SLADE
+IGGY AND THE STOOGES
Allen Theatre, Cleveland, Ohio
January 18, 1974Interview by DOUG SHEPPARD
Photos by JOHN CATTOShare Come for a walk down the Time Tunnel. I wasn’t at the Allen Theatre in Cleveland to see Iggy and the Stooges and Slade on January 18, 1974. Way too young. So we’ll let CHRIS YARMOCK and HARVEY GOLD review the show.
Yarmock, then a teenager, would later go on to play with punkoid miscreants the Kneecappers in the late ’70s, the avant Easter Monkeys in the 1980s, and more recently St. Jayne. Gold, then a record store clerk in his early 20's, would later make a name with the Beefhearted Akronites known as Tin Huey and, after that, as a music video producer extraordinaire working with everyone you can name.
Take it away, boys...
Chris Yarmock: They opened up for Slade here at the Allen Theater. It was a mess, man. They did like three or four songs. The band came onstage and they riffed on “Raw Power” I don’t know how long; that was like half the show, I think. Because they were all waiting for Iggy to come out.
I think they just pushed him onstage -- because he came out flyin’ on the stage. And he was totally, totally fucked up. And I think they did three or four songs: “Raw Power,” “Open Up and Bleed,” “Gimme Danger” and something else ... maybe “Your Pretty Face Is Going to Hell.” It was just a mess. Iggy couldn’t do anything; he was totally out of it.
Harvey Gold: There’s that whole story behind what was going on with Iggy. He had a rotten tooth; he had probably a little bit of a concussion when he got there to Cleveland. The story that we heard was that not long before that, the Stooges had played with the New York Dolls for New Year’s Eve at the Fillmore -- and during that show, Iggy fell over backwards and kind of cracked his skull. So he had been not really quite right leading up to it, and apparently he also had a really, really bad tooth. As I understand it, the next day or the day after the show we saw him, his dad met him in Ann Arbor and took him to the family dentist to get his tooth taken care of.
But he arrived in Cleveland and apparently took half a dozen tuinals and passed out in his room, and they had to do your classic house detective: unlock the door, drag him out of bed, stick him in the shower or whatever, get his ass up and get him to the show. So they ended up starting late, which is why they only played for like 20 minutes.
It took a long time before Iggy was able to make it out on to the stage. He was real slow and real unsteady. After the first song ended, he was really holding himself up by his mike, and he just kind of looks out and goes, “I’m the world’s greatest dancer.” [laughs]
Yarmock: The band sounded tight when they got it together. It wasn’t the band so much; Iggy was just totally out of it. On “Open Up and Bleed” and “Gimme Danger,” he didn’t know which song it was -- so he was kind of like singing both of them, just in and out of consciousness. It was a pretty wild show.
Gold: I saw the first Ziggy Stardust show at Music Hall -- the first gig in America, and Bowie was kind of awkward. He’s kind of little with that big guitar on him and that red hair ... just kind of walking back and forth. And Ronson just marched around the stage like a goddam golden god and really held it together: This big-assed Les Paul through Marshall stacks really just gave the whole thing a legit anchor.
And that’s kind of what Williamson did for the Stooges. He looked like this weird-assed Keith Richards-ish, skinny, black-haired God knows what, but he just punched that shit out on guitar. Whatever else was going on with the Stooges, Williamson was just like this serious-assed hired assassin brought into the band to rip people’s heads off. That was one of my enduring memories of that show, too.
Yarmock: Half the crowd was booing [Iggy]. It was a real 50-50 crowd, because half the people are cheering him on -- because there were definitely people that were all gung ho to see the Stooges. And then the other half wanted those guys off the stage. They were booing and throwing shit.
Gold: Peter [Laughner] used to hang out with us a lot -- and this is a really comical thing, because we all drove up together. And we had been drinking a fairly substantial amount of Jack Daniels.
When they finished and they shut ’em off, I just heard this voice behind me -- and I thought what I heard him say was: “They suck.” And it was Pete, but what he was saying was: “That sucks” -- that they stopped the show early. But I thought he said the Stooges sucked, and I just -- and I never get violent -- turned around and punched him and he sort of fell back in his seat. And then we all got up and went and got in the car and drove home. I think it was a really clumsy shot and then I probably hit him in the throat or something.
Yarmock: It was really weird, because there was this group of people sitting behind me at the show, and I didn’t know Peter Laughner at the time. But this one asshole was behind me and he kept on kicking my fucking chair. And I turned around and I was giving him dirty looks. Me and my buddy were high; we were doing reds and wine -- the usual thing for back then. And I was like: “What the fuck? Who is this asshole?” Because he was screaming and yelling throughout the whole show.
And then we get to the hotel, and it’s that same guy. I’m like, “Oh, there’s that asshole again that was just sitting behind me at the show.” So that was my intro to Peter.
At the time, me and my buddy used to go around after shows and try to get autographs. So we went to the Holiday Inn where they were staying; we wanted to find the Stooges’ room. There were a bunch of groupies; Peter Laughner was actually one of the people that was waiting in the hotel lobby with me and my friend. The hotel detectives warned us: “We smell anything weird or anything, you guys are outta here.”
So eventually we got up to the room, and I’m sitting on the bed. The Stooges are roaming around; James Williamson and all those guys are there -- and all these big, scary Detroit guys. So these two people come in the room, literally dragging Iggy. And I’m sitting on this bed, and they plop him down on the bed right next to me. He’s totally out of it; he’s totally passed out.
This chick comes up to him and she goes: “Oh Jimmy, Jimmy -- are you OK?” And he just opened his eyes for like a split second and then just closed them, and they just picked him back up. His legs weren’t even touching the ground; they literally dragged him out of the fuckin’ room.
And he had that black velvet bow tie with rhinestones on it. And I’d seen it in a lot of pictures in Creem magazine and places like that at the time. They took it off and put it on the night stand right next to me -- and me and my buddy were looking at it. Because at one point, everybody left the room except us; we were just sitting there. We’re going, “What the fuck?” We had all these drugs on us because we wanted to party with the band. There were all these girls there, so they went out.
So we’re looking at the fucking bow tie going: “Should we steal it? Should we steal it?” Because it would have been the ultimate souvenir. We didn’t steal it. I’m a good Catholic boy, ya know?
James Williamson came in the room -- and we talked for a little bit. He was a really, really nice guy. I got his autograph, which I still have -- and it’s actually hanging on my wall in the music room.
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