The 80’s/early ’90s were an interesting time. You never knew when skinheads were going to come and screw up a show. Well, of all shows they decide to jump on stage during a Bliss show (!??!!) and bark about their hate. Then, during the last song Grant gets into it with the guy and they start rolling around on stage, fighting during the last song. Then chaos ensues and (I think) a team effort gets the skinhead out of the club. Just bizarre- Bliss is a band reminiscent of old SST acts, why would these guys even show up? Anyway, thanks Grant for bouncing.
For today’s On This Day in History, Thin White Rope played with Young Fresh Fellows and American Music Club at the I-Beam. It was a Frontier Records showcase. Man, Lisa Fancher had great taste in the bands that she signed to Frontier. What a lineup. This is about 20 minutes of Thin White Rope’s set. My tape is a bit longer but the first few i=minutes is unlistenable due to a bad tape dub. Hopefully ML or someone has the full set because it sounds great!
Recorded by: ? (possibly ML Compton) Transfer by: Shayne Stacy Equipment used: Nakamichi Dragon and M-Audio Audiophile 2496 card
This was yet another memorable night. We(Jason & I) got to the show early, thinking that the show would start at a reasonable time… but no. It started at like 10 or 11pm. At 1am, I begged Jason to leave. I think he was pretty pissed that I dragged him out of there. Sorry Jason! Filmed with Aiwa CV80 & ECM909 mic
Warning- this is gonna be long. I wasn’t planning on making this an all- filmed by me weekend, but apparently that’s what we are going to do. A nice gentleman named Zaved Khan reached out to me about the Nirvana Cattle Club video I filmed in 1990. He was looking to get permission to use a clip for his instagram post, but was having difficulty contacting people to get the OK for the multicam version (eternal thanks to Jim McLain for editing Jerry Perry and my angles together). I told him he could use my raw stage shot angle… then I remembered that I had this version that was cleaned up by Lance Bangs to be included in the “With the Lights Out” box set that I never posted.. then I remembered that I never told the story of getting screwed on that deal. So, sit down kids, grandpa has a story.
I about 2002 or 2003, I was contacted by Universal Music Group about using some of the Cattle Club footage in the “with the lights out” box set that was released in 2004. I worked closely with Michael Meisel, who was a totally cool guy and a pleasure to work with. I fedex’d the tape to Lance Bangs (Jackass series, tons of his own stuff, married to Corin Tucker, etc) and he did a nice job of bouncing it to digibeta and cleaning up/color correcting. Jim McLain’s version looks brighter, as software advanced over time.. but this one looks pretty good, albeit dark. I like the color balance on it.
So, I am all excited to get my footage on the box set AND get paid. In 2004, UMG randomly contacts me again and asks for contact info to the guy who filmed them a few days later in Long Beach. I work with my good friend Jim Utz to get his contact info and I relay that to UMG. Then there is no communication- complete silence. The release date is drawing near and I was getting concerned. I call UMG asking for Michael and am routed to the A&R guy. I don’t know his name, but he was a total d*ck to me. He tells me that my footage was cut from the box set (for the Long Beach footage I helped them acquire!), that I was not getting paid, and there was nothing I could do. So, I furiously call Michael and he calls me back in 1 minute- he is super pissed off too because nobody told me what happened.
Michael tells me that they found a version of Sappy (the song they wanted) that had better lighting with the Long Beach show, so they went with that. The A&R guy was supposed to call me and tell me…he didn’t. He was also supposed to tell me that I was still getting paid, and that as a consolation, they made my name an easter egg on the DVD…he didn’t. So, if you have the DVD from the Nirvana “With the Lights Out” box set, you can select my name in the ending credits and it will take you to some secret footage of Nirvana.
So, that’s the story of how I became an easter egg.
Recorded by: Shayne Stacy Equipment used: Aiwa CV-80 w/ Sony ECM-909 mic velcro’d to the top. Enhanced (lighting and color correction, denoise) by Lance Bangs
Thornucopia opening up for Nirvana and TAD at the Cattle Club in Sacramento, CA on Feb 12, 1990. This line up of the band was Jed Brewer, Susan Voss, Brian Grattidge, John Licatesi, and Justin Zimmerman. http://www.latherrecords.com
Audio Taped by Anonymous. Editing and soundrack mix by Jim McLain. Straight from the master VHS and Hi-8 tapes. Extra-special thanks go to Jerry Perry and Shayne Stacy for making their footage available and allowing for this to hapapen. An additional Anonymous audio recording was used in mixing the soundtrack, thanks to Anonymous as well. This is an upgrade from the version that was screened in Sacramento several years ago.
Here’s something cool, to commemorate the 30th anniversary of this show. For the first time ever, here is Jim McLain’s edit of the full Nirvana set. There is another 2 camera edit out on Youtube, but that one is a totally different edit and it has different(inferior) audio. THIS one is the one that was shown at The Crest a couple of times.
A funny story about this show- I always used to ask the bands for permission to video. I went up to Kurt(remember, this is pre-internet. it was not easy to find a band photo) and asked him “Are you in Tad?”. He said no, he was in that other band. He gave me the OK to film and wrote his aunt’s address on a slip of paper… which I transferred to my personal contacts book and threw the original slip of paper away! D’oh! Kudos go out to Mark Martin for strongly encouraging me to go film this show- he was the early adopter of grunge among our circle of friends.
Recorded by: Shayne Stacy (stage cam) & Jerry Perry (Cam on PA)
