Circle Jerks
On Broadway
San Francisco, CA
1984-02-10
MYTP Release 4
Source: SBD > Sony D5M > Cassette Master > CD
Extraction: CD > rubyripper 0.8 (cdparanoia secure rip, cdrdoa TOC) > FLAC
Processing: Audacity (soft limit -0.1db to remove light clipping, phase correct, splits) > FLAC 8 > acxi (tagging, checksums, FLAC data)
Recorded, preserved, shared by micgram
Release processing by teetering
FLAC: 16/44.1 (2 channels)
Quality: 4/4 (18khz, excellent, great capture)
Time: 35:13.72
Size: 249.0 MiB
Average kb/s: 988
Tracks: 26
Setlist:
01. intro >
02. Dude (Instrumental)
03. Moral Majority >
04. Letter Bomb >
05. In Your Eyes
06. Back Against The Wall > tuning
07. High Price On Our Heads
08. Leave Me Alone > tuning
09. Junk Mail
10. Deny Everything
11. Operation
12. Wild In The Streets (Garland Jeffreys)
13. Red Tape
14. Parade Of Horribles
15. I Just Want Some Skank >
16. Beverly Hills
17. intro > Bang You Head Metal Health (Quiet Riot tease) >
18. Wasted
19. Coup D‘Etat
20. When The Shit hits The Fan
21. Stars And Stripes >
22. Under The Gun
23. Don’t Care >
24. Live Fast, Die young
25. audience, tuning
26. World Up My Ass
Lineup:
Keith Morris - vocals
Greg Hetson - guitar
Chuck Biscuits - drums
Earl Liberty (Mark Vidal)) - bass
Processing Notes:
* At this point of their career, Circle Jerks were merging songs one into the next, with literally no break (indicated by >), just a single beat to mark the new song's start in many cases. I tried to get the splits as close as possible, but you definitely want to be using gapless playback on this one.
Notes:
* Toxic Reasons opened up (MYTP 3) for the Circle Jerks.
* Band is at their shredding best, the band is smoking, hard not to with this lineup.
* Band website: https://www.circlejerks.net/
And yes, they are touring North America as you read this!
https://www.circlejerks.net/tour:
2021-22 North American tour already under way, then it moves over to Europe in 2022. Now's your chance!! First tour in 15 years!!! Be there or be square!! Like they say, support the band, go to their shows!!
* About the band:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circle_Jerks
One of the defining charactertics of the LA sound at this point was the technical ability of many of the musicians who formed most of the early bands.
* This version of the Circle Jerks is really a true allstar lineup from the West Coast punk scene of the day.
* Keith Morris of course co-founded Black Flag with Greg Ginn, then went on to form Circle Jerks.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Morris
* Greg Hetson was in Redd Kross, then left for the Circle Jerks, and had also joined Bad Religion at the same time roughly as this show.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greg_Hetson
* Earl Liberty had previously been in Saccharine Trust, a band that was one of the most significant underground bands of the Los Angeles scene. They featured some of the best musicians in the Los Angeles scene.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earl_Liberty
He featured on the amazing Saccharine Trust album Paganicons.
"His stage name was coined when Minutemen's D. Boon declared "Jesus Christ, you're fucking huge! You're as big as the Statue of Liberty!" which was then wedded to his earlier nickname of "Earl.""
Joe Baiza, Saccharine Trust's guitar player, went on to explore more intense avante-garde jazzy stuff in his Universal Congress Of.
* Chuck Biscuits was previously the drummer for the legendary Vancouver, BC, Canada's D.O.A.
* About the On Broadway (435 Broadway, at Montgomery St., San Francisco, CA):
The On Broadway was basically the 2nd floor of the Mabuhay Gardens. It was not quite as grungy as the Fab Mab in its heyday.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mabuhay_Gardens
"The Mabuhay was in the lower level of the 435 Broadway building, which also housed the On Broadway Theater, known in 1984-1985 as "Rock on Broadway."
Dirksen had a unique style as emcee, deliberately baiting and trading insults with audience and band members, which had the effect of raising the energy of audience and performers alike. Dirksen’s abrasive performance was a central part of the atmosphere of the Mabuhay.
Dirksen and Aquino dissolved their agreement in the early 1980s over disputes concerning Dirksen booking all his higher profile shows at the venue directly upstairs from the Mabuhay, The On Broadway Theater."
* More on the On Broadway/Mab: https://oldpunkflyers.tumblr.com/mabuhaygardens
"After booking both venues for a period of time Dirksen moved his entire operation upstairs. Aquino brought in two young booking agents, Michael Reidy and David Kaplan who started "Punk Nights" on Monday's with free spaghetti featuring bands like Urban Assault, Fuck Ups, MDC, Code Of Honor and Sick Pleasure. In their 4 year tenure post Dirksen, Reidy and Kaplan soon started doing weekends as well with bands like Social Distortion, Agent Orange, Wipers, Richard Hell, Johnny Thunders as well as goth bands like 45 Grave and Specimen. The two venues engaged in booking wars, Reidy and Kaplan finally left in 1986.
The Mabuhay Gardens closed in 1988, at the very end Aquino attempted to move his operation upstairs to the On Broadway (by then vacated by Dirksen) under the moniker of “The Mab On Broadway."
* Even more about the On Broadway: https://acidheroes.wordpress.com/2013/12/11/the-on-broadway-theater/
"People still talk about the legendary Mabuhay Gardens and the Elite Club. But you rarely hear about the On Broadway Theater these days. Which is odd, because it was the primo venue for San Francisco punk bands back in the 1980s.
The On Broadway Theater was run by the legendary Dirk Dirksen.
...
The On Broadway Theater itself was a beautifully laid-out piece of architecture. It had the vibe of a decadent and decaying haunted mansion right out of the Addam’s Family. You walked up a narrow staircase to get into the place. The seating and the balcony was akin to the most cozy and comfortable, beat-up old movie theatre. Then there was a bar in the next room. And an outdoor patio where you could sit and drink around tables and clear your head with some fresh air. And if the bands sucked, you could always go downstairs and check out the more intimate setting of the Fab Mab. Outside there was the narrow alleyway where the roadies loaded and unloaded the bands, and where drugs were scored and beefs were settled (usually over cracked heads and bloody noses)."
* San Francisco renamed that small alley next to the On Broadway/Mabuhay "Dirk Dirksen Place" to honor Dirk's contributions to the cultural heritage of San Francisco. The alley next to City Lights Books (founded by Lawrence Ferlinghetti, at 261 Columbus, right by Broadway, a few blocks from the Mab... and somewhere the more literate people in the scene would have spent time) was similarly renamed Kerouac Alley to honor the famous beat writer. It was originally named Rowland Ave but Kathy Peck of the band Contractions and founder of H.E.A.R. (Hearing Education & Awareness for Rockers) spearheaded a movement to get the name changed to dirk dirksen Place.
* To give you an idea of how much times have changed since then, the 433 Broadway building was recently listed at around $10,000,000!!!
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No distribution in lossy formats!!
No selling!!
No bootlegging!!
Yes sharing. Definitely share.
Support the artists when or if they play, and buy their records/merchandise.
Please correct any errors or oversights in this information in the comments section so the information can be as accurate as possible.
If you can find related materials like flyers, posters, ticket stubs, even photos, etc, please add them in a comment and I will add them to the main release folder, so that can be included on the next re-seeding. Every bit is welcome, and as I am time constrained on this project due to the amount of material, I cannot spend as much time on each release doing research as I would like, so if we can add to and improve the information and release contents during this series, that would be great.
Please make an effort to pick at least one of these MYTP releases and keep it seeded for as long as you can, particularly the lesser known groups. That will really help out long term.
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About Michael Young and the MYTP:
Michael: "I lived in the bay area 1980-92. Being a Deadhead I had a lot of friends who recorded shows, so when I got a nice Sony D5M (in 83, I think it was) I would bring it with me to the Mabuhay Gardens and On Broadway and other places as well. I would ask the sound man if I could plug in and they usually said yes. I did this mostly in 1984 a few in 85. My first punk show was in my hometown of Philadelphia at a place called the Hot Club in 1978. I was hooked on the high energy and the fun of slamming around... I think my first SF hardcore punk show was Flipper at Kezar Pavilion in May of '81. I might have seen some other bands around town before that but that one sticks out for sure."
[teetering: I was also at that Kezar TG/Flipper show. Flipper was great that night.]
TECH:
Michael used a Sony D5M portable cassette recorder, plugged into the soundboard outs, to record most of these shows. This was for the time a very expensive unit, with some advanced features, which probably accounts for why these recordings are so good in general.
* D5M manual: https://transom.org/wp-content/uploads/2005/02/om.tcd5m.pdf
* About D5M: https://transom.org/2005/sony-tc-d5m/
All metal, reliable, simple, and fixable, it runs on two D-cells
* More on the D5M: https://www.cassettedeck.org/sony/tc-d5m
This Sony TC-D5M is a stereo cassette deck with Dolby B noise reduction, it was first sold by Sony in 1979 with a recommended retail price of USD $680 [about $2500 in today's dollars] and discontinued a year later.
The main features of the Sony TC-D5M are: 2 heads, mechanical 3 digit tape counter, manual tape type selection and capable of handling normal, chrome, ferro-chrome and metal tapes, belt driven single-capstan transport.
Typical of this deck is the 70's top loading layout with the cassette compartiment located on the left side of the deck. Tape eject is operated mechanically and the cassette needs to be placed with the side to be played facing forward in the cassette well.
Level meters used on the TC-D5M are analog needle VU reading meters. Mechanical transport controls for reliable TC-D5M transport function selection.
The Dolby-B system reduces tape hiss on tapes recorded on the TC-D5M by as much as 10 dB at the highest frequencies. The 19kHz multiplex pilot slgnal present in FM stereo broadcasts can cause false triggering of the noise reduction system. The switchable MPX filter of the TC-D5M filters out the pilot signal, and assuring proper Dolby processing of FM stereo programs.
To make live recordings this deck has 2 microphone inputs to connect microphones with a jack connector.
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About Dirk Dirksen and the Mabuhay Gardens/On Broadway:
Dirk Dirksen (RIP 2006), aka 'The Pope of Punk', was the music promotor and MC (but really more accurately, the impresario) of the Mabuhay Gardens/On Broadway punk clubs. Dirk was an incredibly interesting, sharp-witted, biting, cutting element of the original San Francisco punk scene. His legendary introductions and post set commentaries are preserved in many of these recordings. Dirk was a nephew of United States Senator Everett Dirksen.
Shows at the Mabuhay started probably in 1977. The On Broadway was an upstairs night club right next to the Mabuhay that opened in summer 1981 and closed 1984. When the On Broadway opened in 1981, they initially only did Friday/Saturday night shows.
The Mabuhay Gardens was originally a Filipino night club/restaurant run by Ness Aquino (RIP). One fateful day he was approached by Jerry Paulsen, who offered to try to fill the club on slow nights (Monday/Tuesday) with punk shows. Dirk took the booking and MC duties over from Jerry, and the rest, as they say, is history.
"...deliberately baiting and trading insults with audience and band members, which had the effect of raising the energy of audience and performers alike. In order to maintain the show's fast pace, he would move past an encore to get to the next band and tell the audience, "Eat it." Dirksen's abrasive persona (which was largely a performance) was a central part of the atmosphere of the Mabuhay.
...
Dirksen was the sole person responsible for connecting the English punk rockers with those in the United States. By creating an exchange program, punk bands for England and NY came to the Mabuhay and vice versa, staying in each city performing a few nights at a time."
Terry Hammer: "[Dirk] believed in theatre and group participation that's why he was sarcastic. He wanted to get a rise in people and get them to participate. He was a really nice person if you got to know him."
Dirk was also active with the organization H.E.A.R. (Hearing Education and Awareness for Rockers), the organization started by Kathy Peck of the Contractions (also part of this THTP series).
It was hard to really know how diverse his interests were until I went to his memorial service in San Francisco, where his punk friends and connections were only a fraction of the people who spoke in his memory. He was involved in various charities, the Mission Recreation Center, the list was quite large.
A book on Dirk was released 2021-01-15:
Shut Up You Animals!!! The Pope is Dead. A Remembrance of Dirk Dirksen: A History of the Mabuhay Gardens
Wikepedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mabuhay_Gardens
Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dirk_Dirksen
SF Gate obituary: https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Dirk-Dirksen-pope-of-punk-amused-insulted-2466523.php
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- teetering