Show Day -
Cold
Up at 11 - shower - after 5 minutes the water overflowed. The dirty bathroom was wallpapered with Penthouse "snatch" shots. I wash, shave and brush my teeth in the kitchen sink - remarkably not filled with too many dirty dishes. We leave at 12 and drive for an hour. Eat at "Bob Evans" then to Madison Wisconsin.
A true bachelor pad. I think I mean the water overflowed in the bathroom sink - so I used the kitchen instead.
Load into the "NarBar" - small stage - OK sound and eat good grub from the bar. Itchy shows up - he set the show up for us. I take a walk. Not much open on "State Street". This town is one of my favorite places to play. The beaches here are great. Pat S. and I spent 2 days here this summer. Back to the bar - we go on at 10:15. Rod and Dan got "Smedley" - a guitar busker that I had seen earlier on the street - to do a 15 minute set for us. Great fun - he had a blast. We play a great first set. Boris and Natasha show up. We break and hang out. Play a great second set - encore with VFW and the Fez - the Fez is great for a change.
"Itchy" was a friend from Philadelphia who was going to school in Madison. I forgot about "Smedley" - sounds like he was a good sport.
We do an interview in the back of the club then load out. I drive to Rockford to Paula's. The 'Johnsons' are here. We stay up until 4 or 5 talking to them. Their tour van blew up the first day - a great start of the tour! They play here tomorrow. To bed.
"The Johnson's" were friends of ours from Philadelphia who were on tour too. They released one album on Fever/Enigma called "Break Tomorrow's Day".
Posted by Dean at November 5, 1986 10:14 PM
Man oh man, was I waiting for this entry! The one and (unfortunately) only DM show I experienced live. My editorial and fan-boy comments follow later. First, down to business...
Smedley was an acoustic guitar-playing "weirdy-beardy". Rod introduced him and came off the stage laughing. I remember two things about this: (1) Smedley played a Creedence Clearwater Revival Song. (2) There was a VERY tall (at least 6' 5") skinhead-esque punk staring down Smedley during his entire set.
Both sets (that's right - two sets!) were indeed great. I snagged a list of the second set from one of the monitors after the show. The second set list reads as follows (Note: song numbers added by me in parentheses "()", extended song titles added by me in brackets "[]"):
(1) Surfin' Cow (2) Nutrition (3) Beach Song (4) Swordfish (5) I Am The Walrus (6) Big Lizard (7) [Theme From] Blood Orgy [of the Atomic Fern] (8) Violent School (9) Rocketship (10) Serated [Edge] (11) The Pit (12) Moron (13) [The] Badger Song
(14) Spit Sink (15) Take Me Apart (16) Beach Party [Vietnam] (17) Two Feet [Off The Ground] (18) Both Sides Now
I had also noted on the back of my Xerox of the set list (1986 was pre-photocopy, kids, and unfortunately the original black sharpie on 1/2 sheet of yellow legal pad seems to be gone to the great memorabilia bin in the sky): "Encores: The Fez, V.F.W. Dead Milkmen - Set #2, November 5, 1986. Nar Bar - Madison, WI. Written by Joe Jack Talcum during break".
Note: During "The Fez", Rod said "bring me the head of Michael J. Fox". Ha, ha, ha, HA. Keep in mind this was 1986. Michael J. Fox was a rising star then!
Editorial/fanboy comments follow (a bit long, but this old timer does tend to ramble...):
The DM are the first "real" band I saw live. I drove up from Janesville, WI (approx. 45 minutes south of Madison, WI - no big thing now but back then for some small-town boys this was a ROAD TRIP!) with my Jr. College chum Dave Loveland (drop me an e-mail, Boyo!).
We had to find this hole-in-the-wall club off the Capital Square. We stopped in one of the local record shops (if memory serves, "B-Side Records", where I saw the "Eat Your Paisley" LP hanging in the window during the summer of '86 and snatched it up straight away) to get directions.
When we arrived at the club, we saw Dean coming out the front door with a very tall African-American gentleman (was this the same guy I remember writing a piece in the DM Newzletter about the phrase "colder that a witch's tit"...). I was star-struck to say the least.
We watched you guys haul your gear in (I seem to remember it was just Dean and this tall guy). I remember you guys ordering the bar food. We waved to Joe who was changing the strings on his SG at one of the booths. Dave Blood was practicing with a little practice amp that fit in his case - he was wearing a "hoodie", and he later pulled the drawstrings completely shut, exposing only his nose. Rodney was at the bar, and my friend Dave told him we had come up from Janesville to see you guys. Rod's reply: "In that case, I'll just have to shoot you", pointed a small fake pistol at us, then went to a booth by the windows to read a paper.
Mr. Clean himself then sat down by us at the bar. Clearly exhausted, he still accomodated our fanboy questions for over half an hour (Dave Blood is in his 30's? Wow! That's OLD! - lol).
As the club started to fill up, some yuppie friends of the bartender/manager/owner (who knows?) stopped by to ask about "the band tonight". He stated y'all were "national - they're international!" Then the bartender/whatever introduced his friends to Dean as a member of the band. The yuppies then looked to us, and my friend Dave introduced himself as Rodney, and I introduced myself as Dave the bass player. Dean started laughing but played along (how freakin' cool is that?).
The yuppies were asking "us" questions about Philly sports teams, which Dean fielded quite capably. The bar was really filling up by this point, and it seemed like something was about to happen onstage, so my friend and I told Dean we were going up for the "soundcheck". Dean laughed, but still played along. Thanks, Man!
Smedley played. And he was a really happy acoustic performer (where are they now, eh? Tenacious D notwithstanding).
A short, dark-haired gentleman takes the stage, identifies himself as a DJ from some radio station that is not in the area (somewhere in Philly?) to introduce the band. The DM take the tiny stage, the place is packed, and the first set RAWKS, doood! If memory serves, during the first set a couple dressed in black made their way close to the stage and the whole band says "Hi Boris! Hi Natasha!" (alluded to in the tour diary).
At one point Rodney threw out some flyers to "Join the Steve Coker Fan Club" (I thought I still had one, but that too is gone to the great memorabilia bin in the sky). There were three identical pics of Mr. Coker on the flyer, dressed in a plaid coat and tie, plus a P.O. Box address in Indiana. Having heard Dean's pre-show tale of the DM's previous night's show, which I remember Dean as describing as "a combination Gong Show [corroborated] and campaign victory party [one of us is wrong, though I'd wager it's me]", I Xeroxed many copies of this flyer and hung them up around my Jr. College over the next few days. Pegging Steve Coker as a conservative local elected official that the DM were goofing on, I sent him a "fan" letter praising his election and decrying the music of the DM. Turns out the joke was on me, eh?
At another point in one of the sets, Rodney jumped into the audience and tangoed through the packed crowd with (if memory serves, again) one of the female yuppie friends of the bartender/whatever.
Anyhoo, set two was awesome. My friend and I waited after the show to shake Dean's hand ("Thanks! It was a lot of fun!"), then the DM went backstage for their 'zine interview.
We were right up front the whole time, and I still remember this as one of the best live music experiences ever. Thanks guys!
