Minutemen . The Reactionaries "1979" SPECIAL PACKAGE

$

45

THE REACTIONARIES – 1979 / LP (WHITE VINYL) SIGNED BY MIKE WATT AND TEST PRESSING.

THE REACTIONARIES

(1978-1979)

MIKE WATT – BASS AND BACK-UP SINGING

D. BOON – GUITAR

MARTIN TAMBUROVICH – SINGING

GEORGE HURLEY – DRUMS

THE PRECURSOR TO THE MINUTEMEN.

12-INCH VINYL RECORD DOCUMENTING A 1979 PRACTICE TAPE BY SAN PEDRO’S FIRST PUNK BAND, THE REACTIONARIES. PLUS A VERY SPECIAL BONUS B-SIDE.

SYNOPSIS

The initial idea by Craig Ibarra came to fruition in early November of 2008. The plan was to launch a record label (Water Under The Bridge) as a support base exclusively for the unpolished and unspoiled talent of the San Pedro punk community.

For the label’s first release, what better band can you ask for than Pedro’s first punk band, the Reactionaries (with Mike Watt’s permission of course). This is a joint release with 45 RPM Records, another up and coming record label from San Pedro, CA.

Document Side A presents a restored and mastered, 10-song Reactionaries practice tape that was recorded in January of 1979, featuring some of Mike Watt’s first songs that he ever wrote.

Bonus Side B consists of the 10 Reactionaries songs from Document Side A covered by 38 members of different San Pedro affiliated bands, both past and present (see list below). 

Front cover art by Joe Baiza.

Label art by D. Boon.

Comes with a two sided (8.5” x 11”) lyric sheet.

The Minutemen Were Reactionaries

By Joe Carducci

For most of the music world – or rather the much smaller rock world – of the early 1980s, the Minutemen seemed to arrive fully formed, as if from some other planet. Questions must have immediately crossed minds: Where are these guys from? What drugs are they on? Are they carbon-based life forms?

Those reactions were understandable, as it was the 45-song, double 33 rpm Double Nickels On The Dime (SST 028) that introduced the band to most folks outside of Los Angeles. If I remember right, the initial sales jumped from the five thousand range for Buzz Or Howl Under The Influence Of Heat (SST 016), to fifteen thousand for Double Nickels. (Of course all those releases sold far more after the day.)

D. Boon, Mike Watt and George Hurley were always deflecting the effusiveness of fans in clubs, or in interviews – it was part of their charm. But think about it, the Minutemen were telling kids that they could pick up instruments and do the same! Nobody who saw them live believed that for a second.

I was at Systematic Record Distribution and got their first record, Paranoid Time (SST 002), from the label and ordered it for distribution to shops around the country. It was hard enough for me to discern how great they were from that and their early follow-up records and compilation tracks. To my ear, I don’t think I really heard what they were capable of until they were playing the Anti-Club regularly in 1983-84. There was just so much music packed into their short, fast tunes. And at each gig a few older, simpler tunes were replaced by new, even more masterful tunes. At their first San Francisco gig at the Mabuhay, Dirk Dirksen (who ran and MC’ed the club), strolled out on stage to introduce them and the first thing he saw was a four-foot long set-list taped to D.’s mic-stand and Dirk said, “What is this, the history of music?!” It was! When we recorded the long tail of the song “More Spiel” for Project: Mersh (SST 034) I joked to D. that he had just laid down a six-minute history of the guitar solo. At SST, hearing guitarists Greg Ginn, Joe Baiza and Curt Kirkwood all the time, it was easy to underestimate how great a guitar player D. was. That radical reformation the Reactionaries performed on themselves to become the Minutemen encouraged that, because it elevated Mike and George to co-lead players.

But their world-historical, musical summation had a history as well. And that was their late-seventies band, the Reactionaries. Mike and D. had known each other since junior high. They met Martin Tamburovich and George Hurley at San Pedro high, although they wouldn’t claim they knew George because in Watt’s words, “he was a happening cat,” whereas D., Mike, and Martin were on the not-so-happening end of the high school social spectrum. As George tells it: “For a long time Mike would ask me to play music with him. He wanted to jam out, but I really wasn’t into it ‘cause I was a Surfer then and he was sort of a geek. I don’t know, we were kids. Finally, I agreed to it.” This kind of transgression of school social hierarchy is common when music brings young kids together in their first band. It’s an under-appreciated aspect of the power of music.

Thankfully the Reactionaries recorded a practice in their attempt to get gigs so we have these 10 songs to contemplate. What you can hear are the rudiments of the Minutemen’s sound, only unlike most bands, they only got rid of stuff as they improved. D. is already a good guitar player with his trebly sound in place. Mike and George play more standard-rock bass and drums parts, and Martin sounds like he belongs on the mic, though the quality of the lyrics varies widely. Chuck Dukowski saw them and reports, “Martin was a cool singer and I liked his style.” They were just out of high school and though they already had their obsessive interests, the lyrics (by Mike, Martin, and friends outside the band) show an awkward adaptation to the punk style as they understood it. Like a lot of lyrics by seventies punk bands, television is of particular concern – punks who were determined to create a music scene thought watching TV was a fate co-equal to Death.

In February of 1979, Chuck and Greg Ginn were flyering a Clash, Bo Diddley, Dils show at the Santa Monica Civic when they met D. and Mike. The flyer was for what would be the second Black Flag gig and it was going to be in San Pedro. D. and Mike were amazed to learn of a gig in Pedro and Chuck hadn’t known there was a punk band there, so he put the Reactionaries on the bill. It was their first gig; they played with Black Flag, the Descendents (their debut too), the Alley Cats, the Plugz and an impromptu mini-set by the Last. A world-historical night, however many paid at the door.

The Reactionaries played only two more gigs, opening for the Suburban Lawns at their practice pad in Long Beach. They made a pass at getting a gig at the Other Masque up in Hollywood, but the band was falling apart. Mike’s description of D.’s loss of interest in the Reactionaries is interesting. Apparently D. didn’t offer his songs to the Reactionaries and then found them another guitarist (Todd Apperson) so he could quit. They broke up around mid-1979. George found a band in Hollywood called Hey Taxi! and is on their 45. Though soon enough, D. and Mike regroup and eventually pull George back into their new, improved mess after their new drummer (Frank Tonche) walked offstage and quit during their second gig. At the Minutemen’s first gig (May 1980), Greg asked them to do a record for SST.

Catalog #:    WUB 001 • 45 RPM 003

Artist:    THE REACTIONARIES

Title:    1979

Format:    12-Inch Vinyl LP

Second Pressing:    250 Pressed On White Vinyl

Release Date:    February 1, 2010

Track Listing:     1. 1979 (watt)

2. The Big Lie (watt)

3. Cheap False Teeth (watt)

4. Video Madonna (watt)

5. My Heroes (watt/tamburovich)

6. Getting Existential On The Beach (watt/john jure)

7. Innuendo (watt)

8. God And Country (watt)

9. Brigate Rosse (watt)

          10. Tony Gets Wasted In Pedro (watt/max lazaroff)

For the full documentation of this record (complete with studio session photos and video) and to find out more about the individuals involved, check out: http://www.waterunderthebridgerecords.blogspot.com

BONUS SIDE-B FEATURES:

Mike Watt (Minutemen, fIREHOSE, DOS, The Stooges), George Hurley (Minutemen, fIREHOSE), Chuck Dukowski (Würm, Black Flag, SWA, The Chuck Dukowski Sextet), Joe Baiza (Saccharine Trust, Universal Congress Of, Mecolodiacs), Jack Brewer (Saccharine Trust, The Jack Brewer Band), Jimmy Mack (Jimmy Smack), Dirk Vandenberg (Tragicomedy, Seatbelt And The Pecking Order, Raymond Pettibon And Super Session), John Blazing (Salvation Army, Hari-Kari), Luis “Madmax” Maldonado (Saccharine Trust, Hari-Kari), Ritch Wilder (Saccharine Trust, Hari-Kari, Mood Of Defiance), Alma McLay (Hari-Kari), Cindy Vodo (The Wigs!), Todd Congelliere (F.Y.P , Toys That Kill, The Underground Railroad To Candyland, Stoned At Heart), Sean Cole (F.Y.P , Toys That Kill, That’s Incredible), Rawl Morales (No Comply, F.Y.P., The Leeches, Jag-Offs, Killer Dreamer, Mike Watt + The Secondmen, Mike Watt + The Missingmen, Lou Barlow + The Missingmen), Christian Wabschall-Moreno (Bedlam, Hippie Temptation, Skinhorse, Rig, 400 Blows), Craig Ibarra (No Comprende, Rig), Jerry Trebotic (Mike Watt’s We Go Speedro, Mike Watt + The Secondmen), Vinnie Vegas (No Comprende), Casey “Chachi” Ferrara (F.Y.P , Toys That Kill, Can Of Beans, SS Fun, The Underground Railroad To Candyland, Stoned At Heart), Mike “Jimmy” Felix (Toys That Kill, The Underground Railroad To Candyland, Bible Children, Stoned At Heart), Tony Cook (The Leeches, Jag-Offs, Killer Dreamer, SS Fun), Adam Gaxiola (Chingas De Mingus, Mike Watt’s We Go Speedro), Jacob Gaxiola (No Comply, Jag-Offs, Killer Dreamer, SS Fun), Philo Van Duyne (SWA, The Jack Brewer Band), Vince LaFarga (Second To Last, The Skanks, Frijoles Negros), Denis Fleps (Spinning Ceilings, Rosemary’s Billygoat, E.Coli, Iambic Pentameter, Toys That Kill, The Megahurts, Epic Debauchery), Bob Archer (Pigsty, Halfdead), David Love (Dig It), Kevin Carle (Four Letter Words, Lipstick Pickups, Killer Dreamer, That’s Incredible), Joey Simeoni (No Comply, The Skanks, Frijoles Negros, Sunken City), Jessica Feeney (Can Of Beans, Thee Ultimate Baby J, Stoned At Heart, On The Five), Vince Giobbe (Tijuana Knife Fight), Jacob Partida (Absorbing Jr.), Ethan White (Absorbing Jr.), Freda Renté (Vicious Attack, The Jack Brewer Reunion Band), Danny Partida (Frijoles Negros, Melting Pot, Absorbing Jr.).

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