EMAIL JOEL at gaustenbooks@gmail.com
Friday, February 28, 2025
A Chat with TOMMY SOUTHARD (SOLACE/GODSPEED/SOCIAL DECAY/MENTAL ABUSE)
Author/journalist Joel Gausten talks with veteran guitarist Tommy Southard (Solace/Godspeed/Social Decay/Sugartooth/Mental Abuse/Slaprocket/Prunella Scales) about his decades-long life in music - from his early days in the '80s New Jersey Hardcore scene to his current activities in his long-running band, Solace.
A Chat with MIKE WATT
Author/journalist Joel Gausten talks with the legendary Mike Watt (Minutemen/fIREHOSE/The Stooges/dos/MSSV/Solo) about the forthcoming MSSV album On and On, his philosophy as a veteran touring musician, his longtime project "dos" with Kira (Black Flag/Twisted Roots), late Stooges drummer Scott Asheton, and much more.
EMAIL JOEL at gaustenbooks@gmail.com
Tuesday, February 25, 2025
From the MISFITS Archives ...
Thirty years ago today, I played drums on this 11-song Misfits recording, done on an 8-track in Vernon, NJ. The snare drum was Robo’s from the Earth A.D. album. Dr. Chud engineered the session, which took place several weeks before Graves auditioned. He handed me this tape that day. I wrote out the details on the card when I got home.
Eric Weiss and a guy named Sherman sang, Doyle played guitar, and Jerry played bass. Dan Canzonieri from Electric Frankenstein was in the room when all of this went down, which is how we met. I was 17 and a senior in high school. I’m on a few other Misfits recordings from around this time, but I’m pretty sure this is the only one I still have — or at least the only one that’s labeled.
I’m thinking of getting this pressed on short-run vinyl — not to sell, but to give a copy to Chudly, Danny, Mo, Doy, Eric, Sherman (if I can find him), and my stepson.
Some of the best times of my late teens were spent with The Misfits. I last talked to Jerry in Philly a few months before the first reunion show with Glenn. I last chatted with Doyle in Massachusetts about two years ago, and I’m still in touch with Chud regularly. I think of the fellas often and fondly.
EMAIL JOEL at gaustenbooks@gmail.com
Sunday, February 16, 2025
A Chat with CHRIS SPEDDING
Author/journalist Joel Gausten talks with legendary musician Chris Spedding about his new album of Little Richard covers with the Swedish band Diamond Dogs (Macon Georgia Giant), his work with Robert Gordon, producing The Sex Pistols' 1976 demo, and much more.
Links in the Video Description
EMAIL JOEL at gaustenbooks@gmail.com
A Chat with KNOX CHANDLER and BOBBY PREVITE
Author/journalist Joel Gausten talks with veteran musicians Knox Chandler (Psychedelic Furs/Siouxsie and the Banshees/Cyndi Lauper/The Golden Palominos/R.E.M.) and Bobby Previte (John Zorn/Iggy Pop/Tom Waits/Jamie Saft/Elliott Sharp/Terry Adams) about their new collaborative album, Previte Chandler, and a few highlights from their respective careers.
Links in the Video Description
EMAIL JOEL at gaustenbooks@gmail.com
Sunday, February 9, 2025
A Chat with SPIDERS
Author and journalist Joel Gausten talks with Ann-Sofie and John of the Swedish band SPIDERS about their extraordinary new album, Sharp Objects.
Links in the Video Description
EMAIL JOEL at gaustenbooks@gmail.com
Thursday, January 30, 2025
WORDS FOR MARIANNE FAITHFULL
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"When you remember who I am, just call."
The lyric above is from "There Is A Ghost," one of the ten tracks on Marianne Faithfull’s 2003 album, Before The Poison. If you’re unfamiliar with the song, give it a listen some 3 a.m. after the wine bottle’s empty and the ashtray’s full. It’s a real motherfucker. Trust me, she’s not singing those words as a chat-up line; she delivers them with equal parts desperation and resignation.
Before The Poison was heralded as a "comeback"— downright silly, considering that everything she’d done since 1979 had been lauded as her return to relevance. Then again, it was always a surprise when she showed up with a new collection of songs and reminded the world that she was still above ground, having cheated death once again.
The Reaper finally got her today. I could take the lazy scribe’s way out and fill this post with a few hundred male-gaze-driven words about her beauty in her youth, her roles as a '60s “it” girl and muse, and her eventual descent into addiction, painting her as just another beautiful broken doll. But that would sell her — and myself — short.
My spiritual aunt deserves more than that.
Right. Broken English. Sigh … where to start? That album has shattered my heart and put it back together again more times than I can count. A cracking voice emanating the sound of strength amidst diminished dreams. Mental illness set to melodies. Enough to make Pele weep amongst her boys. A gorgeous goddamn thing and the most nakedly and honestly human recording in my possession. Nearly 46 years after its release, its grooves still bleed.
You can’t sing with that much pain and truth unless you’re the real fucking thing.
Her rendition of “The Ballad of Lucy Jordan.” My God. I’ve known a few Lucies in my lifetime. We shared secrets. Often a bed. Ladies who dropped their kids off at school before dipping into their secret stashes of Oxy. Women who fucked with the lights off so I couldn’t see the cut marks on their thighs or left the bathroom with the faint smell of vomit lingering. Marianne sang for them — and helped me see them, love them, and hold them close, despite it all.
There’s more I could say, but there’s no need. Her albums are in print and utterly perfect. They already say it all. If you’re new to her work, start with Broken English. It may not speak to you, but if it does, it will always be there when you need it.
Farewell to Marianne — and to all our dear Lucy Jordans, when their time comes.
EMAIL JOEL at gaustenbooks@gmail.com
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