock 'n' roll band was OK by us. At that time, it was Sandy and Murray. In hindsight, if they had just managed us and not produced the records, it probably would've been better because they were not competent producers. And then perhaps Girl Crazy would have satisfied both you and me.

D.F.F.D. (Dictators Forever, Forever Dictators)

released in 2001

Was the direction the group took with Manifest Destiny a reaction to the commercial failure of the first album?
Top Ten: It wasn't only about running scared from commercial failure... We deserved better. Andy's a better writer than that; we're a better band than that. So, we got Ritchie Teeter; he could play in time. And Mark The Animal, for all his heavy metal tendencies, was a fabulous musician. And all of a sudden, we had guys who were as good as Ross. Manifest Destiny had a lot to do with that, with the band living up to what it should be. And we tried to make a record that could compete with any of the nitwits that were out there. And there were nitwits aplenty — Styx and REO and whatever.

What were your thoughts going into Bloodbrothers?
Top Ten: Y'know, Bloodbrothers was the best we could do. It was stripped down... That was at least who we were. We decided we were gonna go back to clubs. If there were two people... If they were there to see us, we played for two people. And it was a very successful philosophy, but for a label like Elektra, it was too little too late. And that was that.

Advert for Bloodbrothers
You can find lots of info about the Dictators and
fabulous ephemera like this at: https://dffdblog.com/

There have been a number of reunions over the years, and I know you guys are working on a new album. Did the Dictators ever really break-up?
Top Ten: Yeah, we broke-up. But we broke-up in a way that was like, "Okay, there's no more band. Alright, I'll see ya tomorrow."

And the next day, you were rehearsing again...
Top Ten: We were at least together all the time. Eventually, in the '80s everybody went their separate ways professionally. But we were best friends, so whenever we were all around it was like, "Hey, you wanna do a show?" And finally, it was like, "Maybe we could make the record that we always wanted to make, and we can sort of rescue the legacy." I think the new record will do that.

How far along are you with recording the new LP?
Top Ten: We're about halfway through recording it. And that brings us here. We're here to let people know we're alive and there's a record coming.

Is the Dictators an everyday concern for you again?
Top Ten: It is. We've all got lives, but this is an everyday concern. We all have a lot of love and respect for what we've done together. Y'know, we've done this for a quarter of a century together. That's a hell of a thing!

Ross The Boss

Manowar — featuring Ross The Boss

Tell me about Total Crudd.
Ross: My very first band! I was a teenager.

Did you do covers or original songs?
Ross: We did a lot of covers — Flamin' Groovies, Randy Newman, MC5... We were doing all sorts of weird stuff. It was an eclectic mix of musicians. It was pretty good; we had our moments... That's where I met Andy.

I heard about the house you guys all lived in.
Ross: We had the Out Of It House. It was like the original hippie house. We had parties and people were coming around all the time... Everyone in the place was a drug dealer — except me. There was so much pot and stuff going around; I was just partying all the time! New Paltz was just a total party town.

Is it true that you used to annoy people by playing MC5 records at the crack of dawn?
Ross: Yeah! I was into that high-energy stuff. I was listening to the Stooges and the MC5 and picking up all this new stuff. And everyone else was listening to New Riders of the Purple Sage and the Grateful Dead. I didn't really fit into that crowd, y'know.

Ross The Boss at Bottom of the Hill - 1999
Photo: Devorah Ostrov

Did Total Crudd ever record anything?
Ross: There's some tapes, and someone said they could blackmail me with them.

Who were your guitar heroes?
Ross: When I first started playing, it was Eric Clapton and Cream. That was it. Leslie West and Mountain, those guys can really play. And Jimi Hendrix, of course. But when Clapton left Cream, I was devastated. When he stopped playing through Marshalls, to me it was just... That's music! Anything less than that is just unacceptable. Of course, there's other people that play very good stuff, but that's why I idolized him — wailing, loud, beautiful solos.

So, you met Andy at the Out Of It House...
Ross: Yeah. Andy said, "This stuff is lame, Ross. We gotta do something." So, we started jamming together.

Did he already have the Dictators in mind?
Ross: We didn't have the Dictators in mind. He was a writer; he was doing fanzine writing. And he knew all these people, like Richard Meltzer. And Richard Meltzer knew Sandy Pearlman. So, we got this house up in Kerhonkson... The boonies, man! We were living upstate and practicing and practicing...

Was Richard just hanging around?
Ross: He was our friend, our roadie; he cooked breakfast for us. We didn't have any idea what his talent was! Haha! He came onstage one night at Popeyes... I remember Chris Stein was in the audience. So, Richard came up and sang "Wild Thing." And the place went insane! The place went crazy! We said, "We think we found somebody."

Ross The Boss at Bottom of the Hill - 1999
Photo: Devorah Ostrov

Were you already playing some of the material from the first album at that point?
Ross: We had a few songs... "Two Tub Man" was the first Dictators' song that we ever wrote, and every night we still play that song. But it's been really amazing, the whole evolution of the band. And we're still here. It's amazing!

The Dictators were around before clubs like CBGBs started featuring punk rock bands.
Ross: Yeah, yeah...

Did you mostly play at the Coventry?
Ross: That was the only real place we could play. Kiss was playing there at the time. They'd already started; they pre-dated us by a little bit. At one point, there were three bands that had record contracts in the City: the Dolls, the Dictators, and Kiss.

How did you get your recording contract with Epic?
Ross: It was through Sandy Pearlman. He was Blue Oyster Cult's manager, and we were able to parlay that. He was pumping money into us!

The Dictators headline the Palladium with

the Michael Stanley Band and (introducing) AC/DC.

August 24, 1977

Did you open a lot of shows for BOC?
Ross: Yeah, it was easy to play with them. Of course, we didn't fit at all!

What were the audiences like at the arena gigs you were doing?
Ross: Audiences were... Some nights it was amazing. I remember one night we opened for ZZ Top in Binghamton, New York, and they loved us! I mean, we got encores! And Alice Cooper, we'd get encores! But other nights, the audiences were like, "What is this?" Back then, people said to us, "What the fuck are you guys doing? I mean really, what the fuck are you doing? This is the worst pile of shit that we've ever heard." Back then, there was Uriah Heep and all these lame beer-guzzling... I fucking hated it!

Shakin' Street (CBS Records 1980)

It seemed like the group got worried and switched direction when Go Girl Crazy didn't sell well...
Ross: We got worried because we didn't sell a fucking lick, and no one understood us. We just had to do something a little different. I don't know why...

What was the relationship between Richard and Andy like back then? Was there a lot of friction between them?
Ross: That relationship... I mean, it's a very strange relationship still to this day. Andy and Richard... It's a double-headed monster.

What happened after Bloodbrothers?
Ross: After Bloodbrothers, we sort of went on hiatus. I took a gig with this band Shakin' Street from France. We played a lot in the Bay Area; we actually recorded the album at the Automat. That was in 1980.

And then you formed Manowar?
Ross: Shakin' Street was on tour supporting Black Sabbath in England, and Ronnie James Dio introduced me to Joey [DeMaio, bassist], who turned out to be my future partner in Manowar. We decided to form a band... We didn't even have to play a show. We met this guy from EMI who signed me right off — he liked my idea, my concept — and Battle Hymns came out in 1982. I recorded six records with them, and in 1988 I left the band.

Iconic photo by David Godlis, 1976

Why did you leave Manowar? 
Ross: I didn't like the direction the band was going in. Y'know, the usual things. But they're still going. They're huge in Europe and South America, and I still get my checks. They've put out two live albums with my songs on them, which I'm very happy about.

And you're recording a new Dictators' album.
Ross: Yes, the album's going to be done pretty soon. This is our last show and then we're going to finish the record. As a matter of fact, I have another project that I'm doing called the Spinatras. That album [@midnight.com] is coming out in August.

Finally, how did you get the nickname Ross The Boss?
Ross: It's from when I was a kid, playing baseball. My friends always said, "Ayyy, it's Ross The Boss." And I kept it because Ross Friedman is really not a rock 'n' roll name. And Funichello isn't even my name. To this day, I can't stand it!

* * *

* The album the Dictators were working on at the time of these interviews would be called D.F.F.D. It was released in 2001.

* Drummer Ritchie Teeter passed away on April 10, 2012, due to complications from esophageal cancer.

* Drummer Stu Boy King passed away on May 1, 2018, following a brief battle with pancreatic cancer.