Dangerous dispatches

It’s early, it’s dark, it’s moody. But that doesn’t stop the punk rocker from turning on the old charm. He jokes around with the two or three DJs present at the early morning radio event. These are not your average, pasty white-skinned nerds. They are thick, beer bellied, tattooed men that look more like hardened Harley bikers than audio technicians. Not in the mood for jokes, they abruptly lead Davey along with myself and Drew Blood, through the “On Air” rules.

No swearing… No F-words, S-words or A-words.

No direct product advertising.

No playing while the DJs are talking.

Speak when spoken to, laugh when asked to laugh, clap when asked to clap.

Otherwise, stay the hell out of the way.

All three Blisterz look at one another. We’ve been playing together long enough now to pretty much know what the other is thinking. And what we’re all thinking is, “Do what the DJs say and avoid a whole lot of trouble. We might be punk rockers, but we’re not stupid. A radio show means huge exposure. Let’s not screw the pooch on this golden opportunity.”

Another DJ arrives on the scene.

She is a younger than the rest. Dare I say it, young enough to be our daughter. She’s a short but attractive blond with an ample bosom and a killer bod. She’s got these big eyes that light up along with her smile. Thus her nickname, Bubbles.

Bubbles is a big Blisterz fan. She’s the one who’s responsible for landing us this live on-air gig. Bearing the energy of youth, she’s already clapping and jumping up and down as we get prepared to launch into our first of what will be three hours worth of hard, fast, pounding punk rock. She approaches us, smothers us with hugs and kisses. The free love is fleeting, however. Because that’s when we suddenly get word from the head DJ that it’s show time.

Places everybody.

I slide behind the drums. Davey straps on his six-string, checks his tuner. Drew Blood throws on his bass, gives a quick over-the-shoulder glance that tells me he’s ready to rock. I hold up the sticks, tap out four quick beats.

“One-two-three-four…”

We slam into a song called, appropriately enough, “The DJ Lets Us Down Again,” a four-chord Blisterz original anthem about a local DJ who insisted we send him a copy of our first CD, “Who’s Laughing Now,” but who refused to air even a single song. He also refused to respond to repeated follow-up phone calls and emails. In a word, after building up our hopes, the “DJ let us down…”

Hard!

The morning sun is only just beginning to dawn on the New York landscape, but I’m banging the drums, Keith Moon-style. kick-pedal pounds the bass drum like a hammer head, my right hand cuts sharp quarter notes on the high-hats, left hand comes down rock-hard on the vintage Roger’s metal snare drum. As the song enters the bridge, I haul off with a rapid-fire fill, making my simple four-piece Ringo drum kit sound monstrously huge.

As the sun continues to rise red-orange on the horizon and the flat blackness of the wide open Holiday Inn parking lot takes shape before me, the sweat begins to build on my forehead and along my back. Suddenly, as if having swallowed magic medicine, my hangover has disappeared. Suddenly, all thoughts of exhaustion have vanished like sound waves into the open sky. All nasty agitation at the slave labor of lugging music equipment and instruments has become a fleeting memory.

I’m doing what I love in front of a radio audience. That’s thousands of people just waking up from a sound sleep; men and women who will have no choice but to face the usual 9-5 daily grind and whose lives can be summed up thusly: “work, TV, bed.” We’re here to rock their world this morning, to give them a reason to wave their fists in the air while trying not to spill their morning coffee. We give them a reason to flip off their bosses behind their backs, if only in imagination.

But hold the phone. We’ve got a big problem looming very close by.

Lights are popping on all over the hotel.

Of course, I can’t hear anyone’s complaints from where I’m sitting behind reverberating drums backed up by buzz-saw-loud guitars. But I’m a writer after all, and I imagine throngs of rudely awakened people screaming out the windows.

“Shut the hell up!”

“Turn it down!”

“Call the cops.”

Jesus, what the hell were these DJs thinking? What the hell was the Holiday Inn management thinking? And as I spot two blue-and-white police cruisers moving in our direction along the main north-south boulevard, I can only ask myself, “What was I thinking?”

But then what if the cops arrest us for disturbing the peace? What if they barrel into the Holiday Inn parking lot, flashers flashing, tires squealing, radio spitting out loud tinny chatter? What if they throw open the doors, draw their weapons, plant their black barrels on us…The Blisterz?

How cool would that be?

Sitting behind those drums, I could just picture the headline: BLISTERZ BUSTED FOR DISTURBING THE PEACE!

Maybe that’s what we want. Maybe getting arrested and hauled off to the police station in shackles and cuffs for playing loud punk rock in front of a hotel at five in the morning would be the perfect end to our live set; the perfect media event. Because that’s what punk rockers do. Like the Sex Pistols a generation before us, we’d love to create a media frenzy.

Disappointingly however, the police cruisers pass us by. Correction… not only do they pass us by, but they honk their horns, flash their lights and wave at the DJ’s bringing their early morning show live from the Holiday Inn, with special guests, The Blisterz.We finish up our first song and get the signal to hold up while the DJs make jokes about Bubbles boobs. While my heart rate slows, I stare out into space and wonder what it would have been like to get arrested for playing punk rock. I wonder if our families would have been disappointed in us or proud. Or maybe fantasizing about being a Johnny Rotten at my age is a little ridiculous.

You gotta grow up eventually.

Or do you?

Sure The Blisterz have homes and families. Sure we have careers. Sure we’re 40-something years old and therefore have reached the age of maturity, respectability and, more importantly, restraint. Sure we’re expected to act as examples to the younger generation, especially our children. But then, we’ve also been given a sacred gift: the gift to play punk rock, and play it well.

We’re punk rock dads.

And in the end, punk rock dads don’t give up. We don’t rust and we never die. We just keep on rocking in the free world. Rocking like rolling stones that gather no moss.

Can you tell I’m not in the best of moods?

Davey Blister does his think in front of the RCA DogNipper

It’s four o’clock on a warm, stormy Friday morning and I’m schlepping hundreds of pounds worth of bass cabinets, P.A. monitors, drums, speakers, guitars and more for an early morning radio program my Albany-based punk rock trio, The Blisterz, have been asked to play “live” and unannounced. I’ve clocked in maybe three hours sleep and I’m having trouble keeping down solid food. Was it absolutely necessary for me to hang out at my favorite watering hole last night, downing beer after beer?

Such is the restless, and reckless, life of the 40-something punk rocker.

How did Warren Zevon put it? “I’ll sleep when I’m dead.”

Drew Blood isn’t fairing much better.

The slim, 42-year-old New York State Attorney General’s Office lawyer had to leave his wife and two pre-teen daughters home alone to make this non-paying punk rock gig. That means his wife of more than ten years will have to tend to the kids alone before setting off to work at her private law firm.

For better or for worse.

Drew Blood can pound out a rapid-fire bass line as well as Dee Dee Ramone. He might even seem an intimidating force on the stage. But in real-life, he’s sometimes plagued by anxiety. And between trips from the Volvo wagon to the stage, he makes a constant check on his mobile phone, hoping against hope that no urgent texts demanding his immediate presence back at the ranch have arrived.

Dave Graham, aka Davey Blister, couldn’t be more different.

The singer/songwriter of the group (we call him, Sting) has no anxieties this morning. Nor does he have to swallow four Advils with a large black coffee to keep a hangover the size of a bass drum at bay. Nor does he drag ass from lack of sleep (he never sleeps anyway. Nor does he drink alcohol).

He emerges from out of the darkness like a sculptured apparition. A muscular, six-foot monster rocker whom the girls referred to as “God” back in high school, he bears not a friendly grin but the grin of a mercenary about to enter the jungle for a dawn patrol. But instead of an M-16, he’s got a Les Paul gripped in his left hand.

Drew Blood Blister, Executive Punk Rocker

In typical Davey Blister fashion, he’s wearing a get-up only he can get away with: tan, California “Surfer-dude” Capris pants, brown Van’s skateboard sneakers, a black T with the arms cut off, gym-honed guns bursting through tight skin. The 40-something mechanical engineer might be living the life he was made for — early mornings, late nights, loud, fast, infectious rock n’roll —but he’s no stranger to domesticity and suburbia. Married for more than a dozen years, he’s got two kids: a daughter and a son. His boy is afflicted with autism and Davey has made it one of his life’s goals to fight the condition tooth and nail. While his guitar is plastered with stickers that bear the names of favorite bands like Social Distortion, The Clash and the Sex Slaves, the six-string also supports logos like “Fight Autisim” and “Cure Autism”. Davey is as passionate about curing the autism epidemic as he is about punk rock. And I suspect both passions feed one another.

Then there’s me, Vinny: the writer, the crime novelist, the explorer, the single dad, and of course, the drummer. Because I’m no longer married, I enjoy more freedom than my other band mates. I’m not so concerned about upsetting my “significant other” if rehearsal goes too late or if we schedule a gig on her birthday. I don’t have to balance the band life with matrimonial obligation, and I no longer live in the burbs.

But I’ve been playing in punk bands on and off now for nearly thirty years. And although there was a time when playing rock n’ roll meant late nights laced with speed, booze, cigarettes and of course, casual sex, the lifestyle has changed dramatically.

Don’t be fooled by last night’s partying.

The Blisterz on stage... From boys to old men!

When you hit 40, partying like a rock star had best be kept to a minimum. That is if you don’t want to end up a rock n’ roll casualty. Fact is I met Davey not in some seedy bar smelling of stale beer and vomit, but inside a local gym where we often traded workout secrets before even thinking about forming a band. Nowadays we’re likely to ask one another which body part we worked on in the weight room today than what CDs we’re listening to. And as for our rehearsals? No booze or drugs allowed. A Blisterz rehearsal is all about the music and getting it right. We want to play and look the part, even if our hair is going grayer by the day.

The Blisterz aren’t alone.

Over forty punk bands have been sprouting up all over New York. We’re often featured on the same bill as some of these bands. Take Crankdaddy for instance. Originating from the western part of the state, this punk outfit consists of 40-something advertising executives who thrive on loud, thrashing, rocket-fast rock.

Watch the 40-something Crankdaddy punks working on an advertising campaign for VW Jetta… sort of.

They also take pride in their advanced age. One of the signature song lyrics lifted from their 2004 CD, “Anthems of the Middle Age” is “40 is the new 30”.

Vinny Blister, aging punk dad

Then there’s the Last Conspirators, a “Last of the Mohicans”-inspired band name connived by three aging punk rock legends of the New York vicinity. While the original punk rock recorded on their latest CD, “Warparty,” has been called “ferocious” and “reminiscent of the New York Dolls,” the foursome are dedicated family men. In fact, the group’s balding, black jean and leather vest-clad front-man, Tim Livingston, is now a grandfather. The drummer, Al Kash, who originally hails from Australia, is a six-foot-something rock god in these parts. Nearing 60 and sporting thick gray hair and matching Rasputin-like beard, Kash is banging out the beat better than ever. Why quit punk rock just because you can’t fit into those 29-inch waist Levis button-flies anymore?

The Blisterz are not without our own middle-aged consciousness lyrics. Maybe as kids we sang along to anthems about the KKK taking our baby away or hoping we died before we got old, but nowadays, our original song lyrics are decidedly more domestic in theme. In one of our signature songs called “Rock’n’Roll Intervention,” song-master Davey writes about his mother who, being a “nice old lady”, is definitely not a “fan of his guitar”. In one of Drew’s songs, he expresses a real fear of having to look out the same office window for “20 years”. In yet another, Davey writes about a daughter who says “It’s not Fair” that she has to “comb her hair”.

And what about the kids? What’s it like to have a punk musician for a parent?

“It’s cool,” my 18-year-old says. “You’re not like other dads.”

Now that’s a compliment only a Punk Rock Dad can be proud of.

(Next installment: The Blisterz gear up to rock the Holiday Inn “live” and-on-the-air, only to draw the ire of sleeping patrons and the cops).