Here are two songs featured on the original Osgood Slaughter cassette demo that was recorded with Jonathan Burnside at Razor’s Edge on Divisidero St in 1987, but recreated live in 2017 on stage some 30 years later.
One deals with parenting the late great Bruno Bersani way… Our hero recounts how he left the whiskey soaked bar crawls of SF’s side streets to raise a child, and how that demon had to be tamed. The second is about the “Weirdo On The Block” another concern of the young Bruno Bersani, and of which he undoubtedly feared he’d become…
These songs were recorded live at The Bottom Of The Hill October 14th 2017 at the band’s last known performance of tunes that originally surfaced on the 1987 Osgood Slaughter demo. The original studio versions are available at Bandcamp and one is embedded below for your streaming or downloading pleasure, as archived via the “ChewyMarzolo1” Bandcamp page, a treasure trove of indie music you likely ain’t heard.
The song comes from “a demo of amazing synth punk. Hilarious lyrics and a band that can really play. Years after this came out, John O’Neil told me he’d hung out with lead singer Bruno while he smashed copies of the tape in his garage with a hammer. Too bad, because there weren’t many to go around, my copy was #86 of 100. I only got to see them play once, it was at a high school dance where they had the plug pulled on them after 10 minutes. “It appears that we’re done for the evening…” Bruno said, barely started on his two liter bottle of wine cooler sitting prominently on his synth before a room of teenagers. “
Psst: Download 13 songs from Bruno’s Moose Lodge band demos here … http://panicon13th.blogspot.com/2011/07/moose-lodge-new-world-babies-cassette.html
Osgood Slaughter – “Live Like An Animal, Die Like A Vegetable!”
As I post this I just got word that Osgood Slaughter’s vocalist Bruno Bersani has left this earthly realm and I send condolences to his extended family and many friends. I was never tight with the guy, but always in awe of his gruff persona, and expecting a laugh. As my pal Dave Pehing wrote after his recent passing of his larger than life stage presence “Bruno was a brilliantly weird and compelling character onstage. ”
Osgood Slaughter was a loud, enigmatic and unavoidably omnipresent force in the dark dingy maze of hedonist hell-hole nightclubs that were San Francisco’s rock scene for a few years in the tale end of the late 80’s through early 90’s. Osgood Slaughter were a confusing comedic combo, somewhat akin to a Northern California alternative to LA band Pygmy Love Circus in some ways, with a caustic and bizarre biting sense of Zappa-esque humor mixed with thrash metal proficiency. They were too weird for the metal crowd, being more bike messenger than biker gang, and not sad or serious enough for the indie rock effete elite, so Osgood Slaughter stomped, wailed and terrorized military bases, bars & backyard bar bq’s alike in search of fame and fortune on both US coasts, and even the South Pacific before disbanding and splintering off circa 1993.
When i first moved to San Francisco, this band soon hit my radar as more persistent than popular, but always active on the underground, and had revolving lineups featuring guitar work from a couple of my earliest punk guitar god pals, such as John Cobbett (of Malefice, Gwar and later Ludicra/Hammers of Misfortune) and one of the guitarists featured in the video posted here Barry D’live (known for touring ax man stints in Gwar and Me First & the Gimme Gimmes, several albums with RKL, and now playing with MDC).
The embedded Osgood Slaughter track “Time To Be A Transient” features the John Cobbett era lineup circa 1990 and is from their Take This All Of You, And Eat It album available on Bandcamp if you can’t find yr crusty old CD copy like me. If you delve into Chewy Marzolo’s overflowing bandcamp, you will find many more Osgood outtakes, unreleased would be albums, and side projects from the members.
Dirtbombs – Shake Shivaree in HD
In August 2001 the Dirtbombs from Detroit Michigan convened at the Bottom Of The Hill in San Francisco for a memorable gig that has stood the test of time nearlt two decades later. Here’s an exclusive never before seen edited HD clip of the Dirtbombs opening number shot with two Sony digital video cameras in the back of a sweaty sold out club on a warm San Francisco night. This newly rediscovered & remastered HD edit of the opening number from the show features the closing track of their 12 song 1998 debut album “Horndog Fest”.
Then below this never before seen video is another of the band tearing through a medley of back of back tunes from the same set:
Cedar Point ’76/ I’ll Be In Trouble/Chains Of Love/Maybe Your Baby
The Dirtbombs, fronted by the then 35-year-old Mick Collins (already a veteran of budget garage rawk groups such as Blacktop & The Gories), were out and about mainly to promote their sophomore album, Ultraglide in Black on the In The Red label. At the time, rock scribe, Jennifer Maerz interviewed Collins for an interview that was published days prior to the gig in SF Weekly where she noted Collins got the idea for the Dirtbombs back in 1992, while on tour in Europe with the Gories. At that time, he said the punk trend was to chuck the bass player and just have drums and guitars — a trend he reacted to by having two bass players. Since then, the band has gone through 10 lineups. “There’s enough ex-Dirtbombs to make five whole bands. There’s a couple people whose names I don’t even remember,” chuckles Collins. (The latest configuration includes Ghetto Records owner Jim Diamond on bass, Tom Potter on “fuzz” bass, Pat Patano and Ben Blackwell on drums, and Collins on vocals, guitar, and harmonica.)
Mick told Maerz “We’re extremely loud live because we have two drum sets and two full bass rigs — and we keep the beat going all night,” says Collins. “In addition to “loud,’ I guess “unpredictable’ is a good word. We never know what’s going to happen. There’s a lot of give-and-take with the audience — the more they’re into it, the more we are. We encourage people to dress wild, wear costumes and stuff. Don’t worry about looking cool; don’t worry about that scenester crap. We don’t fit in, why should you? Let your freak flag fly high, baby! Let it all hang out!”