LOGICAL NONSENSE

Logical Nonsense - 1999

ELDOPA (1332)

ElDopa (1332) - full set from the 2006 December Bastards B-day Bash, which took place in January of 2007 at the Chop Shop (West Oakland). We did two B-day Bash shows that year because of a scheduling conflict with Gilman’s 20th Anniversary weekend the month before. Happy birthday to all the December Bastards out there!

GRIMPLE

GRIMPLE at Ashkenaz in Berkeley, California circa 1999.  Photo by Sam Bortnick

OJOROJO

Ojorojo instrumental track from their split with Inflicted.  Ojorojo was an offshoot of a short lived band called Cancer Alley, that featured ex-members of Grimple, Econochrist, Animal Farm, and Multi Facet.  They released a full length on East Bay Menace in the late nineties, toured, contributed some tracks to the "Shit Gets Smashed" comp, and lastly there was the split with Inflicted.  The members of Ojorojo wasted little time before moving on to other projects.  Mark and Ira went on tour with a reformed Grimple, and then shortly after that we introduced Ira to our buddy Greg and those two went on to do a band called Brainoil with Nate Destroy.  Grant's new band was Talk Is Poison with Brian from Dead & Gone, Jim from Black Fork, and Will from Copout.  Jon went on to play in a band called Pig Iron with ex-members of Grinch and Fuckface.  Jenean was, for a very shot period of time, the lead screamer for Murder Takes No Holiday, which featured ex-members of Eldopa.  Ah, the East Bay in the late nineties.

GRIMPLE

Grimple...and Ojorojo rhythm section.  This was taken back in 1999 at "Bike For Beers" in San Jose, California by Murray Bowles.

POCOS PERO LOCOS

It wasn't that long ago that finding videos of GRIMPLE performing live in the early nineties online seemed nearly impossible.  I remember scanning the lists of many a video trader way back in the AOL days of the internet and only seeing one, that being a reunion show the band played at a memorial/benefit show for a friend (Lucky Dog) who passed away in the late nineties.  The video of that performance, if you could track a copy down, was always a second or third generation copy (best case scenario).  In spite of the grainy quality and less than optimum sound quality, that video really captured what was the stand out performance of a stacked bill that also featured sets from ELDOPA(1332), FILTH, and EXODUS.

A few years after tracking down that grainy copy of the GRIMPLE reunion at Lucky Dog's memorial show, I came across a second video from that same night, shot from a different (better) angle.  A friend of mine - Carlos Antagony - had master copies of both GRIMPLE and ELDOPA's set, the quality of which blew everything else away.  To make a long story short, Carlos and I edited the GRIMPLE set down to include on a GRIMPLE discography CD that I was going to release on my label at the time, but when members of the band mentioned wanting both Vinyl reissues, as well as a CD containing the first LP, 7" EP, and some unreleased songs, we passed the project along to Prank Records.  Prank Records was a much more established label, with superior distribution, and of course its owner Ken Sanderson had drawn the cover art for the band's first LP - "Up Your Ass".  We gave Ken everything we had at the time, including the video, which was supposed to appear on the Prank version of the CD reissue, but even though it's listed on the CD insert, the video is nowhere to be found.  You can probably chalk up the videos omission to excessive cost or perhaps the limitations of technology at the time, but till this day very few people have ever seen a good quality version of what the band's guitar player Greg told me was the best set GRIMPLE ever played.

More recently, Dan Hashthrash from KillThatCat.com has tracked down and posted two different videos featuring live performances from GRIMPLE during the "Up Your Ass" era at 924 Gilman.  What makes these videos interesting to me is the way the band mixes in songs from the first 7" with songs from the "Up Your Ass" LP, then they'll throw in a song or two from their considerably more metal influenced split with LOGICAL NONSENSE, before returning once more to the melodic thrash of their earlier releases, after a quick spoken word or freestyle rap by lead vocalist Pat Vigil of course.

Update from Ken at Prank Records: 'Met with Pat Grimple this week, and we are finally going to start rolling the ball on the Split LP and Re-issuing "Up Your ass". Kinda thinking the Split remastered with a gatefold sleeve and the 1st LP as a picture disc.  Fall....'

WORD SALAD

One of my favorite bands - WORD SALAD - played a reunion show at 924 Gilman in 2007, and luckily there was a video camera or two present to capture the moment.  This video in particular was shot by Dan Hashthrash / killthatcat.com

The WORD SALAD reunion shows that took place in the Bay Area back in 2007 came about because, going all the way back to 2001-2002, I was like a broken record when it came to asking these guys (mainly Jase and Sonny) to reunite the band for some huge shows I had in the works.  Both guys were in WATCH THEM DIE, a band I worked closely with, so at some point it was like open season when it came to pestering everyone about reuniting their former band.  Finally in 2007, Jase called me from Los Angeles and to my surprise he informed me that WORD SALAD was finally ready to play some reunion shows in California.  Stoked, I immediately booked them on a show I had on the calendar at 924 Gilman in Berkeley, then I called Scott Alcoholocaust who helped to nail down a second show in The City, and...the rest is history.  Don't forget that today's Throwback Thursday post was brought to you by the letter B, which stands for many things, but most of all it stands for beer!

GRIMPLE

For today's Flashback Friday post we have some shots from 1999 of GRIMPLE playing Bike For Beers in San Jose, CA.  All photos by Murray Bowles

RORSCHACH

On September 16th, RORSCHACH (NJ) is playing a show at 924 Gilman with BRAINOIL, NO STATIK, and NEEDLES. Advance tickets are available now at brownpapertickets.com.

BRAINOIL's first album in eight years is currently streaming on the 20 Buck Spin website for free!