Early History of The Contortions #3

Early History of The Contortions #1 (Introduction)
Early History of The Contortions #2 (Dec '77 - May '78)

5.5.1978 – Artists Space, New York, NY

Setlist unknown

James Chance (voc, as), Jody Harris (guitar), Pat Place (slide guitar), Adele Bertei (organ), George Scott (bass), Don Christensen (drums).

I do not have access to a recording of the Artists Space gig. So far recordings of the Teenage Jesus and the Jerks and Mars sets have surfaced, so I’m pretty sure the tapes exist. The performance was notable for a well-documented  scuffle taking place between James Chance and rock critic Robert Christgau after Chance harassed a female audience member. Brian Eno's anthology of no wave bands "No New York" (released November 1978 on Island subsidiary Antilles Records) came about after he witnessed these shows. Originally the album was to feature two songs from ten bands, but ultimately Contortions, Teenage Jesus, Mars and DNA took four songs each.

James Chance scuffles with self-proclaimed "Dean of American Rock Critics" Robert Christgau at Artists Space on May 5, 1978.
photo by Julia Gorton

Brian Eno, far left, eyeballs the camera while James Chance melts himself down and some fucking geek makes a weird face

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5.25-26.1978 –  CBGB’s, New York, NY
1. Throw Me Away  2. Twice Removed  3. Jailhouse Rock - other songs unknown

James Chance (voc, as), Jody Harris (guitar), Pat Place (slide guitar), Adele Bertei (organ), George Scott (bass), Don Christensen (drums).

Contortions at CBGB's circa mid-1978. left to right:
Adele Bertei, Jody Harris, James Chance, George Scott, Pat Place.
obscured: Don Christensen. Photo by Eugene Merinov

This listing is a wild guess, but three well-recorded tracks of the band live at CBGB’s in 1978 were slated to appear on the aborted ZE Records soundtrack for the Diego Cortez film “Grutzi Elvis” and I believe they may have been recorded at one of these gigs. My logic stems from the fact that “Jailhouse Rock” is short-lived in the group’s set and that these three particular performances seem a bit faster and tighter than the 5.4.1978 Johnny Blitz Benefit versions. These tracks were later issued as bonus cuts on the 1994 Infinite Zero CD edition of “BUY”, the rare 2002 Munster Records double LP version also (including James White and the Blacks’ “Off White”) and all new ZE Records CD pressings. The Senders opened the shows.

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6.1978 –  Big Apple Studio, New York, NY
1. Dish It Out   2. Flip Your Face  3. Jaded  4. I Can’t Stand Myself

James Chance (voc, as), Jody Harris (guitar), Pat Place (slide guitar), Adele Bertei (organ), George Scott (bass), Don Christensen (drums).

There seems to be no definitive date available for the “No New York” recording sessions, but most sources consider them to have taken place in June 1978. It can be surmised that the recording for the Contortions tracks was done live in the studio on one day. The sound is fairly raw and there’s no real production on the tracks beyond the balance of the mix. There's a lot of resonance from the room on the recording, which may have come from reflective panes of glass balanced against the walls of the studio. Essentially the Contortions' "No New York" tracks are live in the studio with "a lot of mistakes" according to Don Christensen. Members of the band long maintained that these four tracks were a better representation of the early Contortions line-up than the album “BUY”. The James Brown song “I Can’t Stand Myself” was supposed to have been spawned from a spontaneous jam at the session.

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6.1978 –  Big Apple Studio, New York, NY
1. That’s When Your Heartaches Begin  2. Schleyer’s Tires   3. McGraw Army Base/Munchen  4. Theme From Grutzi Elvis

James Chance (voc, as), Arto Lindsay (guitar), George Scott (bass), Bradley Field (drums)

There definitely existed a promo cassette of the original, lost “Grutzi Elvis” soundtrack. I know somebody who saw one back in the day, but didn’t hold onto it. That was the closest lead I’ve ever had on it. It is listed, with track titles, in the 1980 publication “Volume: International Discography of the New Wave”. Although the official “Grutzi Elvis” soundtrack (also featuring Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, DNA, Brian Eno, Rosa Yemen, Snatch, Boris Policeband and Tuxedomoon) was never released, this odd EP appeared on ZE Records in 1979 with a cover still featuring Anya Phillips, as well as a different pressing by Celluloid Records featuring minimalist cover art focusing on James Chance. It’s entirely possible that this record was made close to or during the “No New York” sessions, as it sounds to have been recorded extremely quickly and uses the same studio (Big Apple) and engineer (Kurt Munkacsi). The cover of “That’s When Your Heartaches Begin” is hilarious.  It features Teenage Jesus drummer Bradly Field on metronomic, closed hi-hat and bassist George Scott backing up Chance’s sour crooning. Halfway through the song, the vocals become painfully loud and DNA’s Arto Lindsay enters with some of his famously disruptive 12-string skronk guitar. The rest of the tracks are extremely minimal: one consists of a single saxophone line repeated over and over, another is a percussion jam and the last one is a repetitive march built on one ugly saxophone blurt. The band is labeled “Pill Factory” on the release. There’s no evidence the group ever performed together again. 

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James Chance, Paradise Garage 6.18.1978.
still from video footage by Emily Armstong and Pat Ivers.

6.18.1978 – Paradise Garage, New York, NY
1. Dish It Out   2. My Infatuation  3. Roving Eye  4. Anesthetic  5. Flip Your Face  6.  I Can’t Stand Myself  7. Jaded  8. Contort Yourself

James Chance (voc, as), Jody Harris (guitar), Pat Place (slide guitar), Adele Bertei (organ), George Scott (bass), Don Christensen (drums).

This recording comes from an ill-fated show featuring Richard Hell and the Voidoids, The Senders, Contortions, Teenage Jesus and the Jerks and the Stimulators at the legendary disco known as Paradise Garage. Multiple sources say the turnout was low in contrast to the massive size of the venue and many people were disgruntled by the lack of alcohol available at the venue. The Contortions open with molten versions of “Dish It Out” and “My Infatuation”. “Roving Eye” is still being played in its Bo Diddley-style arrangement, albeit much faster in tempo than ever. The song “Anesthetic” makes a first appearance here, with driving kick drum quarter notes and a more hectic feel than it would have in its final form on the “BUY” album. “Flip Your Face” and “I Can’t Stand Myself” sound very similar to the “No New York” renditions. Before “Jaded”,  Kristian Hoffman is invited on the stage to “contort himself”.  It’s possible he is playing additional guitar on the song, but there’s so much guitar racket going on that it’s hard to discern. The set ends with a fast, tight version of “Contort Yourself” in an arrangement similar to the “BUY” version.  After the gig, it seemed the bands were having a hard time getting the club to pay. Chance began to argue with the management and wound up cutting himself with broken glass to intimidate the thugs.  This show was shot on black and white video by Pat Ivers and Emily Armstrong for their New York City cable show “Nightclubbing”.  Excerpts of the Contortions and Teenage Jesus sets have appeared in a program of clips the two have been touring sporadically since 2000.

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7.14.78 – Millenium, New York, NY
1. Dish It Out    2. My Infatuation    3. I Can’t Stand Myself   4. Twice Removed   5. Throw Me Away

James Chance (voc, as), Jody Harris (guitar), Pat Place (slide guitar), Adele Bertei (organ), George Scott (bass), Don Christensen (drums).

The Contortions most likely appeared at CBGB’s the night before. This Millenium gig also featured DNA, The Dots, possibly Tim Wright (former Pere Ubu guitarist and future DNA bassist), Youth In Asia and the debut gig by Lydia Lunch’s Beirut Slump (billed as “Belfast Ghetto”). This event was a benefit for Les Guerillieres Film Collective, as advertised in the Village Voice ad. “Dish It Out” sounds a bit lethargic compared to other recent performances, but James is definitely screaming his guts out. Immediately after the song ends, Chance berates the audience with malice, setting a tone for the rest of the performance. “My Infatuation” follows in a high-strung mode. Before “I Can’t Stand Myself”, Chance tells some people sitting on the floor that if they don’t stand up “and change their attitude” the band won’t continue.  More insults segue into the jazzish intro to “Twice Removed”. The applause dwindles noticeably after the song ends and somebody from the audience yells, “Why don’t you get a haircut, hippy?” Chance tells the guy to get a “brain cut” and have his frontal lobes removed. James rambles incoherently for a long time before the band finishes off with “Throw Me Away”. During the song, it definitely sounds like James Chance is running out of steam. He pretty much disappears during the second half of the tune (fighting in the crowd?) and the set is cut short. There isn’t much applause afterward. 

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8.3.1978 – Horseshoe Tavern, Toronto, Canada

1. Introduction  2. Design To Kill  3. My Infatuation  4. Roving Eye  5. Anesthetic  6. I Don’t Want To Be Happy  7. Throw Me Away  8. Dish It Out  9. Jaded  10. Contort Yourself

James Chance (voc, as), Jody Harris (guitar), Pat Place (slide guitar), Adele Bertei (organ), George Scott (bass), Don Christensen (drums).

The band opens this show with a very Contortion-oid variation of the classic 12-bar blues form. “Design To Kill” appears in the set for the first time. It is referred to alternately as “Designed To Kill” up through the release of “BUY”. George Scott’s bassline here is more dissonant and abstract than what David Hofstra would play on the album. Otherwise the arrangement is already pretty close to the definitive version, although this performance sounds under-rehearsed. The renditions of “My Infatuation”, “Roving Eye”, “Dish It Out”, “Jaded”, “Contort Yourself”  and “Throw Me Away” are typical. Teenage Jesus and the Jerks also appeared on this bill. “Anesthetic” has been slightly rearranged to sound less driving. Adele Bertei’s whispy, percussion triplets underline the beat and Don Christensen lays back more on the drum kit, giving the song the languid feel it would take on “BUY”. “I Don’t Want to Be Happy” is brought back into the set, played at a very fast tempo led by Christensen’s manic hi-hat 16^th notes and Bertei’s loud organ clusters. “Contort Yourself” does contain an unusually long musical freak-out at the end of it.

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8.17.1978 – Max’s Kansas City, New York, NY
“Contortions No Wave Jam”

Soundcheck: 1. “I Can’t Stand It Any More”(?)  2. Please Please Please 

First set: 3. Untitled Blues  4. Dish It Out  5. My Infatuation  6. Design To Kill  7. Twice Removed  8. I Don’t Want To Be Happy  9. Anesthetic 10. Throw Me Away 11. Flip Your Face  12. Contort Yourself 

Second set: 13. Maintaining My Cool  14. Chain of Fools  15.  16. “I Can’t Stand It Any More”(?)  17. unknown  18. Be Bop A Lula  19. Satisfaction  20.  Nobody But Me  21. 96 Tears  22. Please Please Please  23. Roving Eye

James Chance (voc, as), Jody Harris (guitar), Pat Place (slide guitar), George Scott (bass), Don Christensen (drums) with Adele Bertei (organ), Bob Quine (guitar), Gary Glassman (vocals), Kristian Hoffman (vocals, ?), Bradly Field (?), Lydia Lunch (guitar), James Nares (guitar), Eric Mitchell (vocals), Rudolph Grey (guitar), Richard Hell (?).

Contortions' No Wave Jam, 8.17.1978. left to right: James Chance, Kristian Hoffman, Don Christensen,
George Scott, Lydia Lunch and James Nares. photo by Robert Sietsema.

This show featured a set by the Contortions proper, and then a “No Wave Jam” during the second set. Beirut Slump were also on the bill. After a few “soundcheck” numbers, the Contortions launched into their untitled blues opener and then a typical set list.  James Chance is almost immediately pissed at the brightness onstage and demands the lights are brought down. After “My Infatuation” somebody from the club speaks over the p.a. and says the fire department has shown up and that everyone needed to sit down or the show would be over. “Design To Kill” has a lazy false start before the group kicks in with a complete version. For some reason Jody Harris plays different chords on this version than he normally would. “I Don’t Want To Be Happy” is played again in the same uptempo manner as the 8.3.1978 show. “Anesthetic”, minus Adele Bertei’s rhythmic organ playing, is faster and more aggressive than the “BUY” version. During the song, Chance screams at the soundman to remove the echo effect from his saxophone mic. The jam session begins with James singing a cover of The Sonics’ “Maintaining My Cool”, later covered by 8-Eyed Spy (featuring George Scott and Lydia Lunch). It’s a little tough to identify the exact personnel on every song, but Robert Quine plays guitar on “Maintaining”, Adele Bertei sings scorching lead vocals on “Chain of Fools” and Gary Glassman (not sure who he is) sings on a song (which I’m not sure what the title is) with Bob Quine on vicious wah-wah guitar. Quine is still on stage for “I Can’t  Stand Myself” and somebody is on organ, probably Bertei. Next up, Kristian Hoffman (vocals), Bradly Field (?), James Nares (guitar) and Lydia Lunch (guitar) are introduced. Filmmaker Eric Mitchell screeches his way through a cover of the old chestnut “Be Bop A Lula”, which he would also lipsync in a more low-key manner during his 1979 film “Red Italy” with a fake back-up band consisting of Arto Lindsay and Lounge Lizard John Lurie.  A live tape from an early Contortions show can also heard playing in the background during scenes of Mitchell’s first movie “Kidnapped” (1978).  James Chance is back on the mic for a cover of the Rolling Stones’ “Satisfaction”. Rudolph Grey is added on guitar for  an improvised/ trainwreck version of “Nobody But Me”. After minutes of dead air, Question Mark and the Mysterians’ “96 Tears” is covered. “Please Please Please” seems to feature Lydia Lunch on guitar, possibly Kristian Hoffman on backup vocals.  James Chance is on lead vocal and Bradly Field and Richard Hell are also introduced,  but it’s hard to tell what they’re doing. The second set closes with “Roving Eye”. It sounds like Eric Mitchell is yelling over the top of it and Lydia Lunch may have played extra guitar. 

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Next up, part FOUR: Contortions go disco with their alter ego James White and the Blacks . . .

This text was written by Weasel Walter, all rights reserved 2011.
If you use this for any reason, please credit the source fairly.

Early History of The Contortions #4
 

Early History of The Contortions #1 (Introduction)
Early History of The Contortions #2 (Dec '77 - May '78)

Mars: Upcoming Archival Reissues from the Seminal No Wave band

NO WAVE ICONOCLASTS MARS:
NEW ARCHIVAL RELEASES FORTHCOMING

A slew of new archival releases by the quintessential New York City no wave band Mars is slated for the near future. Hatched in 1975 (under the original band name "China"), and finally self-destructing in December 1978, the band played about thirty shows total in their existence, primarily in classic Big Apple clubs such as CBGB's and Max's Kansas City. Fortunately bassist Mark Cunningham dilligently archived recordings from almost all of the events. He has leaked moments out on various releases through the decades, primarily on a rare 1993 CD "Mars Live" (Les Disques Du Soliel Et De L'Acier) as well as the compilation "Mars '78", originally issued on Lydia Lunch's Widowspeak imprint and later expanded as "Mars 78+" on Atavistic Records. Those particular recordings are fairly low in fidelity - albeit listenable - but the upcoming LP to be released on Feeding Tube Records this winter should prove to be the definitive live Mars release. Reputed to be of stunning quality, this document was recorded at Artists Space in May 1978 during the mythic festival which spawned the classic Brian Eno produced release "No New York" (Antilles, 1978 featuring studio tracks by Contortions, Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, DNA and Mars). Another album featuring the band's penultimate performance at Irving Plaza in August 1978 may follow soon after. Mark has also assembled a slew of rehearsal tapes which will emerge as a three cassette box. The set includes rarities such as the first version of the group featuring the late Sumner Crane on piano (instead of his usual guitar mutilation) as well as a side of outtakes from the "No New York" session.

Mars, live at CBGB's. left to right: Connie Burg, Nancy Arlen, Sumner Crane, Mark Cunningham

For the uninitiated, the progression of Mars' output gradually descended into a maelstrom of chaos and madness. Their early sound is documented on a debut 7" recorded in September 1977 and released in March 1978 on the French Rebel Records label. Rebel was the label of Michel Estaban, who then went on to help run John Cale's Spy imprint briefly before founding ZE Records with Michael Zilkha. ZE would soon become a major player in the New York Underground scene, releasing full-length efforts by Contortions, Suicide, Kid Creole and the Coconuts and many others. The A-side is a brisk number with propulsive, marching snare drum and endlessly jangling drone guitar work topped by Sumner Crane's urgent vocals. "3E" is still identifiable as a rock and roll song, but it conveys a bracing amateurism, light texture and sense of anti-machismo separating it decidedly from the typical punk rock prevalent at the time. The flipside "11,000 Volts" is a more accurate harbinger of the Mars to come, with its slow-motion drum patter, skittering guitar motifs and Connie Berg's nascent vocal glossolalia. According to Cunningham, the song is about "a sadomasochistic relationship between an imprisoned robot and its cruel keeper", and despite the fact that the lyrics are completely incomprehensible, the music conveys this bleak scenario in an undeniably expressionistic manner. In 1979, ZE Records reissued the 7" as a 12" EP.

The next Mars recordings, from June 1978, appeared as four tracks on the seminal "No New York" compilation album. Clearly the band had chosen to pursue the more abstract possibilites of their concept and these classic cuts are a watershed of ideas. Mark Cunningham's racing bass chords open "Helen Fordsdale" before an onslaught of tom-tom drumming and percussive guitar jabs treated with a jarring, short delay
effect impact the listener. The second guitar whines away in the background, its highest possible pitches elicited with a metal slide played near the bridge. Crane's vocals have now reached the same psychotic incoherence that Burg's feline "11,000 Volts" performance foreshadowed. "Helen" ends where it begins,
suddenly cut off by a stumbling drum figure and a long tail of distant reverb from the voice. "Hairwaves" is something completely different: an insectoid, pointillistic threnody of space and silence. There is an extremely slow bass figure underlying the song as more cricket like guitar chatter and sparse, freely-rhythmic drumming underlines Connie Burg's tortured moans. It is a sonic construction governed by a tight but elusive set of rules, appearing to be completely free, but easily recognizable as a composition. "Tunnel" is a bracing assault of Grand Guinol proportions, led by more martial drumming by Nancy Arlen as Crane's violent gibberish fights for space, spitting manically through a forcefield of guitar racket. The succinct conclusion to Mars contribution on this album is the masterful "Puerto Rican Ghost". The song opens with a pugilistic drum fragment which repeats itself in spite of the song almost immediately heading in another direction, lead by the chanted vocal patterns of Crane, Burg and Cunningham. "Puerto Rican Ghost" is the first evidence of the distinctively disruptive morse-code bass style Cunningham would use as a foundation for many of the future band compositions.

The final studio output by Mars came in the form of the 1980 Lust/Unlust Records release "The Mars EP". The extremely minimal packaging and credits add immeasurable mystery to the impact of the completely warped, deranged contents of this disc. Recorded in December 1978 in an empty theater soon after the group's final concert at Max's Kansas City, the flat, unenhanced live-to-two-track master recording is a clear representation of the culmination of the unit's effort. Immediately, the first track "N.N. End" roars out of the gates, with Cunningham's disembodied bass thrusts, a cloud of static-y white noise guitar, retarded drumming and distant slide guitar glissandos. The vocalists randomly grunt, bleat and scream nonsense and, at one point, some flatulent trumpet is heard. A 15-minute version of this piece is heard on the August 4, 1978 Irving Plaza tape, which features additional six-string torture from Red Transistor/Blue Humans anti-guitar legend Rudolph Grey. "N.N. End" is a nightmarish vision of insanity, as startling today as it must have been when it was made. "Scorn" is more obviously rhythmic, but still extremely disjointed, featuring more brass bronx-cheering before Crane enters with catatonic vocals comprising simply of a series of dates and the title word. There's a hint of African drumming here as the guitars are used percussively rather than tonally. "Outside Africa" raises the aggression again as all four instrumentalists stab away manically in opposing short figures. Connie (or "China" as she is called in the credits) Burg enters with piercingly nasal high-pitched monotone vocals before Crane interrupts her with a short aside. She continues briefly before the entire band breaks down and finally plays an inexplicable, one-second coda. "Monopoly" opens with stampeding drums and sparsely deployed accents from the guitars. Crane enters after 30 seconds with more bizarre babbling countered by quasi-Dopplar-effect vocalizing by Burg. Occasionally, the trajectory is slashed with loud outbursts of slide guitar debris, but the piece is basically one consistent mood throughout. The final piece, "The Immediate Stages of The Erotic" begins with the intermittent shocking sounds of hands manipulating the end a live guitar cable before more spastic African drums enter. Crane caterwauls in a strained falsetto range - eventually lapsing into coughs and fart noises - and Cunningham shouts ancient Egyptian consonants. The sonic gestalt is extremely debased, bordering on infantile. At this point, Mars have completely devolved into total musical destruction. Their mission, accomplished. The complete Mars studio recordings were issued on CD (in 2004 on the Spanish G3G label and 2008 on No More Records) and LP (2005 and 2010 on Important Records), containing a far better sounding master of "The Mars EP" than the original issue (which reputedly used a master tape which had been damaged in a flood).

After Mars was dissolved, Crane, Cunningham and Burg, joined by DNA drummer Ikue Mori, spent a year working on a crazed adaptation of Mozart's "Don Giovanni" renamed "John Gavanti", released on Cunningham's Hyrax label as an LP in 1980, and reissued on CD in 1998 by Atavistic Records. The album, improvised using primarily brass, bass clarinet, guitar and strings, is far more organic and acoustic in nature than anything Mars did, but still has bears all the conceptual hallmarks of their classic approach. Sumner Crane died of lymphoma on April 15, 2003. Nancy Arlen died on September 17, 2006, following heart surgery. Mark Cunningham has lived in Spain for more than a decade. Connie Burg collaborated with Cunningham on the liner notes for the complete studio CD in the mid 2000s. There is no known film or video footage of Mars.