by LORRAINE CARPENTER

The field may be filthy with new bands reviving that late ’70s/early ’80s golden age—when electro, punk, reggae and rap crystallized and converged—but few measure up to New York City’s Bush Tetras, one of the bands that pioneered that heavy, heavy hybrid sound. Even though they only released three 45s in their heyday (1980–’83), the Bush Tetras defined that pocket of post-punk known as no wave, alongside acts like ESG and Liquid Liquid.

“We didn’t know how to play our fuckin’ instruments,” claims singer Cynthia Sley, a dubious statement considering the widely respected talents of guitarist Pat Place, not to mention the centre-stage rhythm of drummer Dee Pop and founding bassist Laura Kennedy (replaced in ’96 by Julia Murphy). But it’s Sley’s way of debunking the idea that her band, and their no-wave contemporaries, intentionally crafted a “minimal aesthetic.”

“It was a tribal interweaving of instruments,” she says. “It was really unconscious, but we knew what kind of beats, riffs and feelings we liked. We listened to the Clash, and what was going on in England, and a lot of reggae and hip hop and African music, and we were just trying to combine everything.”

Not least among the quartet’s influences was James Chance & the Contortions, with whom Place refined her hot staccato style prior to co-founding the Bush Tetras—Place is doing double duty at this weekend’s Osheaga festival, playing with both bands on the MEG stage.

Another major influence on the Bush Tetras was the mid-’70s music scene in Sley and Kennedy’s hometown, Cleveland, Ohio, which produced Devo and Pere Ubu.

“Pere Ubu are one of my favourite bands of all time. We used to go to see them every week, and we were among the few people who danced,” says Sley, whose group of footloose friends were dubbed “the Nerve Gas Dancers” by the band. “If you can’t dance to that music, well, you’re not on my wavelength.”

Once in New York, Sley and Kennedy found it easy to find like minds, form a band and ease into the city’s art scene.

“We started playing in this really great environment ’cause everybody was just having fun making music, coming from all different angles of the art field,” says Sley. “New York was a wide open place then. It was like Dodge City—very dangerous and wild and funky. You could ride your bike down to Soho and get into places for free and just happen upon things, like mud wrestling.”

Topping Sley’s fondest memories from the period is a show with one of Washington, D.C.’s legendary proto-hardcore bands and a certain British band whose name is arguably this decade’s most name-dropped.

“The best show that we played was [with] Bad Brains and Gang of Four at Roseland,” recalls Sley. “It was such a great line-up of bands, it was such a good night—it was definitely a peak.”

While it would seem that the Bush Tetras’ peak is long past, their frequent reunions (in ’92,’96, 2002 and 2005) and recent return to songwriting (they’ll preview new material this weekend) indicates that the show’s far from over.

“We keep coming back to each other because there’s this undeniable chemistry between us.”

With James Chance & the Contortions, We Are Wolves, Duchess Says, Crystal Clyffs, Think About Life, and the Hushpuppies on Osheaga’s MEG stage at Parc Jean Drapeau

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