Who Put The Bomp! #14

Who Put The Bomp was an ur-fanzine, one of the earlier and absolute best examples of a rocknroll fanatic following his obsessions and documenting every jot and titter from his heroes. Greg Shaw is deservedly lauded for parting from the mainstream in his writing when it was warranted; for going deep into topics that no one else would touch (like this issue’s instrumental surf records coverage) and for bringing on a king’s table of rock writers over the years to write for the mag – including Lester Bangs, Richard Meltzer, Dave Marsh, Greil Marcus and “Metal” Mike Saunders.

I’ve had all six of the late 70s punk-infused issues, from when it was just called Bomp! magazine, for quite some time. I’m only now coming around to trying to cobble together issues of the pre-1976 Who Put The Bomp! fanzine, of which there are 15 issues. The first one of those I got was the “British Invasion Issue”, #10-11, and it’s so massive and meaty and full of tiny type that I’ve barely cracked the code on the thing. All-in, it’s longer than most books about music you’re likely to read. All the issues before that one are too scarce and expensive for Fanzine Hemorrhage’s pocketbook, but if there’s a will there’s a way, and there’s totally a will. 

So I’m concentrating on those issues between that British Invasion one and and the punk-era stuff, and recently found a lovely copy of Who Put The Bomp! #14 from Fall 1975, the one with these hodads on the cover. Like I said, the key to the issue is the instrumental surf music discography and backstory. It’s an incredible resource even now, 48 years later. I’m sure there’s probably some small-press record collector book that’d tell me a bunch of the same info I can get here, but there might not be. I happen to love this stuff and it grows on me even more as I age into the typical age bracket of the “1961 surf instrumental 45 record collector”. After glomming onto this thing I’ve been spending a bunch of time with the Surf-Age Nuggets: Trash & Twang Instrumentals box set, as well as with my Lost Legends of Surf Guitar comps. OK, grandpa!

I learned all about Tony Hilder, who produced Fresno’s Revels (who did “Church Key”) and was a prime mover in the early 60s California Central Valley instrumental surf scene, which I was surprised as you were to find out was a thing. Hilder then put out a series of “right-wing records” about the John Birch society and Barry Goldwater, which I’m sure are total fucking godhead. Alas, the piece says “The defeat of Barry Goldwater and the demise of surf music marked the end of Tony Hilder’s active involvement in the music industry. He is now employed as a salesman of freeze-dried food products in Southern California, writing reactionary declarations in his spare time”. 

Other highlights: a complete discography and story about Dutch rock (The Outsiders, Q65, Shocking Blue etc.) and another oddly compelling discography of Beatles novelties and parodies – none of it by the Beatles, but stuff like The Twiliters’ “My Beatle Haircut”. I mean, the folks that put this stuff together, need I say, did not have the internet, or Goldmine, or anything similar. Just their own crate-digging and obsessive compiling, at a time when a used, non-picture sleeve 45 in a record store could be picked up for a nickel, dime or quarter.

And Roky Erickson is back! He’s just been released from a Texas state psychiatric hospital after being inside for five years – and he’s got a new band, Roky Erickson & Bleib Alien. He’s come to Los Angeles to play his brand-new songs, “Two-Headed Dog”, “Starry Eyes”, “Don’t Slander Me” and “Don’t Shake Me Lucifer”. Can you believe it? Greg Turner is on the scene, and gets Erickson to do a fairly coherent interview. This is then followed up with a full International Artists discography, because of course it is. 

The new wave is almost here. Shaw notes in his end-of-issue column that “Big news around Hollywood is The Runaways, a group of 3 high school girls (14, 16, 18) who play like The Sweet and sing great teenage anthems, most of them written by Kerry Krome, a 13-year-old girl prodigy. They also do The Troggs’ classic “Come Now”. Remember, you read it here first.” In 1975, that was probably the case. She was actually Kari Krome, real name Carrie Mitchell, and boy does she now have a sordid and likely indisputable story to tell.

Who Put The Bomp #14 is one of those fanzines you wanna hold onto for dear life, not merely because of its centrality to a certain all-encompassing rock & roll mindset in ‘75, but as a resource to be frequently mined. I probably gave Shaw short shrift in my twenties for being what his contributors Greg Turner and Mike Saunders would call “a power pop turd”, but hey, I’ve even come around a little on some 70s power pop. Let me see if I can find a few of those other issues and I promise to meet ya here to talk about them.