The Drink Tank 126 (2007).pdf

The Drink Tank

garcia@computer history.org

Fading, but Not Yet Gone

Letter Graded Mail

Sent to garcia@computerhistory.org

by my Loyal Reders

nothing for the following incarnation

which was published by Chester

Anderson, but the third incarnation

was from the publisher of the NYC sex

tabloid, Pleasure , and I not only wrote

a bunch for them, I was handsomely

stiffed for my efforts with several large

bouncing checks. Shortly after their

checks bounced they disappeared

from their ofices and Crawdaddy

entered its fourth incarnation, this

time as a slick newsstand magazine. I

understand the new publisher took it

over so his college-age son could edit

it. As such it lasted for several years.

And now, on issues 118 and

119...Ted White!!!

Dear Chris,

It’s been Too Long since a) I had

a free day at work, and b) I read and

LoCed The Drink Tank . So, let’s rectify

that.

Always glad to hear from ya!

The last issue I read was #117, your

Corlu report issue, so I started in on

#118, the Corlu Annex issue, so to

speak.

I know Klaatu. I got one of their

albums in a record exchange back

in college. Good, kinda trippy stuff.

I ran into Ben Fong-Torres not too

long ago and we chatted about

Rolling Stone and Crawdaddy

and Bomp and he said something

very interesting that I had never

thought of. He said that most of

the early zines weren’t done by

SF fans. The irst rock zines were

ClubZines for the Fan Clubs of the

various performers that may or

may not have had any connection

with SF fandom. It’s hard to tell.

General rock fanzines certainly

came out from SF fans. I have a few

of those later issues of Crawdaddy

and they’re nothing compared to

the originals, which had a lot of

personality that the latter versions

lacked.

John Purcell mentions “Calling

Occupants of Interplanetary Craft”

but forgot who originally recorded it.

(I haven’t read subsequent issues yet

– gotta keep this spontaneous! – so I

don’t know yet if anyone else picked

up on this. No, don’t tell me yet.) The

band was Klaatu, a Canadian group

which was briely accused of being

the Beatles in a clever plastic disguise

(although they sounded very little like

the Beatles, in my opinion). In more

recent times it was recorded by the

Star People, a now-defunct New York

(Long Island) band whose stage show

was a delight. They used the song on

both their irst and second albums

(same recording), they liked it so much.

Then there’s Michael Layne

Heath’s piece. Weird to see my name

pop up in that. Weirder to realize

that somewhere in my house I have

copies of his Snifin’ Glue . I wonder

if he realizes that the people who

started rock fanzines – Paul Williams

and Greg Shaw – were originally SF

fans who had previously put out SF

fanzines. Although I corresponded with

Greg, I never met him (and never will,

now), but I’ve known Paul since he

was maybe 14, and he mimeographed

the irst issue of Crawdaddy in my

basement in Brooklyn. (As soon as he

started getting record company ads, he

went to photo offset.) I didn’t write a lot

for his incarnation of Crawdaddy , and

Hope Leibowitz asks why you

spelled it “CorFlu,” and you offered

an explanation. But, Chris, “CorFlu”

is something entirely separate from

“Corlu.” “CorFlu” is what an unghodly

number of us picked up at the San

Francisco Corlu, a couple of years ago

– it hit me as I was lying home, and

had me sick in bed for the next couple

of days, a wretched experience.

from really big names, but Laser

Disk versions of videos did much

better. I guess that folks who had

the real interest in videos wanted

the best quality and Laser Disk put

out far better quality.

You say, “folks like Michael

Moorcock and John Shirley have lived

in both the rock and music worlds

at the same time.” Well, yes, sort of,

and so has Norman Spinrad (who

collaborated with Richard Pinhaus).

But only John has been a real

performer in a real band. Moorcock

contributed ideas and words to

Hawkwind, and made a fairly awful

album with his own one-off band,

The Deep Fix, to which he again

contributed only ideas and words (but

Graham Charnock played guitar).

I didn’t stay in the hotel for

CorFlucisco so that must be why

I avoided it. And remember the

most important thing: how things

are actually spelled/grammared/

capitalized has little to no bearing

on how I will spell/grammar/

capitalize.

In #119 you passingly mention a

laser disk player. Ah, yes. I have close

to 50 Laser Disks, many of which I’ve

never watched, but would like to. My

original LD player, purchased circa

1985, stopped working in the early ‘90s

with a disk still in it. In 1999, as DVDs

were making LDs obsolete, I managed

to pick up a Really Good LD player

on close-out, and I thought I’d inally

get to see those unplayed LDs (mostly

music videos, concerts, like that – all of

XTC’s videos on one disk, for example

– one of them being the Stones’ Rock &

Roll Circus , and another a quasi-illegal

release of Let It Be ). But, a few years

ago when my son and I were watching

rock videos together, I discovered that

the LD player wouldn’t turn on . Neither

the front-panel control nor the remote

turned it on. Yes, it was properly

connected. But for all intents and

purposes it was an inert hunk. It still

is. One of these days I must pay an

extortionate amount (perhaps as much

as the purchase price) to have it ixed.

There’s also an SF poet name of

Dave Meltzer (not the wrestling

writer, but a different guy) who

played with various bands too. I’ve

recently found that Deep Fix album

and I’ll listen to it shortly...to my

dismay!

If I may brag for a moment, my

own involvement goes deeper. I was

a professional jazz critic in the late

‘50s and early ‘60s, and a rock critic

subsequently (starting in 1965), and a

radio deejay in the ‘70s. But in 1979

I also became a performing musician.

I played alto (and sometimes tenor)

Laser disks are great. To this day,

the best version of 1776 (which I’m

going to show at Westercon this

year) is the laser disk version. Rock

video videotapes were rarish and

never sold too well unless they were

sax with a number of

local DC-area bands,

and fronted my own,

Dr. Progresso & The

Hired Assassins,

for live gigs. In the

spring of 1979 I began

recording my music

(now available on the

also in my Hired Assassins in 1980),

and two non-fan friends, JD Mack and

Bob Crain. We are a totally improvising

band. Our material has ranged from

melodic and orchestral to spacey

and atonal, with free jazz thrown in.

I play keys and saxes (including the

C-melody, a sax which its between

alto and tenor). Dan plays keys, bass

and drums. JD plays bass, keys and

drums. Bob plays drums, tenor sax,

bass and keys. We move around a lot

on our instruments.

was a nice venue

compared to what

I’m used to out here.

We have a page on

MySpace, with four of

our pieces available to

be heard there ( http:

//www.myspace.com/

conduitdc ), and we have a video of one

piece from our appearance at the Orion

also available on that page and on

YouTube ( http://www.youtube.com/

watch?v=axocQI4vess ) as well. Check

‘em out.

“privately released” CDs, The Doctor

Is On , vols. 1 and 2), including the

studio composition, “The Slow Mingus

Shufle/Goodbye,” my elegy to Charles

Mingus.

Sounds like a good trio. I’ve got

a few other friends who are fans

and musicians (including my good

LA buddy George Van Wagner),

though sadly, I’ve no musical talent

whatsoever.

In 1984 I was part of a band

which met and played weekly, but

not publicly, which evolved into

Barbara & The Bohemians, ultimately

a trio. We played what we called

“macrominimalistic” music. We

recorded everything we did, digitally,

for four or ive years. Thus far I’ve

compiled two CDs, Macrominimalism

and On The Terrace , from more than

a hundred hours of recordings. The

music was much ahead of its time and

still sounds fresh, twenty years later. I

tended to play more keyboards (I had

six!) than sax by then.

I will. I have two MySpace pages:

one for Christopher J. Garcia and

one for Pop Culture Associates.

Well, I was just interrupted (but

not rudely) by Henry Sun, from our

production department. “I don’t have

anything for you today, and nothing’s

coming in, so you might as well take

off and go home,” he said, at about

3:30 PM on a beautiful spring day

(our irst in weeks!). So I shall. Thus

ends this LoC. Expect another at an

unscheduled time.

We get together about once a

month and play for one to two hours,

recording everything on a Fostex board

with a hard drive with sixteen tracks

available for simultaneous recording,

plus additional “virtual” tracks. Around

99% of what we record is good and

usable. Thus far we’ve had eighteen

sessions and produced eighteen

albums, several of them double CDs.

Two of those sessions and albums were

from live gigs at local venues, including

Baltimore’s Orion, a premier venue for

progressive rock.

I am totally using the phrase

macrominimalistic from now on.

Always good to hear from ya, Ted

and I hope you made the most of

the unexpected afternoon off!

In late 2004, after a ifteen-year lapse, I

got back into making music by forming

a new band, Conduit. The quartet

includes former fan, Dan Joy (who was

All best,

Ted

I’ve been to the Orion. I can’t

remember who I saw there, but it

Thanks, Ted!

And now, with his Drink Tank

debut, EsJay himself...Steve Jeffrey!

ought to google for that. Or maybe not.

Vince’s head is kinda pointy.

Re the Hugos, I guess what

Mark meant was that Harry Warner

wasn’t an sf pro but he was certainly

a professional writer making a living

writing for a newspaper. He also sold a

lot of non-i ction to magazines, I recall

reading somewhere, and I am pretty

sure he sold some sf stories in the

i fties.

That’s true. I couldn’t i nd any real

evidence though.

It’s always struck me that

American fen tend to rate UK zines

rather highly (too highly?) I think

it is the effect of something slightly

different being rated “better” when in

fact it is just different. Mind you, I

am married to a former UK fan. Mary

always remarks that a lot of Americans

are impressed by the British accent.

People she talks to on the phone

always remember her when she calls

back. I think over the years UK zines

have kind of got the benei t of having a

“British accent.”

That’s a good point, but then again

the only BritZines that get over here

are the real good ones, I guess.

Good luck with the Hugo thing, by the

way. At least they’re not going to cancel

the damn con on you!

And for that, I’m eternally grateful!

Best,

Eric

Hi Chris

Re. Lloyd Penney’s comment in

DT123 (absolutely fantastic cover on

this ish btw. Yours?)

Sadly the cover was not mine. I

found it on DeviantArt and the

artist was kind enough to lemme

use it. Sadly, I’ve forgotten her

name.

“Then there was the time in 1992 when

NPR announced that Richard Nixon

was declaring for the Presidency again.

He was quoted as saying that, “I didn’t

do anything wrong, and I won’t do it

again”

I love Nixon’s post-Presidency. Yeah,

he wasn’t as good an ex-President

as Carter has been, but he lightened

up and was really funny. Kind of

like Bob Dole when he used to show

up on the Daily SHow.

On BBC Radio ‘The News

Quiz’ a couple of days ago, humorist

Alan Coren came up with an equally

splendid remark attributed to Ronald

Reagan to Caspar Weinberg, at the

time of the Oliver North scandal. “OK.

What don’t I know, and when didn’t I

know it?”

Bests

Steve Jeffery

That’s a famous one, right up

there with the classic line from

Casablanca about being shocked

that there was gambling!

Thanks, Steve! Hope you keep

reading!

Let us roll over to Mr. Eric Mayer!

Chris,

Just a note. Well, you know

about me and cons, or not. So what

can I say? Well, for one thing, anent

your remarks to Lloyd, here’s a more

sobering thought. I’m older than your

mom! And, what Vince McMahon got

his head shaved? I can’t imagine that. I

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