The Lanternjack

Bad Obsessions

It's So Easy

10:30PM

"Those flying monkeys are starting to freak me out."

I had batted around the idea of opening this issue's column with some maudlin diatribe on 'love in the time of Anthrax', but if I keep up this streak of open hearted honesty, I'm going to blow my image, so I'll get to the Rock as soon as possible. Suffice to say, it was awfully Goddamn surreal to actually be saying, 'I hope there's no terrorist attacks this weekend to fuck up our wedding', but Hell, I'm an American, I'm adaptable. Luckily, nothing blew up. I wore leather pants, and we all lived happily ever after. Thanks to the Super Rockers that played the Sleazegrinder Rock and Roll Wedding party- The Humanoids, David James Motorcycle, Lamont, Milligram, Rock City Crimewave, and Cracktorch. It was the best fuckin' rock show I've ever been to. And I didn't even have to pay to get in. But back to our story. What flying monkeys? It's Halloween, and the Linwood is littered with faux-Hessians and blood splattered Kurt and Courtneys. Tonight was originally supposed to feature the world's greatest all female black metal band, Tormentula, but they couldn't make it. Too many church burnings to attend to back in Wisconsin, I guess. In one of those classic rock and roll 'Hail Mary' moves, local post-indie, gasket blowing noise tyrants Black Helicopter signed on to save the night. They had something big planned, they assured me. Word on the street was that they had a night of Nordic Black Metal planned, nail armbands, corpsepaint and blood. That's not what happened at all. The Linwood's stage was covered in a giant blue screen. The "Wizard of Oz" was being projected on it. Black Helicopter, who are surly, burly cats in dressed in trucker chic most days, had transformed themselves into the film's main characters- Dorothy, the Cowardly lion, the Tin Man- with an almost Gwar-like attention to detail. And they were playing Pink Floyd. It was madness. I don't do enough drugs, so I didn't know there was a whole cult of stoners that listen to Floyd and watch Wizard and find some cosmic synchronicity, but there you go. So the wife and I are gawking from afar. The place is packed, which is good news, because people seemed to be under the impression that I had something to do with tonight's show, and I feared some kind of Wednesday night, nothin' but crickets disaster. But we can't see what's happening at the front of the stage, we can't see the flying monkeys. "They were peeking in the windows, earlier." Bob Maloney, Quitter rock star is yelling in my ear. "I didn't know what the Hell was going on. It was spooky, man. There's like 15 of them up there." After the band segue into some of their own convenience store suicide anthems and finish their set, the crowd starts heading for the bar, and I see them. Flying fucking monkeys, a whole gang of them. Heavy. "You know what the weird thing is?" Black Helicopter's main man Zach is still in his costume. My guess is that his blonde pony tailed wig, nicely offsetting his black stubble, is the weird thing, but that's only one of them. "The weird thing is that those monkeys aren't ours. I mean, we know who they are, but we didn't plan this. They just showed up." I ask him how this whole theme developed. "Well, we were going to do the black metal thing, but people have seen that, it's been done before. What they haven't seen is a big fat guy dressed up like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz playing Dark Side of the Moon. Maybe next year we'll have Munchkins." It could have been weirder. A few months go, Zach had come up to me at a show and said, "You think if a band played the Redneck Fest dressed up like the Klu Klux Klan- you think people would get the joke?" I just stared at him. "Not that we were planning it, or anything. I'm just wondering." I love those brain damaged motherfuckers.

11:15 PM

Illustrious Hitlist editor and the original rock and roll burnout, Jeff Bale is in town tonight. He's on some East Coast mission. Rock shows, record collecting, checking in with his far -flung columnists. Jeff's easy to find, his gray curls of Michael J Pollard hair billowing off of his head like smoke, his tattered leather jacket, which has sweated through everything from the Stooges to the Donnas, hanging off of his shoulders like a crack addicted girlfriend. He's drinking the Nyquil of rock bar drinks, Jagermeister, and he's leaning against the wall next to the women's bathroom, leering at the local talent. A total pro. "Are all the girls in Boston fat?" He asks me. "Well, my wife's not", I tell him. "No, she's a pretty one. Good job." He says. Jeff talks about the West Coast, the publishing racket, what a joke Punk Planet is- you know, life, the universe, and everything. And then he imparts a little bad wisdom on me. "The MC5", he says with all authority, "weren't really that good." Son of a bitch. Somebody call Sweden, there's been a change of plans.

12:00 AM

"Can somebody find me some duct tape, so I can put my pants back together?" Such are the perils of the rock and roll werewolf. The Humanoids have finally made it to the stage to close out Halloween with a blast of living dead motor sleaze, but it hasn't been easy for Clay Nferno. His glam-wolf make-up is coming off in clumps, and now his leather pants have split down the middle. The band launches into "Big Rig', their ode to rock and roll truckers. Sparks shoot out of Johnny Machine's guitar like some post-mortem Ace Frehely. Joey Sinn wants to bombard the crowd with candy, but he can't find it in the green haze of the smoke machine. "Candy?" Clay asks, incredulous. "My fucking face is falling off, I don't give a shit about candy!" You know, they tell me there's a war going on, that we're a nation on high alert. But at least as far as tonight's concerned, the kids are all right.

The Perils of Rock and Roll Decadence

"It happened this winter, somewhere in February or March, I'm not sure anymore. It was really cold that night, snow was falling, and it was freezing. We had to do a gig in Beverlo, about a 45 minute drive from home. We knew some guys over there and one of them, Marcel, was going to pick us up with the van of another friend, Poef. At 7pm he picked us up at our rockin' place. But first he had to fill the tank with some boostin' fluid. No problem, about 3 miles down the road was a gas-station. But not being his own van, Marcel asked Bloodshed what he had to fill it with: gasoline or petrol? Well, considering it was a very old orange van, we decided to go for gasoline. About 1.5 miles further we asked God, 'Why... why, oh why?!' Yes indeed, the motor was running on petrol and we poured gasoline in it. So we stood their next to the road, about 3 miles from home, in the blistering cold, in the snow... freezing our butts and things off and waiting till the tank had lost all the gasoline... with the speed of drop by drop. We phoned the guy from the gig and he said people were waiting... some even had brought a camera to film the gig. Bloodshed walked back 3 miles through a snowstorm to the gas-station to buy petrol (after he first bought a gas can, because we didn't even have that.) After the tank was finally empty, Marcel tried to start the van... but the battery was down. So... we had to perform at 8pm... at bout 1.30 am I phoned the guy at the gig that we weren't coming... we never got further than 3 miles from home. Yes... Spinal Tap lives!" - Bloodshed Bob, Bronco Billy (http://surf.to/bronco-billy) 

"I want to swim through honey, I want dance with the dead. Instead I will tell you of my only glimpse at luxury through the indie eyes of the Dirtmitts (Vancouver, B.C)I wish I could you tell of bare cocaine asses and ecstacy love-in's (what if my mom reads this?) or brushes with stardom (had a few, they never recognized me), but instead I will tell you of our 2 day tour, yeah a 2 day tour. We had a big agent represent us for the weekend for a 2 day Kokanee beer event in the beautiful Rocky mountains of Alberta. First stop was an eight hour drive to Jasper, Alberta. We overestimated our travel time and arrived early for check-in at the 4 star hotel, the Athabasca. Not only did we get put up in a mackin' crib but were told to keep quiet that we were being paid $500 more than the headlining well-known Canadian band. We had fun, drank their booze and Jen necked with the hot drummer. Next day, off through the cascading peaks of the snow-capped Rockies to Banff, another resort town further south. Astounded we laughed hysterically in disbelief when the agent told us to check into the Banff Springs Resort Hotel. Snuggled in the mountains, we swam in the outdoor/ indoor water-falled salt-water pools, running like kids down the castle hallways lined with Medieval torches leading to hidden rooms with guarded knight's armor. After playing the large cash, small gig we gladly retired to our 5 star hotel, sneaking down to the grand piano parlor room and rested at 4 am on the wood floors in the pastoral fresca ceiling ballroom. Kokanee in one hand, joint in the other, we were the queens and kings of the world. Oh, the Rockies beer companies, how you rocked our world, well, at least our weekend. Yeah, corporate sponsors suck... right?" - Natasha, Dirtmitts (www.dirtmitts.com)

"A few years ago we drove several states away from our home in Texas to play at a private Art college. I don't know how we got on the show other than it was set up through a band we drove up there with, the now defunct Reverbarockets (who were really good). So, apparently this private art school full of pseudo-intellectuals have a once a year party/ fashion show. Somehow, we got on the bill. We were to go on right before the fashion show. As we loaded our equipment on stage ( good sized school auditorium) wanna-be model types got dressed up by wanna-be designer types and gave us looks of disdain. The stage was about 4 feet high and the art kids had constructed a big runway for the models to walk to down (sort of like an ugly Victoria's Secret commercial). After we tested our equipment a 'stage-manager' who was a couple of steps away from 'Hollywood' in those Mannequin movies, approached us and told us that under no circumstances were we to set foot on the precious runway. That's like giving someone a new porn tape and telling them that "under no circumstances are they allowed to jerk-off to it". Yeah, I'll just look at the tape for the acting.... Anyway, we played and tore the black velvet covering the runway to shreds. 'Hollywood' started hyperventilating and shrieking in that Hollywood way (I know you've all seen the damn movie). The crowd of about 250 art kids stared at us like we were from another planet and remained silent when we berated them. After we played and the models went on everyone went out to the outside campus area for some type of art student circle jerk. We were informed by 'Hollywood' that we had almost ruined the evening and we wouldn't be getting paid, and that we were a blight on humanity. After I talked my band mates out of murdering 'Hollywood', a terror was unleashed upon the students final projects...sculptures were broken, tables were smashed and clothing was doused in beer. Many paintings of minimalist abstract paintings were made all the more meaningful by now reading "I love the Riverboat Gamblers". Etchings of wildlife now had "Texas" scrawled across them. One of the Reverabarockets shit in a teacher's desk. It was beautiful. It more than made up for not getting paid. We may have destroyed the next Picasso's early work, but I think it's more likely we destroyed the next graphic artist for Vagisil's early work. They say that to this day the kids at that school still talk about "those asshole from Texas". - Teko, Riverboat Gamblers (www.beatville.com) 

"We played Sir Morgan's Cove, which is now the Lucky Dog in Worcester, with a bunch of hair metal bands. It went over very badly." Random Road Mother are one of the most truly beloved bands in Boston. The suburbs are a different story entirely. "Most of our worst shows were in Worcester. I got beat up there once. That was at the hair metal show." Dave laughs. " My band had pretty much ditched me, they went to find a strip club or something. The bartender loved us, so he had just been giving me free drinks all night. So finally I stumbled out of the place looking for the band. I found my guitar player, and I was yelling. Worcester sucks!' and it just so happened that the LLCool J concert just got out at the Centrum. I guess some guy wanted to display some civic pride, so he decided to kick my ass for saying that his city sucked. I don't blame him. So he got in a couple of punches, and I fell in the street, and as soon as I fell, our van pulled up and I jumped in. That was probably the worst gig." - Dave, Random Road Mother (www.roadmother.com) 

"So, as usual, we got to the club way too early to load in. I was kind of surprised to see some people already there and ready to Rock. Okay, well, there was a 30-something creepy guy staring at me over his beer and his mother, knitting an afghan, on the stool next to him. They stayed all night and didn't draw too much attention to themselves so I kind of just smiled to myself about the whole thing and shrugged it off. The next day the band got together to watch the videotape of the show. We noticed that when in fast forward, my creepy friend remains completely stationary in the middle of the screen while the world goes on around him... 3 hours... as the afghan grew and grew, "Bobby" never moved. I eventually got a phone call from my new fan. Over the sound of really big dogs barking, I recognized my voice in the background. He was talking about how great my CD was and how he wanted guitar lessons. Anyhow, we ended up playing our next show at the same club and Bobby was there early like before, his mother with her many bundles of yarn. He gave me some pink slippers that she made for me. They fit like a glove. Time passed and I got a few more calls, but I never saw the odd couple again... Well, I got a letter in the mail about a week ago. The return address was that of our local mental health complex. It explained how my little friend had been kidnapped and tortured by the police. They shot his dog. He was locked up. He wanted me to come visit, and he wrote me a song. "The sea gulls chased the dove away during the sunrise we made love all night," was one of the lines that struck me. It was disturbing in a cute sorta way- sorta. So last Friday night I stopped by County Psyche and left him a band T-shirt and letter to refresh his strange attraction to me, because everybody knows you need a creepy, stalker-guy fan in order to be any kind of legitimate Rockstar chick. Right?" - Binky Tunny (http://www.geocities.com/binkytunny/) 

"To be kicked from a support tour with a big band is no fun and The Scarecrows absolutely got bad luck and experience of that shit. We played a show in a pretty big Swedish town in '99 when the headlining band just had released their hit-single. We had 10-15 cool Swedish gigs to look forward to and after that a trip round Europe. But what can I say, we didn't behave. Both bands had played a successful gig and the party at the Hotel afterward got a little wild. I remember it started with both bands peeing in a big juice pitcher because we wanted to play a joke, putting it outside of the tour managers door and writing 'applejuice' on it. But the guy who carried it kinda dropped the whole thing in the lobby. Hmm, the pitcher was pretty big and the floor was covered with a very nice carpet which is not so very nice any more. The best thing bout the hotel was that there was no security awake. So the bar stood open for two already fucked-up bands. I remember we drank a lot of wine from the taps, but we wanted some stronger stuff so me and the guitarist from the other band made a break-in on the cocktail cabinet and stole lots of vodka- and whiskey-bottles and hid it in their drum cases. We thought we were smart and the hotel-personnel would never notice anything was gone. The morning after our room was strangely filled with water (PeeGee might had some fun in the shower or something) and all the booze was in the other bands cases. But they had left and we were still there to take the blame. Some days after we got a call from their manager, kicking us off the tour telling us we were too bad to have around, and the hotel sent us a pretty heavy invoice. Shit happens, but it was a hell-lotta fun!" - Manx, Scarecrows (http://www.torget.se/users/t/thecrows/) 

"We were playing in a club in a club on Melrose in August. There were these three Mexican chicks we were talking to that had some drugs. So, of course, we are gonna do the drugs. So we all get in the van and we are all doing drugs, and we turn around and one of the Mexican girls is totally going down on Pickle. I mean sucking his dick. The rest of us went in the club to tune up and that's when the drive by happened. They were shooting back and forth at each other on the corner of the club. 2 people got hit. A bullet went through our van's passenger side windshield, through the dash where the air bag is. Pickle got freaked out, but lived to tell about it none the less. Good thing we got the insurance on that rental van. We rocked, after the show cops were everywhere looking for shells. They checked our van and told us to go. We went and hung out with our friends in LA, and when we woke up in the morning we saw the bullet hole. It was pretty fucked up shit." - Abe Ruthless, Slash City Daggers (www.slashcitydaggers.com) 

"Once years ago, there was this girl who hung out at practices all the time. I told her that if she kept showing up we were gonna just chain her in the practice place and leave her there all the time. She got all excited and said she wanted me to chain her up. It was really ridiculous, but she kept at it. I told her I was broke and she would have to buy the chains. So we went to home depot, the big warehouse place, where our old guitar player Tom worked at. We got there and I told Tom, "I need some good chains to chain this girl up" and he couldn't believe it. And she was like, "Yeah! yeah!" and she picked out these hefty chains and a lock to go on it. So I was like, "Yeah, you better buy those, those look sturdy" and I'm all laughing and stuff. So she took em up to the counter and bought them. I was like "Ok, if that's what you want to do, I'm your man!" Tom was just laughing like we were a couple of crazy people. We were probably all high and drunk or just stupid because we were young and crazy. We went back to the practice place, I chained her up and we had a crazy fourth of July that I better not talk about...then she disappeared and I never saw her again. Years later I heard she was telling people I was this evil guy who chained her up and shit like that. I wish I knew where she was today. We had a lot of fun." - Gideon Smith, the Dixie Damned (www.smallstone.com) 

Don't Fuck With Johnny:
Deep inside the Lanternjack

"Sleep less and drink more wine..." - Milligram

Johnny Flash cares about two things. He care about his kicks, and he cares about his ROCK. And don't ask him about 'in what order'. Johnny Flash doesn't do order. "Dude, Got the Cracktorch", he recently wrote me. "Started listening to it on Sunday before rehearsal. Had eaten a small arsenal of pills the night before...I started drinking a gallon of cheap wine while it played. The wine was gone before I knew it but luckily my pill girl showed up. We drove to the bar afterwards while Cracktorch played in the car. I ended up in a shitty part of town, taking more pills and listening to Cracktorch. I passed out on a couch and woke up to a pit bull that wouldn't let me upstairs and I'm yelling 'Someone come get this fucking dog!'....So the dog bites me and I barely make it out. I'm still cooked out so I just have these guys drop me off at the bar around 2 pm...This girl shows up and we go and get another bottle of wine. I end up eating more pills and playing Cracktorch for her. I wake up on Tuesday morning and walk home with my Cracktorch CD... I find myself alive and call my friend 'cause I'm lookin for something to do. I take the Cracktorch CD over her house and play it while we drink some beer. I end up driving back Downriver and hooking up with some valium. After taking the pills, I listened to Cracktorch. At this point the entire week has become a blur and the only thing constant that I can remember is Cracktorch. Basically, Cracktorch is my new favorite band. I owe you big time for sending me that CD...I still haven't got the Little Beast out to you 'cause I've been trying to compile some shit that we've recorded to send you. I'll get it out. Dude, thanks for the CD...and tell them I really wanna hook up and play some shows....and drink some beer. Later man, J" 

When he's not in a full bore pill frenzy, Johnny Flash is the main man in The Lanternjack, Detroit's sleaze punk, fuck metal titans. Their self-released 2000 album, Hussy, was a flash fire of unrestrained charisma, cartoon violence, and slashing, dive bombing cock rock extravagance, the most convincing display of desperate glory whoring since 'Appetite For Destruction'. Genius in a plastic bottle, in other words. With a sound that stretches from the razorblade proto-punk of the Dead Boys to the glossy hard rock swagger of the Comatones and Gunfire Dance, the Lanternjack take the legacy of rock into their veins with an easy indulgence and spit it out in wall shaking, tits- out 2 minute anthems of gutter lust and outlaw pride. So why haven't you heard of them? Because they're broke, crazy, and from the wrong side of the tracks. But with a new album in the works and an ever widening spiral of apocalyptic live shows, they are on the verge of becoming, if not a household name, then an instantly recognizable wanted poster at post offices everywhere. You want blood? You got it. Ladies and gentleman, the most dangerous band in the world, straight out of Motor City - The Lanternjack. Join the party, or run for cover.

I call Johnny at 2 PM one Saturday in October. "Dude, this is the earliest I've been up since 8th grade", he tells me. Being Johnny Flash, it seems, is a full time job. "Hopefully not", he sighs. "You know we get ten cents for every bottle out here?" Welcome to the Lanternjack twelve step program. "I pass these guys on their ten speeds, and they're like 45-50, with long hair, and they've got a plastic bag full of 40 ouncers that they're taking back to the liquor store. They're on their bikes because they lost their licenses thirty years ago. I don't want to be that fucking guy." Yet the rock must roll on, so Johnny has devised a plan for rock star longevity- short bursts of sobriety. "If you go a week and a half straight drinking, then you're not having a good time, you're just maintaining", he says. "I know when my synapses aren't firing right, and I know I'm not a dumb guy, so when I start talking or thinking like a dumb guy, I know it's time to eat some algae and drink some juice, to go out and get an oil change." Turns out, I've managed to catch Johnny during one of these rare dry times. "I like to take a break once in awhile. Like right now- I'm on the wagon. I'm doing Vicodan instead of drinking." Only in rock and roll would a class C narcotic haze pass for sobriety. "It's only for a week", he assures me. "For the liver, you know." Mr. Flash's voice is deep and low, his throat like some cactus-choked desert that the words barely escape from, but he talks like a winner, like a bulletproof poet with a jaundiced, battle hardened sense of humor. Which is easy to do when you're the leader of a band that simply cannot be out-rocked. "I really don't think anybody can", he says with authority. "Arrogantly enough, I don't think it ever happened. I mean, we might have been out-rocked playing wise, because we were too fucked up, but then our performance would have been above and beyond, because I probably fell down on my face, or something."

The Erotic Adventures of Frankenstein

"Everybody hates us", Johnny readily admits. "I have no idea why." Theories do abound, though. "A bunch of shit went down, but this was a long time ago. And all these rumors circulated over time, like in high school, you know? Rumors that were basically about me knifing somebody." 'So', I ask him, 'did you knife anybody, Johnny?' He laughs. "No. No, I didn't." When pressed for further details, he paints the bloody picture. "We played this bar on the East side of Detroit. It's right on the edge of Grosse Point, which is this really wealthy neighborhood, but it's right next to the ghetto. It's really weird. I had a lot of wine. I drank a gallon of Carlo Rossi before the show. I was like Tony Clifton in drag", he deadpans. "Anyway, apparently I got too close to some guy's girlfriend or some shit, and I didn't realize it until later, until I watched a videotape of the show, but these guys were throwing these big motherfucking thick beer glasses right at me, but the music was so loud, it was breaking off the walls. So that one dude, he came around to the corner of the stage, and he got in a good pitch right at my head. He got me, right in the eye. That busted my face open. But we kept going, you know." Of course. "They shut the bar down, shut the power down, called the cops, and all these ambulances showed up. Because apparently- see, I didn't know why the ambulances showed up." 'Maybe', I offer, 'It's because you were bleeding to death.' "Right. But there was this other dude, I guess, who tried to stop the guy that threw the glass on his way out, you know, trying to play the hero. So the dude that broke the glass, he just grabbed a bottle, and broke it over this dude's head. So, he Frankensteined him, too. We got blamed for starting a riot, and after that, no one wanted to book us." Ever the optimist, Johnny finds a spin even in this freakshow. "Yeah well, there's a good and bad to everything. Paying for that show was the best thousand dollars I ever spent, because everybody knew who we were in a week." But before that, there was this, a simple conceit - what if we formed a band, and we just rocked harder than everybody else? That would be cool, wouldn't it? Sure it would, but you can't be a werewolf without getting bitten first. "I played in a band for about 5 years, from the time I was 14 until I was 19, and that band was really bad. We actually put out a 7 inch or some crap on a Chicago label." The band? "It was called Yellow No. 5, and there's probably 20 of them out there now, but at the time it was an original name. But it was just a drunken mess, it was like if Love Battery couldn't keep their shit together, it was like two guitarists and bass player, and we were all soloing the whole time. It was fun, though." After that, Johnny spent a few years in the basement with an 8 track. "I didn't have anyone else to play with", he explains, "so I just recorded everything myself." The results of the Johnny Flash solo project? "Mud. It sounded like psychedelic mud." Soon after, Johnny finally found some players that were hurling towards a similar destiny. "I got the guitarist(Vivian Camaro), he's a friend of mine that came back from Chicago, he was the only one that could play the songs. I give him the solos. That's his jerk-off time." The back end comes courtesy Larry Lava on bass, and of course, the secret super villain Holy Goat on drums. "He was working at a costume shop at the time, and got a goat mask. I have no idea why or how it stuck, I don't know what we were thinking, but it stuck." You've got to wonder, though- doesn't he ever show up at practice and say, 'look, I don't want to wear the fucking goat mask?' "No. No, he doesn't." Johnny laughs. " He's good with that. We've done a lot of work on the mask, so it's well ventilated. It's really hard to see out of that mask, so when he's at home, he practices with his eyes shut." The early days of the Lanternjack found the rest of the band in equally extravagant states of dress. Think early NewYork Dolls, and shudder appropriately. "Our first show ever, we played at a community center. We had this big bass player back then, he dressed up as 'Maude'. I don't know how I was dressed, but it probably wasn't much better." The cross-dressing, he explains, was largely the results of desperate geography. "Detroit is such a hard fuckin' sell. At the time we got together, (1998) no one was playing rock and roll, except for the Trash Brats and Queen Bee. There was no way to get people's attention, it was so un-cool to be playing rock, that it was the only way to get people to look at us. It's toned down a little, because we were like, completely in drag before, and it got to be a pain in the ass, because you're drinking, you want to hang out, and you've got to put fuckin' lipstick on. So, that got old fast. Now we want to strip it down even more. I don't want to worry about what shirt I'm wearing when it's time to rock." The band's name even reflected the bait-and-switch of men in dresses. "There was this old, old dictionary that my dad had from the 1800's that got passed down", Johnny tells me. I got it from that. It's an old nautical term. It's a trick. Like if someone sees swamp gas, and they think it's a ghost, they got Lanternjacked."

Let Me Show You How It's Done

"I'm not going to name any names, but I went to a 'Rock' concert a couple of months ago, with two well known bands, and there's this guy screaming about 'Rock and Roll ain't dead!' and he's ripping on boy-bands, you know, all this 'processed, choreographed bullshit', and blah, blah blah. And they're up there drinking their mineral water, and I swear to God, the two guitarists knew, on the exact note, when to jump up on the risers. They jumped up on these fucking boxes, and I'm like, 'Wait a minute, this asshole's complaining about this choreographed stuff, and it was just as choreographed as anything else. When he was talking in between songs, he had a dialogue written out, because the sound guy knew when to put delay on his voice. And I like the damn band, but it's bullshit, dude." The Lanterjack has a problem with phony rock and roll, and phony rock and rollers, from power tripping Space Lords to their own copy catters in Detroit. "You go to these shows, and there's 10 bands playing together. And the reason that they're all playing together is that they're safe behind the veil of mediocrity. You get ten bands together, they all have 30 friends, and the place is packed, right? Everybody's happy. Well, I'm not happy." The Lanternjack are one of those dying breeds of bands that actually believe that rock requires danger, fire, passion and pain to make it work. "A lot of the guys playing in bands these days are like tourists. They get off stage, and they're designing a building, or something. They go home and play Playstation, have some pie and talk about how good the show was, and that's just like, whatever, man." Without a lick or a promise of scenester credibility, the Lanternjack forged ahead on their own terms. Early results were not pleasant. 

"We went through a time when we were playing in basements in Ypsi and Ann Arbor, and it was... it was bad", he says. "I remember we played with bands that used like, Atari video consoles. Ann Arbor art-rock bands, because we couldn't get a show at first." As time went on, however, the band began honing their live attack into the unruly beast that it's become, and the crowds, for better or worse, started showing up. "There's people in the indie rock scene that 'get it' that come to the shows, and then there's the beer guzzling derelicts that I grew up with from down in the sticks, so it's a really big clash", he explains. " So that's why some people have deemed as un-cool, or whatever, because there's not 150 mod guys hanging out with their 150 mod girlfriends, because that's what the scene is like here. Everybody has their uniform. You go to an indie rock show, everybody's dressed like Clark Kent. You got to a garage rock show, and everybody's dressed like the Fonz. And it's safe for them, nothing's coming in, nothing's coming out." The Lanternjack have sought to shake up this complacency with the two things they do best- rip snorting rock, and psychopathic behavior. "I don't know", he says, when I ask him if there's any set vision to the Lanternjack live experience. "It's just drunkeness, really." He cites some typical moments. "I don't know if they were just going with the show or what, but I've had a couple chicks just smack me right in the nuts." He laughs. "Once I was wearing this necklace. It was pretty much like that army dog tags shit, and this chick just grabbed it from the back of my neck and just twisted it, so that it was choking me, and she just dragged me across the stage. Dude, pretty much any chick can kick my ass. I think that's one of the reasons that I really haven't got my ass kicked yet, because guys look at me, and they just go, 'whatever, dude." I ask him if his on stage persona as crazed sex god has resulted in any stalker fans. "We've had some chicks that were on the verge of that, yeah, but luckily they didn't know where we lived, so they couldn't come over and boil our dogs, or anything." There have been some incidents, however, when it wasn't so fun to be Johnny Flash. " A lot of times you get fucked up, and you start fucking with people, and you don't always recognize the people in the crowd. Lately, it's been getting a little fucked up, because I'll go to the bar, and some guy will start a fight with me, and I don't even know him. But he knows who I am, you know what I mean?" Right. You're the loudmouth with the microphone who was just threatening to kill him on stage. "I think it's their problem if they can't separate the two", he says. "If I'm at the bar to get a drink, I'm getting a drink. I don't have on fucking Rockabilly gear, I'm not looking for a fight." The confrontational aspect of the Lanternjack, then, is a performance. "Exactly. And a lot of these meatheads can't tell the difference." Not only that, but like bull fighting fans, the Lanternjack faithful now expect a little frenzied violence with their rock. "Recently, there's been a couple of shows where I was too hungover from the night before, so I just stood there, and I think people came away disappointed because they wanted to see a car crash, and all they got was a fender bender." Regardless of the damage done on any given night, the Lanternjack show is a pulse- pounder, and Johnny hopes to spread the band's tendrils outside of Detroit soon. "We've stayed mostly in the midwest so far", he tells me. " I don't see the point in playing in Kansas City, say, and then turning around and driving back home. They'll just forget you in a month, it's like wasted time. I'd rather take it over, you know, take over all the neighboring cities so that everybody knows who you are. Then you're building a foundation. If you're playing New York, then you're playing Kansas City, then playing Miami- it just doesn't work." The Lanternjack, then, are more Napoleon - like in their approach to the rock. "Exactly. Just like Napoleon. You can't take over Canada from Detroit, man. You've got spread it out." 

There is No Such Thing as Free Porn

What did the funeral guy from Slacker say? 'I may live badly, but at least I don't have to work to do it.' Well, that pioneering spirit lives on in Johnny Flash. "The other guys have jobs. I'm kind of the bottom feeder", he laughs. "I'm always scrounging around. I used to drive a truck, but after awhile, I'd get home and I'd be so tired I didn't want to go anywhere. And then I got to the point where I didn't want to write, and I was just like, 'You know what? I'd rather be broke.' I haven't worked for about a year, but I get by." The follow-up to 'Hussy', then, will not be produced from money sweat and bled from the fingers of the Flash, but from some powerful outside source with pockets full of green, and an unwavering faith in the Lanternjack's Super Rock. At least, that's the plan. "We were hoping to have somebody finance the record", Johnny explains. "Of course, we were hoping that awhile ago, so I've just been writing and writing. We've got 20 new songs. We only play 2 songs from 'Hussy' live, because in my opinion, the songs have gotten so much better. So, I want to do it, but I don't want to take the local approach, I don't want to be driving around to record stores consigning records, because I think the songs are too good, and I think somebody ought to come here and give us a million dollars to record them."

I think so too. After about 30 seconds of the burning, Hell-bound riff of the Lanternjack's signature 'I Got Life', I was on the phone to friends and loved ones, babbling about the greatest rock and roll band in America. Turns out, I was the first one, outside of Detroit. How did this happen? Junk Records, Sal from Electric Frankenstein, Jeff fuckin' Bale- where were you guys? "We don't know anybody", Johnny sighs. "We'd like to, though. But I swear to god, I don't keep up with the scene, so I don't know who's who or what's what at all." Location seems to play into this rock and roll situation, as well. "People that are in these so called rock bands around here, if they're from, say, the Northern suburbs, they can form any kind of shitty band, and everybody knows about them in a week, because the press is all over them. But us? Nobody cares, nobody writes about us, because we're from Downriver." Downriver, as another Detroit rock star recently told me, is the "Sleazy part of an already sleazy city". Perfect for a band of criminal savages like the Lanternjack to hide out in. Not so perfect for launching a career. "If it sounds seedy, that's because it is", Johnny admits. "The press hate it. I used to say, yeah, I'm from Downriver", he drawls, sounding embarrassed, "But now I'm like, yeah, I'm from Downriver.. asshole. But, it's hard to get out of here, man. Nobody gets out of here." So that's the key to the Lanternjack's baffling obscurity. Nobody comes to visit them in the ghetto. "Yeah, so I don't know what's going on, I don't keep up with the scene, I don't know any of the new bands. When I started this band, I had to stop listening to everything for awhile, just to get a new perspective on things. Which actually turned out to be an old perspective."

The Lanternjack sound, the napalm thunder and bad craziness, turns out to have ancient territorial roots, but not the ones you expect. "There was this old band from Ann Arbor called Jacks. They weren't rock and roll at all, they were more like the Birthday Party. I really got into them, the dissonant notes, or whatever. So, I'd say it's a cross between Jacks and the Cult. Every review I read in Detroit always says Stooges, Stooges, Stooges. But I listen to our fuckin' record, and I go, 'ok, I'm going to find some Stooges in here', and I really can't. But people keep pegging us with that." Half-assed rock journalist rule number 1: Name drop the Stooges and the MC5 every chance that you get, even if the band sounds nothing like either of them. It gets the chicks. "The newer stuff sounds, to me, like a heavy metal Doors", Johnny says. "If I'm going to rip somebody off, I'd rather just rip off one of my old songs." That's the part of the story that gets swallowed up in a flurry of goat killing and crowd baiting- the songs of Johnny Flash. Feral little things, with snapping teeth and blinding claws. Rock and Roll with the leash snapped off. "Everybody's attention span is so short these days", Johnny says. "Everybody's got ADD now, for whatever reason- drugs, television- so why would you bore them with the same chord over and over?" He's explaining his song writing philosophy, the careful construction of a sloppy science. "People can't wait ten minutes for an oil change, they're not going to sit though a 4 minute song." Lanternjack songs are direct hits, rabbit punches to the brain that do unto others, then split. "That's what it boils down to", Johnny says. "Everybody else sound like...pussies, for lack of a better term." The brevity of the songs is one of the band's signatures. Another is the sin driving, outlaw anthem lyrics. "They're about booze and sex, basically", he explains. "But I've been venturing out in the new shit. I've been going back to a little more of the writing aspect. I'm not going to say the word 'poetry', but some of the lyrics are more of a story. Most of them are as dirty as the old ones, though." If even half of them are auto-biographical, then Johnny is a man both blessed and cursed in equal measure. "Oh, they all are", he admits. "I never understood people that make up stories, like 'Jack and Diane', you know? 'I went out and ran over a kid in my car'- well, I know you didn't", he laughs. "Because then you'd be in jail, not singing songs, so what the fuck are you talking about? If people are writing songs about something they made up, it's because they don't have their own stories. It goes back to the Playstation thing. They spent too much time playing video games, and not enough time living their lives."

Don't be like those chumps, brothers and sisters. Join the Lanternjack's Super Rock revolution, and live a little. (www.thelanternjack.com) 


Sleazegrinder's Top Ten

Nixon Now "Solution Revolution" (www.nixonnow.com) Not since Thee Hypnotics has a band tunneled so deeply into the poisoned guts of the Stooges and emerged napalm scarred but victorious.

Boogie Man - demo (www.boogieman.nu) Like some dark and hoary hybrid of Roadsaw and Soundgarden (and no, smart- ass, they're not the same thing) Sweden's Boogie Man play galloping stoner-grunge anthems that manage to sound suicidal and heroic all at once.

Jack the Hot Rod  "500" (www.jackthehotrod.com) The revenge of Seattle rock has begun with Jack's insanely catchy, flash rocking power pop. That's right, motherfucker, they sound like Urge Overkill.

The Accident- S/T (www.the-accident.com) Bloody knuckled trucker metal by a bunch of bad asses in Venom t-shirts. Like Fu Manchu, all their songs are about cars. I think 'Riding Shotgun' might have a whole different meaning to the Accident, though. 

Dog Leg Preacher - S/T (www.screamingskunk.com) Hands down, the greatest band name I've ever heard. Dog Leg Preacher play street metal that' s so rooted in the 80's I want to pull out the fingerless gloves and protest the Cold War. Did I mention they're bikers? Goddamn, these cats are cool.

Gideon Smith and the Dixie Damned "Southern Gentlemen" (www.smallstone.com) Halfway To Gone? Gid and the boys are All The Way Gone, baby. A southern fried hammer -down orgy of dusty, sun baked grooves and low down stoner rock riffs.

The Brought Low - S/T (www.teepeerecords.com ) Mother Love Bone lives, sort of, in this stellar band of New York hard rockers. Equal parts Black Crowes slink and druggy, glammy grunge. This is pretty fuckin' close to the best record of the year. In my universe, anyway.

The Monoxides "The Free Release of Energy" (http://monoxides.tripod.com) Yet another bunch of Canadians obsessed with Grand Funk, Monoxides play 70's fuzz rawk laced with thundering Thin Lizzy riffs and the kind of soaring, arena rock vocal harmonies that previously, only Raging Slab could handle. The only reason that this album couldn't have been made in 1974 is because none of the Monoxides were born yet.

Scissorfight "Mantrapping for Sport and Profit" (www.tortugarecordings.com) Good lord. Every song on this record seems calculated to drive the listener into a fist fighting, coke snorting, ass fucking frenzy. Although they sound more like ZZ Top with every record, this is still a monstrous beast of punk-choked redneck metal. Every copy should come with a prescription to Valium. You'll need it.

Trash Can Darlings "Gore Gore Boys and Splatter Pussies" (www.trashcandarlings.com) I swear to God, I just found the next Dogs D'Amour. Sweden's finest gang of drunken gypsies. 

Next Issue: More rock, I imagine. War, she's a whore - Sleazegrinder 11.01