Jerry moved to New York in 1979 to further the hardcore music he and his band th' Cigaretz, who had formed in 1977, had been working. Realizing that Raleigh, North Carolina was not the best place in the world to be a punk band, the group made the move; shortly thereafter th' Cigaretz released a twelve-inch. As history would have it, a copy fell into the hands of Dave Parsons who wrote a glowing review of it in Mouth of the Rat.
In September of 1980, Jerry Williams would begin renovating the interior of 171A. At the time, most of the available rehearsal spots in New York City were tiny little rooms, but 171A offered much more. Jerry described it as being like "...a full sized room with 15 foot ceilings and a floor space 60 feet long and provided recording artists with a quality PA system suspended from the ceiling. It was a cut above other rehearsal studios and since it was about half the size of CBGB's it produced a very similar sound."
Over the next few years, 171A Studio would then go on to be used by the Bad Brains, Regan Youth, Beastie Boys, Young and Useless and many more. In the fall of 1981, Jerry was working extensively with the Bad Brains and actually formed a post-Cigaretz group comprised of Bad Brains roadies who called themselves Bloodclot. Williams played guitar, the Bad Brains drum tech Alvin Robertson did drums, John Joseph (who went on to have success with the Cro-Mags) did vocals, and lastly Ted Horowitz rounded out the Bloodclot line up. Although Bloodclot never released an album, they did perform many live gigs opening for the Bad Brains. In fact, Bloodclot played the second day of the now famous November 1982 CBGB's benefit.
Today Jerry resides in California and still stays in contact with fellow former Cigaretz member Scott Jarvis. It was Scott who engineered the Polly Wog Stew ep and also went on tour with the Beastie Boys when they opened for Madonna (1985). Jerry Williams had been on the road with the Bad Brains at the time so by default Jarvis ended up doing the work on that release. However, for the record it was Williams who engineered the Young and Useless' very sought after Real Men Don't Floss ep.
http://www.beastiemania.com/whois/williams_jerry/
