FOR LADIES ONLY

My radio upbringing poisoned my very veins and soul. Growing up in Northeast Pennsylvania, every single person listened to Rock 107 FM, the AOR monolith where the morning host comedy duo broadcast live from a Scranton topless doughnut shop, free ticket giveaways to Eddie Money flowed like cherry wine, and an extremely limited playlist of Aerosmith, Zep, REO, Billy Joel, and Eagles radiated in a nonstop loop that let nary a modern artist penetrate its titanium walls until, I guess, Pearl Jam came along. Rock 107’s enveloping volcanic-ash presence surrounded my childhood and teenage years, as suffocating as the coal mines all of my friends’ grandparents worked in. They probably were also hearing Rock 107 broadcast there. The station played nonstop when I worked at the Hasty Tasty ice cream parlor, and I still remember the low angle my head hung while making banana splits as “American Pie” came on constantly, because you knew you had eight minutes and 33 seconds to endure this shit, the chorus ringing, “This will be the day that I die.” Who needs a song that long? Driving home from New York in later years to see my family while terrestrial radio would crackle in around the Poconos, I would often try to guess what song would come into range first; it was 7 out of 10 times “Love in an Elevator.”

My arrival in college in the mid-’80s and discovery of its station’s library alleviated the fog to great extent. Hearing the Replacements’ The Shit Hits the Fans live cassette where they drunkenly disemboweled BTO and Thin Lizzy flashed the first lights in my head that wow, someone else has less than reverent feelings toward this stuff and wishes to destroy it, but jeez, maybe they also like it. And then there was the one Killdozer record in the library, the all-covers collection For Ladies Only. Where the Replacements’ uncaring, sloppy live attack was one thing, Killdozer (also solid Midwestern stock, though from Madison, Wisconsin) made precision sludge here, blazing through an entire LP of dumbass AOR anthems with aplomb and menacing grip. Bassist-singer Michael Gerald’s inimitable growl was up front leading the exorcism, while Bill Hobson’s guitar bellowed an evil, noisy swarm of bees like some American-inbred equivalent to the Birthday Party’s Rowland S. Howard. Dan Hobson’s ceremonial thud moved things slothlike down some country road at night that most certainly led to a place where your ass would be kicked for listening to this band. Luckily Killdozer had some kindred spirits to gig with like the Butthole Surfers and Big Black, so barroom caged-in stages were mercifully off the circuit for the most part. The agile studio board work of fellow Wisconsinite Butch Vig (before his days engineering Nirvana) also helped shape the band’s sound into something wholly unique and their own, giving them distinct voice to transform these staples with heft; far from being novelty, either. Killdozer were smarmy but engaged, and meant business.