...18 years ago...

Woke at 10AM. We thought Sheila and Paul were at work and we made coffee etc. They got up. Sheila went to work late. She was having too much fun with us around. We went out walking to thrift shop, music store, post office etc. Others went back. Rod and I walked to record store etc. By 4 or 5 we met Joe on his way to The Defoliants rehearsal. He figured out the train to take so Rod and I decided to go along. Dave R. and Dave B. went to Eyelab.

I already mentioned that Rob from the Defoliants now plays in the San Andreas Fault. I also see that Chuck - the Defoliants guitar player is in a band called the Sonnets. Jeff is AWOL for the time being.

The Three of us rode downtown - 20 minute ride. Met the coolest surf band in Chicagoland. Stopped for cokes - went to rehearsal at Jeff's (drums) house. They talked about a new song they would play for us. To our surprise they ripped into Nutrition - great version. They played some of their tunes - 'I Lie A Lot', 'Speed Racer', 'Wild World of Animals' and surf covers - great band. We jammed a little and talked about music etc. Jeff's dad came home. He's a drummer for hotel show bands. Offered us dinner - Polish sausage. We went out and got rolls and beer - good food.

I wonder if I should have trade marked "Coolest Surf Band in Chicagoland"^TM..? Legend has it that I gave Jeff his nickname which apparently stuck - Jeff Bar-B-Que.

We asked the Defoliants to come up to Sheila's to hear some Philadelphia bands, At the CTA station, we pulled the slow scam. One guys goes in with a transpass - slips it out to the next guy - we saved everybody a dollar. Back at Sheila's we played them 'The Johnsons', 'Electric Love Muffin', 'Psychotic Norman'. Gave them some midwest [promoters] numbers - they have to play out more. Get them to Philly in the Fall. To bed 2AM.

'The Johnsons', 'Electric Love Muffin', 'Psychotic Norman' were all friends of ours back in Philadelphia. The Johnsons where a trio with Mike Morrison on guitar. He was also the music director at WXPN at the time and was responsible for introducing us to Colin at Fever Records. We had recorded 9 songs to release as an EP on our own. Friend Dan Mapp (later to become our road manager for many years) was going to help with money but an unfortunate car accident left Dan with no spare change and us holding a master tape. We played Mike the tape and he was impressed enough to have us give a copy to Colin. Colin agreed to release it on Fever (distributed by Enigma) with the condition that we go into thew studio and record enough additional material to flesh it all out into a full album. About $900 dollars later we had a full 21 songs recorded and 'Big Lizard In My Backyard' was born. Colin's economics experiment eventually produced some results because 'Big Lizard' has proven to be our biggest seller over the years. Not bad for a $900 dollar investment.