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Some of us are rock dudes. Some of us are pop-people. Like Stacey, the beautiful bride of Sleazegrinder, for example. She’s a pop person. Power-pop, to be specific. She’s got  a pretty face and a slender waist. She likes to dance,  and she has long, curly hair that bounces when she laughs. Me? I  have none of these things. I am heavier and hairier in all the wrong places, prone to despair, panic, and grandiose thoughts. I strangle every urge to drink, smoke, fight, run-riot, party-til-I-puke. I wear my scars like medals. I still believe used leather is the height of fashion, and I do not believe in tears. I’m a rock dude, through and through. I may be envious of the pop people, but I could never be one. I dream in knife fights and motorcycle crashes, not quirky romance and rainy afternoons. And that’s cool, really. The two tribes have learned to coexist over the years, even cohabitate. Sometimes, there’s even assimilation. Or crossover. Who doesn’t like Material Issue? Or the Replacements? But even in that hazy gray area, deep down, you know that Material Issue were a pop band, and the ‘Mats were rock dudes. Sweaty, drunken louts. You ever smell those guys? The Replacements Stink, indeed.

So it went for decades, with pop on one side, and rock on the other. And then, in 1988, one band decided they were gonna be both. They called themselves Dear Mr. President. And they were fucking crazy.

The band formed in 1986 from the ashes of several Portland, Oregon based hard rock bands, including Bang Bang and the pre-Black and Blue melodi-rockers Moviestar. Vocalist Julian Raymond named the band, reportedly, after a Leif Garrett painting that deeply disturbed him. Not a painting of the troubled former child star, but one by him. Why not? The band bought headbands and wrote songs, and just a year later, they signed to Atlantic records. Their debut album, released a year later, was produced by Mick Jones. Not the cool one with the tombstone teeth and the beatbox. The other one. The one in Foreigner.

The Dear Mr. President album is one of the strangest artifacts of the flash metal era, for more reasons than one. Unlike the majority of their Bacchanalian brothers-in-rock, Dear Mr. President had no use for parties or good-times or girls with legs up to there. No, Dear Mr. President were angry. Their lyrics were stark, haunting, apocalyptic. They told stories of murder and mayhem and injustice and terror in the cities, in the streets, the pollution of mind and body, the desecration of souls, and the despondency of spirit. They rattled cages, raged against the machine, screamed at walls.

Well, maybe not screamed. You see, despite the revolution-metal trappings, Dear Mr. President was a pop band. There were flashes of hard rock guitar in spots, and perhaps a rousing wolf-dog howl here and there, but for the most part, their rock was a feather-light, with a dance-ability that seemed almost defiant when bubbling under lines like :“Looking over the ocean/I get aroused by a loaded gun” or “Take a walk down your street/See the hungry and weak/Get beaten on/As violence rages on”. It’s fairly maddening. Imagine if Kory Clarke fired the rest of Warrior Soul and hired Duran Duran for his backing band. That’s Dear Mr. President.

The album had barely hit the shelves in 1988 before it was recalled. Apparently the White House decided the name was theirs, and you just can’t argue with a Bush. Even politically charged pop-rock bands know that. The band changed their name to Flesh and Blood and Atlantic re-released the album, but by then, the momentum was lost. The album fizzled, and the band split before they could record a follow-up. Frontman Raymond decided to abandon the angry young man shtick and sign up with The Man, eventually becoming a high-level A&R man at Hollywood records and elsewhere.  The rest of the fellas trudged on in various rock n’ roll capacities. And that’s just how it went.

Now, in some eyes, the Julian Raymond transformation might seem ludicrous. Like the worst kind of ideals-shredding sell-out. And if Raymond was a rock dude, that would be true. Can you imagine Kory Clarke or Ian Astbury taking a corner office? But he was not a rock dude, he was a pop dude. And pop dudes can do whatever the fuck they want, as long as pretty girls can dance to it.

Which leads us, inevitably, back to the music. While its interior is dappled with lite-funk and goth-pop and bubbly synths, the Dear Mr President album still contains two of the most compelling tracks of the era. By design or accident, they open and close the album.

The first is lead-off track “Daddy, Have You Ever Been Arrested?” Raymond is in full-blown sleaze-slink mode here, questioning his father’s motives and violent actions over spurts of Sigue-Sigue future-billy guitar and funereal washes of brooding Dracula-synths. The break is pure Cult, the beat is dangerous, and the effect is sly, knowing, and full of menace. It’s 80’s rock for sure, but it’s very good 80’s rock, which is rarer than you think.

At the complete opposite end of the spectrum is closer “Who Killed Santa Claus?”, a short, disturbing bit of pitch-black ghost-pop based on the true-life case of Eli Creekmore, a three year old from Washington who died from ruptured intestines after his father repeatedly kicked him in the stomach. Suddenly it becomes clear why Raymond was so interested in knowing whether daddy was ever arrested. It also becomes clear that there’s a lot more to this album than bad vibes and a beat you can bop to. It is a deep and troubling narrative about the powerless and the damned. And with some muscle behind its groove, perhaps it could have shook mountains.

But it didn’t. Dear Mr. President's uneasy mix of rock notions and pop songs failed to ignite many hearts and minds, and they remain a mere smudge in the vast tapestry of flash metal history. A scant few copies still float around in dusty vinyl shops around the world, however, and while it will do nothing for the more rabid ‘eadbangers among us, those with more adventurous tastes may find some tasty morsels within. Who knows, maybe your girlfriend will like it.

In the meantime, here are Dear Mr. President’s most notable tracks for your edification. And, while I’m here, might I pass on Mr. Raymond’s final message?

“Hey…love is still the answer. Let’s get it together.”

Yeah, man. Let’s.

-Sleazegrinder

Download: Daddy,_Have_You_Ever_Been_Arrested?

Download: Who_Killed_Santa_Claus?