Angry Samoans

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The Angry Samoans are an American punk rock band in the first wave of American punk. Formed in August 1978 in Los Angeles, California by early 1970s rock writer "Metal" Mike Saunders and his sibling lead guitarist bonze blayk,^[1] along with Gregg Turner (another rock writer, for Creem Magazine during the late 1970s-mid 1980s) and original recruits bassist Todd Homer and drummer Billy Vockeroth.

Background

During 1978 both Turner and Saunders had played in the Los Angeles punk band VOM, which issued a posthumous 5-song EP Live at Surf City on White Noise Records in early summer 1978. In 1969 in hometown Little Rock, Saunders and Samoans guitarist bonze had cut a 14-song highschool garage-rock album I'm a Roadrunner Motherfucka (unissued until the late 1990s) under a twice-used local band name the Rockin' Blewz, and in 1975 Saunders briefly played in an embroyonic backing line-up for 1950s rockabilly cult artist Ray Campi before moving back to Arkansas for two years (pursuant to a second college degree). Bassist Todd Homer had played in 1977 Masque-era band Jesus Prick, and drummer Bill Vockeroth was a veteran of the Pasadena "backyard kegger party" cover band circuit.

Shortly after the Angry Samoans formed, in late 1978 Saunders/Turner/Homer wrote a song about long-time LA/Hollywood scenemaker (and KROQ DJ, beginning in 1976) Rodney Bingenheimer titled "Get Off the Air."^[2] Due to Bingheimer's strong influence with LA/Hollywood clubs, when the song was included on the band's first record Inside My Brain, the band was blacklisted at the Starwood/Whiskey and any other club in Hollywood/LA proper for about two years during mid 1980 - late 1982. The band's ostensibly offensive, politically incorrect attitude and (somewhat humorous) lyrical content was not a factor in this situation.

The Angry Samoans

The first Angry Samoans gig was opening for Roky Erickson and the Aliens in Richmond, California on October 30, 1978. Roky was sick and did not make the show (Aliens band members covered for his lead vocals) but remained a lifelong friend and inspiration to Gregg Turner of the Samoans (the next night they played an "all-LA bill" at the SF Mab, opening for Shock and the Zeros).

The Samoans' first release, Inside My Brain, was one of the early hardcore punk albums to come out of the 1980 LA punk rock scene. In between this recording and Back from Samoa, the band released a four-song EP as "The Queer Pills," allegedly using the pseudonym because the EP was to get air time on Rodney's KROQ radio program. (See interview, Forced Exposure magazine) Their 14-song 17-minute hardcore album, Back from Samoa, released in 1982, featured lyrics on such themes as the trendiness of poking your eyes out ("Lights Out"), finding Adolf Hitler's penis ("They Saved Hitler's Cock"), and ranking on your old man ("My Old Man's A Fatso"), over hyper-distorted guitars and "early LA/OC hardcore" drum beats.

In the mid-1980s, the Angry Samoans returned to their roots/influences from mid-60's American garage rock (they had long cited many 1966 bands such as The Velvet Underground, the 13th Floor Elevators and Shadows of Knight as among their musical influences). The next two releases recorded during 1986-87, Yesterday Started Tomorrow EP and STP Not LSD, were largely in this neo-1960s garage/psych style. Singer/bassist Todd Homer left at the end of 1988, and formed The Mooseheart Faith Stellar Groove Band with Larry Robinson, formerly of 1970s teen pop-soul band Apollo. And in 2005 Homer co-formed, The Hollywood Squaretet, a free-jazz band with comedian/drummer Larry "Copcar" Scarano, formerly of Comedy's Dirtiest Dozen for HBO and the 1960s New York rock band The Bougalieu.^{[disambiguation needed ]} Turner left in early 1992, putting out an album in 1993 with the Mistaken before forming his next band, the Blood Drained Cows (two albums issued to date), occasionally featuring autoharp player Billy Angel (née Miller) from the Aliens. During the mid-to-late 1980s Saunders moonlighted in several electric/acoustic two-guitar duos (only, no rhythm section) such as the Clash Brothers (with Bob Fagan in SF), the Sons of Mellencamp (with Turner), and the Gizmo Brothers (with Kenne Highland), with various small-club performances during that period in San Francisco, LA/OC, and even Boston (with Krazee Ken Highland from the Gizmos/Hopelessly Obscure/etc).

Recent activity

The Angry Samoans continued with Saunders, original drummer Bill Vockeroth, and a wide variety of other individuals, and gigging steadily from early 1996 into the new millennium. They have performed mainly along the West Coast, besides occasional out-of-state weekend trips and three short/successful tours of mainland Europe in 2003/2007/2008. At present the band is still playing weekend gigs once a month, usually all-ages shows around all of Southern California like the many other old LA/OC bands (from 1977–1982) who have been active during the 21st century—the Adolescents, the Dickies, the Crowd, Circle Jerks, Agent Orange, CH3, the Germs, Redd Kross, TSOL, Fear, the Weirdos, the Skulls, D.I., not to mention one-time major-label acts Social Distortion, X, and Bad Religion.

In 2010, they played at the Van's Warped Tour for 4 dates on the legends stage.

Discography

Studio albums

• Inside My Brain (1980)
• Back from Samoa (1982)
• STP Not LSD (1988)
• The '90s Suck and So Do You (1999)

EPs

• Queer Pills (1981) – EP (Pseudonymous release)
• Yesterday Started Tomorrow (1987) – EP
• Fuck the War EP (2006) – EP
• I'm In Love With Your Mom (2010, recorded in September 1978) - EP

Other releases

• Return to Samoa (1990) (unauthorized bootleg)
• Live at Rhino Records (1992, recorded in May 1979)
• The Unboxed Set (1995)

Band members

Vocalists

• "Metal Mike" Saunders – vocals, guitar, drums/1978–present
• Gregg Turner – vocals, guitar/1978-1991
• Todd Homer – vocals, bass/1978-1988
• Bill Vockeroth – vocals, drums/1978–present
• Jeff Dahl – vocals/1981

Guitarists

• bonze blayk^[1] – lead guitar/1978-79
• P.J. Galligan – lead guitar/1979-1984
• Steve Drojensky – lead guitar/1984-1988
• Alison Victor – lead guitar/1996
• Mark Byrne – guitar/1996-1998
• Jonathan Hall – lead guitar/1998-2003
• Kevin Joseph – lead guitar/2006-2010
• Landon Gale-George – guitar/2007
• Colin Alflen – lead guitar/2011

Bass Guitarists

• Scott Greer – bass/1988-1990
• Heith Seifert – bass/1990-1991
• Mike "Cyco Loco" Avilez – bass/1996
• Adrianne Harmon – bass/1997
• Rick Dasher – bass/2005
• Dan Siegal – bass/2007
• Matt "Malice" Vicknair – bass/2009–present

References

External links

• Angry Samoans on Facebook
• Official website
• Booking info
• Angry Samoans discography at MusicBrainz