Whenever we flip on the ABUSE BOX nowadays, we're immediately inundated with flash images, disinformation, and jive propaganda, carefully honed by teams of well-paid weasels, designed to lull us all into a dark and lazy, lower state of consciousness. In this "American Idol" culture, there's proof -everywhere we turn- that any random, obedient, charisma-free, willing, hand-job can be made-over, propped up, and shoved into our consciousness by saturation-marketing all day long, until even serious adults end up having to make references to them as "stars". They infiltrate our consciousness. I'm not proud to have had to become this hyper-conscious of Justin Timberlake or Pink or Fifty Cent-let alone, so repeatedly inflicted with them, and these non-stop, 'round the clock updates about who they're fucking, and their shitty music, that I end up feelin' resentful about it...AFFECTED, by these vapid little lap-dancing mousketeers!
OTHER PEOPLE ARE JUST BORN WITH SOMETHING. A PRESENCE, A STAR-QUALITY, and if they're not so eager to get a bar-code tattooed to their ass, and dance obediently in a line, the establishment goes to grave links to push them ever deeper into the shadows, where their alienated, raspy, relentlessly reduced, little voices can't be heard. Like forgotten singer, BOBBY DURANGO from ROCK CITY ANGELS! Now that guy was a STAR. Born to be a motherfuckin' sing his heart out, transform his suffering, uplift the bar-room, and wink at your ole lady, natural-born ROCKSTAR. He had that thing, man. THE HARD STUFF! This was no mere high-school athlete with a Colgate smile, who was taught how to break-dance along to some banal dance-track, custom-designed to get you to associate purchasing a certain product with having sex with a room full of hot black chicks with huge titties and collagen-injected blowjob lips. This cat was a singer, people. An authentic song and dance man. A real entertainer. I sez, if you can't "do it" underneath a light-bulb in your cleanest dirty shirt, then you don't really "have it". BOBBY DURANGO had it, babies.
ROCK CITY ANGELS were an Exile On Main Street style rock'n'roll outfit with all the right glam and blues and country influences, that featured this swaggering, pained, rhinestone cowboy, who came-on like a bluesey, outlawed HENRY LEE SUMMER singin' for the JONESES or DOGS D'AMOUR or somethin'! Channeling the ghosts of both Otis Redding or Hank Williams, Senior sometimes he'd whirl 'round the roadhouse like a chicken with it's head torn off, a dervish of soul-beltin' and demon purgin'! The true confessions of a truck-stop poet with a hell-hound on his trail. You can't get this stuff no more. I mean, every once in awhile, you'll discover a white kid in a jacket who practiced his DUDE LOOKS LIKE A LADY Steven Tyler chicken-hawk dance in the mirror enough times, until it reminds you of Jagger and David Johansen, and you're encouraged for a minute, as it's an echo of something you can still remember ringin' true once, but that's as close as we come anymore. Luckily for some, the in-expendable SLEAZEGRINDER'S still here, instructin' the herd as to how to put a little show on, who to listen to, what to wear, and we at SLEAZEGRINDER WORLD H.Q.'s, DO get encouraged by the people who've done all their home-work, who've attentively listened to the right instructions, copped the "right profile", taken notes, and carefully assembled all the elaborate trappings of a MARC BOLAN, or a ZODIAC MINDWARP-"LIKE", but mostly affected, "rock persona." Even still, when I lay awake at night, listening to these bands, for that one line that's reflectin' even something real about the pain I'm in, it almost never comes anymore. I have to go all the way back to the ROLLING STONES, to hear MICK JAGGER for fuck's sake, singin' bout, "THOSE NIGHTS I SPENT-JUST WAITIN' FOR THE SUN" to recognize anything that sounds even REMOTELY SINCERE in all the stacks of c.d.'s I got here-everyone of 'em, picturing some dude trussed all up to LOOK jes like ol' Jagger or Rod or Bolan or somebody. But nothin' original or authentic ever seems to come out of those grooves anymore, man. No intimate expression of an individual's OWN trip. No glimpse into someone's TRUE FEELINGS is ever exposed. I mean, you got some of these glam-rawk types goin' folk on you all of a sudden, last year some guy wanted to be the singer from Ratt, now all of a sudden, he's NICK DRAKE. That seems to work on people, too. We're just so happy he wants to be NICK DRAKE and not JA RULE, we become willing to play along. But it's still all so reduced...to whether or not we are willing to all play along with another achin' to be anything he's not, wanna-be. Meanwhile, I just keep waiting for that song.
When Bobby Durango sings, "OH, MARY! ONCE I HAD A LOVE, OH MARY, WHERE'S MY LOVE?! OH, MARY!" from their debut double-album, "Young Man's Blues", see, I BELIEVE HIM. He's got the panic, the real goods. REAL EMOTIONS, babies! He ain't fuckin' around. You know it ain't some jive-ass put-on recycled from a previous generation's most famous figure-head. He's not fakin' it-that's HIS SONG, man. That never happens anymore. They just keep trottin' out more high school athletes with winning smiles and maybe this one new group, maybe they DON'T wanna wear swet-pants and a gold chain, so they gotta go buy their own feather boas or whatever. If they're less willing to get that bar-code tattoo right away, and they don't wanna learn how to break-dance in a line; let's just say, they prefer adopting a different, more outta-style persona, then they gotta go put some other kinda costume on their Pop's credit card, but that's as far-out as they usually get. I mean, even the ones with 24-hour access to shit-hot recording studios, and old-dudes, 'hip to old albums, and what kinda tube-amp Robert Quine was usin' back then, bein' PAID to help 'em capture something that sounds authentic, or echoes something that once rang true, even THEY can't seem to ever get close to findin' their OWN SONG. Even with all that help and coaching and access to the "right instructions"! A REAL SONG-that's all I wanna hear, man. Halloween's great and everything. Everyday Is Halloween. No, that's cool, I get it. Love it. Now where's YOUR SONG? I swear I had one around here, somewhere... Again: Once I had a song, Oh Mary, where's my song? OH MARY! BOBBY DURANGO had a REAL SONG. Hell, that guy even had a bunch of 'em. "Boy From Hell's Kitchen", "Cherry Street", "Damned Don't Cry", "Let's Go", "Beyond Babylon", "Deep Inside My Heart" and some boss versions of their old guitar player, Davy "Lightning" Greg's, "Hush Child"; and even an ace-cover of "These Arms Of Mine" f'rinstance! They had a little hit with "Deep Inside My Heart", and got to open up for Joan Jett and Jimmy Page, and got a short-lived ride on the big-league rock'n'roller-coaster, but lots of people still insist that their "lucky break" wasn't really all it seemed to be. We DO know they got paid alot of money for this record, at some point.
There's conspiracy theories all over the internet as to why GEFFEN records honcho David Geffen signed the ROCK CITY ANGELS then supposedly sabotaged their careers, allowing them to record a DOUBLE DEBUT (!!) (held back until after GUNS 'N' ROSES had fully established their market-place preeminence) but then, shelving it (??), after one catchy little hit single set fire to MTV, "DEEP INSIDE MY HEART". A rollicking little groove about, "alligator alleys at the dark end of the street" and adolescent romance-- tearin' your soul right apart, that just tapped into some universally-recognized southern-fried boogie kinda soul-vibe that both "pleased and sleazed TM" fans of THE BLACK CROWES, CIRCUS OF POWER, ZZ TOP, THE GEORGIA SATELLITES, GEORGE THOROGOOD & THE DESTROYERS, JOHN COUGAR MELLENCAMP or even DOGS D'AMOUR. Anybody who liked any of those groups, or BOB SEGER & THE SILVER BULLET BAND, or THE ROLLING STONES, themselves, probably liked that song. ROCK CITY ANGELS had major commercial potential back in their day, man, they appealed to everybody. They were teachin' the kids about BO DIDDLEY and HOW! HOW! HOW! HOW! JOHNNY LEE HOOKER! So why did Geffen shit-can their promotional campaign all of a sudden? Shit! Kid Rock's probably on the horn, tryin' to "befriend" ol' BOBBY DURANGO right now!
UNSOLVED MYSTERIES
Formed in Florida by Bobby Durango (a.k.a Bobby St. Valentine) and bassist, ANDY PANIC, with actor Johnny Depp amidst their ragged ranks in 1986, (formerly known as the Abusers the Delta Rebels) ROCK CITY ANGELS' early songs were heavily N.Y. DOLLS-influenced. They all wore make-up, and wrote tunes like, "TEENAGE LIPSTICK BOYS":("I went to the doctor-and what did he say? TEENAGE LIPSTICK BOYS!") You know-real cool, but amateur-hourish , garage-sale versions of old Hollywood Brats or N.Y. Dolls type tunes. One of the other guys in the group totally gave off a Syl Sylvain kinda vibe, and they found a label called New Renaissance, who helped 'em formulate a promotional strategy, involving moving out to Hollywood, and they optimistically hit the SUNSET STRIP, smack-dab, in the middle of the hair-metal glory daze, AND their rattlesnake boots werent newly-purchased on Melrose, if you know what I'm sayin'.
GUNS 'N' ROSES had recently signed to Geffen records and were no longer playing the clubs, so ROCK CITY ANGELS easily filled the gap, and quickly generated a huge buzz, effortlessly appealing to the same GUNS "N' ROSES Hollywood fan-base. After just a few successful performances on the strip, their indie-label (New Renaissance) manager, Ann Boleyn, started receiving death-threats demanding she "back-off" ROCK CITY ANGELS, and was nearly run off the road in Topanga Canyon by someone who was obviously less than, "pleased and sleazed (TM)" about BOBBY DURANGO and the boys showing up in their Stetsons, all hungry, out here in Tinsel-Town, to maybe steal away any of that (ka-ching ka-ching) AXL ROSE heavy metal thunder. Lawyers were telling Ann that if Geffen wanted to sign the band, it probably had something to do with how similar they originally were to the formula Geffen's publicity department were devising to make GUNS 'N' ROSES the hugest band on the planet. She was advised to let the boys go when Geffen started courting them, because fuck, man---she was getting death-threats, and she didn't wanna derail the boy's careers. Geffen Records aggressively signed the band for an unheard of sum-allegedly, something like 6.2 million dollars(!!!???) Why would Geffen invest all that money into a little Palm Beach glam-rock hootchie-kootchie band if they weren't concerned ol' man Durango was onto something with his stardust-cowboy rhythm and blues revue?
Geffen (Guns 'N' Roses label mind you) then told them to lose the glam-look (!!!) , local radio immediately ceased playing songs from their promisingly ramshackle, New Renaissance pre-release, and all evidence of their Dollsy debut was destroyed by their new mgr., Satan. Geffen Records then air-lifted the band immediately out of Hollywood, down to Memphis, where they were told to "write songs" in some hotel room. Unwilling to leave Hollywood, Johnny Depp quit the band. GUNS 'N' ROSES, a band led by a singer with a very similar appeal, who obviously shared a lot of the same Aerosmith/Rolling Stones trashy blues-punk influences, (ROCK CITY ANGELS saw themselves as a cross between "MUDDY WATERS AND THE SEX PISTOLS" according to their Geffen bio) then became one of the biggest bands ever. ROCK CITY ANGELS were made to sit idle in Memphis for months and months, and it would be two more years before "Young Man's Blues" would see release, while the glammy, cowboy-booted, blues-metal of GUNS N ROSES skyrocketed them to the kind of mammoth legendary rock-star status that's gone unseen, ever since IZZY STRADLIN quit the band, and Axl decided he wanted to become Nine Inch Nails, and started calling in absurd collaborators like Moby, Buckethead, and Shaquille O'Neil, to help him make this "Chinese Democracy" master-work, that we're starting to wonder if it will ever see an official release.
As talented as the ROCK CITY ANGELS so clearly were, even I have my doubts as to how big a threat ROCK CITY ANGELS ever could have really been to GUNS 'N' ROSES. C'mon! I mean, first off, it seems extremely unlikely that BOBBY DURANGO was ever gonna become the crossover teeny-bop pinup- idol AXL was. He just wasn't good looking enough. Whenever anyone ascends to the dizzying heights that AXL ROSE & CO. did, there's always armies upon armies of people who all have their stories about how they were somehow wronged because it wasn't them, or how they're somehow entitled to a piece of that succe$$ and glory somehow. I mean, doesn't that guy from SHARK ISLAND still swear, everyday of his life, to anyone who'll listen, that AXL ROSE stole that dance he used to do, off 'im? OBVIOUSLY, Guns ’N' Roses were heavily influenced by a buncha people (Hanoi Rocks, Nazareth, Aerosmith, AC/DC) and maybe the SHARK ISLAND dude DID invent that my my my my my serpentine-hipsway dance, but the thing I'm trying to say here, is it's equally obvious, that GNR had come up with something pretty magical all their own, based on the synergy created by the five guys in the band, (that even THEY, themselves, can't come even close, to approximating again, without one another!) and ultimately-- that had alot to do with how huge they became, IN ADDITION to however many untold millions Geffen execs poured into into breaking them big, world-wide.
The ROCK CITY ANGELS debut was still a raunch'n'roll classic worth hearing if you can find it on E-BAY or something, a lot of pretty smokin' little Black Crowes style bar-room boogies and anguished love songs. Fans of the band's earlier incarnations, were reportedly disappointed that the major label release saw them completely stripped of all their bubble-gummy, glamour punk influences. THE ROCK CITY ANGELS saga's still a seldom-told, shady little story, (no matter which version you're inclined to believe) that's as intriguing, and stranger-than-fiction, as most any gangster-rap whodunnit. Conveniently, for those higher-up corporate rain-makers who pulled all the strings, ROCK CITY ANGELS were indeed, tortured, emotional, real rock'n'rollers, genuine articles-so they were, naturally, prone to substance abuse. So anytime their story conflicts with the corporate-version, the suits can easily discredit the ANGELS by suggesting they were all just a bunch of fucked up junkies, who fucked their careers up all by themselves, because they were addicts and losers to begin with. It had nothing to do with shoring up any potential competition, or shelving the record to make way for their higher-priority, massive money-makin' band! Those clowns just flash metal suicided their careers all by themselves, see? They couldn't handle the pressures of stardom. They self-destructed. They wouldn't go to the gym. They refused to get TOTAL make-overs-they took off the lipstick as instructed, but Bobby Durango wouldn't stop wearin' that damned black cowboy hat. Why wouldn't ANDY PANIC don the proverbial sweat-suit and gold chain like he was instructed? They were TOLD they needed to change their name!
The music business is a dark world, once you go beyond first assembling your little outfits, and assuming some ready-made "rock persona" by fictionalizing all those reviews for your band web-site, eventually gettin' some real attention for (GASP!) knockin' over some stools at the neighborhood bar. Unless you got that Colgate smile, and are willing and EAGER, cos there's a longass line----to get that aforementioned bar-code tattoo, and tit-job, and total make-over, and learn how to break-dance in a line, that web-site is usually about as far as you're allowed to get nowadays. It's BIBLICAL man. Am I the only one spooked by the highway wind, here? These are fucked up times, friends, and most folks are so plugged-in, hopelessly addicted to the DRUGGY-EFFECTS of these blue-hued ADVERTISEMENT-MACHINES that we can hardly ever even bring ourselves to admitting it, that anything's wrong, here. LET ALONE-- take any quiet action to affect any real change. Everybody's caught up in the mainstream, and if YOU insist on sitting there bare-footed on the banks of said stream, don't be expectin' no invites to the whoop-de-do fish-fry this Friday down at the corporate campfire. You're lucky we don't INCARCERATE YOU! SHUT-UP, AMERICA! KEEP SHOPPING! SHUT-UP AMERICANS! DON'T MAKE WAVES! Like the heavily-silenced social commentator, Bill Hicks (R.I.P.) used to say, "YOU ARE FREE TO DO AS WE TELL YOU!" It's fucked.
Rumors set the message boards alight that Bobby Durango and Andy Panic blew all their money ($6.2 million????) on BOOZE AND SMACK, then Bobby got married, and was broke, and was reduced to installing cable in Memphis. Others have it that they've been recording new songs and the eternal, ever-receding, big come-back's still in the works, any day now.... Hollywood oughta make a movie about the ROCK CITY ANGELS, whatever the truth is, it's worth investigating more deeply. Even if all that happened was they signed to Geffen and blew all their money on drugs like their many detractors claim, and one of their old guitar players went on to become America's most beloved silver screen heart throb, and so now, they're just a buncha embittered old dope-fiends constructing these crazy conspiracy stories to justify their inability to manage their own success, fuck, who cares, it's still a brilliant rock'n'roll rise and fall---and as far as I know, everybody's still alive. So, no matter what, no matter how you wanna spin it, there's a helluva story here. What's Johnny Depp got to say about it? The internet's cluttered with shit-loads of broken links to obsolete ROCK CITY ANGELS fan-sites, and while I did come across a picture that looked like it could've been taken in recent years, of some reformed RCA line-up, where they are now, is still a mystery to me. Some reports have Durango still getting shit-faced in Hollywood bars, cryin' in his cups to Lemmy Kilmeister, others have it he's clean and sober and still writing and recording his songs back in Florida or Memphis or somewhere. However betrayed ROCK CITY ANGELS may have felt, when GUNS 'N' ROSES became far bigger stars, if they ever received even half of that six million dollars so many websites claimed they did, if they ever received even one sixth of that figure, FUCK, I hope they've figured out, by now, that not everybody with talent even gets to have their material recorded for posterity, and they were still mighty fortunate to get as far as they did. Talented and all. Talent, soul, rock'n'roll? A REAL SONG? ROCK CITY ANGELS HAD IT. I dunno WHY they couldn't keep it! So where'd you guys traipse off to with all that dough anyhoo??? All us aging hoodlums wanna know: Whatever Happened to the ROCK CITY ANGELS?
-Pepsi Sheen
OCTOBER 2005.......
Whatever Happened to the ROCK CITY ANGELS?.....
The spirit of RCA is alive & well with the die hard fans & within the core members of RCA. Bobby, Andy, & Ringo are all alive & well and each continue to pursue music. With the Re-issue of "Young Mans Blues" & a rekindled interest in the band & its history it seems that, like with all good music, that it stood the test of time. A testament to it's purity & honesty. From their Punk beginings to the "glam" years to the balls & beauty of Y.M.B. & to some of the bands later works that has never been released....but will be posted here...Rock City Angels .....Nuff Said.
