She caught the band live in London in 1991 after the release of Pastoral Hide And Seek: They were so uninspired that night., The recording of Pastoral Hide And Seek in Belgium had become a workmanlike chore for Kid Congo. Pierce bildade The Gun Club 1980 och de albumdebuterade ret efter med Fire of Love. And finally, if you dig up the latters How Long, the version with Sonny Terry on harmonica, you will be struck not only by the unloved outcast yowl toward the end, but by its chilling kinship with Jeffreys own airless planetary howl as well. By initially flirting with it, he accidentally ended up inhabiting it. Jeffrey Lee Pierce, for all intents and purposes, was the Gun Club. I wouldnt be playing guitar if it wasnt for him, and I wouldnt know a lot about music if it wasnt for him. At the center of everything was Jeffrey Texas-born, Los Angeles raised a music fanzine writer, an obsessive Blondie stan (as a teenager, he was president of their fan club and was fairly regularly ousted from hotel rooms by members of the Blondie contingent for overstaying his welcome) with an unscratchable reggae itch and a compulsion for Delta blues as well as country murder ballads. The album is dedicated to Debbie Harry, "for her love, help, and encouragement".[12]. Produced by The Flesh Eaters Chris D and released in 1981, The Fire Of Love was the perfect distillation of Pierces vision of punk and blues coming together. With the songwriting being dealt with by Pierce and Mori, he began to feel sidelined and interest in the band dwindled along with their performances: It just seemed that after that album the audience was getting smaller and wed have more bad shows than good and that depended on our inebriation and/or interest. He was very hard work. Still, the most critically lauded of their albums, it roared out of ramshackle blocks we hadnt yet built even in our imaginations, an inconceivably twisted fusion of blues, punk, and country, a mixture of Robert Johnson, Skip James, Son House, Howlin Wolf, Huddie Ledbetter, the Blasters, X, Black Flag, Blondie, The Sex Pistols, Burning Spear, Smokey Robinson, Canned Heat, Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, Marty Robbins, and Hank Williams. After punk and post-punk, the next logical step was for us to have a band.. Or can, I forget which). Released in 1987 to much critical acclaim, Mother Juno and its subsequent tour became the most successful period of The Gun Club. The band's first album, "Fire of Love" (1981), remains its most admired, with a fast-paced, irreverent version of the Mississippi blues song "Preachin' the Blues" and Mr. Pierce's warbling voice wailing about dark themes like drugs and death. Jeffrey Lee Pierce Birthday and Date of Death Jeffrey Lee Pierce was born on June 27, 1958 and died on March 31, 1996. But I think it was very difficult for him Jeffrey very often didnt make sense. We really liked the songs. In 1993, the last Gun Club album, ironically entitled Lucky Jim, featured his Japanese wife, Romi Mori, on bass. He formed the Gun Club, originally named Creeping Ritual, in 1979 and developed a reputation for flamboyant performances. After contacting Mark Lanegan to get involved with collaborating on a new recording of these work-in-progress tapes, he realised that many other artists were willing to get involved too. [6] Becoming disillusioned by the evolution of punk rock into what he saw as strict formality, and feeling that reggae was an import, Pierce developed a keen interest in and extensive knowledge of the Delta blues, taking influence and inspiration from his own culture's history. In December 1984 the Gun Club played two gigs in London, but by January 1985 had broken up, cancelling an upcoming Australian Tour. Hed play the songs to me and Id learn the bass parts. At his suggestion, their next album, Mother Juno, was recorded at Hansa studios. He was the child of a multi-ethnic marriage. The wild-eyed voodoo child that is Fire of Love will probably always be considered the bands masterpiece, although the fatally wounded zombie Lucky Jim deserves more accolades, assuming you can stomach the festering core of abject sorrow and regret that beat within its infected frame. . The multi- talented Pierce wrote for Slash magazine as a Reggae reviewer and even lived in Jamaica for a bit. What can you say about a record that you cut for 2500 bucks in 48 hours, on speed? See the article in its original context from. He went on: "with Jeffrey, you pretty much entered his world when you saw him. As excellent as it is in isolation, its nonetheless a little sad in context. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Sign up below to get the latest from Classic Rock, plus exclusive special offers, direct to your inbox! I want his head cut off and his brain taken out. David Antrobus is a former youth worker and a writer (for. Refused it, I mean. In late 1993, Pierce spent time with Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds during the recording of their album Let Love In. Around this time Pierce met Los Angeles musician Phast Phreddie Patterson, who introduced Pierce to American roots music. And while punk, on the surface, at least, eschewed and discarded what had come before it, The Gun Club tapped into a lineage that took them through the decades via punk, primal rocknroll and eventually the blues. When he was a teen-ager, he was president of the Blondie fan club. We were recording in Holland and, as you can imagine, you could get hold of anything you wanted. Jeffrey Lee Pierce July 2, 1959 July 28, 1975 So we went and kept in contact, and it was decided that the next album should be recorded with Robin., She continues: Jeffrey had been wanting to record The Breaking Hands and he knew that he wanted loads of bells on it, so he figured that Robin would be perfect for it. I think that was very much part of his character. Patricia Morrison agrees with Mori on this point. Start your Independent Premium subscription today. As were The Gun Club as a live draw, and their popularity increased in Europe, especially Britain. Featuring five songs, the material on the EP sounded thicker and bolder than anything that had previously been released, with a far stronger emphasis on the songwriting. Patricia Morrison: So many bands came from us but we never got the recognition. During his two-decade career, hes interviewed the likes of Keith Richards, Jimmy Page and Ozzy Osbourne, and has been ranted at by John Lydon. [44], The Journey is Long, the second album from the project, was released in April 2012 and features The Jim Jones Revue, Barry Adamson, Warren Ellis of The Dirty Three, Steve Wynn of Dream Syndicate, as well as artists from the first album. Garnering much critical acclaim, it would prove to be an influential album, not least on the UKs nascent psychobilly scene and the 80s garage band revivalists that followed. Punk had left its mark on both of the young friends, with Pierce and Powers running the Blondie and Ramones fan clubs respectively. Pierce was also known for his strong admiration for Debbie Harry of Blondie, and was president of the Blondie fan club. What can you say about a record that you cut for 2500 bucks in 48 hours, on speed? It was just punk rock. Everybody felt the same and we were there for the music. Toward the end of his life, Jeffrey Lee Pierce increasingly embraced a more traditional blues, as if hed lost interest in the future altogether. In addition to directing the documentary, Andree and Lange will serve as producers alongside Scott Crary , Anahita Nazemi, Katrin Sandman and Alexander von Sturmfeder. During the mid-1970s, after attending a concert by Bob Marley, Pierce became an avid fan of reggae, and subsequently traveled to Jamaica, where he met Winston Rodney and others, but also "got beat up there too", as he later recalled in an interview.[5]. And for sure, when you get to the part where we can fuck forever but youll never get my soul, you either embrace such electrifying defiance or refuse the abandon unconditionally, absolutely. Inscription. The Gun Club have themselves informed and inspired many artists, including The White Stripes, Screaming Trees, Calla, The Pixies, Henry Rollins, and PJ Harvey. Born in 1958, Jeffrey Lee Pierce was raised in the east LA suburb of El Monte. She would soon discover that life in The Gun Club around Pierces personality would be far from easy. In the early 80s, emerging from the sombre aftershocks of a Manchester recently bereft of another driven, misunderstood boy Joy Divisions Ian Curtis and beginning to discern, through the Mancunian perma-drizzle, welcome hints of light via that bands enigmatic progeny New Order, I inexplicably uprooted and moved south to the nondescript town of Northampton. Gun Club looked like serious contenders but, by 1984's "Las Vegas Story" (which would have formed an apt soundtrack for the Mike Figgis Oscar- nominated Leaving Las Vegas movie) Pierce's boozy and druggy life-style had started to overshadow the music. retrieved. He tragically died of a brain hemorrhage on March 31, 1996. Jeffreys idea was to be as antagonistic as possible. It must have been so hard for him. (part 1)", "OFF! His obsessions crawled all over him. Furthermore, his cover of the traditional outlaw ballad John Hardy on Miami is eerily similar to a Leadbelly version (on most compilations, the accordion-less 3:13 cut). Heres how it works. "[19] In May 1994, Pierce joined the band on-stage during the "Let Love In" European tour,[20] culminating in a show at Shepherd's Bush Empire in London, where he sang a cover of the Johnny Cash/Bob Dylan song "Wanted Man". The odd thing is that although they are understandably pigeonholed with fellow haunters of the gothic margins such as Cave and The Cramps, they were also different. Pierce's autobiography, Go Tell The Mountain, goes into detail about the personal turmoil he experienced during the late 1980s and early 1990s. All rights reserved. Jeffreys idea was to be as antagonistic as possible. Actually no, somewhere off-centre of it all was Jeffreys voice, for he rarely cleaved to the melody back then, quavering in a tremulous howl mostly sharp and occasionally flat, which further served to heighten the tension of his themes, which were, somewhat predictably: sex, pain, intoxication, and murder. It was one of the best rocknroll experiences of my life and Ill never forget it.. "He was the star of the show, and we all just jumped on and off," says Terry Graham. Learn how your comment data is processed. Harry contributed backing vocals on the album Miami under the pseudonym D.H. Lawrence, and was a longtime mentor and supporter of Pierce. 181737469. subject named as. PleaseKillMe.com is the home of Please Kill Me: the Uncensored Oral History of Punk. Pierce returned to Europe to play more shows, culminating in the Quartet's final gig on December 27 in London. 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Jeffrey Lee Pierce, fdd 27 juni 1958 [ 1] i Montebello, Kalifornien, [ 2] dd 31 mars 1996 [ 1] i Salt Lake City, Utah, [ 3] var en amerikansk rockmusiker, frontfigur i det Los Angeles -baserade punkbandet The Gun Club . But this isnt the place for either masochism or specific reviews, even of the thumbscrew/thumbnail variety, so Ill merely hint at an entry point: go listen to a song that didnt make the cut originally, only showing up on the reissues, Secret Fires. Clocking in at just over two-and-a-half minutes, at first glance its a boilerplate country-folk waltz that pits an open-sky acoustic strum against the mating-cougar wails of a lap steel, all dry arroyo echo-sketches, yet within its weary concision it exemplifies the wild mercury allure of the best Gun Club music, transient and indelible as the ozone dance of summer night lightning. June 27, 1958 Jeffrey Lee Pierce is born to Margie and Robert Pierce in Montebello, California at Montebello Community Hospital. By this time, Pierce had become obsessed with the ethereal music of the Cocteau Twins via Mori, and a chance encounter with the bands guitarist Robin Guthrie and singer Liz Fraser in the Hollywood Hills would lead to the reformation of The Gun Club with Guthrie in the producers chair. Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in, Please refresh your browser to be logged in, Extra 20% off selected fashion and sportswear at Very, Get up to 10% off using the Booking.com app, $6 off a $50+ order with this AliExpress discount code, 15% off orders over 15 using this eBay discount code, Compare broadband packages side by side to find the best deal for you, Compare cheap broadband deals from providers with fastest speed in your area, All you need to know about fibre broadband, Best Apple iPhone Deals in the UK April 2023, Compare iPhone contract deals and get the best offer this April, Compare the best mobile phone deals from the top networks and brands. Salt Lake City. Id gone down the skids again and Jeffrey was in Utah staying with his father and cleaning up again. The label clarified that the third album has become the "penultimate" full-length release of the Project, but did not name the final album, or its release date. retrieved. "[14] Pierce toured Europe as The Jeffrey Lee Pierce Quartet, and from August 1985 he toured the United States and Canada. At the time of his death he survived by his large extended friends and family. But it wasnt to last. Perhaps the severing of any ties to that troubled music was a gift from my subconscious. [7], In March 2012, Nick Cave gave an interview to Gun Club biographer Gene Temesy, researching for a book on the history of the Gun Club, which was published on the Australian web-based magazine Mess and Noise, noting Pierce's obsessions with the Vietnam War, dinosaurs, and Japanese horror movies. They were deadly serious, for one thing. WERE WE ALL BRAINWASHED BY THE CIA WITH SEX, DRUGS AND ROCK & ROLL? As the Deputy Online News Editor at Xfm he revealed exclusively that Nick Caves second novel was on the way. Pierce continued working despite failing health, and reformed a Gun Club lineup for two shows in Los Angeles in August and September 1995, including guitarists Powers and Mike Martt, formerly of Tex & the Horseheads, and the Wayne Kramer rhythm section of bassist Randy Bradbury and drummer Brock Avery. They took the original guitar parts played by Pierce and Powers and built a new song, with drums by Bad Seeds drummer Jim Sclavunos and guitar and vocals from Pop, Cave, and Moore. Mori saw him one last time: It was his last day in London. From his days as a peroxided, Debbie Harry-fixated Los Angeles teen-punk, through a lengthy era when he seemed convinced he could channel the spirit of Robert Johnson, to a more recent probe of the seedier side of continental balladry, Pierce who died of a cerebral blood clot in Utah at the end of March 1996 always . He was 37 years old. Apparently his health had been very bad again but it was a step in the right direction. Says Powers: The concert was great and at the end of the night, in a fit of inspiration, I suppose, Jeffrey said, Why dont we have a band together? So I said, Well, okay, but I dont play any instrument or do anything. So he said, Well you can be the singer and Ill play the guitar, and Im like, Im not going to be the singer. And hes like, I could show you how to play guitar. Jeffrey Lee Pierce. In July 1996, Tom Engelshoven of Dutch music magazine Oor described Jeffrey Lee Pierce as the missing link between the Eagles and Kurt Cobain. A diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder and clinical depression was still half a decade in my future, but the low-grade torment had already begun. [50] The documentary received mostly positive critical reception, but was criticized for not including any of Pierce's music or interview footage with him.[51]. [26] However, on March 25, 1996, Pierce was found unconscious at his father's home in Salt Lake City, Utah. Jeffrey's mother Margie Pierce is a stay-at-home mom; Jeffrey's father Robert Pierce is employed as a union organizer and arbitrator (Local 1710 Electrical Workers Union). Its counterintuitive, and often, at its most abject, unforeseen beauty lurks. I play a lot of his music because I miss him and I want people to never forget the Gun Club. Recording wasfine but live it all changed.. [30], Pierce is honored by Thstrm in a 2005 song recording. Theres a clip out there of him performing Alabama Blues by Robert Wilkins, which seems wrenchingly poignant to me, the woe writ large on his face, the naked self-deprecation at the end after he stumbles, the hollow weariness when he looks right into the camera, even his apparent lack of awareness at the questionable spectacle of a white man singing Brownskin women, gonna be the death of [me]. Perhaps he no longer cared. Despite being recorded in London during the short gestation period between The Gun Club's breakout trilogy and the ethereal Mother Juno, Jeffrey Lee Pierce's Wildweed is coated in a fine, gritty cloud of Americana, starting from its Southern Gothic album art and then threaded through familiar themes of death parties, the abandoning God and He slithered away in Salt Lake City, Utah, on. Not to mention the dark cross-pollination between Pierce and good friend Nick Caves many projects. It features interviews with Pierce, acoustic performances and clips of the Gun Club. By Gregg L. Friedman MD, I really miss the great musical groups of the 1960's. The maddening part for me is that I missed most of it. Kid Congo Powers chuckles when asked what hes proudest of: Many things. Such an accomplishment, in a world mostly devoid of magic, is damn near miraculous, quite honestly. Here, the latter was almost out. He did me first before the rest of the band and I loved that. So bookends of sorts: one darkly prosodic, the other starkly prosaic: one running frenzied from the swamp-demons of the past, the other recoiling in vain from the keening horror of an unspeakable future. It was difficult to do anything because he was using. I knew the situation he was in: he couldnt drink and he so he needed something else. An obsession for record collecting in his early teens led to him meeting fellow music fan and future Gun Club guitarist and co-founder, Kid Congo Powers (ne Brian Tristan). His guitar had arrived and ours hadnt come yet, sighs Morrison. Despite a pick-up replacement, the magic was gone and the tour ended at Dingwalls in Camden Town, London. At the center of this storm was Pierces voice. Get our latest storiesin the feed of your favorite networks. Suddenly the songwriting just happened. Yes. He had the idea that he wanted a Cocteau Twins kind of sound for it. [citation needed], Mark Lanegan recorded a cover version of the Gun Club's "Carry Home", from the album Miami, on his album I'll Take Care of You. Bandmate Kid Congo Powers is interviewed, among others, in the documentary below. Jeffrey Lee Pierce And The Gun Club - The Life And Times Of Jeffrey Lee Pierce And The Gun Club. In this case, what would happen if this blues band played a Cocteau Twins song?, Mori agrees and adds that whatever Pierces ongoing musical obsessions were, they always informed The Gun Club: That was because of his personality. In my defense, my own life was undergoing plenty of upheaval, both outwardly (a migration to Canada, which required my relinquishment of every piece of vinyl I owned at the time) and inwardly. The Gun Clubs 1981 debut Fire of Love was rarely off my turntable in those days. Hes never name-checked Jeffrey and I think thats a little rude., Rupert Orton is quick to acknowledge where he hears The Gun Club now: Guadalupe Plata are, I think, the people closest to re-inventing it in a way thats interesting. If he liked something, say, like a type of food, then hed eat that for months and months and then drop it and move on to something else. Despite the continued alcohol and drug abuse, Pierces talents were flourishing. Jeffrey Lee Pierce was an American punk, and a bluesman lead singer and guitarist for that most contradictory of bands, The Gun Club, whose erratic embers smoldered and sputtered fitfully during the 80s and the first half of the 90s, rarely if ever catching fully in fames spotlight, yet illuminating the margins with a deep fire that, since their passing long ago now, feels richer and more blood-red the older we all get. He was being deported and he needed somebody to take him to the airport. Future Publishing Limited Quay House, The Ambury, By subscribing, I agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. The Gun Club had truly arrived. Death Party: 8:29: 3-6: Stranger In Our Town: 5:14: 3-7: Gila Monster New Mexico / Preachin' The Blues: 9:40: 3-8: My . It was an even trade! laughs Powers. Jeffrey Lee Pierce was the brilliant frontman of The Gun Club. Sexual rage. Creeping Ritual Productions was formed June 27th 2007, not only as a tribute website to the late Jeffrey Lee Pierce but most importantly its primary purpose is to archive and protect the legendary memory of this rock . 5", "THE GUN CLUB The Las Vegas Story Punk Blues Vinyl Album Gallery #vinylrecords", "From The Archives -The Gun Club- Concert Chronology / Gigography", "iTunes Music Wildweed by Jeffrey Lee Pierce", "The Quietus | Features | A Quietus Interview | Kid Congo Powers Interview: From Gun Play To Monkey Business", "Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds Setlist at Muziekcentrum Vredenburg, Utrecht", "Nick Cave on Jeffrey Lee Pierce: 'His Obsessions Crawled All Over Him', "Gun Club Oral History, Part Four (Pastoral Hide and Seek to 1996)", "an interview w/ Keith Morris & Dimitri Coats of OFF! The Parisian rock elite, always in love with tragic figures like Morrison, Thunders and Iggy Pop, had found a new hero. Pitchfork may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. Whitechapel Jack. So returning later, at some point before I left the land of my birth, to the supposedly troublesome Miami, whose admittedly thin Chris Stein helmed production is nowhere near as problematic as history has decreed, I discovered a perfectly fine album. Elvis From Hell will tell the story of Pierce, a. But for those who played in The Gun Club and suffered the outrageous behaviour, demands and whims of Jeffrey Lee Pierce, there remains an enormous sense of pride at what was created. "[25], Pierce contacted Powers in early 1996 to work together on a new iteration of the Gun Club, and they began making plans, with Powers looking to recruit musicians in New York.
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