**New Wave Theater,
The Waitresses and The Plimsouls**
April 7, 1982 - - - -- by billy eye

Because you can't go out every night (or can you?), there is a way you can get to see your favorite local bands without leaving the house. New Wave Theater on UHF channel 18. As usual, the April 17th edition will feature a mix of bands from the LA area, but because I'm not your TV Guide, I can't tell you exactly who they will be.

This fast paced show presents the best of the great and the not so great bands from the local scene every week, and it is not to be missed. So don't.

Outrageous host Peter Ivers gives the show a sardonic edge, and the videos he produces for the show are often incredibly good, an expressive tour de force that showcases the bands the way they were meant to be seen.

Classic Peter Ivers

Local bands like Fear, X, The Blasters, Circle Jerks and The Dead Kennedys are shot in performance, no lip sync, with wild camera angles, and a small live audience present. The performances are interlaced on the spot with archival and original footage - the effect is socko television for anyone who loves new music.

Red Wedding recently filmed a spot for New Wave Theater, and their live performance made for some powerful viewing. The song they performed, "We Make History", is a favorite at Red Wedding shows and the resulting frantic video montage efectively captures the incendiary experience of the band's live shows.

Speaking of Red Wedding, they played a great show at Club Lingerie in March with new drummer Brian Ford. This band has had some bad luck with drummers, losing two really good ones to other bands just last year. Out of frustration, an 808 drum machine was used for shows for a while, but this proved less than successful.

Lean and hungry lead singer Michael Ely continues to weave a hypnotic path in concert with his poetic lyrics and detached demeanor.

The blending of voices between Ely and bass player John Tagliavia creates a bone chilling effect, especially on standout tunes like "Think About It" and "All Dressed Up". Marc O creates seemingly incongruous synth sounds while Spider proves he is the guitar's master, his stunning music wrung out of the instrument's neck by sheer force.

A new album is due in a few weeks from this amazing group, called 'Up and Down the Aisle', so watch for it.

Wall of Voodoo just signed with Miles Copeland's management company, along with Oingo Boingo. (Copeland is president of IRS Records and manages The Police). I guess it's the big time for Wall of Voodoo now, and you read about 'em here first.

The Boingo boys put on one of the best live acts you will ever want to see, if energetic power-pop is your flavor of the month. I saw them at the Country Club in Reseda not long ago and they have a large and rabid following. I think rabid is the right word. Oingo Boingo is brainy new wave pop and their stage show was even better than the one in the parking lot where a certain smart alec red head former big time kid star tried to sell me coke.

The band Nile will be appearing at The Troubadour on April 27th and at Madame Wong's West on the 29th. These guys did the trippy theme song ("Pink Motel") to a great documentary film called "Motel" and hail from the Malibu Area.

The Smog Marines, one of my favorite all time bands, have evolved (with a couple of new members) into the tremendously exciting new romantic experience Aphotic Culture and they are destroying audiences with their funky fun ride. Great at Al's Bar recently.

The Grandia Room will be presenting 'Art' videos and record company promo films by artists like David Bowie, Grace Jones, Kraftwerk and others on the last Sunday of each month. The Grandia Room is a great party space, stark, only slightly seedy, and events are being scheduled there that will require your attendance.

The location on Hudson Street in Hollywood off of Melrose makes Grandia Room accessible for people all over town. Some great bands will be playing here in this space soon; look for the crowd outside, the street itself is kind of dark and the club is hard to see from the street.

Perkin's Palace

The Plimsouls

The Plimsouls played a triumphant set at Perkin's Palace recently and nearly sold the place out. This is a band reeling from their disastrous deal with Planet Records, but The Plimsouls are on the way back up thanks to strong new material and an aggressive assault on the local clubs. They remain LA favorites, group leader Peter Case is one of the best pop songwriters on the scene and The Plimsouls sound better than ever as a band. "A Million Miles Away" and "Inch by Inch" are stand-outs, real high energy pop.

The animated audience certainly was responsive to the band and most seem to be new fans. The Plimsouls were there at the birth of 'new wave' and came up through the clubs at the same time as the Go-Gos, and the Go-Gos have been a national sensation for years.

There is no question that The Plimsouls are the real thing, with stronger material and musicianship than their more successful counterparts, but national exposure still eludes them. The bonus for concert goers is that we get to see this great band in smaller venues like Perkin's Palace and occassionally even in record store parking lots.

The Waitresses

Another surprise show at Perkin's was The Waitresses when they played in March. This group is really together, lead singer Patty Donahue resembles a fifties high school cheerleader gone nuts in the eighties.

The music, most of it penned by keyboardist Chris Butler, is smart and sophisticated, while the presentation is irreverent and sly, with welcome solos from band members who can actually carry it off. The sax player is outstanding! When it came to doing their KROQ rotated hit, 'I Know What Boys Like', lead singer Patty let everyone know what she was thinking... with a prolonged pause before... "Sucker!"

The Waitresses are best appreciated live in concert, because as good as most of their material is, the band is still produced on vinyl like a novelty record. This is a band expanding in two directions at once, but I like the effect.

I also caught the new group Mnemonic Devices while stumbling blindly through the clubs this week. They're a really good arty band, and I will review them at length later. Look for something on vinyl from these guys soon.

The Ju Ju Hounds, fronted by Kerry McBride, are fast becoming scene favorites thanks to the quirky sets they've played at Al's Bar and elsewhere. Their hypno-junglecentric rhythms, paired with a lead singer who manages to be both garish and somber at once, are not to be missed.

There's always more for next time...

Editor's Note:
By this point, Judy Zee had stopped contributing to the Data-Boy Rock and Roll articles.