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Night of the living Dickies >> The funniest band that punk forgot resurfaces
by CHRIS BARRY
"When our first record came out, the critics were brutal," says singer Leonard Phillips. "Punks weren't supposed to have a sense of humour or be anything other than these predictable Sex Pistols or Clash clones." By 1980, after two moderately successful albums for A&M, the Dickies were dropped from the label and left to fend for themselves. They languished around L.A., getting progressively more fucked up and patiently waiting for the next multimillion dollar offer to come their way. Something that still has yet to happen. Nevertheless, the band has managed to get a new record together every five years or so. And some of these records have been nothing shy of brilliant--even if nobody wants to believe that a band with a 40-ish junkie singer who plays with giant rubber penises on stage is capable of genius. Their latest, Songs From the Hare That Bit Us, is a collection of cover tunes (says Phillips, "a convenient way not to have to write any songs") that is starting to get some serious attention in the U.S. and Europe, and Phillips and guitarist Stan Lee (the two remaining original members) are actually writing their next album for Fat Wreck Chords as you read this. Better yet, Offspring guitarist Noodles recognizes the brilliance of the Dickies and has gone out of his way to make sure the band has an opening spot on his band's current mega-tour. Crediting Lee as his main inspiration for wanting to play guitar, Noodles deserves praise for helping our heroes get their music and attitude out to a whole new generation of kids. And does this new generation understand the Dickies any better than the last? "In Portland last night," says Phillips, "I was doing my schtick and jokingly begging the audience to start buying our records, but nobody realized I was joking and I think the kids actually started feeling sorry for us. Aw, who knows, maybe they sensed something that I wasn't even aware of. Maybe I was begging for real after all."
With the Offspring and Lit at Place des Nations, Monday, August 2, 5pm, $32 |
The first punk band out of L.A. to get signed to a major label, the first one to go to Europe, the only California punk band of their generation to have Top 10 hits (of course, they were both covers of '60s cartoon theme songs), the Dickies also hold the distinction of possibly being the most overlooked band of their generation. For some inexplicable reason, it seems the vast multitudes out there never really acknowledged the beauty of their melodies or the incisive humour behind classics like "Going Homo," "Mental Ward" or "You Drive Me Ape (You Big Gorilla)."