Sylvain Sylvain, 1951-2021: The Teenage News Checks Out

AN APPRECIATION BY TIM STEGALL

The current issue of Ugly Things contains a heartfelt tribute from Tim Stegall to New York Dolls guitarist Syl Sylvain, written in January after his passing. It unfortunately contained a factual error that could not be verified at the time of writing, pertaining to his birth name. The family and their representatives have confirmed his full name was Sylvain Sylvain Mizrahi. We apologize for any emotional distress and inconvenience this has caused the family. Here is the full obituary, corrected.

PARDON ME if I’m sentimental when we say goodbye. Don’t be angry with me should I cry. It ain’t often the likes of a Sylvain Sylvain—born Sylvain Sylvain Mizrahi in Cairo, Egypt, Valentine’s Day 1951—comes along. Which means when someone like Syl exits—as he did January 13 this year, following two years battling cancer—this big boppin’ world feels a whole lot emptier.

Of course, you can’t write about Syl without writing about the New York Dolls.

In 1980, Lester Bangs—the one rock critic (then) alive who wrote verbal rock ‘n’ roll—spent a benzadrine’d weekend pounding out Blondie, a quickie bio of New York punk’s first superstars. Published by Simon & Schuster’s rock division, Delilah, the thin book likely paid Lester’s rent for a couple of months. As with even Lester’s most crass efforts (as this surely was), there were flashes of genius. Such as the chapter “In Which Yet Another Pompous Blowhard Purports to Possess the True Meaning of Punk Rock,” the best three page summary yet written of punk—musically, culturally, aesthetically.

Which meant at least three or four of those paragraphs were some of the best writing ever about the New York Dolls.

“They might have taken some cues from the Stooges,” noted the pride of El Cajon, California, “but who they really wanted to be was an American garage band Rolling Stones. And that’s exactly what they were. Everything about them was pure outrage. And too live for the time — ‘72-3-4 mostly. They set New York on fire, but the rest of the country wasn’t ready for it.

“I was talking to a guitarist friend, and the subject of the Dolls came up.

“‘God,’ she said, ‘the first time they were on TV, we just couldn’t believe it, that anybody that shitty would be allowed to do that! How did they get away with it?’

“I felt like throwing her out of my house. They didn’t ‘get away’ with anything. They did what they could and what they wanted to do and out of the chaos emerged something magnificent, something that was so literally explosive with energy and joy and madness that it could not be held down by all your RULES of how this is supposed to be done! Because none of them are valid! Rock ‘n’ roll is about BREAKING the form, not ‘working within it.’ GIVE US SOME EQUAL TIME! Let the kid behind the wheel.”

I can remember one of those moments the Dolls were “lookin’ fine on television.” September 13, 1973, the day after my seventh birthday. Mom and Dad were at the Friday night kicker dance at the local VFW hall, in the tiny town where I grew up, Bishop, Texas. My teenage babysitter let me stay up with her to watch The Midnight Special, NBC’s popular televisual rock showcase of the age. It was always fun, especially when glitter rockers like Alice Cooper might appear, or old Fifties dudes like Little Richard.

I can’t remember who else appeared that night. But I remember the New York Dolls. I remembered them seven years later, when I picked up bargain bin copies of their Mercury albums after reading Sex Pistols interviews where the only bands they praised were the Dolls and the Stooges. I got it, the moment I heard “Personality Crisis.” There was the delinquent energy and the snot and venom I heard in the Pistols. And Johnny Thunders’ grimy guitar roar was clearly the square root of Steve Jones.

Then I realized this was that band that got me in trouble the day after that Midnight Special episode. I wandered into the kitchen as Mom washed dishes, wondering about this word my babysitter snarled at the TV screen as this band played.

“Mommy, what’s a faggot?”

I don’t think I’ve forgotten how nasty Palmolive tastes since.

Nor, as stated above, have I forgotten what I saw that night with my babysitter. (Mind you, the clip is easily viewable on YouTube.) Maybe two minutes prior to the opening credits, Thunders ignited the opening guitar riff to “Personality Crisis” with a baby doll strapped to his back, all swagger, stacked heels and ultra-teased hair. David Johansen strutted like a Max Factor-ed Mick Jagger. Syl Sylvain and his Flying V guitar pirouetted in matching leopard trousers and oversized bow tie. The kids in the front row appeared shell shocked, save for two girls bopping at the stage’s lip.

Those cross legged James Taylor fans would never get it. The New York Dolls reinvented the ‘70s in that moment. What those boys on the floor didn’t know, those little girls did understand….

What nobody got then was how there’d have never been a New York Dolls without that bopping imp in the leopard spandex, with the corkscrew curls and that Flying V. Yeah, Johnny Thunders had the star power, charisma and raunchy guitar ethic that every future punk guitarist copied wholesale. But it was Sylvain Sylvain who taught Johnny how to do it.

“Basically, what we wanted out of music was something simple, powerful and sexy, topped with a hook that would just drive you crazy,” Sylvain told me in 1997, in an interview that ran in New York Dolls oral history “Doll Parts” for Guitar World magazine eight years later, as the band first reunited. “The Dolls’ music was mostly derived from ripping off the Rolling Stones and Eddie Cochran. We didn’t invent [the power chord], but we perfected it, and it became the punk sound. Instead of holding all six strings, you’re holding only two. But when you hit it hard and you’ve got your amp up loud, that’s what gives you the power. I showed that to Johnny, and I swear to God, he took that to the hilt. And that’s how we came up with every other song. ‘Chatterbox’ and the beginning of ‘Human Being’ were all power chords. It gave Johnny a brand-new invention. Of course, Marc Bolan [of T. Rex] used it and so did James Williamson from the Stooges.”

Syl Sylvain taught the Dolls all their dirty tricks. The name was his, derived from a walk past the New York Doll Hospital at 787 Lexington Ave while on lunch break at late Sixties Manhattan clothing shop Different Drum. Upon returning from a European business trip on behalf of his and original Dolls drummer Billy Murcia’s Truth & Soul clothing business, he found Thunders, Murcia, and bassist Arthur Kane rehearsing under the name that was his brainchild. Singing: Someone Syl’s pal Rodrigo Solomon introduced to him, David Johansen.

Management and Mercury seized upon Johansen and Thunders as the Dolls’ power duo. Producers were instructed to pay attention to them, downplaying crucial Sylvain compositions like “Trash” or the second album’s “Puss ‘n’ Boots.” But can you imagine either New York Dolls or Too Much Too Soon without them? And few get that Syl shared lead duties with Thunders on things like “Vietnamese Baby” and “Jet Boy.” He was a little bluesier, a little cleaner than his flashier friend. Later Sylvain classics like “Teenage News” became critical to the band’s Red Patent Leather endgame, before getting disseminated between David Johansen’s and Sylvain’s own solo records.

Now listen to Syl’s records. The Dolls’ mix of ‘50s rock ‘n’ roll, girl groups, and Stonesy raunch? That remained the core of solo Syl. He was the Dolls’ heart and soul.

I came to understand this as I got to know him the last 30-some-odd years of his life. I first met him and classic Dolls drummer Jerry Nolan on my first trip to NYC in 1988. They’d reunited under the name the Ugly Americans, playing a weekly residency at East Village raunch ‘n’ roll palace the Continental Club on Friday nights. It was the closest you’d get to seeing a Dolls reunion in those days. Years later, he was generous with his time, memories, and wisdom when I worked on that Guitar World piece. You could hear his pain at how the Dolls dissolved—that was his baby. You had to laugh at some of his DIY scams, like recording albums on a four-track, then dumping the mixes on cassettes, designing homemade covers, then sneaking them into the cassette sections of various New York record stores!

Mind you, I’d kill to hear some of those lost solo albums now. Bet you would too.

A few times, my bands the Hormones and Napalm Stars were privileged to open his shows. Those were always a master class in showmanship and raw rock ‘n’ roll. The main lesson I learned was that, for all the anger in punk’s DNA, the core of Syl Sylvain’s art was joy. He had his anger, certainly, especially when recounting how the New York Dolls broke up. But Syl Sylvain mostly wrote happy tunes, three chord celebrations. Onstage, he was overjoyed at playing this wild, primitive, yet deceptively well-crafted rock ‘n’ roll. This was a party.

And you never saw anyone happier when the New York Dolls finally reformed in 2004. The best tunes on those reunion albums? Syl Sylvain compositions like “Dance Like A Monkey.” He’d been the guardian of the Dolls’ spirit and legacy in those wilderness years in between, and he was ecstatic at being at the heart of their new lineup with Johansen and Kane, for the brief moment the latter could enjoy it before he died from leukemia. And no one was more heartbroken when the band dissolved for many of the same reasons that killed it off in 1975: Egos. The death of every great band. Of every great relationship, really.

So, it was back to Syl Sylvain to keep the band’s spirit alive again. David Johansen had returned to his Buster Poindexter alter ego. In 2017, Syl came to Austin to play a weekly residency at hipster garage room Hotel Vegas, backed by a local punk supergroup calling themselves the Sylvains. The Hormones were overjoyed to be handpicked to open one of the shows, of course.

The afternoon of our gig, I called my old friend, who had become my “Uncle Syl” by this point. “You’re family now, Tim,” he told me after I’d worked as the Dolls’ guitar tech one SXSW weekend. “Listen to what your Uncle Syl tells you, now!” And now I was calling him where he was staying.

“Syl,” I began, “y’know that since the Dolls broke up, we’ve been playing ‘Personality Crisis,’ we’ve been playing your song ‘Teenage News,’ we’ve been playing some of Johnny’s songs. We don’t want the Dolls to die. Would you like us to lay off those songs in deference to you tonight?”

“Are you kidding?!” he roared. “I am so fucking proud of you for playing those songs! You are keeping the spirit and music alive! I want you to play every one of those fucking songs tonight!”

We did. The crowd went apeshit. Then he came on and showed us the right way to play them. With all the joy of having invented everything we all love about punk rock. Now it’s up to all of us still standing to carry it on. Uncle Syl, I weep as I finish typing these lines. We have lost a lot with your passing. That will never be replaced or equalled. Thank you for the rock ‘n’ roll. Thank you for punk rock. Thank you for the New York Dolls.

Thank you for having been Sylvain Sylvain. Sleep, Baby Doll. Sleep.

Jan Savage 1942-2020

By Harvey Kubernik

Guitarist Jan Savage, who was born Buck Jan Reeder, of the American rock band the Seeds died in early August, according to a report in The Ada News and a subsequent Facebook posting that announced his passing.

Formed in 1965 in Los Angeles, the Seeds, guitarist Savage, keyboardist Daryl Hooper, drummer Rick Andridge and singer Sky Saxon were an influential pioneering psychedelic and garage rock outfit who offered a whole lot more for pop culture than their hit single “Pushin’ Too Hard.”

The well-received Seeds long form 110+ minute movie documentary THE SEEDS Pushin’ Too Hard, directed and produced by Neil Norman for GNP Crescendo was initially released in 2015. Norman conducted extensive new interviews about the Seeds. Subjects lensed by Norman include Iggy Pop, Mark Weitz of the Strawberry Alarm Clock, Johnny Echols from Love, Kim Fowley, photographer Ed Caraeff, deejay Rodney Bingenheimer, Richard France, a roadie from their heyday, the Bangles, concert promoter Jim Salzer, Bruce Johnson of the Beach Boys, and myself. Humble Harve (Miller), the onetime KHJ and KBLA DJ who supported and introduced the Seeds at Los Angeles area shows in their heyday is also featured in a voice over capacity.

A handful of years ago Ace Records in the UK reissued the domestic GNP Seeds’ expanded edition Future and Raw & Alive albums were re-released in 2014 as double disc sets on the 60 year old independent GNP Crescendo label, following 2013 reissues The Seeds and Web of Sound. Earlier this decade Ace distributed a new vintage Seeds’ collection, Singles A-sides and B-sides 1965-1970. The original single versions of the Seeds’ celebrated run of 45s. Includes the garage classics “Can’t Seem To Make You Mine” and “Pushin’ Too Hard” along with many non-LP items, including the bands swansong 45s on MGM.

“Of all the Nuggetarian bands that came to psychedelic light in the Gar Age, the Seeds brought rock back to its most hypnotic elementals,” proclaimed writer, musician, Patti Smith group member, and Nuggets box compiler/producer, Lenny Kaye who emailed me in March 2015. “This docu-drama provides a heartfelt insight into the band’s inner universe, their time and place, a behind-the-scenarios look at a group whose impact would resonate throughout the coming of punk and beyond. We are truly up in their room, and it feels so good…”

In the June 15, 2009 LA Record website, Nels Cline, current Wilco guitarist, posted a comment when having learned about the death of Saxon. In My First Rock Idol, Cline wrote, “I am truly saddened to learn of the death of Sky Saxon. As a boy growing up in Los Angeles, Sky Saxon was my first rock idol. The Seeds’ music was important to me, sure, but Sky’s amazing charisma—as he appeared rather ubiquitously on TV shows like Boss City and The Groovy Show and American Bandstand in 1966—67 was galvanizing. I would stare in disbelief as he—clad in shiny satin Nehru shirts bedazzled with some gaudy brooch—would gyrate around lasciviously, holding the microphone in every cool way imaginable. He seemed from another planet. I thought he was amazing. I feel lucky to have ever even seen him on TV, yet alone to have played some wild, extemporaneous psychedelia with him. They say Mick Jagger copped tons of his moves and style, and I believe it. But there was so much more to this man that remains to be revealed.”

Future Star Wars director/producer, George Lucas, in his 1967 student film at the University of Southern California, The Emperor, profiling KRLA DJ, Bob ‘Emperor’ Hudson, used the Seeds’ “Rollin’ Machine” in the soundtrack at the top of his movie.

I interviewed Jan Savage and Daryl Hooper in 2014. Portions of our conversation were published in my book Turn Up The Radio Rock, Pop and Roll in Los Angeles 1956-1972.

“When we recorded with a bass player on our recordings, Harvey Sharpe, he brought a new perspective to the low end and that freed up Daryl from playing piano bass to be more creative,” explained Savage, who was always proud of his Native American Indian heritage.

“In 1965, before I met Rick, Daryl and Sky and before we first did any recording, I lived in South Hollywood, near the Melrose and Vine area. Many of the starving musicians lived in that neighborhood. The Byrds, Sonny & Cher, when they were Caesar & Cleo… Everybody within one year had a hit. In 1966 the Doors were our opening act at college concerts up and down the California coast. We had the same booking agency.”

The Hooper and Savage team also commented on a few recordings by the Seeds, including their urgent care plea, “Can’t Seem to Make You Mine” selection. Jan Savage sheds some light on their infectious and enduring recording.

“Compared to the other things we were doing in clubs at that time, like ‘Pushin’ Too Hard’ and ‘No Escape,’ that song was a change of pace. And we needed something like that to show development and a little bit of originality.”

“In the early material,” reinforced Hooper, “Sky would have different relationships with ladies, some good some bad and a lot of the music of that era it was a good time. Love was portrayed or perhaps a not-so-good love happening story that occurred. ‘Can’t Seem to Make You Mine’ was about a girl again. Longing for and trying to make things right, and couldn’t quite do it. They were simple stories. But they were good stories.”

“As far as ‘Pushin’ Too Hard,’ Sky wrote the lyrics to the song and we kind of came up with the beat and the rhythm to it,” remembered Hooper.

“It was written about a girlfriend, who literally was raggin’ on Sky all the time. It was sort of that intense driving song we would perform in clubs. We found that everyone got up and danced. We were on tour with Buffalo Springfield, the Shadows of Knight and our record was just starting to be played. And we would hear it riding on a bus. ‘Listen. There’s our song. This is cool.’ And by the time we got back to Los Angeles we had a huge record. Behold, the next gig in LA there were hundreds of screaming fans. We were a little bit in awe of the situation. Any recording artist has that dream but you can’t predict it or know when it might happen.

“’Mr Farmer,’ Hooper recalled, “I can tell you I literally wrote the music to that song. I woke up at three in the morning with the tune going through my head. I got up, I put it on a little recorder and in a few days I presented it to Sky. ‘What do you think? Wanna write some lyrics?’ And he immediately did and it produced that song.”

Daryl Hooper and Jan Savage both provided fond memories of their drummer Rick Andridge.

“Rick was the basic foundation,” stressed Savage. “He was on the beat all the time. We could depend on Rick whether we were on stage or in the studio. He counted it off and was on the beat. He didn’t have to worry about speeding up in the middle of the song, or slowing down somewhere else. You knew he was right on it.”

“I think the Seeds as a whole played off of one another,” Hooper underscored. “It took four people to make the Seeds. Sky couldn’t have done it without us and we couldn’t have done it without Sky. He was the lyricist and the front man and we were the foundation behind him that came up with the melodies, chord patterns and rhythms. We all had out own little job. We worked together. Put it in here or there. It was a team. Basically, in a nutshell, you had four people that clicked together as musicians.

“The audience could not tell that we hadn’t been playing together for years. “Sky started writing some lyrics,” mused Hooper, “and would come to us. I’d play a few chords. Jan would play a little lick on the guitar. All of a sudden, sometimes within ten minutes a song would materialize.

“We started at Bido Lido’s. In two months we were adding originals into our set and we found that the audience was responding more to our songs than the cover songs. One night we looked at each other and said, ‘The audience is responding to our songs. No more cover versions.’ From that day on we did no more covers.

“On the television shows we did they were mostly lip sync. You got used to it. That was the technology of the time. You had no choice whatsoever. Most shows did not have the technology to have you come out sounding decent live. That was the way it was. Some of the times Sky’s vocals were live. We got used to it OK. They were playing your music in the background. Your instrument may not have been plugged in but you’re still playing right along with it, and singing along with it.”

“The best songs come from personal emotion,” concluded Savage. “There were a lot of complimentary things we did together.”

“We did an album A Full Spoon Of Seedy Blues,” emphasized Hooper. “Muddy Waters wrote one of the songs and played harmonica on the session. It was at RCA. It was a very fun time. Sky had met Muddy and they clicked. Sky played some of his songs, sang them. He talked Muddy into coming to the session with his guitar player, Luther Johnson.”

“That was the first time we met him. And talk about a down to earth guy,” beamed Savage. “He was fantastic. He really liked us. It was an amazing experience. One of the most memorable sessions. The greatest compliment he ever gave us,” marveled Savage, “was, ‘You have a lot of soul for white boys.’”

© Harvey Kubernik 2020

Music historian Harvey Kubernik saw the Seeds at the 18,000 seat Hollywood Bowl in 1967, and venues all around Southern California 1966-1968.

Kubernik is the author of 19 books, including Canyon Of Dreams: The Magic And The Music Of Laurel Canyon and Turn Up The Radio! Rock, Pop and Roll In Los Angeles 1956-1972. Sterling/Barnes and Noble in 2018 published Harvey and Kenneth Kubernik’s The Story Of The Band: From Big Pink To The Last Waltz. For 2021 they are writing a multi-narrative book on Jimi Hendrix for the same publisher.

Otherworld Cottage Industries in July 2020 has just published Harvey’s 508-page book, Docs That Rock, Music That Matters, featuring Kubernik interviews with D.A. Pennebaker, Albert Maysles, Murray Lerner, Morgan Neville, Michael Lindsay-Hogg, Andrew Loog Oldham, John Ridley, Curtis Hanson, Dick Clark, Travis Pike, Allan Arkush, and David Leaf, among others. In 2020 Harvey served as Consultant on Laurel Canyon: A Place In Time documentary directed by Alison Ellwood which debuted on May 2020 on the EPIX/MGM television channel. It just received three Emmy nominations.

Kubernik’s writings are in several book anthologies, most notably The Rolling Stone Book Of The Beats and Drinking With Bukowski. He was the project coordinator of the recording set The Jack Kerouac Collection. He has just penned a back cover book jacket endorsement for author Michael Posner’s book on Leonard Cohen that Simon & Schuster, Canada, will be publishing this fall 2020, Leonard Cohen, Untold Stories: The Early Years).

Paul Krassner 1932-2019

By Harvey Kubernik

Paul Krassner, the writer, investigative satirist and free speech advocate, who published the groundbreaking counterculture periodical, The Realist, died at his home after a brief illness in Desert Hot Springs California on Sunday, July 21, 2019.

People magazine cited Krassner as “the father of the underground press.” The activist and author replied, “I immediately demanded a paternity test.”

Krassner was hailed by in the pages of Playboy: “Krassner lives in a world where Truth and Satire are swingers, changing partners so often you never know who belongs with whom.”

George Carlin and Lenny Bruce admired Krassner’s work and were inspired by him. Krassner interviewed Bruce for Playboy in 1959 and became a confident of Bruce and edited his autobiography, How To Talk Dirty and Influence People.

Krassner was born April 9, 1932 in Queens, New York. In the 1950s he studied at Baruch College in New York, before embarking on a stand-up comedy career booked as Paul Maul.  He started his self-published journal The Realist, in 1958. His literary career actually began at Mad magazine and writing for The Steve Allen Show. The Realist developed a forum for a satirical view of America, and Krassner provided an outlet for his group of friends that included Lenny Bruce, Groucho Marx, Norman Mailer, Phil Ochs, Timothy Leary, Terry Southern, Dick Gregory and Mae Brussel, Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin with whom he founded the Yippies, (Youth International Party) in 1968. The Yippies protested America’s involvement in the Vietnam War at the 1968 Democratic National Convention.

(more…)