The SPIN Interview
A BossToneS Tea Party
Gather round, my children, for a story of our Founding Fathers your teachers forgot to tell you. You’ve heard of the Boston Tea Party, a late-18th Century protest carried out by a bunch of thoroughly pissed-off merchants and tradesmen, the likes of which has tea boxes embedded in Boston Harbor’s murky bottom to this day. Well, this is the story of a band who, in their own way, formed a different kind of revolution. While George Washington had the Battle of Bunker Hill, punky kids who had trouble going to school five days a week had The Channel, a legendary ‘80s Boston nightclub located—you guessed it—across from the famed site of the Boston Tea Party rebellion. From Anthrax to X, all the best played at The Channel. Not giving a rat’s ass about school, a young Dicky Barrett trekked in...
Serj Tankian on Activism, Elasticity, His Dream Supergroup and System of a Down
Onstage, Serj Tankian is a tornado of energy, his intense passion and informed vitriol delivered pointedly in System of a Down songs like “Toxicity” and “Chop Suey!” His unique staccato vocal style, influenced by innovators including Frank Zappa and Mike Patton, is a potent accompaniment to System’s dynamic and powerful post-metal musicality. Yet on his new solo EP, Elasticity, there’s a lovely piano-based song for his son Rumi that’s tender and heart-wrenching/warming. He then shifts easily to the punky EP closer, “Electric Yerevan,” where Tankian rails “we don’t want to be the bitch of any superpowers … We say no to corruption and no to plunder / Billionaire playgrounds are going under.” [Yerevan is the capital of Armenia.] The singer/activist’s dedication to h...
Dreaming of Debbie
Debbie Harry, quite possibly the most iconic woman in music, doesn’t know she’s an icon. It must have been twenty-five years ago when I spotted Debbie Harry floating down an Alphabet City street in Manhattan, clutching not a purse but a small dog, her signature blonde lob glowing like a crown of light. Years later I saw her in the 2000 Axis Theatre production of Sarah Kane’s play Crave, a brilliant beacon in an ensemble cast. That was definitely after she starred with one of my exes in an indie short film, and also after, I think, I was lunching with an acquaintance who casually mentioned that Debbie was in the audience of her friend’s Lower East Side play, and brought her dog along to that, too. When you live in New York, star sightings are somewhat rote, and amidst the churning hus...
Feed My Frankenstein: Alice Cooper Isn’t Slowing Down
The big story on Alice Cooper, aside from the music (check the start to finish classic LP Love it to Death and the hit-heavy Best Of for starters) has always been theatrics. From his garage band days in the Spiders to his heyday in the ’70s and early ’80s, Alice Cooper was a bridge between rock ‘n’ roll and theater, and the band helped inspire and create heavy metal, punk and new wave. The idea of spectacle on stage isn’t a new one (Aristotle noted its importance in Poetics more than two millennia ago), but Alice always adds his trademark touch of shock and awe to immersive and fantastical effect. Though his touring schedule is already booked through the next decade, like the rest of us he’s sitting out the pandemic and waiting for the giant pause button on the world to be lifted. Alice fi...
Either You Love the Go-Go’s – Or You’re Wrong
There are two types of people in this world: Those who will watch the new Go-Go’s film and learn that they’re one of the most important bands in modern music — and those who already knew. Either way, their self-titled, 2020 documentary The Go-Go’s is available just about everywhere this month (streaming now, DVD/out on Blu-ray on Feb. 26), so no matter which camp you’re in, you’re in for something truly great. Directed by Alison Ellwood (Laurel Canyon), the 2020 Critics Choice Award for Best Documentary winner gives you the full scope of their wild ride through musical stardom, from their gritty early punk roots to the top of the charts, to their rough personal journeys with addiction and betrayal that forced their world to crumble under their feet. And, eventually, brought them back...
National Treasure
If you care at all about democracy and the way our world works, you should be watching Real Time with Bill Maher. As January 2021 marks the show’s 19th season, it’s one of the most in-demand shows on air. With good reason. What the world needs now—right now—is someone brave enough to fight for the truth. Someone who will put himself out there, be willing to be despised as much as he’s revered, and say the things that make us ponder and squirm. From religion to healthcare, mass media to political correctness, Maher enlists experts to help start the all-essential conversations. He leaves it up to you, the thinker, to do the rest. Nineteen seasons, FYI, doesn’t happen to any TV show by accident. Before Real Time there was his round-table, idea mosh pit Politically Incorrect (1993 – 2001...
John Fogerty Is Still Trying to Get the Country to Understand His Lyrics
Last March, John Fogerty could sense there was trouble up around the bend. The songwriter was set to play a string of West Coast casinos as part of his My 50 Year Trip tour, along with a Las Vegas residency at the Wynn. The first show was canceled. The second concert took place about two hours south in Laughlin, Nevada, which he tells SPIN was”so spooky” due to the looming pandemic. For the third casino gig, Fogerty said, “The whole time [before the show], I was thinking about how much I don’t want to [play it].” A few hours before taking the stage, he found out the show was canceled due to COVID-19 restrictions. “You could just tell that something was afoot, and we didn’t have a cure,” he says of the pandemic. “When you have that scenario, it’s just really going to get worse until yo...
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