Ultra Rare Texas Psych Poster Art!

How would you all like to see some REALLY RARE Texas Psych poster art? This is what the big time collectors are into up in their rarified airs! This stuff is as rare as hen’s teeth baby!

Look what we got:

1. A The Vulcan / Zilker Owl Love In poster. That’s about thirty-five hundred.
2. A Grateful Dead, Panther Hall, poster. Panther Hall was a Dallas Area place. Recently, another poster like this went for seven grand at auction.
3. A 13th Floor Elevators “Hand” poster and handbill! You’re looking at five grand right there.

The best part of this whole thing is that this collector is an actual human being. He’s cool and humble and interested in other people’s interest in this space who might not be at his level. You know, I’ve met so many assholes in this space over the years that, sometimes, I forget what a real human being is like.

You know, after being exposed to the Billy Alienate’s, Lama’s, Andrew Brown’s, Chris Meerbott’s and other sundry hemorrhoids in the Texas Psych Universe uhhhhh… I stuck it out (and stuck it to them too) and I discovered that there is a whole other level of COOL PEOPLE into this stuff; people like this collector, the Roky tape donor, my pal George Kinney, my pal Jerry Lightfoot, more…

Sure, the assholes are there but they are really a small part of things and they got nothing. They’re just really, really vocal about the little bit they do have. And you know what? Nobody *has* anything. It’s all part of the big, cosmic, mathematical, semantics gas bag envisioned by Tommy Hall and others. You just got to plug into it and light a match. BOOM!

It’s nice to see that this stuff exists. It’s nice to see that it’s owned by an actual human being too.

South Austin Museum of Popular Culture

Cool, South Austin Museum of Popular Culture, Vulcan & Armadillo Poster Exhibit.

George Kinney - A Theory of Eternal Life

A Theory of Eternal Life

By George Kinney

The following presentation is a brief consideration of a series of key ideas regarding possible relationships that exist between densities of matter, time, and quality of life. Further, I will attempt to shed some light on how these ideas may correspond to some of the most essential elements of Traditional Chinese Medicine, specifically the concept of Qi. Without attempting to define Qi, an attempt will be made to show possible similarities between the actions or properties of Qi, inseparable from the concept of Yin and Yang, and the properties of various states or densities of matter and energy.

Comprehensively, these key ideas allude to one or more ways of attempting to understand our existences, collectively and individually, in a vast and mysterious universe that possesses qualities, aspects, and dimensionalities that are essentially beyond our ability to define or fully understand that is, these ideas are metaphors or symbols to aide us in the search for the miraculous, a search which by all indications so far, can by nature never be completed.

POINT

Let us first examine the fundamental nature of our understanding of time, and let us use geometric symbols to do so. Primarily, time, according to our psychological apparatus, is essentially sensed as an ‘instant’ or moment, isolated in perception and connected with past and future moments psychologically thru the application of the associative cortex of our brain. Geometrically, this may be corresponded with a point.
LINE

The extension of this span of time, a moment, linearly gives us the psychological experience, presumably, of a series of events. This expressed geometrically can be visualized as the extension of a point into a line. The same relationship that exists, therefore, between a point and a line, exists also between a moment and a linear series of events. This extension is generally considered to be infinite in the sense that there are conceivably an infinite number of points in a line and an infinite number of potential events in a series. We may further assign a dimensionality value on them and that value would be one. That is, we have begun with one dimensionality, both in geometrical space and time.

Another way of looking at it is that a point, infinitely extended one dimensionally, produces a line. By the same token, a moment extended infinitely produces a series, or infinite succession of events in linear time.

PLANE OR SURFACE

Our one-dimensional friend, the line, if extended either vertically or horizontally, becomes a plane, or we may say that the ‘trace’ of a point becomes a potentially infinite line and the trace of a potentially infinite number of lines forms a plane or surface.
SOLID

A plane or surface, similarly traced in a any direction perpendicular to it, forms what we refer to in Euclidian geometry as a solid. Thus we may follow these natural progressions of dimensionality to result in the following relationships:

Point; line; surface; solid forming the continuum of 3 dimensional space that we have all come recognize as our normal sphere of observable existence.

According to the same model, we may experience seconds becoming minutes, becoming hours, becoming days, becoming weeks, months, years, decades, centuries, etc.

These are the logical extensions of aspects of our psychology into graduating levels of dimensionality. *1

In addition, these relationships can be shown to correspond to our experiences in terms of sensations, perceptions, concepts, up to and most likely beyond abstractions and idealisms.

The point of all this is to demonstrate that our sense of time and space, as well as our method of arranging them into understandable forms, systems, and patterns, depend on assigning them graduating degrees of dimensionality in order to grasp them with our understanding, or even to experience them without comprehensive understanding. That is, all the human qualities and potentials for experience are RELATIVE. This is directly associated with Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity.

EVERYTHING EXISTS AND IS MEASURED EXCLUSIVELY IN TERMS ITS RELATION TO SOMETHING ELSE

A grossly oversimplified bumper-sticker understanding of E=MC2 is that something perceived in a particular state or form is observed as such due to the nature of the observer’s ability to observe and the particular conditions, internal external, under which the observation occurs. That is, energy and matter are either /or dependent, literally, on how one looks at it. This makes the existence of anything relative to the existence of something else and only such interdependence and interrelationship allows or defines such existence. This indicates that existence consists more of patterns and relationships than of tangible particles of 3-dimensional matter, shrinking in size logarithmically until they mysteriously disappear into theoretical beings such as the infamous ‘strings’ and slip away from our direct observation altogether.

You may also remember that in TCM fundamentals, we learned that Yin and Yang, the powerful creative forces of life, are interrelated and interdependent, that is, they exist only in RELATIVITY to each other. However, it is important to note here in light of modern advances in quantum physics, specifically in the observation of the characteristics of light and the behavior of energy in the ‘string theory’, that it seems reasonable at this point to speculate that the more comprehensive our awareness, that is, the more dimensions our awareness is able to embrace and process intelligently, the more comprehensive will be our experience of our environment. In fact it can also be justifiably speculated that the very nature of our environment and our ability to manipulate it constructively, which is a key element in the practice of TCM, rests in expanding this ability through increased awareness of the energies involved.

OUR CONCEPTS HUMAN OF LIFESPAN ARE DETERMINED BY THE LIMITS OF OUR AWARENESS

While a comprehensive understanding of this concept may be well beyond the scope of this presentation, it is not overly difficult to consider that the same limits we naturally place on matter due to the limitations of our natural sensory apparatus as it relates to our psychology and our understanding, we may also be imposing upon our concepts of our own potential lifespan. That is, our understanding of both our environment and our existence in it, as it pertains to time or duration, is deducted or induced by our method of observation, which may not include all of the potentialities existent within the phenomena themselves, apart from our ability to understand them. Here we return to the idea of the relationship that exists between the limits of our awareness and the definition of what constitutes our existence, both as matter and/or energy. Thus, varying densities of matter, or various states of matter, involve different laws of physics and time.

The implications of this concept in regard to conscious, practical manipulation of this awareness or energy and its application to healing disease and establishing and maintaining a beneficial equilibrium, or health, may be an important precursor to a vast new approach to health care and quality of life in general.

LIVING TIME

The idea of immortality can either be synonymous with the idea of eternal life or not, depending on how you want to look at it. One common connotation of immortality implies the absence of death. If taken as such, we would not consider eternal life and immorality to be synonymous terms at this time, although they are closely related. Only if we expand our understanding of death can we make these two concepts synonymous.

So right off the bat we have to say that if by death we mean the death and decomposition of the human body, and the absence of that process is immortality, then the concepts I am discussing here do not imply immortality. If, on other hand, we agree to consider death as a process that is intimately integrated with the process of life, and cannot be separated from life, then we could consider eternal life and immortality to be one and the same phenomena. So let’s say, for now, that we can have it both ways that we can experience death, that is, the decomposition of the cellular material that makes our bodies, and yet that life, for us, can go on, relatively, forever. It is in this context that I offer the following information for consideration.

THE INTEGRATION OF SCIENCE, RELIGION, PHILOSOPHY

Let me emphasize that what I am proposing as a possibility here has almost nothing whatsoever to do with any particular religion, cult, social group, or dogmatic system of worship of any kind. It is interesting to note, however, that most all organized religions and ‘spiritual belief systems’ stem from the fundamental concepts (and the investigations thereof) that roughly form the general category of thinking sometimes correctly referred to as esoteric knowledge. Even this distinction is fading, however, as what has formerly been considered esoteric knowledge begins to merge with the most advanced ongoing scientific discoveries.

Let us consider some of the similarities that can be found that interrelate behavior, awareness, and duration of existence. **2

Matter in our neck of the physio/psychological woods may for our purposes here be broken down into various states of density that have corresponding relationships to duration, i.e., time.

They are, in order of density and duration, the mineral state, the cellular state, the molecular state and the electronic state.

We know that the present doesn’t really exist because by the time we consider it, it is already past. So if the present doesn’t really exist, and the past doesn’t exist any more and the future doesn’t exist yet, then everything doesn’t ever exist, and also, nothing always exists. This paradox can only be solved by evolving ones’ concept of time and by lifting the restrictions we impose on the consistency of matter according to our sensory apparatus. This process can be referred to as the conscious expansion of consciousness, or psychological evolution.

Here are some examples of comprehensive systems that express evolution through the increase of their dimensionality:

Dance: a) A concept of possible motions including all types of dance, known and unknown. These motions exist in abstraction and only as potentials, but include all possible dances and the steps therein. b) The specification of particular dances that share some common aspects with all ‘dance’ and have unique characteristics which define it as a particular dance
c) The various steps that formally identify the particular dance from other particular dances
d) The variations of those identifying steps according to the individual interpretation and expression of the individual dancer

Literature:
a) All books and all written ideas or experiences, including all linguistic applications such as letters, words, sentences, paragraphs, chapters, etc., which make up the essential elements of literary expression
b) Any particular genre of literature such as fiction, non fiction, speeches, poetry, etc. that classify literature into particular categories
c) The various literary techniques specific to a particular author, which utilize the general characteristics of the genre to identity his work from others
d) The individual and unique interpretation of these techniques in a specific work by a reader

The point here is that the trace of a dance movement in linear time forms a segment of a dance or an entire dance, dependent upon the duration of that extension. The finite repetition of that sequence may represent the lifetime of the dance, or the dancer, and the existence of the dance throughout linear time may represent eternity for the dance. That is, eternity for the dance is repetition of the steps in an infinite field of recurrence, which is not limited by the individual dancers participation by any physical application.

Art, Science, and even Religion may be seen to follow this pattern, as well. Religion is perhaps the most ephemeral of the pack in that its precepts and key ideas are not as easily categorized, yet contain definite and obvious concepts involving the transformation of various degrees of matter, an expanded concept of time, and an interactive paradigm of cause and effect which is largely dependent upon an individual’s psychology, expressed through behavior and the concept of choice. Beginning to sound a lot like quantum physics, isn’t it’

STATES OR DENSITIES OF MATTER:

Mineral states of matter

These are the densest, and therefore the slowest instances of existence as we consider it. Relative to the next finer state, cellular life, it is 800 times slower. That is everything is experienced (if we can even use the word experienced in that reference) 800 times slower that it is in cellular life. In this context we will consider cellular life as it pertains to humans, as an 80-year span. The accompanying charts illustrate some of the variations in the velocity of matter at different densities and the relative ‘work’ done in various time spans relative to these variations.

Cellular states of matter (human body)

This is the next finer state of matter, cellular organization, specifically the human body, but also including the biological world of nature. We may consider it to last 80 years, more of less.
Molecular states of matter

Next up we have molecular life, represented theoretically as the nature of the existence of the human soul. Also, we may consider scents to be a part of this world. The sense of smell is akin to molecular states of matter, in that it can permeate and travel through cellular matter. So the soul can permeate and travel through cellular and to some degree, mineral matter. In this world everything happens roughly a 1000 times faster than in the cellular world.

Electronic states of matter

Last and certainly not least we come to the fastest of the lot, electronic matter or solar matter or the most essential expression of energy as it relates to matter, light, and how it specifically relates to a human life. Everything happens in just 40 minutes that happens in one month in the molecular world and 80 years in the cellular world and 800,000 years in the mineral world. In other words, life in the fast lane, the sub-atomic world of light, is about a million times faster than in a human cellular body.

Living Time and the Integration of Life

So what? Why does any of this really matter to anyone but speculative mathematicians, quantum mechanics (even shade tree ones) and theoretical philosophers’

Here’s why:

The beautiful paintings which follow describe the various world views of major spiritual systems covering a vast time spans and vast geographic areas.

Interesting to note is that they all involve behavior, choice, various states of matter, and duration of life force. They also include states of being superior by degree of dimensionality, which operate in realms of energy that are subject to fewer physical laws as density decreases. These higher states allude to conscious judgment of some degree and that choice and behavior are extremely important factors in determining further states of being.

It is crucially relevant to notice the connection in all of these world views, the relationships of consciousness, behavior, choice, varying states of matter, and the allusion to an omnipotence that is both subjective and objective, intimately connected with what we may consider an invisible aspect or aspects of our being. All include states of being between death and birth that accommodate some form of conscious experience. All incorporate some form of existence after the decomposition of the physical or cellular body. All include some relationship between behavior and the potential outcome of some sort of ‘judgment’ that occurs after death and before birth.

EAST MEETS WEST

Understanding one’s life in time in light of the vastness that the above concepts suggests, life itself may become much more meaningful, and the idea of individual responsibility becomes inseparable from quality and duration of life. This is essential to the integration of fundamental TCM concepts into western medical modalities and research. To accept and seriously investigate the elemental properties of Qi and Yin and Yang together with the investigation of western advances in quantum physics is to initiate the ultimate merger between the ideas of the East and the West.

NEW AGE HEALTH POTENTIALS: FANTASY OR EXPANDABLE REALITY

Whatever else one might gain from this investigation, regardless of spiritual beliefs, the idea of being able to extend our abilities to manipulate cellular activity through the manipulation of molecular activity and ultimately through the knowledgeable manipulation of electronic or subatomic energy is an exciting and relatively limitless quest. It could even imply the refinement of health care to levels never before possible, even to the extreme of developing a capacity to treat a disease in the timeless, subatomic realm in order to literally prevent it from ever occurring in the first place.‘ Imagine a doctor who could manipulate energies that existed in a patient that has contracted a life-threatening disease in a realm independent of time. This would be preventative medicine in the most advanced context.

PSYCHOLOGICAL EVOLUTION

However you look at it, this life is most likely very important, and how you consider it, that is, the degree to which you are aware or present for you own life is a major factor in determining the overall quality of it. It affects others, too.

For instance, what if you believed that everything existed always and forever’ Every thing you did or said would then be in some way more or less permanent.

You wouldn’t waste so much time on insignificancies; things would matter more to you. And this level of awareness of your life would affect everyone around you, in direct proportion to your level of interaction with him or her.

It would be less attractive to you to be unpleasant or inconsiderate of others and of yourself. Personal self-esteem would gain ground in your overall evaluation system or worldview.

This is not to be confused with moralization.. It is relevant only insofar as it applies to actual conscious experience and the potential for the improvement thereof, a process that I fondly refer to as psychological evolution.

But even if you don’t think of life as something that extends for an individual consciousness beyond death and decorporealization, all this is still relevant, if only because it affects the 80 years you might have in which to live and breath and have your being. And anyway, to master the skills in self remembering and persistence in consciousness that might allow you to exist eternally as an individual being, but not confined to the limits and laws of cellular existence would take a whole lot more energy and intent than the vast majority of us are able to muster.

So don’t worry too much if you don’t think this will happen to you. You still might be eligible for some kind of rebirth or reincarnation, as another you just like the old one, constantly recurring on and endless circle of existences without memory of the succeeding life. Or perhaps you might progress with little increments of positive change (visualized by the upward spiral a slinky toy makes when stretched upwards) that might someday qualify you for electronic existence or the life of pure spirit or energy. But in any case, I highly recommend that you do everything in your power to avoid the ultimate degradation, that is, consignment to the world of mineral existence. Remember, that one lasts 800.000 years without significant change or modification. For most of us, that would be Hell.

SO THEN:

In summation, the quality of one’s life depends upon one’s fundamental understanding of time. Everything you do, say, feel, or think, is related to how you view time in general, and specifically how much time you may or may not have. Many if not most of us have experienced the death of someone close to us. At these times, our own sense of mortality is enhanced, for better or worse. Somehow we seem to understand something that passes us right by in our normal daily lives. It has to do with being present for our lives instead of absent from them. It has to do with living our lives under the stark, tangible realization that our bodies will, indeed, succumb to decomposition and yet embrace the thrilling, invigorating sense of timelessness that may exist for more durable components of our being.

NOTES:

2: The ideas of evolution and intelligent design are anything but mutually exclusive. One only had to consider the evolution of a novel to see this. What are the chances that War and Peace wrote itself, randomly, with no intelligent design’ Tolstoy had letters and words already available, a totally random field of potential combinations of them, and he organized them into patterns that communicated his essential artistic ability, emotional desire and intellectual intent. Now the letters and words were also invented by intelligent design by humans who came before Tolstoy. The origins of the written word are clearly evolutionary yet include obvious intelligent design. In fact, nearly everything you can think of follows this pattern. Why then, is it so difficult to consider the possibility of mutual participation between intelligent design and evolution’ I think discounting the possibility of such a combination of complementary forces is not only unwise, but also unfruitful. 3: The big bang theory, Stephen Hawking and the others notwithstanding, is not necessarily all-inclusive, even though relative to what we have to observe it the best explanation we have within the confines of an understanding of time limited to linear conceptualization.

The thus-far unanswerable question is: What existed before the big bang’ Nothing’ Well, nothing is something. In fact, nothing and everything are equal according to Zen philosophy. The idea that everything either does or doesn’t have to have a start and a finish is based on a linear concept of time, that is, the progression of past to present to future.

Roky and the Aliens - Roky CD Club #48 & #49 Review

I've been listening to the three Roky and the Aliens discs and... this is some of the best material we have put out. The quality is amazing and the material is great. The material is also missing that Stu Cook polish that (I think) detracts from the LP.

Billy Miller is hardly evident; they kept their yapping dog on a leash for these sessions. We didn't have to employ the Billy-o-Meter on these tracks. The Billy-o-Meter is Roky CD Club Production identifying Billy's terrible screeching tone on the signal processing software interface. We then can "shave" it down. One day, we will eliminate it. Sure, Billy jumps in occasionally and tries to make his statement but, on these more raw tracks, that little yapping dog was kept on a leash.

Disc #48 is a collection of MP3 sourced tracks that were floating around along with a few tracks from another boot. We wanted it all gathered together. This disc sounds great but the bass signals might sound a little "boomy" on cheaper systems. Still, the sound is great.

Even though #49 is from cassette sources they are 1st gen off the masters. The quality is fantastic. Additionally, the music has a DYNAMIC RANGE because we didn't compress the shit out of the signal like Charly did with the 'Elevators masters.

With these discs one can crank up the volume without the sound becoming all brittle & harsh like the Charly discs. One can crank this up without hurting one's ears. The sound has that warmth and it's not all flat and up in your face like the Charly discs. Those Charly discs have zero dynamic range.

Roky sounds GREAT on these discs.

Be sure to grab these discs. Here are the blog posts for information on hos to grab them!

Roky CD Club #48:
http://www.texaspsychedelicrock.com/2011/07/roky-cd-club-48-roky-erickson-and.html

Roky CD Club #49:
http://www.texaspsychedelicrock.com/2011/07/roky-and-aliens-evil-one-alternate.html

Golden Dawn - It's Gonna Be A Golden Day

It’s Gonna Be A Golden Day

This band is not to be confused with the 90s ritual-magick band. I’m sure I’ll love them too, but (like Nirvana) they should have chosen a different name; this one has been taken since the 60s. The Golden Dawn to which I presently refer produced some of the hardest-rocking metaphysics you’ll ever hear. Texas produced some of the finest music of the era, a good deal of it emanating from the International Artists label, who had Thirteenth Floor Elevators hogging most of the glory but also preserved such true freaks as the Red Crayola for incredulous modern ears.

That would have been plenty, but they also had The Golden Dawn on the roster, who if the Elevators had never existed would have been the best psychedelic band in Texas. Perhaps in fact they were, but they only managed one album (A Power Plant in 1968) and not a very long one at that. Laboring under the shadow of the Elevators and the Crayola, their star never quite attained the ‘legendary’ luminescence of their peers--but Texas music doesn’t get any better than this. The Golden Dawn was out on as farflung a spiritual tangent as were the Elevators, yet they played much tighter rock and roll. (The Red Crayola were lightyears past either, but they ended up severing themselves from the most minimal standards of coherence to get there.)

So there’s a chunk of the playing field that the Golden Dawn will have wholly unto themselves for all eternity. And a glorious chunk it is. Their liner notes attest that they were as heavily into meditation as they were into acid (they weren’t shy about the fact they’d read a little Crowley either). Their LP (both cover and title) was as unabashed a celebration of the triumph of sacred herb as anybody could desire. One wishes more present-day bands would be as militant about it. There are things like The Chronic, but I can’t think of much from the ‘rock and roll’ bands--not the Americans at least.

There’s a thriving scene in England around Hawkwind, Bevis Frond, Gong, and a hundred other interlocking bands. Prime Minister Blair, for all his punk roots, probably won’t consider giving them their Stonehenge back (as if Maggie had ever had the right to take it away), but even if they don’t have their standing stones the freaks still have each other. In America, unfortunately, hive mentality remains on the throne. So if by chance you inhale, don’t hold your breath.

Remember that cereal commercial, filmed entirely in yellow, tawny, electric brown and orange, and featuring sunbeams glistening off of a haystack’ Some corn-pone voice would drawl, ‘It’s gonna be a gol-den day!‘ Surely there were many lovely days for this band, sneaking a toke or two behind the barn. Ah, yes, people breathed easier in them thar days...The hell they did--you don’t believe that, do you?

We’re talking Texas! In the 60s! Paranoia was one of the very emblems of hipness. If you were into any sort of chemical adventuring beyond coffee, beer or cigarettes, you were best off assuming your phone was being tapped and the FBI was following you around, because it was not at all inconceivable. And the local cops would be more than happy to pick up from the feds whatever slack there was.It was one of those historic changing-of-the-guard moments. You know what that means--you’re busted! Or at least fearful of it. Nowadays it’s hard to appreciate what a brave gesture it was for a rock band in that place and time to put it all on the line, flaunting their lifestyle choices in so provocative a manner.

These people truly were ‘outrageous’ in a way to which most moderns have forgotten even to aspire--because back then the outraging of certain authority figures over that particular set of issues could get you anything from a fractured skull to 10-to-20 years in jail. Or both. Lest we forget, in the more white-trash areas of Texas (and just about anyplace else in the country where the kids still eat lead paint chips) such a fate can easily be manufactured for you, to this very day.

If I may digress: That’s one thing nobody is ever willing to give Deadheads credit for--true grit. Punk was little more than a fashion statement after the first few years, and unlikely to get you more than a lot of dirty looks, but Deadheads (especially in the years before their MTV coronation as a ‘valid’ subculture) had guts. Year after year they’d go out on tour, knowing full well that they were sitting ducks for every narc within 500 miles of the show who was too lazy or chickenshit to earn a badge doing real policework and picked upon lamblike suburban tie-dyes for the crime of flaunting themselves in front of somebody else’s parents instead. (Fun Facts To Know And Tell: During WWII, the theme song of the Bulgarian resistance was entitled ‘He Falls In the Battle For Our Freedom.’ I’m not even Bulgarian, and yet it comes to mind.)

What does all this have to do with the Golden Dawn’ What, you mean the G.D. initials aren’t enough‘..welllllll... The only parallel in recent times that I can draw to the atmosphere of young Texas in the late 60s is that of Deadheads in the early 90s being thrown in jail for nothing more or worse than their chemical preferences. (Which is going to be the next cultural war, after we win the one for freedom in our sexual preferences. Sign up now. We’re gonna need something to keep us entertained in our old age.) Anyway...I ramble ridiculously, but the fact remains that The Golden Dawn were Texas kids who were into peace, pot and microdot, as well as meditation and various metaphysical practices...and while they never were as persecuted so publicly and spectacularly as the Elevators, they lived and breathed and did their very best to practice their peace-and-love in a poisonous, rednecked, hate-filled environment not of their making, which is why they played their rock and roll with a viciousness that the Dead Kennedys or Fear never had a prayer of attempting.

Which is not to say that the latter bands weren’t louder or more raucous overall, but when all is said and done, they were merely doing what was expected of them. When the Golden Dawn were doing their thing nobody had ever heard it before, and there was no niche that had already been carved out in society for them. Nowadays you can go to the mall and the New Age boutique is right next to the body-piercing cubicle, but people back then were obliged to make everything up as they went along.

This is why the freaks of the 60s were the freaks of the century. There are modes of expression developed by latter generations that were inconceivable during the Summer of Love, but the only reason there was a possibility for such things was that the 70s and 80s kids stood on the shoulders of giants. One could say that there would have been no hippies had it not been for Elvis on the one hand and the beatniks on the other--but the hippies didn’t feel any particular debt to either, nor was there any trace of the kill-the-father hostility that the hippies ultimately inspired. Which is the other thing the punks owed to the hippies--a context.

Johnny Rotten used to parade around in a homemade, self-mutilated ‘I Hate Pink Floyd’ t-shirt. I’ve never lost any sleep over that, but it begs the question: what would Johnny have been had there never been a Pink Floyd to hate’ Precious little--a Teddy Boy with bad teeth, muttering to himself about life on the dole. Since killing-the-father is what punk is all about, one couldn’t have expected anyone to admit it at the time, but now that ‘punk’ is synonymous with Boring Old Fart it’s long overdue that somebody ought to ‘fess up.

It’s not likely to happen, and I guess it doesn’t matter. As far as the ‘ber-society is concerned, ‘punk’ and ‘hippie’ both are synonymous with Loser, and people should be distracted from making any finer distinctions, much less researching the question for themselves. But if you care to, A Power Plant (their only album--the French liner notes bemoan the fact as much as I do), was released on CD in 1992 and can be located without too much difficulty. It’s the crappy French reissue label, Eva, but that’s infinitely preferable to the crappy American reissue label, Collectables.

You will find it to be one of the most simultaneously enlightened and pissed-off records you will ever hear. For all the snarling rock and roll tunes (‘Evolution,’ ‘Starvation,’ ‘I’ll Be Around) on it, there are also beautiful mellow numbers that nonetheless have an edge to them. There’s even one midtempo tune that sounds like the Monkees. No matter. The rock and roll on this record kicks and growls and leaves tooth-marks on your aura even as it elevates your consciousness. $26’ Cheap at twice the price. Buy!

Steve Czapala

Charlie Prichard Interview - 3/26/2005

Charlie Prichard Interview - 3/26/2005 Interview by Carlton Crutcher

the Charlie Prichard Interview In the summer of 1981 when I was 19, I was listening to underground radio in Houston Texas (KPFT, Pacifica) and Roky Erickson was being interviewed for a show he was playing. The interviewers seemed to be in awe of Roky and Roky was so detached from the interview he seemed to be on another planet. They would ask him long detailed questions about the 13th Floor Elevators and his answers would all be after long pauses ‘yeah’ or ‘could you repeat the question’. It got to the point where the interviewers started snickering and then they would play some 13th Floor Elevators and I was fascinated. I popped in a blank tape and recorded the rest of the interview and listened to these songs over and over, it was like finding the Holy Grail of 60’s psychedelic music and all right here in Texas. That fall I started attending the University of Texas in Austin and by then I was a 13th Floor Elevators fanatic having bought ‘The Psychedelic Sounds of’’ and ‘Easter Everywhere’. One day I was in the local cool record store ‘Inner Sanctum’ probably looking for 13th Floor Elevators albums. There was only a couple of people in the store when I noticed this guy with long hair, acid bleached bell bottom jeans, barefooted, reading from the Bible out loud to no one in particular. I realized this was the Roky Erickson - it was one of the most far-out psychedelic experiences I’ve ever had, and my true introduction to Austin. Roky looked young and fit; to me he was a mythic figure from a far distant time but he was only about 33 years old. It was horrifyingly fascinating, I didn’t dare speak to him to break him out of his trance. So anyway I started a psychedelic punk band called Tulum in 1985, the Spacepunk band ST37 in ‘87 and improvisation space band Book of Shadows in ‘99. In March of ‘05 my wife Sharon’s friend Smokey invited us to the ‘Instruments of Freedom’, a forum featuring local musicians including Roky. While we were sitting there waiting for things to start this guy stopped by and said hello to Smokey. I asked Smokey who he was and he said ‘oh, that’s Charlie Prichard, he used to play in the Conqueroo.’ I’d seen this guy around town for years and had no idea he was a musician much less a member of the mythical Conqueroo. I’d seen their name for years, almost always in association with the 13th Floor Elevators, other than this I’d never seen any of their recordings or any information about them anywhere. So I thought I should interview Charlie Prichard for the Terrascope, an idea which was immediately and enthusiastically embraced by Phil, and here it is. ‘ Carlton Crutcher History and Dramatis Personae The Conqueroo line-up consisted of: Charlie Prichard (lead guitar, bass and vocals), Ed Guinn (bass, keyboards, woodwind, vocals), Tom Bright (drums), Bill Carr (vocals, harmonica) and Wally Stopher (rhythm guitar and keyboards). The band was initially led by singer/guitarist and songwriter Powell St John, however he left before the band took off and was replaced in October 1966 by rhythm guitarist and vocalist Bob Brown. Drummer Daryl Rutherford replaced Tom Bright for a series of recordings the Conqueroo made at the Vulcan in their home town of Austin, Texas in 1968; he in turn was subsequently replaced by Gerry Storm - and when the band recorded 4 songs at Pacific High Studios on San Francisco, drummer Alvin Sykes deputised. The band released one 45 on Bill Josey’s Sonobeat label, ‘1 to 3’ b/w ‘I’ve Got Time’. The record featured a full-colour picture sleeve designed by the legendary Gilbert Shelton. A compilation LP entitled ‘From The Vulcan Gas Company’ was released in England on the 5 Hours Back label (part of Pete Flanagan’s Zippo Records group) in 1987 which featured, in addition to ‘1 to 3’ and ‘I’ve Got Time’, four other songs recorded at the Vulcan at different times, and three of the 4 songs recorded in San Francisco. Members of the Conqueroo also feature on a Gilbert Shelton Ensemble 45 released on ESP Records in 1968, and can be heard jamming with the 13th Floor Elevators in 1967 on ‘She Lives’ (Texas Archive Recordings, 1985) The interview took place March 26, 2005 at Mexico Lindo at 1816 South Lamar Blvd in Austin Texas. Present were Charlie Prichard (CP), Carlton Crutcher (CC) and Sharon Crutcher (SC).
		1. ‘I’m a huge Elevators fan but I never see Conqueroo stuff around’’ CC: I’m a huge Elevators fan but I never see Conqueroo stuff around. They released a Conqueroo single in England’ CP: No, that was an LP [‘Live from the Vulcan Gas Co’’ (5 Hours Back TOCK008, 1987)] It was recorded at the Vulcan but it wasn’t a live performance. CC: Well I guess we should go ahead and formally start the interview. Where are you from’ CP: San Antonio is where I grew up CC: How did you become a musician’ CP I’d played music from an early age and I’d just always done it. My parents both could play a little. I’d lived next door to a music teacher when I was kid so I started playing the trumpet at six. I could read music by the time I could read words. CC San Antonio, that’s where Doug Sahm is from too’ CP Yeah CC What was your first band’ CP Probably a jug band in San Antonio called Tom Swift and His Electric Grandmother (Sound Tex 1964) CC Wow what a name! CP Yeah, we put out a single, the guy that was on there that you might have heard of was Michael Murphy, Michael Martin Murphy. CC Really’ CP Yeah, he sang on one side of it CC I bet that’s a collector’s item’ CP (laughing) Probably so, yeah CC Would you just play locally’ Would y’all come up here (to Austin) and play’ CP We didn’t play much, you know, mainly got together and did the record, did a few little gigs. CC Were ya’ll teenagers in high school’ CP Actually it was after I was in high school. I didn’t play in bands in high school, I played in the marching band until I got tired of being made to march. CC Right. So you put out the one single, played locally a bit then broke up’ CP Yeah, and then I did some folk music stuff in San Antonio, I was into that scene. CC It was the early sixties’ That was the big folk craze’ ‘63, ‘64 CP Yeah CC What year were you born’ CP ‘45 CC Did you do any recording in the folk days’ CP Not much, just playing CC Did you have a fancy name for yourself then’ CP (laughing) No, no, I was just lucky to get to play CC So you’re mainly a guitar player, right’ CP Yeah CC Do you play lap steel or stuff like that’ CP Not so’s you’d notice. I used to wanna be a slide guitar player and I’d play slide on everything, you know, if I could get away with it, but not so much anymore. Although that seems to be what people notice. CC Were you playing slide in the Conqueroo days’ CP Some, yeah; not so much with the Conqueroo but I was always playing bottle neck in those days. Some of my big influences were always slide players like Blind Willie Johnson (born in Texas 1902-1947) and Fred McDowell (Mississippi Fred McDowell 1904-1972) is the first guy I heard and said ‘hey, I can do that!’ And he was so elemental, so forceful. CC We would always cut off the longneck from a beer bottle and use those. CP He played with a wrist pin from a diesel piston CC That’d work CP Yeah, some steel with some weight to it, y’know CC Tell me how you spell your last name, it doesn’t have a t in it’ CP No, it’s like Richard with a p in front of it. CC Is that French originally’ CP No, it’s probably Welsh, and I think we all used to be together. The Pritchards. Somehow there was a rift in the family and now they’re all jewellers and bankers, you know, Investment Counsellors. And the Prichards without the T are all hog farmers and coal miners. CC (laughing) Right! SC Who were your favourite musicians that influenced you’ CP Ray Charles, Pop Staples (Roebuck Pop Staples born 1915 in Winona Mississippi. Patriarch of the musical family, the Staples Singers) - and Blind Willie Johnson and Robert Johnson SC So it’s predominantly blues stuff’ CP Well yeah, I guess so. I’m from San Antonio and we don’t have the sense down there to think of it as all separate. I played with Doug (Sahm) and stuff and he’s a perfect example of it. I mean we think we can play country and jazz and rock and blues and all that stuff. CC So after your folk stint was it then on to Conqueroo’ CP Yeah, yeah 2. ‘Then I got busted with Doug Sahm’s band down in Corpus and dropped out of college’ CC So you moved up to Austin to go to college’ CP I did. It didn’t work out, though I tried it several times. I did a couple of years at San Antonio College first, I started out in Engineering and mathematics lead me to Philosophy and then I became an American Studies major. . CC You were playing in Doug Sahm’s band’ CP Actually I just went down to Corpus to hang out with them although I played later with Doug and we did recordings together. CC Years later’ CP Yeah, yeah. They were just my friends at that point and I went down there to hang out with them. So ‘they’ were waiting for us. CC What year are we talking about, ‘66, ‘65’ CP Exactly, yeah. CC What was his band called then’ CP The Sir Douglas Quintet CC Did they already have their single out and all of that’ CP Yeah, and I think what happened was, we did a show at a TV station in San Antonio the day before. It was like the local version of American Bandstand or whatever, you know, and we were smoking pot behind the set. They said a bottle of bottle of shaving lotion busted open in Doug’s bag and they opened his bag and found this pot, but I never believed that. I think they just set us up. CC Where were you, in San Antonio’ CP Well we were in San Antonio (Doug lived in San Antonio but the bust was in Corpus Christi. The TV show was in San Antonio) but it was a Federal thing so they were over the whole Southern District. And when Augie [Meyers] and Johnny [Perez] and I got to Corpus we knew that Doug would be staying in one of two hotels. And we went to the first one and checked and he wasn’t there and then they just pulled us over on the freeway, on the way to the second hotel without a reason. There was no probable cause but it cost a bunch and set us back. CC Was the bust something that followed you around’ CP It was a set back at the time. I had my bags packed, I was going to San Francisco. CC You were gonna go out there to get away from that’ CP No, I was gonna go out there because that’s where I wanted to be. I had sorta given up my house here in Austin. I had a house with Don Hyde, he was one of the original guys at the Vulcan Gas Company. Actually it was the old Lomax House, I don’t know how deep you wanna get into this stuff’ CC As much as you want to. CP John Lomax, do you know who John Lomax was’ CC Yeah, he was the guy who recorded all the old time blues guys. CP Yeah, right. He was the folklorist at U.T. (University of Texas) at the time. We’re talking about the late 40’s I’d say. But anyhow this house at 910 West 26th street was the old Lomax house. I was fixing to move out of that house and move straight to San Francisco, and then I got busted and then I had to stay a week or two at my parents house in San Antonio because they saw me on the Channel 12 news. CC Y’all were on the news’ CP In Corpus Christi, yeah, with my sweater pulled up over my head shootin' the BIRD. CC Wow, y’all were like Bonnie & Clyde or something. CP (laughing) Hardly, I was a kid you know. Doug was too. And as it turned out instead of going, I mean we got really good lawyers and stuff. But the thing that got us off was our age really. CC You were under age. CP The judge was the first Mexican American Federal Judge. He was appointed by Kennedy and he was very strict. I don’t remember his name. We got our hair cut real short before we came in. He said, ‘I’m glad to see you boys cut off that long hair and stuff’. But the thing that got us off was our age. There was the young offenders act and the youthful offenders act. Doug was under 25 and I was under 21 and so we both got off on that, you know we had 5 years probation, or I did, I don’t know what Doug’s was. But luckily the Probation Officer in Corpus Christi wrote his Masters Thesis on why pot was better for you than alcohol or tobacco. CC Wow, that was pretty progressive. CP Yeah, and Doug got the guy in San Antonio that was the asshole of assholes and I got this guy in Corpus Christi. I said ‘Look, I may be fixing to go to England you know, I’m a musician you know, I can’t be coming in to see you all the time and shit. You know this is the first time I’ve been to Corpus Christi in 5 years’. He said, ‘Look you’re a free citizen, all you gotta do is write me a letter once a month. Y'know, tell me if ya got another job or whatever.’ I said ‘Sure, I can do that’. So I would fire off a letter once a month saying ‘Hi, it’s me, I’m fine.’ Then after a couple of years I said ‘Look 2 years is up, can I get off of this shit’’ He said ‘Yeah, ok, fine.’ So it wasn’t too bad but Doug had to deal with this asshole in San Antonio, they took his phone. CC His what’! CP They disconnected his phone from his house. They said it was because of ‘Mr. Sahm’s problem’ SC Did you end up going down to San Francisco and living for a while’ CP San Francisco’ Oh yeah. Powell St John used to just get on the bus and ride all day in San Francisco. Get on the bus, sit there with his little book and write weird shit out like Powell writes now. You know, what a brilliant guy. The other guy that used to do that was Richard Brautigan. They’d run into each other on the bus. CC Is Powell St John still around’ CP Yeah, he was around last week. They just recorded an album. CC Really, did you play on it’ CP No, I don’t even deserve to be mentioned in the same paragraph with Powell. CC Really’ CP He’s a brilliant, brilliant guy. He’s just one of the most creative people I’ve ever met in my life. He’s a songwriter, he’s an illustrator. When I first knew Powell he was doing these things, 4 feet by 3 feet of little ballpoint pen illustrations that the nearest thing I can think of is like Hieronymous Bosch or something. Illustration of hell and purgatory or whatever. Little red, green and blue ballpoint pen highly detailed drawings. He lived in this house over on 45th street back in the ‘60s. He had this house that was surrounded by tons and tons of little weird cactus plants that he cultivated. I don’t even know how to begin to explain Powell, he’s such a creative force. CC What I know about him is that he wrote those songs for the Elevators and he was part of the Ghetto crowd and that he was in Mother Earth - and that’s about all I know about him. I don’t know anything he’s done since then. CP The Conqueroo was originally St John and the Conqueroo. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the legend of High John the Conqueror but it was a pun on that. High John the Conqueror or the Conqueroo in black American folklore, the guy that fixed it up so no snakes ever bit any black people until after the Emancipation Proclamation. He’s the guy that walked on the masters table, kickin' down doors. CC Is it based on a real person, or is it mythology’ CP It’s mythology, and like most mythology I’m sure it’s based in fact to some degree. Actually there was a little jug band with Powell and Tary that I stole the name from. CC Tary Owens’ CP Right. Tary was one of my oldest best friends. When I moved to Austin in like ‘65 my friends Mark Weakley and Bill Holloway, who were both San Antonio guys, musicians that I was blessed to get to play with at that time. I met Tary and he was the Folklore archivist at the University of Texas. He was going around in the country recording both black and white both singers and players and story tellers and stuff, and I got to do a lot of that with him, go out and do some of those field recordings. We had several bands together over the years, but anyway the Conqueroo was sort of Tary’s idea for a name. (St John and the Conqueroo) CC Really’ CP Yeah, which I appropriated, because he and Powell had a little sorta two man folk act. Then they quit doing that. I got drunk one night and booked some gigs and’ CC Needed a name for the band’ CP Well, I had Powell and got Ed Guinn to say he’d do it, you know, and we needed a drummer and there was one next door. CC Was Ed a bass player’ CP No, Ed was basically a clarinet player at that time. CC Did he play bass in the band’ CP Yeah he played bass in the Conqueroo (and keys) you know sorta, ‘ok, you’re the bass player’ CC That’s how most bands get started, as kind of a lark! SC There is a herb that is called High John the Conqueror CP Yeah, it’s a root, one of those man shaped roots like a ginseng or something [Mandrake, possibly ‘ Ed]. Did you ever hear the Muddy Waters song about the ‘My John the Conqueror Root’’ SC No, I haven’t. CP (singing) ‘I was accused of murder in the first degree and the judge’s wife was cryin' let the man go free cause I was rubbin' my root, ain’t nothing she can do when I’m rubbin' my John the Conqueror root.’ CC So ya’ll were into that when you named the band’ CP Yeah, yeah we were into different things between us y'know. Ed was classically trained, he was in the music program at U.T. and ridin’ his little motor scooter around through all the non-motorized vehicles parts of U.T. They called him ‘Super Spade’ at the time. CC Was he half black’ CP Yeah, I met his grandmother. She was this beautiful little Mexican lady down in San Antonio. Living right there in the shadow of the Hemisphere Arena there. Then we got Bob Brown in the band 6 months down the road. CC He was the guitar player’ CP Yeah, he was the rhythm guitar, he was a brilliant songwriter; still is. Photo: Ed Guinn pictured in February 1967 CC I came across a Sonobeat website. They had a little clip of each side of the single, only 15 or 20 seconds, but I listened to it and the single sounds great. They had some kind of recording set up at Vulcan’ CP Yeah, right. 3. ‘I always thought it [the single] sounded like it was recorded in a fucking fishbowl or something’ CC But man it had such a ‘cool’ full sound, you know! My main impression was that ‘wow, if the Conqueroo had recorded a whole LP of that same session it really would have been a classic.’ CP That’s nice of you to say that. I always thought it sounded like it was recorded in a fucking fishbowl or something. That room had, uh, unfortunate sonic characteristics shall we say. I mean Johnny Winter recorded his first album there, same people. That was the coolest band and it benefited from all that ‘natural reverb’ that occurred in there. Johnny was such a monster, man! CC I’ve always wanted to find that album (‘Progressive Blues Experiment’), I’m a big Stevie Ray (Vaughn) fan also and I see that as Texas blues; psychedelic blues at it’s best; Johnny Winter. CP Both those guys, I’m lucky to have been really close to both those people. We first met Johnny, once again don’t ask me what year it was, but we went to Denver. Chet Helms had this idea that San Francisco was going to fall into the ocean, which it may well at any moment you know, and that Denver was’ CC Going to be the new coast’ CP Yeah exactly, yeah. So they opened the Family Dog in Denver. We went out there and played a couple of weeks I think. CC Is that when the Charlatans relocated out there’ CP The Charlatans’ That’s Dan Hicks and those guys. They were from San Francisco, I don’t know them. I can’t remember the exact sequence of who we played with buy anyhow Johnny Winter came out there. Maybe we played a week and he came there with his band ‘Winter’ which was him and Uncle John Turner and Tommy Shannon. And he completely fried my mind. I mean, he had all these amps that were strung together, like Fender and Leslies. He and I stayed up and played like well past dawn in there, you know, just the two of us on stage playing guitars, and I’m sure it was horrible. CC Let’s get the chronology straight. Did y’all start the Conqueroo before you went out to San Francisco, or’ CP Oh yeah, oh yeah. We were students, I use the term loosely. CC So the band, it started around what ‘65 ‘66 or just vaguely’ CP I’m thinking that you know, yeah ‘65. CC And when you went to San Francisco did the whole band go out’ Or a version of the band’ CP Yeah, the band as it were at the time, which was me and Bob and Ed CC Was Powell still in the band’ CP No, Powell was already with Mother Earth, I think, in San Francisco at that time. Powell and I have had, I forget how many bands together, let me say three or four. Probably more than that. CC So, when the Conqueroo went to San Francisco, tell me what San Francisco was like for you guys. Was it like just totally awesome or was it hard times’ CP Well, I mean we were poor but we had a place to alight. We had a big ol’ house on Portrero Hill. Which I lasted one or two nights at. I think one night. But I mean it wasn’t just like driving into town and not knowing anybody, but we didn’t really have anything going for us except we knew some people at the Avalon and the Ripoff Press. CC Had y’all already done the single by then’ CP I think so. CC So they probably had the single out there. At least whoever who was into that sort of thing. CP Well, yeah. I mean there may have been someone out there, but it wasn’t like it was all over the place or anything. But we proceeded to rehearse ourselves to death, y’know, we didn’t play that many gigs but boy did we rehearse! We had a history of breaking a drummer’s brain about once every six months; we had a whole lotta drummers. CC So how long were you in San Francisco’ CP About seven years, I don’t know. I started playing with Doug again out there. Doing session work for Mercury Records. That was Doug’s label at the time. We started doing Little Junior Parker records (‘Honey Dripping Soul’, I played guitar ‘ Doug played guitar too), played on some of Doug’s stuff. And then Ed & Bob eventually moved back to Austin and started calling themselves the Conqueroo again, and they had a band, some really good players. CC When they came back they continued with the band without you’ CP Uh huh, and then they became Texoid. They called it Conqueroo for a while and it sorta evolved into a band called Texoid. CC I read that after the Conqueroo Sonobeat single that some of the guys got together for another Sonobeat single. CP Oh’ That’s probably it. Oh, well there was also this thing that I wasn’t involved in, that for some reason they called the Conqueroo which is half the Conqueroo. I mean it’s Ed and Bob and Minor Wilson and some other guys that’s some sorta acoustic stuff I think primarily that they did down in Houston at the place the Elevators recorded. CC When you were in San Francisco, I’m taking that this is probably late ‘66 early ‘67’ CP No, no no it was ‘68 when I moved to San Francisco. We were there in ‘68. One of the first things we played was in Golden Gate Park, somebody told me the other day they got a tape or something of us playing in Golden Gate Park. 4. ‘We were a fuckin’ garage band basically.’ CC Wow, that would be awesome to hear that. So when y’all went to San Francisco that was kinda after the period where you’d already had like been opening for the Elevators around Austin all the time’ Right’ CP Yeah. The first show we put on in Austin before we had our own club, The Vulcan Gas Company, and everything was over at Doris Miller Auditorium with us (Conqueroo) and the Elevators’ I said ‘we’, I’m talking about Houston White, Henry Carr and Gary Scanlon, the guys who eventually opened up the Vulcan Gas Company. They were the people who made it possible for us to play music and act like we knew what we were doing. We were a fuckin’ garage band basically. CC Right CP Which the Elevators weren’t. They were the Lingsmen plus Roky from the Spades and Tommy on jug. They’d been making a very good living playin’ down on the Texas beaches. They were like a surf band; not a surf band but they were the hip dog band from a previous era or whatever, y’know. They were accomplished professional musicians and we were a bunch of college hippies who wanted to be a band. CC So when you played with the Elevators here in town would you play before them or after them’ The headliners used to play first, right’ CP Not that I recall. There may have been some show where they played first. CC As for as the Elevators locally you guys would be the opening band usually, I mean when you would play with the Elevators’ CP Yeah, sure, and then we might get to jam some together. CC Let me back track a little bit. How would you describe the Conqueroo sound’ What kind of sound were you going for, were y’all even conscious of going for a sound or were you just doing what you do’ CP Oh, we were just playing around trying to find something. Ed had more catholic, not in the religious sense, but y'know, universal tastes. We wanted to sound like Black Orpheus, we wanted to sound like Stockhausen. You know, in our fuckin’ puffed up pomposity. I wanted to sound, like I said, like Blind Willie Johnson. When I was 20 years old I consciously felt, well maybe I can sound like that by the time I’m 40. When I was 40 I revised it to 60. Well this year I’ll be 60. I’m still workin’ on Blind Willie Johnson. CC Conqueroo were more blues oriented and not really going for the pop thing, right’ CP Well Ed and Bob and I were sort of the driving forces, y’know. I wanted to be black and he wanted to be well educated or whatever’ CC Did Bob, the other guitar player write most of the songs’ CP He wrote a lot of them, and we did a lot of covers of stuff I brought in. CC Is he (Bob Brown) still around’ CP Bob’s back in town. I’m thinking he’s a Cable TV Executive or something like that. CC Have y’all ever done any Conqueroo reunion gigs’ CP No, people keep talking about that but uh’ CC Is everybody still available’ CP Well, I’m obviously available. I play guitar with anybody that doesn’t stop me pretty much, and Bob I think would be amenable to it - and Ed doesn’t want anything to do with getting up on stage and making further fools of ourselves. CC So back to Conqueroo San Francisco ‘68. You opened for Howlin’ Wolf. What other memorable gigs did y’all do around that time’ CP Oh shit man, I played with Mance Lipscomb at the Avalon. CC You played in the band, not opening for him’ CP Yeah. Powell St John was in that band too - and George Rains CC Really, wow that’s cool. How long did you guys stay out there’ CP I stayed out there longer than the rest of them. I stayed out there like 7 years. CC Oh really’ CP Yeah, well not just San Francisco but San Francisco and then I moved to Berkeley and then Fairfax then Mendocino. I had another band with Tary and Powell called St John and the Angel Band. The Hells Angels came to see us and said they liked the band a lot but thought it would be good if we changed the name (laughter). So we changed it to Free Chicken. ‘Yeah, right away, no problem!’ CC Free Chicken’ CP Yeah, the song that Gilbert Shelton wrote and the Hub City Movers recorded. We gave away free chicken at the first gig we played at. (laughter) Then I joined this band Cat Mother which is where Jimi Hendrix comes in. CC I have that album, Cat Mother’s ‘The Street Giveth and the Street Taketh Away’ CP Oh yeah that’s the one Jimi Hendrix co-produced it with them, it’s the only thing he ever produced as far as I know. It was their first album, they were just finishing up their second album when I met them. They’d moved out to California and were lookin' for a guitar player. So I came and brought my Little Champ amp and then a few weeks later got the call to do the Atlanta Pop Festival. You know, five hundred thousand people! CC I have a video of Jimi Hendrix from that’ So you joined Cat Mother and that was while they were recording their second album, so you played on that second album’ CP No, I played on the third album. They were just finishing the second album when I met them. I played on the third and helped them get the music together for the fourth but they were going back to New York. They were taking a school bus and were all going to stay on the Bowery in New York, because of this tie with Michael Jeffrey who was Jimi Hendrix’ manager. CC Right CP You know I just said ‘no I’m not going to New York.’ We picked up this guitar player in England, Charlie Harcourt, who was a great guitar player, a great guy. Geordie lad, from Newcastle way. So they had a good guitar player so I just said ‘this is where I get off’ And they went back to record their fourth album. CC What was that third album called, do you remember’ CP I think it may have been called just Cat Mother. CC They shortened their name to just Cat Mother’ CP Yeah, when they moved from New York they dropped ‘the Allnight Newsboys’. I think the first one was called ‘the street giveth and the street taketh away’ the second one was called ‘Albion Doowa’ I believe. 5. ‘We toured opening for Hendrix, we were the opening band.’ CC So when you joined the band, is that when you went down and played that Atlanta Pop Festival’ CP Yeah. We actually toured opening for Hendrix, we were the opening band. CC Wow, was that one of his last US tours’ Must have been. Did you get to hang out with Jimi’ What was he like’ CP He was a sweet guy. SC A real spiritual person wasn’t he’ CP Yeah. I used to see Jimi Hendrix, back on TV in Austin in the ‘60s there was this show called Night Train on TV that was either out of Nashville or Knoxville I can’t remember. It was like a black R&B show. It was on at midnight, Friday nights. It was sponsored by the Victory Grill and the Sweet One Hour Cleaners and they’d have like Bobby Bland and Bobby Bland imitator or Jackie Wilson and the Jackie Wilson imitator all on the same show. Had this guy called Ironing Board Sam, and they had Little Richard’s Band and this was when Little Richard was with God you know. And there was this guy on the end and we’d go ‘oh man look it looks like a Black Bob Dylan.’ And it was Jimi Hendrix sitting there playin' guitar and he’d throw his guitar up and it’d go do two or three flips in the air. CC That footage would be worth a gazillion dollars now! Wow, it’s amazing. Opening for Hendrix must have been a trip. CP You know he’s from Seattle’ CC Uh huh CP So we went back there and played at this baseball field called Sicks Stadium. It was Cactus, which was some guys from Vanilla Fudge I think, playing first. We were supposed to go on next and then Jimi. But it was raining and we were on this big stage at a baseball stadium and ‘we ain’t going out there and playing in the rain.’ You know playing electric instruments. But Jimi kinda had to play. I mean his dad was there and everything so he got out there and played and there were guys holding up tarps over his head while he played and the rain was in the tarps. Ya know it was really weird. (laughter) Talk about psychedelic - that was a psychedelic scene. CC What did you think of Hendrix’s music and what did you think of those gigs’ CP Oh, what a treat, getting to hear him play. It was an education and I shoulda gotten more from it than I did, but I sure got a lot you know. CC So you recorded that album with Cat Mother and then you said you worked a little bit on the next one, or putting the songs together that were going to be the next one’ CP Yeah, yeah. CC Then you quit’ CP Well, when it came time to record it like I said I just couldn’t face another bus trip across country, ‘you know they have really excellent recording machines out here on the West Coast now fellas.’ Plus I had this little R&B band to be busy with down in Santa Cruz with Jerry Miller the guy from Moby Grape. CC Oh really’ I’m a big Moby Grape fan. CP I don’t know the rest of the guys but Jerry Miller’ he’s a great guy. He was probably the most serious musician in the band. CC What was this band called’ CP Uh, it was me and Jerry Miller and this guy Lloyd Morris and some guys from a band called Oganookie including Isaac Stern’s nephew. You know who Isaac Stern is’ The classical violinist. It was called ‘The New Shreveport Homewreckers’ for awhile and then when I left they started calling them ‘Santa Cruz Blues Jews’ (laughter) Which is’ seemed like a good idea. But ah we played a lot around Santa Cruz Hills ya know in that area. CC And that was after the Moby Grape kinda had run it’s course’ CP Yeah, whatever they did. I mean they played at the Vulcan I think’ I didn’t get to hear them, I think I was already gone. CC Let me back track a little bit. What was your take on Tommy Hall’ I mean did you know him very well’ CP Yeah. CC I kinda get the impression he was a little bit older than the rest of the guys’ CP Well, when I met Roky he was 17 and I was 19 and I felt a lot older than Roky. Tommy might have been a year or two older than I was but I thought of him as a contemporary you know. I mean Roky was’ CC A kid. CP Yeah. And I thought ‘here’s a 17 year guy that knows the difference between Blind Willie Johnson and Blind Willie McTell and he can talk to you intelligently about this stuff’ y'know. Plus Roky’s personality, I mean he was so real and so genuinely interested in you. It’s a lesson that I learned from Roky that I still haven’t learned. You came to Roky’s gigs you know when he was playing with the Spades up at the Jade Room or something he’d come around to your table and be genuinely interested in meeting you, you know, and really thank you for coming out and hearing his band. He’s just such a beautiful, beautiful person. CC How was Tommy Hall different than that’ CP Tommy was very different, he was a beautiful person in his own way. Tommy was real into esoterica y’know’ CC The impression I got was that he was a little older than the rest of the guys and he kinda influenced them a bit as their direction or their lyrics or whatever. CP Oh yeah, he was the Cagliostro of the group. CC And then I kinda got the impression that he’d totally lost his marbles maybe even more than Roky had, but when I read an interview with Tommy in the Chronicle recently it was like; granted the guy was kinda coming from far left field but he actually made sense. I was impressed that he stuck to his guns and was still into his thing y'know’ CP Yeah, I haven’t seen Tommy for so long, I’d love to see him, he might not remember me. CC He seemed like he was really the brains behind the Elevators just in the fact that he wrote most of those lyrics or a lot of them. CP Tommy and Roky had this little house over on 5th street that I moved into after they left. Michael Erickson and I moved in eventually. CC Is that one of Roky’s brothers’ CP Yeah and they’d sit there all day and Roky would play songs on the guitar, not songs, riffs. Did you see Roky play at the Threadgills the other day’ SC No no, how was it’ CP It was SO! good. Oh it was so good (banging table) CC To me it’s so awesome that he’s back! CP Oh, it was just wonderful man! But anyhow they’d sit there and Roky would play guitar all day and Tommy would go, ‘that one right there, remember that, do what you just did again’. That’s how they sorta made some of these songs. 6. ‘I counted up the other day, I’m in 12 or 13 bands.’ SC Do you have a band now’ CP I counted up the other day, I’m in 12 or 13 bands. (laughter) SC Typical Austinite right’ CP I play with anybody that doesn’t stop me. I’ve been getting to play with my buddy Carolyn Wonderland a lot. SC She’s an awesome guitar player. CC As far as your career goes, we kinda stopped off in the late 70’s after you came back to Austin. CP Yeah, their was a big hiatus there. I went back to school for a while. CC Really’ CP Yeah, and I got into illustration and sculpture. CC Where you pretty good buddies with Gilbert Shelton’ CP Oh, from the jump, yeah. CC Was he a San Antonio guy also’ CP No, but when I came to Austin in ‘65 or whatever I met Gilbert Shelton, Lewin Adkins and Tony Bell, Joe Brown and all those guys. The Ranger Family and the Conqueroo and Vulcan Gas Company. CC When the Vulcan Video started up in the early or mid 80s, you used to work there right or do you still work there’ CP I worked there for 9 years. Don’t ask me which 9 they were, but I did. CC What’s the connection between Vulcan Video and Vulcan Gas Co’ CP It’s all the same family. The owner of Vulcan Video is Dian who’s Houston White’s wife. Houston’s probably the guy who you should be talkin’ to about this instead of me. I mean he’s the guy that made everything happen. The booking was so hip. They’d get Big Joe Williams, they’d get Big Mama Thornton, they’d get Fats Domino, they’d get Muddy Waters, Jimmy Reed. CC But then they would also get the big time bands like the Jefferson Airplane coming through there, right’ CP Right, they’d get Canned Heat, they’d get Johnny Winter you know - but they’d get people like the guys I just mentioned. Many people here didn’t know who they were but they oughta, you know. CC What was the community’s take on what ya’ll were doing at the Vulcan’ CP Oh, we should be stamped out, absolutely. We were dangerous! CC The Vulcan went to about ‘70 or so’ CP I was gone in ‘68. CC Looking back on it, do you think bands like the Conqueroo and the Elevators really influenced the whole San Francisco psychedelic sound’ CP Well it’s sorta contemporary with all that, you know, I mean it’s the same thing happenin’ at the same time in some ways. We didn’t lead them in any way, but the Elevators were probably better than all that shit and all our shit put together, ‘cause Tommy took a really popular band from a local regional area and the best part from a local band from this area and put it together with something overlaying, you know a leitmotif that was not in either of those bands, and made something special. You know how cool the Elevators are. CC Yeah, the Elevators were the shit. Oh I just thought of something I have to ask you about. What was your relationship with’ CP I NEVER TOUCHED HER!!! (laughter) With who’ CC Mayo Thompson and the Red Crayola crowd. CP Oh Mayo, I never knew Mayo. My friend Jerry Lightfoot knew Mayo but I always liked them cause they prided themselves on never being asked to play the same place twice. (laughter) CC Yeah, you know to me they’re such a fascinating band. They got asked to do these Folk Festivals in ‘67 and they’re playing these Folk Festivals and their doing like total electronic sound it’s so experimental and so cutting edge for ‘67. CP They were highly inappropriate every place they played. Jerry told me about one gig they did, I think it was like a supermarket opening or something I don’t know, but it consisted of Mayo getting guys on their Harleys to ride up on stage and gun their engines (laughter) for great long periods of time. CC I’m sure that went over well. (laughter) CP I’m sure it was well received. But they were on IA (International Artists). CC But you guys never were on IA’ CP I never was, I don’t know about that little Texoid side project the others did. CC And finally, this Conqueroo LP we mentioned at the beginning - it was all from the same sessions as the single’ CP You’re pushing me, man, but probably. It was done at the Vulcan Gas Company but it wasn’t before a live audience. [Ed’s note: see above - the album credits 3 songs as having been recorded at Pacific High studios in San Francisco in 1968) Wally Stopher wrote on the Texas Psych Google Group 7/30/11: Hey Carlton et al. Thanks for your interest in the Conqueroo. Some of your info is incomplete. You did a pretty good job for the most part, as far as I could tell, from reading the intro to the interview with good ol' Fat Charlie. However, here is the band lineup in the first few years as I recall. The first band was Powell St. John, Ed Guinn, Bob Brown, and Tom Bright. He was the first in a series of problematic drummers. Then the San Antonio cats showed up, Fat Charlie on guitar and Bill Carr as singer. Also Henry Carr, self-appointed manager, agent, daydreamer, and charlatan came along with his brother. Powell headed out to San Francisco, after a few minutes in Ed's band, and playing briefly with the 13th Floor Elevators and contributing about four of their songs. Powell wrote "The Kingdom of Heaven," "Living with the Animals," and "Monkey Island." He also wrote some great songs in the earlier folk music era when he was one of the Waller Creek Boys, along with Lannie Wiggins and Janis Joplin. When Powell got to San Francisco he joined Mother Earth, playing with Tracy Nelson, Toad Andrews, and Bob Arthur. They had a great booking agent/representative named Travis Rivers. Powell contributed a few more fabulous songs before leaving the insane world of contemporary music for the quiet world of hipi jewelry-company craftsman. The last few years he's been playing out again, coming out with new amazing songs. The core band was Ed, Bob, and Charlie. They got me to join around the same time they fired Bill Carr. They let him stay for a few months after they fired him, but finally he was gone. Being tall and handsome is not enough for the singer. After that Ed sang some of his own songs, Bob did the same, and Charlie covered the r&b hits like "Midnight Hour," "Mustang Sally," and "Rockin' Pneumonia and the Boogie Woogie Flu." Ed and I traded off on bass and Farfisa organ. Sometimes I played the tambourine. Bob played rhythm guitar and Charlie played economical lead. We sometimes played long "psychedelic" jams but got few gigs. For a while, integrating the East Side, we were the Wednesday night band at the IL Club in East Austin, owned by Ira Littlefield. His son, Ira, Jr., became a friend of mine and later I ran into him all the time when we worked at the Texas State Capitol. Ira played drums in the great gospel group Bells of Joy. If he's still kicking, I'm sure he's still playing. Conqueroo never had a drummer that good. Tom Bright was this scrawny troubled soul with washed out blue eyes who played that style of drumming known as frantic flurries. How can the crew tell if the outdoor stage is level? If the drummer drools out of both sides of his mouth. Steve Petrovcik was the next drummer, a Chicago guy with that "ethnic" name, he had thick straight dark hair and a big nose, was swarthy. He looked like an American Indian. Sometimes when I was playing bass he and I could get into a solid groove, but mostly he rushed the beat. Don't know what ever happened to old Steve. Maybe he's on Facebook. HA! The drummer who was with us during the time when we played the two gigs with the Elevators was Darrell Rutherford. He rushed the beat, too, just a little. A great guy, real country Texas gentleman. Strange how this band ever came together. We brought diverse talents for sure. Charlie was this shanty Irish San Antonio r&b aficionado. He and his friends Mark Weakley and Bill Holloway introduced me to the music of awesome performers such as Otis Redding, Carla Thomas, and Tina Turner. Ed played the flute, integrated the UT Marching Band, but then dropped out. He was a doctor's son from Fort Worth. Bob was the Austin native, and I was from Thibodaux and Beaumont. There's a lot more in the autobiography I've been working on for years. Actually, none of this stuff I'm writing today. Okay, one more story. The Elevators got a gig through radio deejays' promotion and they brought the Conqueroo in to open. International Artists, that is, Kenny Rogers's brother Leland, stiffed us for the money. What a piece of work he was. The building was a dome that had been made by piling up a big mound of dirt, makkng forms over it and pouring in concrete. The stage was circular, and it revolved. But after it had gone one direction for a while, it came to the end of its cable, lurched to a stop and then started back the other dirrection. Kinda funny when you're onstage. We drove to Houston in some cars packed full of musicians and friends and instruments, checked into the cheap motel and got over to the place. Walked into the dressing room and it was immediately obvious that the Elevators were tripping hard. You could feel it in the air and see it in their vibrating bodies. Cool, man. We got our equipment set up, went out and played to an audience of young people who had come to see Roky and the 13th Floor Elevators. They were polite but mixed in with the polite applause were shouts of "Roky!" We finished our set, to everyone's relief. The Elevators sh;ambled out and got ready to play. A radio deejay, looking out of place with his facial makeup, slicked back hair, shyster suit, and insincere aura, stepped up to the mike next to where Roky was standing with his guitar, dressed like any Texas kid in bluejeans and long long wavy mountains of hair. The deejay said a couple of words, his name and radio station, and then started in giving props to various organizations and people. Roky looked up, took a step forward, and the band blasted into "You're Gonna Miss Me." Loud. The deejay retreated. Not sure what song it was they opened with. If you read Fat Charlie's interviews, he never mentions my name. Even in his mention of the "other Conqueroo" that made a recording in Houston in 1966, he doesn't. That's the session that we recorded my song "Little Sun Dance,'" that made its way via second-generation cassettes through the Houston folk scene, to be heard by many, including Townes Van Zandt, who when he found out years later that was my song, exclaimed "That's the best song ever written!" He even wrote a song in homage to it, "Little Sun Dance No. 2." I'll close with a quote from Walt Whitman: "It ain't bragging if you done it!"