It's All Too True
1965 was a great year for cars (Mustang), music (Satisfaction), art (Warhol), and probably many other things, but most notably it was the year of my birth.
In gestation I was flown to West Germany (no longer there, don't look for it), and on the 30th of October of that fantastic year I was brought into the world by a Hispanic doctor in a little U.S. Army hospital in a small German town by the name of Muenchweiler am de Rodalb. "Feliz navidad, Eduardo", indeed. According to my father 'muench' refers to monks, and 'weiler' means hamlet, so apparently there was some sort of abbey, or monastery, there at one point in the distant past. Rodalb is the very small river, more of a creek, that the town is located upon. I have no memory of that place, or of the slightly larger Pirmasens where my father, then Lieutenant Colonel Robert Wilson, Uninted States Army, was stationed.
My fathers tour of duty in the former West germany took us to Ulm, and finally Frankfurt, but alas, again I have no recollection of those places either. During this time my father commanded a battalion of engineers. They practiced maneuvers, built bridges, and greatly impressed my brothers, Rod - the eldest, and Fred, one year his junior, with their dress uniforms and motorpools full of bulldozers and cranes.
After three blissful years - the photo's from that time depict a period of unending happiness and lederhosen, we all got on a gigantic boat, the U.S. United States, and sailed back to the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.
I like to think I remember that trip, the rain on the deck, a movie theater? Most likely those memories are largely figmental. Kinda like the eighties.
In 1968 my dad shipped off off to Vietnam. He was a staff officer at the U.S. Army HQ in Saigon. The rest of us lived in a house on Willard Avenue in Chevy Chase, Maryland, mostly due to the proximity we would share with The Grandmothers. I think of this time as the Grandmother Time, as I spent a lot of time with them. Grandfathers were something I never had in any tangible sense. My father's father died before I could meet him. He was called Gramps, and he was a loved and respected man. My mother's father had been estranged from the family since before any of us came along. He wasn't around, and he wasn't discussed.
We got a dog, Mary. Named after the state of Maryland, this Shetland Sheepdog was a key factor in my development, I have had a lifelong love of dogs. Mary was a bit nuerotic.
This is the part where I actually start to have memories. I remember a blue bed. By the time that bed left my life, I had peeled off at least half of the paint.
My father's mother, Dorothy 'Dottie' Wilson, who we called Granny, lived on Yuma Street in NW DC. Nice digs. There are countless photos of me in Christopher Robin outfits climbing trees and posing on the stoop. I remember watching a lot of TV there, mostly Love American Style and The Partridge Family.
My mother's mother, Isabel Rehkopf Engeman, lived in Bethesda, Maryland, the same suburb of DC where my parents would move to many years later after my Father retired from the Army. Izzy spent a goodly amount of time with me that year. I have no doubt that three young boys are a bit much for any single parent in any age.
I had a nifty red wagon. There are a mess of photos with me and the wagon.
I remember my mother carrying me up the stairs.
I remember my brother Rod, age 8, accidentally sending me to the hospital with a gash in my chin from his experimental home made see-saw. I'm sure I could have been in the wrong place at the right time. I have often been so.
A year and a day after my father left for Vietnam he came home. The one extra day was a temporary stop-over in Hawaii on the way back so my father could tell Admiral McCain about some important stuff that he had been working on. My mother, however, did not think it was important enough to justify the delay.
All know was that I didn't remember him, and now I had to share my mother with this guy. I was four, and I couldn't recognize such facts as: he cared for us, provided for us, loved my mother, and served his country with honor and dignity.
Upon his return from Vietnam, my father was given a post at the Pentagon. I don't know much about what he did there, the war was still on, and I'm sure it was all very hush hush type stuff. At this time we moved to a different neighborhood on Redwing Lane in Bethesda. Highlights from that year include watching Ultra-Man on the tiny black and white TV in our kitchen, collecting cicadas in my Playschool barn, my brothers, Rod and Fred, attending catholic school at Little Flower (not a highlight for them), and a trip to the emergency room for Fred, the victim of a curtain-rod sword fighting accident.
One day my mother left the car in neutral without the parking brake on in my grandmother's driveway. The car rolled backwards, across the street with me in it. A tree took off the open driver's side door, and the car nearly rolled into a ravine. More than the incident itself, I remember my mother driving home without a door.
I seem to remeber the dangerous stuff.
The Army at that point, 1970, decided my dad was worth further investment and gave him the rank of Colonel. He was then sent off to the War College at Carlisle, Pennsylvania. This would be my fifth move in as many years, another key factor in my development. Later in life I would get wanderlust if I stayed in one place too long. It has not seemed to have the same effect on my brothers, who received four to five years more of it than I did (respectively).
We had a really funky house in Carlisle. I seem to remember my mother complaining, retrospectively, about the quarters. I thought it was a neat house. That year I would develop an inexplicable passion for the San Francisco Forty-Niners, start kindergarten (thanks for bringing me the clean pair of pants, mom), learn to ride a bike (a tiny German model suitable for circus midgets), and sled down the hill in my backyard. Years later I would return to that neighborhood and look aghast at the tiny mound that I remembered as being much larger, barely the length of the sled itself. Carlisle has a big bulbous water tower. I dig water towers.
Around this time I started to notice that my parents had lots of friends, and loved to have, and attend parties. The military is a society, and they get pretty damn social. Booze was big. I'm sure it still is.
In Carlisle my dad was given the opportunity to 'go academic'. That is, he was encouraged by the Army to pursue a doctorate in engineering so they could post him at West Point as a professor. He accepted this opportunity and we all headed off to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania so my father could obtain his PHD at Lehigh University. Move number six. Age six.
We spent two years there in a ranch style house that had a huge half acre, biggest half acre ever, of a vegetable garden in the back yard. We had apple and peach trees as well. To this day I won't eat a peach in it's natural state. When a peach ripens and falls off the tree it becomes a mush that is very attractive to bees. One of my chores was to pick up the rotten peaches. For some reason I don't mind bees. In the garden we grew broccoli, giant pumpkins, tomatoes, and a plethora of other fruits and vegetables including grapes, whith which my father attemped to make wine. I can't comment on the results of his efforts, but knowing my father, if he was good at it, he'd still be doing it.
These were the free and easy days of riding bikes into mailboxes - Fred goes to the emergency room, cement blocks in the sandbox- Ted goes to the emergency room, and Rod finding a worm in his broccoli - no emergency room necessary.
There was my friend Jason Shackleford who lived across the street. His dad flew jets.
I was 'educated' at Asa Packer Elementary School. We lived close by so we would walk to school. I remember having to walk 'single file, against the wall' in the hallways. At Asa Packer I began my formal education, and was immediately screwed up by it. I started there at the first grade level, I was introduced to reading and writing by the ITA system. I'm not sure what ITA stands for, but 'It's Truly Asinine' fits.
The ITA system used separate symbols for compound phonetic sounds, such as; 'th', or 'ou'. They would blend the letters together to create a whole separate symbol for that sound.
Fuckin' hippies.
Thusly, when I arrived at West Point elementary two years later, I was one messed up kid. They thought I was writing gibberish or some kind of secret hieroglyphics I made up with an imaginary friend. Consequently I did two third grades.
The giant pumpkins were awesome. Good times were had in Bethlehem, despite being locked in the basement with 'the monster' by my brothers. I remember eating escargot on New Years eve with my family. I remember the newspaper saying that the Beatles had broken up, but that it was okay because the Stones still had Mick, and I remember the Leaning Tower of Pizza, who's zeal for delivering fresh out of the oven pizza culminated in another emergency room visit for yours truly. If for no other reason, I'm happy for my time spent there because I understood Billy Joel's 'Allentown' much better than the other kids in my high school (ooh aah).
Come summertime, usually in August, we would pack ourselves off for the annual Wilson family vacation. This invariably meant camping, visits to places of historic import, usually a battlefield, and plenty of consumee. My Dad has got a thing for consumee.
During a trip to Nags Head North Carolina we encountered hurricane Agnes, which sent us scurrying for the shelter of a Holiday Inn, and a visit to the Appamatox Court House; technically not a battlefield, but it still qualifies.
In 1977, we were on vacation on our way to Kingston, Ontario, when we passed a stadium in Utica advertising the up-coming Elvis Presley concert. The next day, in Kingston, the death of Elvis was everywhere on the news. All I could think was how pissed off those folks in Utica must have been.
In the summer of the year of our lord 1972, I was six going on seven, and we moved to West Point, New York, the United States Military Academy. My father was given the post of Assistant Dean of Cadets, while waiting for his future job, Head of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, to become vacant, which it would within a year or so.
West Point is a great place to grow up, and I was fortunate to have had eleven years there to avoid doing just that. West Point is on the Hudson river, about fifty or so miles north of New York City, surrounded by woodland - revolutionary forts decaying not one hundred yards from my house. Michie Stadium, home of Army Football, lay a quarter mile away across tranquil Lusk Resevoir. How could a kid not be happy in this American Vatican. Much like the Church (I'll get into that later), the Army takes care of it's own. West Point is an island within. Everything you need, they supply. On post we had a grocery store (commissary) a department store (PX) a gas station, a movie theater, a concert hall, ski slope, golf course, you name it.
Our house was a mansion by any normal standard of living.
I made friends, some would move on; Bobby White, Doug Crissman, others would remain like Dave Anderson. I have known Dave for thirty-three years. His father Jim was stationed at West Point so long that his house on Partridge Place is still known as Jim Anderson's house years after he moved away.
Doug Crissman lived in Stony Lonesome, a housing area on top of the mountain that West Point leans upon as it holds to the bank of the Hudson river. Behind Doug's house in the woods was a tree fort that all the kids knew about. One day, Dave, Doug, and myself decided to climb the tree fort. I'm not sure if we ever made it up, all I know is that Dave came down with a thump and a broken arm, leg, and some internal injury. Dave recovered in due time, smelly cast and all. For years we would look in amazement at the foot long scar on his abdomen.
Sometime in the early seventies, I began to notice music. Somewhere between the last year in Bethlehem, and the first year at West Point I began to listen to the radio while playing with the G.I. Joe's. The first song I remember really digging is 'Little Willy' by The Sweet. The Sweet would be a seminal band in my musical development, but that would happen much later. From this time period, 72-76, my musical interface was AM radio, 77 WABC. I liked music. I had not begun to specialize. I didn't know about genre, and hence I was into 'Rubber Band Man' as much as 'The Night Chicago Died' or 'Billie Don't Be A Hero'. I loved story songs, 'Seasons In The Sun', 'The Cat's In The Cradle', and 'Bad Bad Leroy Brown'. There was one song that I really liked that I thought was called 'Sing Women'. That song turned out to be 'Dream On'.
Back in the seventies we had something known as winter. In winter you have a phenomenon called snow. Maybe it's me, but it just seemed to snow more back then, and the snow stayed on the ground longer as well. We had joyous days on end making snow forts, jumping into snow drifts, and generally enjoying life. I still long for those winter days, no school, and nothing to do but play, and play I did.
Ah, the 70's; Jaws, Star Wars, stupid synthetic clothing, and the Dallas Cowboys. I was a Dallas fan back then. Hey, I was twelve, what do you want from me. Staubach, Newhouse, Dorsett, Pearson, Pearson, Golden Richards, Too Tall Jones, Hollywood Henderson, the stuff of legend.
Before long however I drifted out of conventional sport. I tried baseball, I lasted two weeks, couldn't field or hit. Then I did hockey, which to my credit I was okay at, until one year everybody grew three inches and I did not, thus ending my hockey career. Basketball - one season, no baskets. So it was on to soccer, the last refuge of a failed sportsman. I wasn't bad and lasted a couple of seasons, but man, all that running, up and back, up and back, screw that. It's only natural then that I should set my sights on Cross Country, right? I did. I also signed up for a 10 kilometer run event. I finished, that's all I'll say, except that what kept me in it until the end was my neighbor Suzy who kept passing me every time I got winded, I couldn't let a girl that I knew, let alone a girl I had kissed, beat me. Thanks Suzy, I would have caved without you.
Seventh grade; I start getting more into Rock and Roll, and less into sports, with the exception of Skiing, which I was an absolute nut for, and still would be today if it wasn't so dammed expensive. West Point had it's own ski slope, and as small as it is, it was a great place to spend my afternoons back in those years when we actually had snow in the greater New York area and I used to kiss Suzy.
Music became my main thing. My brother Rod got me Abbey Road for Christmas 1976, and within six months I had managed to obtain Revolver, Magical Mystery Tour, Sgt. Pepper, and both the blue and red 'best of' collections. It would seem that the record collector deep inside me had been born.
Sometime in 1976 I had also gotten into KISS, and for those two years, 1977 and 1978, there was nothing else. I used to dress up in my hockey gear and pretend I was Gene Simmons, I was the God of Thunder, tennis racquet and all.
During this time both of my brothers would, along with my neighbor Brian Hutchison, try to bring some new music into my world. Fearing that a steady diet of Kiss wasn't healthy, I started getting into other hard rock acts of the day: Aerosmith, Van Halen, Ted Nugent, the standard Cal Jam fare. It was armed with such music, that I set off to Germany in the fall of 1979.
The ways of academia baffle me, as will prove to be evident later, but I know this; if a professor establishes himself at an institution, whether through publication, or diligence, they get tenured, which has nothing to do with the number ten, but amounts to job security. You gotta fuck up serious to get canned. A perk of tenure is sabaticle, or, some time off from the grind, usually a year, to take in, recharge, write, explore, whatever.
In '79, my father was due for sabaticle. He decided that he missed what he calls 'The Big Green Army', and took a post with the Army Corps of Engineers at the USAREUR HQ in Heidelberg, West Germany.
I was not all that thrilled about it. I was thirteen. A year away from the girls you're just starting to make some headway with (okay, so a lot of guys were making headway with Jenny Crapps), and a year away from the guys I'd lie about them with, was not, in my view, a good thing.
I've come to regret my negative attitude.
My Dad went over earlier during the summer of '79, my mother barely survived. He flew back at the end of August to gather up Mother and myself. My brothers would both be starting college that year, and hence not coming with us.
My brother Rod had attempted college the year before - a misguided enrollment at the Citadel in Charleston, South Carolina. He really didn't begin the college part, he just got a haircut, got yelled at for a few days, and then split. I was glad to see him, and tried not to laugh at his head. He spent the rest of that year renting recreational gear before attending the University of Bridgeport.
Fred went to MIT. I remember the trip to Boston when Fred was checking it out. We stayed out in the 'burbs with some friends of the folks. When we visited the campus, I bought the Gene Simmons solo record at the Student Union. Thusly I began a long association between college, music, and sleeping in my clothes.
When we landed in Frankfurt- we're back to Germany folks, I remember being tired and unsure of the black blur that whizzed by us as we drove down the Autobahn toward Heidelberg. "That was a Porsche." My Dad informed.
We drove on to our quarters on Brandywine Lane, Patrick Henry Village, just outside of Heidelberg proper, about an hour.
We dropped our bags, napped, got back in the family truckster (Chevy Malibu station wagon, not too conspicuous in Europe), and drove to some weekend engineer retreat my Dad had lined up at a resort in some wald or another northeast of Heidelberg. It wasn't very fancy, but Germany at large is not too fancy. Germany is clean, comfy, and alien.
The Germans do, after all, speak German. The clerk at the Gasthaus, however, spoke better English than I did. That only added to the otherworldlieness I was experiencing. There was a small game farm/petting zoo, which was cool. The Gasthaus toyed with being a resort with some outdoor sporting stuff, whatever the Germans have instead of tetherball, croquet, and mini golf. I was tired, and thirteen. The biggest impression made was that of the sheet/blanket comforter bedding, the duvet. I liked it very much.
So now I'm in Germany, starting eighth grade, and I know nobody. I was probably a bitch around the house those first few weeks, but through the Power of Rock and Roll I made friends relatively fast. I fell in with the tough crowd, the bad kids from the military version of the wrong side of the tracks - the kids from the 'stairwells', the non-com kids - sons of soldiers. I was a Colonel's kid, and the only things we had in common were the army, being thirteen, and Ted Nugent. I had some new releases - Aerosmith's Night In The Ruts' in particular, that hadn't made into the bins at the PX yet. They had Deep Purple, the Scorpions, AC/DC, and Motorhead.
I learned quite a bit from Andy, Kurt, and the gang. Sex went beyond kissing in this world. Drinking and smoking were commonplace, though I would not indulge myself with intoxicants for a couple of years yet. I was shocked, and extremely delighted. West Point was quite a repressive place in those respects, and I was experiencing a culture shock of a different sort. I remember one day after school; Andy had scored a bottle of Jack Daniels and we kicked around PHV while the guys got duly wasted. I then brought a gang of drunk thirteen year olds home to find my parents engaged in entertaining my aunt Anne and uncle Drake. For some reason, I didn't get in any trouble, most likely because I was sober. I was watching, and learning. I watched them do lots of things I wasn't ready for, but I was getting ready.
Over Christmas break, my brothers came for a vistit, and the promise of skiing in the Alps was ample attraction enough to keep Fred in Germany for a few weeks. We went to Garmisch, and Fred and I hit the slopes. I love skiing, and I love skiing fast. Fred gave me some proper lessons on downhill racing style which would come to haunt my fellow patrons of the ski slope back at West Point. Fred went on a couple of other U.S. Army sponsored ski trips during that winter break. He claims to have had a great time. Being that he was probably traveling and hanging out with the mothers and fathers of my school chums, I have no doubt of it.
I guess I was having a good time, because I got a 'D' in math, and was 'restricted' for a good third of the year. I dated two girls, not simultaneously, Dina Guzman, and Carol Lapponese. I got crushed by the untimely removal of Ms. Lapponese from my world, but such is Army life. One gets used to losing friends, and one gets good at making new ones.
I saw Boston and Rainbow, not simultaneously, at the hockey arena in Schwetzingen, missed Judas Priest and AC/DC (same bill) in Manheim, and basically got on as a normal eighth grader.
Except I got to see Europe (not the band).
Knowing that I may never return, and for ulterior self-motivated reasons I'm sure, my folks took me around the joint; Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Holland, France, and, of course, Germany - East and West.
Right.
The sight of the Alps as they creep over the horizon while you're toolin' down the Autobahn (my Dad obeyed American speed limits in Germany - 55 to the bone) is one hell of a sight, probably much like toolin' through Colorado heading for the Rockies. ( I had never seen that, it would be some time before I got a chance to explore America west of the original thirteen colonies.) What's cooler is to wake up in the middle of the Alps, having arrived by cover of darkness, to majestic splendor.
What was becoming the biggest drag in my life was not school, but church. My mother raised her children Roman Catholic, my father stayed out of it. Sometime in the early seventies at West Point, I had been pressed into service as an altar boy. I have ambivalent feelings about that experience. I think it was my first taste of being on stage, which I liked, but it was boring as hell, and I definately felt goofy wearing a surplice. I had successfully removed myself from those duties by the time we reached Germany, but now I had to go to Mass with my mom every sunday and be duly punished for my various 'sins' with an aincient torture techique called boredom. What I did that year to pass the time while some guy blabbered on about God, what I did while everybody recited the Liturgy by rote - not even bothering to examine what they were even saying, - was read the Bible. I read the whole thing that year, one hour a week. I figured that I knew enough about both testaments, and that I could move on. My mother, however, disagreed, and continued to push church on me until I moved out of her home some years later. "Give it up to God" she'd day. God wants an hour a week aparently. Like probation.
I took in history virtually by osmosis, I was breathing it in, it was everywhere. In Italy I found a culture that was comfortable with both their glorious past, and their present rather lethargic state. They seemed to have given up worrying about the rest of the world, and were just getting on with their day. In Germany I found a sense of conscious effort to get over their recent history, there was always an elephant in every room, but both the elephant and the room were very clean. In Switzerland and Austria it seemed time barely moved.
When you're a fourteen yearl old wide eyed American male, don't tour Paris with yer mum. I was embarrased the entire time. Apparently, I picked up a love for pepper steak there. I went to the Louvre, and saw the Venus De Milo, and the Mona Lisa. It was weird actually. The Venus was kinda just plopped in a intersection on some stairs, and barely anybody really took it in as they hurried past to go see the Mona Lisa, which was behind so much glass and other people's heads that it was impossible to see anyway.
I began to read for pleasure. On the road with mom and pop one needs distraction. I was hooked on horror. I read all the books of movies I had seen, The Exorcist, The Omen, Amityville Horror, which led me to Stephen King, and a lifetime of readership.
While in Europe I furthered myself down the road of gastronomic exploration. My mom and Dad tell me that I ordered pepper steak (au poivre) everywhere we went. I think that was just France and Italy. I remember a healthy amount of schnitzel and spatzle that year.
Heidelberg itself was fantastic with a famous schloss. A quick bus ride, sometimes during school hours, took us downtown to Hauptstrasse, a pedestrian only main drag type deal with shops, and Konditorei.
Here was the real record store. The PX only had a limited selection of records. I remember seeing 'London Calling', 'Shut Up And Play Yer Guitar', and of course the Scorpions 'Lovedrive' - the greatest record cover of all time - lining the walls of that record store on Hauptstrasse. There was also a guitar shop, Salamander, and we'd go in there and drool over Les Pauls and Flying Vs. We'd go to the Konditorei and point at a pastry and use the only German we knew; "Eine mal bitte" (which really should have been; "Einmal bitte"), crude German for "can I have a piece of that?". We'd hand over our Deutsche Marks which we'd obtained at the currency exchange at Mark Twain Village, stuff our faces with gooey, creamy, breadthings, then get back on the bus to get home before anybody figured out our scam. Something would inevitably go wrong of course, and we'd get busted. Once, we thought we were busted by one of our teachers who saw us as he came out of a shop on Hauptstrasse, but as we looked up at the letters 'SEX' over the shop he had been patronizing, we figured we had enough on him to keep him quiet.
In the late winter the Germans celebrate Fashing. People dress up, have parades, and get drunk. My buddies and I went to Hauptstrasse for the event. I remember discovering that I did not find women with hairy pits unattractive. Years later Madonna would be much relieved.
I made a big deal of my misery while in Germany, but all the photos suggest I had a great time, and my memories have caused me to yearn a plenty. I had made friends,:Andy, Kurt, Bruno, Forrest, and even had a few girlfriends. I grew my hair, and saw life as it was for those who lived in the real world. It was time, however, to return to the American Vatican - West Point. My eyes had been opened, though, and I was about to start high school, which was to be a public school - James I. O'Neill in Highland Falls. The real world was waiting, and so were my friends, and something that was called the 'Pat Phillips Gang', but was becoming The Skateboard Gang.
Black Plastic.
I should start a band called Black Plastic.
This is where I need help. The summer I got back, 1980, and the summer after get confusing, largely because I was away most of both summers, but somebody was home.
Rod says:
"Summer of 1980 I came back to an empty house, got the Vega out of storage in a garage down by Wilson road, and worked as a bell boy at the hotel (Thayer). I had the house to myself most of the summer, but you guys (Mom, Dad, and myself) came back before it ended. Summer of 1981, Mom and Dad went on a two month trip around the country, you (me) went to Boston, I got Razz (cat) and put up the black plastic to keep your friends (most likely Pat, Sam, and Bill) from looking in the windows down stairs (basement). One summer I worked at the PX in the four seasons department, and one summer I sold hot dogs at Delafield. Maybe that was all in one summer, this is where I get confused."
Fred Says:
"I was reading the Rolling Stone Record Guide and going to Nuggets every day that summer (probably both) in Boston."
Pat Phillips Says:
"I hope for your mom's sake that the foreboding talk of the "Skateboard Gang" back at WP didn't cause too much concern for the soon to be returning Wilson family even though, thanks to your brother, your WP residence was the best kept secret den of iniquity sitting squarely in the belly of the beast amongst WP's Jr. level power brokers, that was truly a great summer! I recall asking a lot: Where the hell was Fred?"
Rod:
" She asked me if we played loud music and if this is why Colonel Tiller always sneered at her. I told her that the music wasn't any louder than when they were home, and Colonel Tiller probably didn't like all the people that were coming over to the house all the time."
Indeed, I bet he did not.
Some things had changed. I inheirited two new friends through Pat Wilson, whom I had met during the summer of 78. He was hanging out at North Pool with Damien Palladino one day. We had a mutual friend named Doug who had moved to Hawaii where Pat was coming to West Point from. That's the way it is in the military, every three years you trade up friends, and there's always somebody who knows somebody from somwhere else.
My two new friends were Bill Devine and Sam Saldivar. Sam was a filmaker, and Bill was a guitar player. I am pleased by the fact that over twenty-five years later I can still say the same about both of them.
Sam and Bill had built a mock-up of a spaceship in Sam's basement, where Sam and his brother Matt had built a small studio. Sam, Bill Pat, Matt, and I made films, radio shows, and played Dungeons and Dragons. I don't think we let Matt play D&D.
Bill Devine was already a good guitar player when I met him upon my return from Germany in 1980. Pat Wilson and I had been messing around with guitars prior to my departure, and during the year that I was away he had obtained a drum set by way of a cadet who needed a place to keep it. It was a Sonor kit, which was cool because Phil Rudd from AC/DC played Sonor drums. The music thing had developed into a more actual deal while I was away, and when I got back, I did my best to jump right in. I remember learning "My Best Friend's Girlfriend" with Pat from Jamie ‘Hey Hey’ Lagasse in somebody's attic, possibly Pat's. It was only natural that a band formed. Pat Phillips and some of the skate crew had been assembling a band, Head, and we were struck with idea of doing the same.Bill and Jamie played guitar. Bill had just gotten his Silverburst Les Paul, which is still his main guitar 28 years on, and Jamie had a D'Agostino Les Paul that was a brilliant piece of work. It was wine red, and played just like a Gibson. Pat played the Sonor drum kit previously mentioned. Bob Gosiki was the only bass player in town, so he was in. Bob was the son of a West Point Band member, and he had gear. He had a Gibson Grabber bass, a Kustom bass amp (that quilted sparkly blue plastic upholstered beast). Bob also had an amp he built, which was like twelve watts or something. We used it as the PA for my vocals. I remember two things about that amp: it had an AC/DC sticker on it, and it was so weak that you couldn't hear me above the band. I look back on the latter fact as a fortunate circumstance.I was bloody horrible. I could neither sing, nor remember the lyrics to the various Deep Purple and AC/DC songs we were doing. The distance I have from those days, and the things I have done since leads me to believe that I simply had no idea what I was doing, but at the same time I knew that cover tunes were not my bag. I didn’t know what my bag was yet, but I was looking for it.Although I wasn't interested in covers, they were, and are, where it starts. I ended up extemporizing, improvising, and fucking about over top of whatever song was being played. I didn't know it then and neither did anybody else, but what I was doing was writing songs. Bill had a riff that he called 'Center Of The Universe' which was an ode to another local guitar player and son of a West Point Band member, Bubba Dixon. Bubba was a natural musician, he could play, and he knew it. I gave the tune a rebirth under the more direct moniker, 'Bubba Is a Cock'. 'Bubba Is a Cock’ was quickly followed by 'Jill's A Bitch', and 'Donny Go Home' (to the tune of ‘Cocaine’), the subject matter of which, respectively, were the Teen Center manager/supervisor, and my neighbor, the late Donald Tillar.We played two gigs, I think. I remember one at the Teen Club, where ‘Jill’s a Bitch’ was born, and thanks to Sam Saldivar’s recent YouTube post, I was reminded of a show at the Golf Club House. The lack of sound on the 8mm footage was a blessing for me, but it would have been cool to hear the band. Mostly I got a kick from the milk crate light show, and Billy’s Molson t-shirt.Songs about people that I didn’t like couldn’t keep me in the line-up of Platinum Dragon for very long. Soon came the fateful night at the West Point Elementary School playground where I was relieved of my front man duties in favor of Sam Saldivar, who had bailed on NYMA, came to O’Neil, and got cool quick. I'm sure I wasn't happy about it, but I think I was relieved. I knew I wasn’t holding up my end. I was still enthusiastic about the band. I liked them, they were my friends. Very shortly after my dismissal, Platinum Dragon was transformed into Nightwolf.Jamie moved to Colorado. Rob ‘Savage’ Simpson, and his cool-ass siverburst Gibson Flying V replaced him. Bob Gosiki was sacked in favor of Chris Dice. I guess everybody had enough gear by then.I don’t remember a whole lot about Nightwolf. I remember a show at the Golf Club House. I remember the lyric:“I don’t really know nuthin’ about ya”They wrote songs. That was way ahead of the curve. A lot of the creativity must have come from Sam, who was certainly the most creative person we knew.At any rate, Nightwolf lacked legs. It ended all too soon.I think, at this point Rob Simpson joined Head. Bret Baugh, guitarist for Head, must have moved on as well. Bret was the most gifted musician in town. He had that ease of play, that effortless vibe that you see in guys like Hendrix or Clapton.Head, to my poor memory, at that point, consisted of Pat Phillips (vox), Dave Palmer (guitar), Savage (guitar), Hutch (drums). Did Dice play bass at this point?Head gigs were fairly memorable.The North Pool gig stands out. My mother, Peg, whose chocolate chip cookies were renown, loaded up the Wilson family Malibu Station Wagon with band gear for the event.There was something about the sound reverberating off the cement; it worked for War Pigs at least.Riot Night.Legend.Palmer doing ‘FX’ with the Memory Man. A proper show with lights………and a church…..How does that happen? Who let’s a bunch of teenagers loose in the basement of a church overnight, largely unsupervised, with sound gear, video gear, light gear, other gear…..?I remember spinning the first Schenker record before the show, and Chris Phillips suggested ‘Victim of Illusion’. The night ended with watching Bruce Lee (Enter the Dragon?) on a big screen as the sun came up.Then they all graduated, but they weren’t done yet.Before all that though, we need to revisit our friends Pat Wilson and Billy ‘Guitar’ Devine. After Nightwolf they went underground for a bit, jamming in my basement, and Bill’s. Bill had moved next door to me in a weird magical confluence of circumstance. Pat played bass for a bit, but soon succumbed to the gravitational pull of the guitar.Around the same time a friendship had developed between our immediate crew and Brian Spears who was succumbing to the gravitational force of the drums.The base of operations moved to Brian’s basement in Highland Falls, and Talon was born.I suppose Diceman had been playing with Head, because initially there was no bass.I don’t think there was bass at the Talon gig when they played at the school rally for financial aid. I do remember the set. Okay, I remember two songs. An instrumental called ‘Backseat Overture’ featuring Pat’s phase pedal, and a cover of ‘Hit Me With Your Best Shot’ featuring Lynn Maloney. Lynn could sing, and she had the Benetar look well in hand. I leant her my silver spandex pants, y’know, as you do. I got them back soiled. Sorry, Lynn, if this public outing upsets you, but posterity must be observed. Lynn decided panty lines could not be tolerated, and so she went commando in my spandex as she menstruated all up inside them shits.Eventually Chris Dice joined Talon and brought his singular showmanship to the band as well as the sorely needed bass. Chris was great to have in the band. His good nature and work ethic were commendable.Talon gigged a few times, at the obligatory Golf Club House, the 49er Lodge, and most notably a major show at the Fort Montgomery Elementary School. We pulled out all the stops for that one, which basically means me lighting off flash pots manually behind Brian. There was another female guest appearance. I forget her name. She was okay, she sang Frida’s ‘I Know What’s Going On’ while Pat hid behind his Carvin stack clearly wanting no part of it.Like most local bands at the time, Talon played mostly cover material, but there were some original compositions. The most memorable was, of course, ‘Take Up the Cross’, which featured a Brian penned lyric about the Children’s Crusade. Everybody was excited about the new tune, and when a chance to record it came up, the opportunity was leapt upon.Bill Walsh is a legend. He is a musical genius. He was also, at the time, a serious party machine. Bill was a West Point Band member as well as an audio engineer. He had the keys to West Point’s very sophisticated recording studio. Who knew?Bill took us in, skillfully ushered the band through the process, and produced a nice little demo featuring ‘Take Up the Cross’, a cover of Judas Priest’s ‘You Got Another Thing Coming’, and probably Sweet’s ‘Action’. I’m not sure if the band paid Bill for the session, but I do know Lagasse dropped by.At the end of that school year, ‘82/83, Talon played an outdoor show at the O’Neill High School Graduation where Bill and Brian received their diplomas. It was off to college for half of Talon, and thus, the end, almost……The Death of Talon was the title given by Pat of the video of their farewell gig. Bill and Brian came back for winter break, and we decorated the Ace in the Ground – Brian’s basement, and invited a bunch of friends.Talon went all out in preparation. Costumes, make-up, set design, oh yeah, and everybody took acid about an hour before the show. The latter was regrettable, especially considering the costumes, make-up, and set design. Hey, we didn’t know, really, we had no idea.The first few songs went well, then a fuse blew and all the power went out as they began ‘Mr. Crowley’. As unsettling as that was, by the time we got things running again, the effects of the LSD had begun to undermine the bands ability to perform. Brian, in his own words, got lost in his cymbals, and Pat seemed to have forgotten how to play. Thankfully somebody gave their guitar to Dave Palmer, and Talon officially died as a loose jam session evolved in the wake. I think the lawn doctor practiced his lurid craft on Brian’s front lawn that night. Pat and I giggled a lot.Back to Head. I know a few of them went out to LA for a stint, Palmer staying longer and coming back a shred-god. Before long they obtained the residence that gave them their name. The House In Newburg. Pat, Hutch, Palmer, Savage……who played bass? Diceman?It was a great house. The basement housed the rehearsal space as well as at least one bedroom. There was pinball, booze, and mayhem. That house prepared me for college much more than O’Neill did.Head wasn’t Head any more, but I don’t think they ever landed on another name, nor do I think they ever played out. They were The Band at the House, and they practiced Metal tunes, many of which were unsuitable for Pat’s bluesy gravel pit voice.In 1984 Metal cover bands could get paying gigs, and I guess that was the idea. I always thought they should have been writing their own material.Neither the band nor the house lasted very long as they began to be interested in their lives and soon went their separate ways. It turns out there wasn’t a surplus of dudes who could sing Maiden or Dio.Savage went to California to be an actor. Palmer went down south into academia. Hutch moved to San Francisco. Pat enrolled at the local Community College. I don’t know what Dice did, or if he was even a part of the scene at that point.1984 saw the end of the West Point Skateboard Gang bands in the proper sense. Many of us stayed involved with music, however. During breaks from school music was still being made.The Ace in the Hole gave us Danger Penguin. Ostensibly, at its inception, the Danger Penguin line-up was Brian (drums), Pat Wilson (guitar) and Mitch Turner (guitar). Soon Pat Phillips was showing up as well. The band never gigged, but it served as the spring board into the next era, the studio years.Pat Wilson obtained a multi-track console and tape machine. We all caught the bug. By 1986 Pat Phillips and Brian had converted Pat’s parent’s basement into the Coal Mine Studio.We recorded every chance we got. Mitch would come up from Georgia. Whoever was at the University of Maryland at the time would make the trip. We learned a craft.Eventually the Coal Mine closed its doors, and we all went off to our lives, but those of us who came out of the Coal Mine are all still involved with making music today. Pat Phillips has a studio in Atlanta. I have mine in Brooklyn. Mitch is a Doctor of Tunes at LaGrange College in Georgia. Pat Wilson still plays his white Les Paul, and Brian plays drums with Jesus.
I had trouble with chicks. I couldn't come from a strong place with a girl, I was very passive, and my relationships with girls seemed to follow the trend of unrequited love disguised as a close freindship. I had done well in Germany, and couldn't find a way to carry that over back home. My freshman and sophmore years were washouts romantically. My biggest problem was the fact that I always seemed to develop crushes on girls who were into Pat Wilson Girls he invariably treated shabbily. I was a shoulder for a good long while.
James I. O'Neill High School was a nutty place. O'Neill had students from West Point, Highland Falls, Fort Montgomery, and Garrison. Highland Falls is the town adjacent to West Point, and like many towns across the world, it basically existed to serve the needs of West Point. This underlying fact caused a divide, as it does, socially between it's populations. Fort Montgomery was an island of it's own, and Garrison was like a foriegn country located across the Bear Mountain Bridge.
1980 at O'Niell was still the 70's in many ways. Think Trans Am driving, Led Zepplin t-shirt wearing, football players. Hell, think Richard Linklater's 'Dazed and Confused'. That was the high school I entered in the fall of 1980. By 1984 we got the skinny ties and spiky hair, but we were a bit behind.
In gestation I was flown to West Germany (no longer there, don't look for it), and on the 30th of October of that fantastic year I was brought into the world by a Hispanic doctor in a little U.S. Army hospital in a small German town by the name of Muenchweiler am de Rodalb. "Feliz navidad, Eduardo", indeed. According to my father 'muench' refers to monks, and 'weiler' means hamlet, so apparently there was some sort of abbey, or monastery, there at one point in the distant past. Rodalb is the very small river, more of a creek, that the town is located upon. I have no memory of that place, or of the slightly larger Pirmasens where my father, then Lieutenant Colonel Robert Wilson, Uninted States Army, was stationed.
My fathers tour of duty in the former West germany took us to Ulm, and finally Frankfurt, but alas, again I have no recollection of those places either. During this time my father commanded a battalion of engineers. They practiced maneuvers, built bridges, and greatly impressed my brothers, Rod - the eldest, and Fred, one year his junior, with their dress uniforms and motorpools full of bulldozers and cranes.
After three blissful years - the photo's from that time depict a period of unending happiness and lederhosen, we all got on a gigantic boat, the U.S. United States, and sailed back to the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.
I like to think I remember that trip, the rain on the deck, a movie theater? Most likely those memories are largely figmental. Kinda like the eighties.
In 1968 my dad shipped off off to Vietnam. He was a staff officer at the U.S. Army HQ in Saigon. The rest of us lived in a house on Willard Avenue in Chevy Chase, Maryland, mostly due to the proximity we would share with The Grandmothers. I think of this time as the Grandmother Time, as I spent a lot of time with them. Grandfathers were something I never had in any tangible sense. My father's father died before I could meet him. He was called Gramps, and he was a loved and respected man. My mother's father had been estranged from the family since before any of us came along. He wasn't around, and he wasn't discussed.
We got a dog, Mary. Named after the state of Maryland, this Shetland Sheepdog was a key factor in my development, I have had a lifelong love of dogs. Mary was a bit nuerotic.
This is the part where I actually start to have memories. I remember a blue bed. By the time that bed left my life, I had peeled off at least half of the paint.
My father's mother, Dorothy 'Dottie' Wilson, who we called Granny, lived on Yuma Street in NW DC. Nice digs. There are countless photos of me in Christopher Robin outfits climbing trees and posing on the stoop. I remember watching a lot of TV there, mostly Love American Style and The Partridge Family.
My mother's mother, Isabel Rehkopf Engeman, lived in Bethesda, Maryland, the same suburb of DC where my parents would move to many years later after my Father retired from the Army. Izzy spent a goodly amount of time with me that year. I have no doubt that three young boys are a bit much for any single parent in any age.
I had a nifty red wagon. There are a mess of photos with me and the wagon.
I remember my mother carrying me up the stairs.
I remember my brother Rod, age 8, accidentally sending me to the hospital with a gash in my chin from his experimental home made see-saw. I'm sure I could have been in the wrong place at the right time. I have often been so.
A year and a day after my father left for Vietnam he came home. The one extra day was a temporary stop-over in Hawaii on the way back so my father could tell Admiral McCain about some important stuff that he had been working on. My mother, however, did not think it was important enough to justify the delay.
All know was that I didn't remember him, and now I had to share my mother with this guy. I was four, and I couldn't recognize such facts as: he cared for us, provided for us, loved my mother, and served his country with honor and dignity.
Upon his return from Vietnam, my father was given a post at the Pentagon. I don't know much about what he did there, the war was still on, and I'm sure it was all very hush hush type stuff. At this time we moved to a different neighborhood on Redwing Lane in Bethesda. Highlights from that year include watching Ultra-Man on the tiny black and white TV in our kitchen, collecting cicadas in my Playschool barn, my brothers, Rod and Fred, attending catholic school at Little Flower (not a highlight for them), and a trip to the emergency room for Fred, the victim of a curtain-rod sword fighting accident.
One day my mother left the car in neutral without the parking brake on in my grandmother's driveway. The car rolled backwards, across the street with me in it. A tree took off the open driver's side door, and the car nearly rolled into a ravine. More than the incident itself, I remember my mother driving home without a door.
I seem to remeber the dangerous stuff.
The Army at that point, 1970, decided my dad was worth further investment and gave him the rank of Colonel. He was then sent off to the War College at Carlisle, Pennsylvania. This would be my fifth move in as many years, another key factor in my development. Later in life I would get wanderlust if I stayed in one place too long. It has not seemed to have the same effect on my brothers, who received four to five years more of it than I did (respectively).
We had a really funky house in Carlisle. I seem to remember my mother complaining, retrospectively, about the quarters. I thought it was a neat house. That year I would develop an inexplicable passion for the San Francisco Forty-Niners, start kindergarten (thanks for bringing me the clean pair of pants, mom), learn to ride a bike (a tiny German model suitable for circus midgets), and sled down the hill in my backyard. Years later I would return to that neighborhood and look aghast at the tiny mound that I remembered as being much larger, barely the length of the sled itself. Carlisle has a big bulbous water tower. I dig water towers.
Around this time I started to notice that my parents had lots of friends, and loved to have, and attend parties. The military is a society, and they get pretty damn social. Booze was big. I'm sure it still is.
In Carlisle my dad was given the opportunity to 'go academic'. That is, he was encouraged by the Army to pursue a doctorate in engineering so they could post him at West Point as a professor. He accepted this opportunity and we all headed off to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania so my father could obtain his PHD at Lehigh University. Move number six. Age six.
We spent two years there in a ranch style house that had a huge half acre, biggest half acre ever, of a vegetable garden in the back yard. We had apple and peach trees as well. To this day I won't eat a peach in it's natural state. When a peach ripens and falls off the tree it becomes a mush that is very attractive to bees. One of my chores was to pick up the rotten peaches. For some reason I don't mind bees. In the garden we grew broccoli, giant pumpkins, tomatoes, and a plethora of other fruits and vegetables including grapes, whith which my father attemped to make wine. I can't comment on the results of his efforts, but knowing my father, if he was good at it, he'd still be doing it.
These were the free and easy days of riding bikes into mailboxes - Fred goes to the emergency room, cement blocks in the sandbox- Ted goes to the emergency room, and Rod finding a worm in his broccoli - no emergency room necessary.
There was my friend Jason Shackleford who lived across the street. His dad flew jets.
I was 'educated' at Asa Packer Elementary School. We lived close by so we would walk to school. I remember having to walk 'single file, against the wall' in the hallways. At Asa Packer I began my formal education, and was immediately screwed up by it. I started there at the first grade level, I was introduced to reading and writing by the ITA system. I'm not sure what ITA stands for, but 'It's Truly Asinine' fits.
The ITA system used separate symbols for compound phonetic sounds, such as; 'th', or 'ou'. They would blend the letters together to create a whole separate symbol for that sound.
Fuckin' hippies.
Thusly, when I arrived at West Point elementary two years later, I was one messed up kid. They thought I was writing gibberish or some kind of secret hieroglyphics I made up with an imaginary friend. Consequently I did two third grades.
The giant pumpkins were awesome. Good times were had in Bethlehem, despite being locked in the basement with 'the monster' by my brothers. I remember eating escargot on New Years eve with my family. I remember the newspaper saying that the Beatles had broken up, but that it was okay because the Stones still had Mick, and I remember the Leaning Tower of Pizza, who's zeal for delivering fresh out of the oven pizza culminated in another emergency room visit for yours truly. If for no other reason, I'm happy for my time spent there because I understood Billy Joel's 'Allentown' much better than the other kids in my high school (ooh aah).
Come summertime, usually in August, we would pack ourselves off for the annual Wilson family vacation. This invariably meant camping, visits to places of historic import, usually a battlefield, and plenty of consumee. My Dad has got a thing for consumee.
During a trip to Nags Head North Carolina we encountered hurricane Agnes, which sent us scurrying for the shelter of a Holiday Inn, and a visit to the Appamatox Court House; technically not a battlefield, but it still qualifies.
In 1977, we were on vacation on our way to Kingston, Ontario, when we passed a stadium in Utica advertising the up-coming Elvis Presley concert. The next day, in Kingston, the death of Elvis was everywhere on the news. All I could think was how pissed off those folks in Utica must have been.
In the summer of the year of our lord 1972, I was six going on seven, and we moved to West Point, New York, the United States Military Academy. My father was given the post of Assistant Dean of Cadets, while waiting for his future job, Head of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, to become vacant, which it would within a year or so.
West Point is a great place to grow up, and I was fortunate to have had eleven years there to avoid doing just that. West Point is on the Hudson river, about fifty or so miles north of New York City, surrounded by woodland - revolutionary forts decaying not one hundred yards from my house. Michie Stadium, home of Army Football, lay a quarter mile away across tranquil Lusk Resevoir. How could a kid not be happy in this American Vatican. Much like the Church (I'll get into that later), the Army takes care of it's own. West Point is an island within. Everything you need, they supply. On post we had a grocery store (commissary) a department store (PX) a gas station, a movie theater, a concert hall, ski slope, golf course, you name it.
Our house was a mansion by any normal standard of living.
I made friends, some would move on; Bobby White, Doug Crissman, others would remain like Dave Anderson. I have known Dave for thirty-three years. His father Jim was stationed at West Point so long that his house on Partridge Place is still known as Jim Anderson's house years after he moved away.
Doug Crissman lived in Stony Lonesome, a housing area on top of the mountain that West Point leans upon as it holds to the bank of the Hudson river. Behind Doug's house in the woods was a tree fort that all the kids knew about. One day, Dave, Doug, and myself decided to climb the tree fort. I'm not sure if we ever made it up, all I know is that Dave came down with a thump and a broken arm, leg, and some internal injury. Dave recovered in due time, smelly cast and all. For years we would look in amazement at the foot long scar on his abdomen.
Sometime in the early seventies, I began to notice music. Somewhere between the last year in Bethlehem, and the first year at West Point I began to listen to the radio while playing with the G.I. Joe's. The first song I remember really digging is 'Little Willy' by The Sweet. The Sweet would be a seminal band in my musical development, but that would happen much later. From this time period, 72-76, my musical interface was AM radio, 77 WABC. I liked music. I had not begun to specialize. I didn't know about genre, and hence I was into 'Rubber Band Man' as much as 'The Night Chicago Died' or 'Billie Don't Be A Hero'. I loved story songs, 'Seasons In The Sun', 'The Cat's In The Cradle', and 'Bad Bad Leroy Brown'. There was one song that I really liked that I thought was called 'Sing Women'. That song turned out to be 'Dream On'.
Back in the seventies we had something known as winter. In winter you have a phenomenon called snow. Maybe it's me, but it just seemed to snow more back then, and the snow stayed on the ground longer as well. We had joyous days on end making snow forts, jumping into snow drifts, and generally enjoying life. I still long for those winter days, no school, and nothing to do but play, and play I did.
Ah, the 70's; Jaws, Star Wars, stupid synthetic clothing, and the Dallas Cowboys. I was a Dallas fan back then. Hey, I was twelve, what do you want from me. Staubach, Newhouse, Dorsett, Pearson, Pearson, Golden Richards, Too Tall Jones, Hollywood Henderson, the stuff of legend.
Before long however I drifted out of conventional sport. I tried baseball, I lasted two weeks, couldn't field or hit. Then I did hockey, which to my credit I was okay at, until one year everybody grew three inches and I did not, thus ending my hockey career. Basketball - one season, no baskets. So it was on to soccer, the last refuge of a failed sportsman. I wasn't bad and lasted a couple of seasons, but man, all that running, up and back, up and back, screw that. It's only natural then that I should set my sights on Cross Country, right? I did. I also signed up for a 10 kilometer run event. I finished, that's all I'll say, except that what kept me in it until the end was my neighbor Suzy who kept passing me every time I got winded, I couldn't let a girl that I knew, let alone a girl I had kissed, beat me. Thanks Suzy, I would have caved without you.
Seventh grade; I start getting more into Rock and Roll, and less into sports, with the exception of Skiing, which I was an absolute nut for, and still would be today if it wasn't so dammed expensive. West Point had it's own ski slope, and as small as it is, it was a great place to spend my afternoons back in those years when we actually had snow in the greater New York area and I used to kiss Suzy.
Music became my main thing. My brother Rod got me Abbey Road for Christmas 1976, and within six months I had managed to obtain Revolver, Magical Mystery Tour, Sgt. Pepper, and both the blue and red 'best of' collections. It would seem that the record collector deep inside me had been born.
Sometime in 1976 I had also gotten into KISS, and for those two years, 1977 and 1978, there was nothing else. I used to dress up in my hockey gear and pretend I was Gene Simmons, I was the God of Thunder, tennis racquet and all.
During this time both of my brothers would, along with my neighbor Brian Hutchison, try to bring some new music into my world. Fearing that a steady diet of Kiss wasn't healthy, I started getting into other hard rock acts of the day: Aerosmith, Van Halen, Ted Nugent, the standard Cal Jam fare. It was armed with such music, that I set off to Germany in the fall of 1979.
The ways of academia baffle me, as will prove to be evident later, but I know this; if a professor establishes himself at an institution, whether through publication, or diligence, they get tenured, which has nothing to do with the number ten, but amounts to job security. You gotta fuck up serious to get canned. A perk of tenure is sabaticle, or, some time off from the grind, usually a year, to take in, recharge, write, explore, whatever.
In '79, my father was due for sabaticle. He decided that he missed what he calls 'The Big Green Army', and took a post with the Army Corps of Engineers at the USAREUR HQ in Heidelberg, West Germany.
I was not all that thrilled about it. I was thirteen. A year away from the girls you're just starting to make some headway with (okay, so a lot of guys were making headway with Jenny Crapps), and a year away from the guys I'd lie about them with, was not, in my view, a good thing.
I've come to regret my negative attitude.
My Dad went over earlier during the summer of '79, my mother barely survived. He flew back at the end of August to gather up Mother and myself. My brothers would both be starting college that year, and hence not coming with us.
My brother Rod had attempted college the year before - a misguided enrollment at the Citadel in Charleston, South Carolina. He really didn't begin the college part, he just got a haircut, got yelled at for a few days, and then split. I was glad to see him, and tried not to laugh at his head. He spent the rest of that year renting recreational gear before attending the University of Bridgeport.
Fred went to MIT. I remember the trip to Boston when Fred was checking it out. We stayed out in the 'burbs with some friends of the folks. When we visited the campus, I bought the Gene Simmons solo record at the Student Union. Thusly I began a long association between college, music, and sleeping in my clothes.
When we landed in Frankfurt- we're back to Germany folks, I remember being tired and unsure of the black blur that whizzed by us as we drove down the Autobahn toward Heidelberg. "That was a Porsche." My Dad informed.
We drove on to our quarters on Brandywine Lane, Patrick Henry Village, just outside of Heidelberg proper, about an hour.
We dropped our bags, napped, got back in the family truckster (Chevy Malibu station wagon, not too conspicuous in Europe), and drove to some weekend engineer retreat my Dad had lined up at a resort in some wald or another northeast of Heidelberg. It wasn't very fancy, but Germany at large is not too fancy. Germany is clean, comfy, and alien.
The Germans do, after all, speak German. The clerk at the Gasthaus, however, spoke better English than I did. That only added to the otherworldlieness I was experiencing. There was a small game farm/petting zoo, which was cool. The Gasthaus toyed with being a resort with some outdoor sporting stuff, whatever the Germans have instead of tetherball, croquet, and mini golf. I was tired, and thirteen. The biggest impression made was that of the sheet/blanket comforter bedding, the duvet. I liked it very much.
So now I'm in Germany, starting eighth grade, and I know nobody. I was probably a bitch around the house those first few weeks, but through the Power of Rock and Roll I made friends relatively fast. I fell in with the tough crowd, the bad kids from the military version of the wrong side of the tracks - the kids from the 'stairwells', the non-com kids - sons of soldiers. I was a Colonel's kid, and the only things we had in common were the army, being thirteen, and Ted Nugent. I had some new releases - Aerosmith's Night In The Ruts' in particular, that hadn't made into the bins at the PX yet. They had Deep Purple, the Scorpions, AC/DC, and Motorhead.
I learned quite a bit from Andy, Kurt, and the gang. Sex went beyond kissing in this world. Drinking and smoking were commonplace, though I would not indulge myself with intoxicants for a couple of years yet. I was shocked, and extremely delighted. West Point was quite a repressive place in those respects, and I was experiencing a culture shock of a different sort. I remember one day after school; Andy had scored a bottle of Jack Daniels and we kicked around PHV while the guys got duly wasted. I then brought a gang of drunk thirteen year olds home to find my parents engaged in entertaining my aunt Anne and uncle Drake. For some reason, I didn't get in any trouble, most likely because I was sober. I was watching, and learning. I watched them do lots of things I wasn't ready for, but I was getting ready.
Over Christmas break, my brothers came for a vistit, and the promise of skiing in the Alps was ample attraction enough to keep Fred in Germany for a few weeks. We went to Garmisch, and Fred and I hit the slopes. I love skiing, and I love skiing fast. Fred gave me some proper lessons on downhill racing style which would come to haunt my fellow patrons of the ski slope back at West Point. Fred went on a couple of other U.S. Army sponsored ski trips during that winter break. He claims to have had a great time. Being that he was probably traveling and hanging out with the mothers and fathers of my school chums, I have no doubt of it.
I guess I was having a good time, because I got a 'D' in math, and was 'restricted' for a good third of the year. I dated two girls, not simultaneously, Dina Guzman, and Carol Lapponese. I got crushed by the untimely removal of Ms. Lapponese from my world, but such is Army life. One gets used to losing friends, and one gets good at making new ones.
I saw Boston and Rainbow, not simultaneously, at the hockey arena in Schwetzingen, missed Judas Priest and AC/DC (same bill) in Manheim, and basically got on as a normal eighth grader.
Except I got to see Europe (not the band).
Knowing that I may never return, and for ulterior self-motivated reasons I'm sure, my folks took me around the joint; Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Holland, France, and, of course, Germany - East and West.
Right.
The sight of the Alps as they creep over the horizon while you're toolin' down the Autobahn (my Dad obeyed American speed limits in Germany - 55 to the bone) is one hell of a sight, probably much like toolin' through Colorado heading for the Rockies. ( I had never seen that, it would be some time before I got a chance to explore America west of the original thirteen colonies.) What's cooler is to wake up in the middle of the Alps, having arrived by cover of darkness, to majestic splendor.
What was becoming the biggest drag in my life was not school, but church. My mother raised her children Roman Catholic, my father stayed out of it. Sometime in the early seventies at West Point, I had been pressed into service as an altar boy. I have ambivalent feelings about that experience. I think it was my first taste of being on stage, which I liked, but it was boring as hell, and I definately felt goofy wearing a surplice. I had successfully removed myself from those duties by the time we reached Germany, but now I had to go to Mass with my mom every sunday and be duly punished for my various 'sins' with an aincient torture techique called boredom. What I did that year to pass the time while some guy blabbered on about God, what I did while everybody recited the Liturgy by rote - not even bothering to examine what they were even saying, - was read the Bible. I read the whole thing that year, one hour a week. I figured that I knew enough about both testaments, and that I could move on. My mother, however, disagreed, and continued to push church on me until I moved out of her home some years later. "Give it up to God" she'd day. God wants an hour a week aparently. Like probation.
I took in history virtually by osmosis, I was breathing it in, it was everywhere. In Italy I found a culture that was comfortable with both their glorious past, and their present rather lethargic state. They seemed to have given up worrying about the rest of the world, and were just getting on with their day. In Germany I found a sense of conscious effort to get over their recent history, there was always an elephant in every room, but both the elephant and the room were very clean. In Switzerland and Austria it seemed time barely moved.
When you're a fourteen yearl old wide eyed American male, don't tour Paris with yer mum. I was embarrased the entire time. Apparently, I picked up a love for pepper steak there. I went to the Louvre, and saw the Venus De Milo, and the Mona Lisa. It was weird actually. The Venus was kinda just plopped in a intersection on some stairs, and barely anybody really took it in as they hurried past to go see the Mona Lisa, which was behind so much glass and other people's heads that it was impossible to see anyway.
I began to read for pleasure. On the road with mom and pop one needs distraction. I was hooked on horror. I read all the books of movies I had seen, The Exorcist, The Omen, Amityville Horror, which led me to Stephen King, and a lifetime of readership.
While in Europe I furthered myself down the road of gastronomic exploration. My mom and Dad tell me that I ordered pepper steak (au poivre) everywhere we went. I think that was just France and Italy. I remember a healthy amount of schnitzel and spatzle that year.
Heidelberg itself was fantastic with a famous schloss. A quick bus ride, sometimes during school hours, took us downtown to Hauptstrasse, a pedestrian only main drag type deal with shops, and Konditorei.
Here was the real record store. The PX only had a limited selection of records. I remember seeing 'London Calling', 'Shut Up And Play Yer Guitar', and of course the Scorpions 'Lovedrive' - the greatest record cover of all time - lining the walls of that record store on Hauptstrasse. There was also a guitar shop, Salamander, and we'd go in there and drool over Les Pauls and Flying Vs. We'd go to the Konditorei and point at a pastry and use the only German we knew; "Eine mal bitte" (which really should have been; "Einmal bitte"), crude German for "can I have a piece of that?". We'd hand over our Deutsche Marks which we'd obtained at the currency exchange at Mark Twain Village, stuff our faces with gooey, creamy, breadthings, then get back on the bus to get home before anybody figured out our scam. Something would inevitably go wrong of course, and we'd get busted. Once, we thought we were busted by one of our teachers who saw us as he came out of a shop on Hauptstrasse, but as we looked up at the letters 'SEX' over the shop he had been patronizing, we figured we had enough on him to keep him quiet.
In the late winter the Germans celebrate Fashing. People dress up, have parades, and get drunk. My buddies and I went to Hauptstrasse for the event. I remember discovering that I did not find women with hairy pits unattractive. Years later Madonna would be much relieved.
I made a big deal of my misery while in Germany, but all the photos suggest I had a great time, and my memories have caused me to yearn a plenty. I had made friends,:Andy, Kurt, Bruno, Forrest, and even had a few girlfriends. I grew my hair, and saw life as it was for those who lived in the real world. It was time, however, to return to the American Vatican - West Point. My eyes had been opened, though, and I was about to start high school, which was to be a public school - James I. O'Neill in Highland Falls. The real world was waiting, and so were my friends, and something that was called the 'Pat Phillips Gang', but was becoming The Skateboard Gang.
Black Plastic.
I should start a band called Black Plastic.
This is where I need help. The summer I got back, 1980, and the summer after get confusing, largely because I was away most of both summers, but somebody was home.
Rod says:
"Summer of 1980 I came back to an empty house, got the Vega out of storage in a garage down by Wilson road, and worked as a bell boy at the hotel (Thayer). I had the house to myself most of the summer, but you guys (Mom, Dad, and myself) came back before it ended. Summer of 1981, Mom and Dad went on a two month trip around the country, you (me) went to Boston, I got Razz (cat) and put up the black plastic to keep your friends (most likely Pat, Sam, and Bill) from looking in the windows down stairs (basement). One summer I worked at the PX in the four seasons department, and one summer I sold hot dogs at Delafield. Maybe that was all in one summer, this is where I get confused."
Fred Says:
"I was reading the Rolling Stone Record Guide and going to Nuggets every day that summer (probably both) in Boston."
Pat Phillips Says:
"I hope for your mom's sake that the foreboding talk of the "Skateboard Gang" back at WP didn't cause too much concern for the soon to be returning Wilson family even though, thanks to your brother, your WP residence was the best kept secret den of iniquity sitting squarely in the belly of the beast amongst WP's Jr. level power brokers, that was truly a great summer! I recall asking a lot: Where the hell was Fred?"
Rod:
" She asked me if we played loud music and if this is why Colonel Tiller always sneered at her. I told her that the music wasn't any louder than when they were home, and Colonel Tiller probably didn't like all the people that were coming over to the house all the time."
Indeed, I bet he did not.
Some things had changed. I inheirited two new friends through Pat Wilson, whom I had met during the summer of 78. He was hanging out at North Pool with Damien Palladino one day. We had a mutual friend named Doug who had moved to Hawaii where Pat was coming to West Point from. That's the way it is in the military, every three years you trade up friends, and there's always somebody who knows somebody from somwhere else.
My two new friends were Bill Devine and Sam Saldivar. Sam was a filmaker, and Bill was a guitar player. I am pleased by the fact that over twenty-five years later I can still say the same about both of them.
Sam and Bill had built a mock-up of a spaceship in Sam's basement, where Sam and his brother Matt had built a small studio. Sam, Bill Pat, Matt, and I made films, radio shows, and played Dungeons and Dragons. I don't think we let Matt play D&D.
Bill Devine was already a good guitar player when I met him upon my return from Germany in 1980. Pat Wilson and I had been messing around with guitars prior to my departure, and during the year that I was away he had obtained a drum set by way of a cadet who needed a place to keep it. It was a Sonor kit, which was cool because Phil Rudd from AC/DC played Sonor drums. The music thing had developed into a more actual deal while I was away, and when I got back, I did my best to jump right in. I remember learning "My Best Friend's Girlfriend" with Pat from Jamie ‘Hey Hey’ Lagasse in somebody's attic, possibly Pat's. It was only natural that a band formed. Pat Phillips and some of the skate crew had been assembling a band, Head, and we were struck with idea of doing the same.Bill and Jamie played guitar. Bill had just gotten his Silverburst Les Paul, which is still his main guitar 28 years on, and Jamie had a D'Agostino Les Paul that was a brilliant piece of work. It was wine red, and played just like a Gibson. Pat played the Sonor drum kit previously mentioned. Bob Gosiki was the only bass player in town, so he was in. Bob was the son of a West Point Band member, and he had gear. He had a Gibson Grabber bass, a Kustom bass amp (that quilted sparkly blue plastic upholstered beast). Bob also had an amp he built, which was like twelve watts or something. We used it as the PA for my vocals. I remember two things about that amp: it had an AC/DC sticker on it, and it was so weak that you couldn't hear me above the band. I look back on the latter fact as a fortunate circumstance.I was bloody horrible. I could neither sing, nor remember the lyrics to the various Deep Purple and AC/DC songs we were doing. The distance I have from those days, and the things I have done since leads me to believe that I simply had no idea what I was doing, but at the same time I knew that cover tunes were not my bag. I didn’t know what my bag was yet, but I was looking for it.Although I wasn't interested in covers, they were, and are, where it starts. I ended up extemporizing, improvising, and fucking about over top of whatever song was being played. I didn't know it then and neither did anybody else, but what I was doing was writing songs. Bill had a riff that he called 'Center Of The Universe' which was an ode to another local guitar player and son of a West Point Band member, Bubba Dixon. Bubba was a natural musician, he could play, and he knew it. I gave the tune a rebirth under the more direct moniker, 'Bubba Is a Cock'. 'Bubba Is a Cock’ was quickly followed by 'Jill's A Bitch', and 'Donny Go Home' (to the tune of ‘Cocaine’), the subject matter of which, respectively, were the Teen Center manager/supervisor, and my neighbor, the late Donald Tillar.We played two gigs, I think. I remember one at the Teen Club, where ‘Jill’s a Bitch’ was born, and thanks to Sam Saldivar’s recent YouTube post, I was reminded of a show at the Golf Club House. The lack of sound on the 8mm footage was a blessing for me, but it would have been cool to hear the band. Mostly I got a kick from the milk crate light show, and Billy’s Molson t-shirt.Songs about people that I didn’t like couldn’t keep me in the line-up of Platinum Dragon for very long. Soon came the fateful night at the West Point Elementary School playground where I was relieved of my front man duties in favor of Sam Saldivar, who had bailed on NYMA, came to O’Neil, and got cool quick. I'm sure I wasn't happy about it, but I think I was relieved. I knew I wasn’t holding up my end. I was still enthusiastic about the band. I liked them, they were my friends. Very shortly after my dismissal, Platinum Dragon was transformed into Nightwolf.Jamie moved to Colorado. Rob ‘Savage’ Simpson, and his cool-ass siverburst Gibson Flying V replaced him. Bob Gosiki was sacked in favor of Chris Dice. I guess everybody had enough gear by then.I don’t remember a whole lot about Nightwolf. I remember a show at the Golf Club House. I remember the lyric:“I don’t really know nuthin’ about ya”They wrote songs. That was way ahead of the curve. A lot of the creativity must have come from Sam, who was certainly the most creative person we knew.At any rate, Nightwolf lacked legs. It ended all too soon.I think, at this point Rob Simpson joined Head. Bret Baugh, guitarist for Head, must have moved on as well. Bret was the most gifted musician in town. He had that ease of play, that effortless vibe that you see in guys like Hendrix or Clapton.Head, to my poor memory, at that point, consisted of Pat Phillips (vox), Dave Palmer (guitar), Savage (guitar), Hutch (drums). Did Dice play bass at this point?Head gigs were fairly memorable.The North Pool gig stands out. My mother, Peg, whose chocolate chip cookies were renown, loaded up the Wilson family Malibu Station Wagon with band gear for the event.There was something about the sound reverberating off the cement; it worked for War Pigs at least.Riot Night.Legend.Palmer doing ‘FX’ with the Memory Man. A proper show with lights………and a church…..How does that happen? Who let’s a bunch of teenagers loose in the basement of a church overnight, largely unsupervised, with sound gear, video gear, light gear, other gear…..?I remember spinning the first Schenker record before the show, and Chris Phillips suggested ‘Victim of Illusion’. The night ended with watching Bruce Lee (Enter the Dragon?) on a big screen as the sun came up.Then they all graduated, but they weren’t done yet.Before all that though, we need to revisit our friends Pat Wilson and Billy ‘Guitar’ Devine. After Nightwolf they went underground for a bit, jamming in my basement, and Bill’s. Bill had moved next door to me in a weird magical confluence of circumstance. Pat played bass for a bit, but soon succumbed to the gravitational pull of the guitar.Around the same time a friendship had developed between our immediate crew and Brian Spears who was succumbing to the gravitational force of the drums.The base of operations moved to Brian’s basement in Highland Falls, and Talon was born.I suppose Diceman had been playing with Head, because initially there was no bass.I don’t think there was bass at the Talon gig when they played at the school rally for financial aid. I do remember the set. Okay, I remember two songs. An instrumental called ‘Backseat Overture’ featuring Pat’s phase pedal, and a cover of ‘Hit Me With Your Best Shot’ featuring Lynn Maloney. Lynn could sing, and she had the Benetar look well in hand. I leant her my silver spandex pants, y’know, as you do. I got them back soiled. Sorry, Lynn, if this public outing upsets you, but posterity must be observed. Lynn decided panty lines could not be tolerated, and so she went commando in my spandex as she menstruated all up inside them shits.Eventually Chris Dice joined Talon and brought his singular showmanship to the band as well as the sorely needed bass. Chris was great to have in the band. His good nature and work ethic were commendable.Talon gigged a few times, at the obligatory Golf Club House, the 49er Lodge, and most notably a major show at the Fort Montgomery Elementary School. We pulled out all the stops for that one, which basically means me lighting off flash pots manually behind Brian. There was another female guest appearance. I forget her name. She was okay, she sang Frida’s ‘I Know What’s Going On’ while Pat hid behind his Carvin stack clearly wanting no part of it.Like most local bands at the time, Talon played mostly cover material, but there were some original compositions. The most memorable was, of course, ‘Take Up the Cross’, which featured a Brian penned lyric about the Children’s Crusade. Everybody was excited about the new tune, and when a chance to record it came up, the opportunity was leapt upon.Bill Walsh is a legend. He is a musical genius. He was also, at the time, a serious party machine. Bill was a West Point Band member as well as an audio engineer. He had the keys to West Point’s very sophisticated recording studio. Who knew?Bill took us in, skillfully ushered the band through the process, and produced a nice little demo featuring ‘Take Up the Cross’, a cover of Judas Priest’s ‘You Got Another Thing Coming’, and probably Sweet’s ‘Action’. I’m not sure if the band paid Bill for the session, but I do know Lagasse dropped by.At the end of that school year, ‘82/83, Talon played an outdoor show at the O’Neill High School Graduation where Bill and Brian received their diplomas. It was off to college for half of Talon, and thus, the end, almost……The Death of Talon was the title given by Pat of the video of their farewell gig. Bill and Brian came back for winter break, and we decorated the Ace in the Ground – Brian’s basement, and invited a bunch of friends.Talon went all out in preparation. Costumes, make-up, set design, oh yeah, and everybody took acid about an hour before the show. The latter was regrettable, especially considering the costumes, make-up, and set design. Hey, we didn’t know, really, we had no idea.The first few songs went well, then a fuse blew and all the power went out as they began ‘Mr. Crowley’. As unsettling as that was, by the time we got things running again, the effects of the LSD had begun to undermine the bands ability to perform. Brian, in his own words, got lost in his cymbals, and Pat seemed to have forgotten how to play. Thankfully somebody gave their guitar to Dave Palmer, and Talon officially died as a loose jam session evolved in the wake. I think the lawn doctor practiced his lurid craft on Brian’s front lawn that night. Pat and I giggled a lot.Back to Head. I know a few of them went out to LA for a stint, Palmer staying longer and coming back a shred-god. Before long they obtained the residence that gave them their name. The House In Newburg. Pat, Hutch, Palmer, Savage……who played bass? Diceman?It was a great house. The basement housed the rehearsal space as well as at least one bedroom. There was pinball, booze, and mayhem. That house prepared me for college much more than O’Neill did.Head wasn’t Head any more, but I don’t think they ever landed on another name, nor do I think they ever played out. They were The Band at the House, and they practiced Metal tunes, many of which were unsuitable for Pat’s bluesy gravel pit voice.In 1984 Metal cover bands could get paying gigs, and I guess that was the idea. I always thought they should have been writing their own material.Neither the band nor the house lasted very long as they began to be interested in their lives and soon went their separate ways. It turns out there wasn’t a surplus of dudes who could sing Maiden or Dio.Savage went to California to be an actor. Palmer went down south into academia. Hutch moved to San Francisco. Pat enrolled at the local Community College. I don’t know what Dice did, or if he was even a part of the scene at that point.1984 saw the end of the West Point Skateboard Gang bands in the proper sense. Many of us stayed involved with music, however. During breaks from school music was still being made.The Ace in the Hole gave us Danger Penguin. Ostensibly, at its inception, the Danger Penguin line-up was Brian (drums), Pat Wilson (guitar) and Mitch Turner (guitar). Soon Pat Phillips was showing up as well. The band never gigged, but it served as the spring board into the next era, the studio years.Pat Wilson obtained a multi-track console and tape machine. We all caught the bug. By 1986 Pat Phillips and Brian had converted Pat’s parent’s basement into the Coal Mine Studio.We recorded every chance we got. Mitch would come up from Georgia. Whoever was at the University of Maryland at the time would make the trip. We learned a craft.Eventually the Coal Mine closed its doors, and we all went off to our lives, but those of us who came out of the Coal Mine are all still involved with making music today. Pat Phillips has a studio in Atlanta. I have mine in Brooklyn. Mitch is a Doctor of Tunes at LaGrange College in Georgia. Pat Wilson still plays his white Les Paul, and Brian plays drums with Jesus.
I had trouble with chicks. I couldn't come from a strong place with a girl, I was very passive, and my relationships with girls seemed to follow the trend of unrequited love disguised as a close freindship. I had done well in Germany, and couldn't find a way to carry that over back home. My freshman and sophmore years were washouts romantically. My biggest problem was the fact that I always seemed to develop crushes on girls who were into Pat Wilson Girls he invariably treated shabbily. I was a shoulder for a good long while.
James I. O'Neill High School was a nutty place. O'Neill had students from West Point, Highland Falls, Fort Montgomery, and Garrison. Highland Falls is the town adjacent to West Point, and like many towns across the world, it basically existed to serve the needs of West Point. This underlying fact caused a divide, as it does, socially between it's populations. Fort Montgomery was an island of it's own, and Garrison was like a foriegn country located across the Bear Mountain Bridge.
1980 at O'Niell was still the 70's in many ways. Think Trans Am driving, Led Zepplin t-shirt wearing, football players. Hell, think Richard Linklater's 'Dazed and Confused'. That was the high school I entered in the fall of 1980. By 1984 we got the skinny ties and spiky hair, but we were a bit behind.
