Lik e a lot of people, I discovered Radio Birdman in 2001, when Sub Pop released their great The Essential Radio Birdman comp, almost 30 years after the band formed. That was before I really started writing about music, so I consumed it the way regular people do, finding favorite songs ("Anglo Girl Desire" "Do the Pop") and playing them over and over, not paying a whole lot of attention to the back story. For example, I didn't know that band founder Deniz Tek had grown up in Detroit and only moved to Australia for college, or that Radio Birdman had reformed in 1996 and was regularly playing shows in Australia and Europe. I didn't know that they had almost played a tour with the Ramones in the 1970s (what a show that would have been! ) but had it cancelled at the last minute when their US label Sire dropped them. And I certainly didn't know that they were writing new material or that eventually there would be a new record, the fantastic Zeno Beach, which came out on Yep Roc this year.
Here's a link to a media player version of the first track off that album from the Yep Roc web site:
http://www.yeproc.com/upload/media/view_media.php?id=278
I interviewed both Deniz Tek and Rob Younger of Radio Birdman a few months ago for PopMatters. The article got delayed, not sure exactly why, and just appeared today on the site. It's a little out of date, talking about last summer's tour in the future tense, but maybe you can look past that:
http://www.popmatters.com/pm/features/article/6180/radio-birdman-does-the-pop-again-an-interview/
My friend Terri Nelles took the live photos, isn't she awesome?
My Trusted MOGs
i'm on it!
My Trusted MOGs
I' ve just recently discovered Radio Birdman for myself, through that same collection in fact. Its great to learn of these great bands that have been around for ages but are new to you. Little Steven plays "Zeno Beach" on his radio show all the time. I'd like to know how many bands are named for Stooges songs too.
My Trusted MOGs
Thanks for the great piece on Radio Birdman! Say, years ago, when I was living in Minneapolis, I had their first (?) album on vinyl and a fellow I knew and liked borrowed it and moved to Austin without giving it back (Sean Stewart...in a band called Heads & Bodies...are you out there?). On the album was a great - and fast - cover of The Stooges' T.V. Eye (oh, how that song lost some of it's tech-age mystique when I learned what "T.V." really stood for). Does that track exist on CD anywhere? Anybody?
My Trusted MOGs
Essone, exactly. It seems like these days, the first thing that happens is that the music resurfaces, then, very often, the band comes out of the woodwork, too. Who would have thought that you could see the Zombies, Radio Birdman, Mission of Burma, Gang of Four, the Pixies, the Slits, the Stooges etc. etc. etc. in 2006?
And Jsguntzel, thanks for the kind words, means a lot. I don't know about a CD version, but I did find a YouTube link to Radio Birdman playing "TV Eye," from 1977. Link here:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=jZ3sZ-Nibc8
Awesome stuff.
jenny
My Trusted MOGs
There are a number of different CD re-releases of Radios Appear (the debut album). Many of them (e.g., the ones on Red Eye and Citadel) include "TV Eye" as a bonus track.