founding member
Johnny Savior (J.D. Buhl), vocals & knee pads
Influences
Brian Wilson, 13th Floor Elevators, Hawkwind, Pere Ubu, The Dickies, Syd Barrett, Soft Machine, British Invasion, The Grass Roots, King Crimson, the Man band, The Stooges, Gong, Joe Meek, Krautrock, Silver Apples, The Soft Boys, The Damned, Frank Sinatra, Ducks Deluxe, Johnny Murad’s Harmonicats, Stiff Records, The Who, The Move, Throbbing Gristle
Sounds Like
Avante-garage Psycho Pop; half sixties & half eighties, Farfisa organ on a shopping cart.
"The Jars were one of the very first bands to successfully combine ’60s garage and ’70s punk... it still sounds good to me, even 28 years down the line."- Steve Tupper, founder, Subterranean Records
The Jars were formed in 1978 out of the remnants of San Francisco’s Beauty Killers. After SST (which included Ted Falconi later of Flipper on guitar) broke up in ‘78, legendary artist Irene Dogmatic (Judy Malloy) formed the Beauty Killers with Matt Markham from SST, on bass, Jim Goodwin (later with Sparks, John Cale and the Call) on sax and keyboards, Marc Time (Gunther) on drums and Mik McDow & Armin Hammer (Gary Hobish) on guitars.
Armin: Mik was an old friend of Marc’s, and I met Marc in 1976 when we both worked at the old Warehouse Record Store on Lakeshore Ave. in Oakland, where soon-to-be Jars manager Marc Monosonic was asst. manager. All of the Jars had worked in the music industry in stores, as Djs, recording engineers, and all were rabid music collectors. I’d been there about a week when Mono told me a friend of his was coming to work there, and that we liked the same kind of music- “You both like that high squeaky voices stuff,” he told me. Later that day I met Marc Gunther...
“I hear we like some of the same stuff.”
“Soft Machine, Caravan, Hatfield and the North?”
“Oh, we’re going to get along just fine!”
At that time, Marc was a DJ on KALX in Berkeley. He was probably the first DJ ever to play The Residents on the radio. With Marc’s help, I joined the KALX staff as well (I had been in radio in NY before moving to San Francisco), running the Import Hour. This was before the explosion of Punk, and both Marc and I were pressured to leave the station for playing too much punk and/or Soft Machine. Around this time, Marc and I did some early recordings as the Vinyl Junkies, one of which was a cover of "Interstellar Overdrive" played on a home-built PAIA synth and some tupperware. The song (sans kitchen equipment) remained a staple of some of the longer Jars’ sets.
The Beauty Killers had been rehearsing in the garage of the house in Albany, CA where Marc had moved with his girlfriend (now wife) Barb. With Armin moving over to bass and with the addition of vocalist Johnny Savior (J.D. Buhl), the nascent Jars- then calling themselves the Saviors- started playing as a unit and writing songs. It was said that the Jars got their start “opening for the Beauty Killers rehearsals.” The band was so poor in those days that they had been forced to use old jars instead of real drinking glasses, which prompted Irene to remark, “You guys should call yourselves “The Jars!”
After a gig or 2 in SF the Beauty Killers broke up, and the Jars began to apply more focus to finding a sound that would combine their wide and eclectic set of influences yet remain freewheeling and fun. At this point, Marc invited his childhood friend Gary Nervo (Mollica) to come out to California and be the band’s keyboard player. Nervo had already had a big influence on the Jar’s musical direction, since he was a well-known DJ in Cleveland and had been sending Marc the early independent releases of seminal Ohio bands like Pere Ubu, pre-major label Devo, Tin Huey (see Ralph Carney and Harvey In The Hall) and the Pagans, for whom he’d acted as road manager on their “World Tour" (2 nights at Jay’s Longhorn in Minneapolis & 2 nights at Bookies in Detroit).
Nervo: I’d grown up with Marc in Connecticut, with early bands being Leak & The Columbian Fathers (approx ’69-’72) - I went to Cleveland, Marc went to Berkeley. Marc got me to move out (78 was one of the coldest in Cleveland history) 11/78 to play keyboards. I played with the band at a party the day I arrived, & the next day we had our 1st rehearsal.
With the lineup now set and armed with a 50/50 mix of originals and obscure covers ranging from forgotten Tommy James & The Shondells B sides (“Say I Am”) and Paul Revere & The Raiders non-released commercial songs (“SS 396”) to the psychedelia of Hawkwind (“Silver Machine”), the pre-Tommy Who ("Disguises") and the 13th Floor Elevators (“Roller Coaster”) to the electronic experimentation of Silver Apples ("You & I") and pure Pacific Northwest punk (The Sonic’s “Psycho”), The Jars helped spearhead the Berkeley Punk/New Wave scene by playing at the International Café, Aitos Club, the Keystone, Berkeley High and various pizza parlors and frat parties. From ’78-81, The Jars were considered one of the top 3 Berkeley bands along with The Mondellos & The Young Adults and were playing all over the Bay Area at the Mabuhay Gardens, the Deaf Club, the Temple and the old Waldorf opening up for Roky Erickson, the Angry Samoans, Horslips, the Dickies, the Flamin’ Groovies, the Psychotic Pineapple, the Dead Kennedys, the Suspects, the Mutants and MX 80 to name but a few.
In 1979, the Jars had been offered time to record a demo for Berkeley’s Fantasy Records. 5 songs were recorded by producer Richie Corsello (an original member of Mink DeVille’s band) and engineer Danny Kopelson, but Fantasy (a seminal jazz label who had only signed 1 rock and roll band in their history- El Cerrito’s The Golliwogs; wonder whatever happened to them?) passed. Johnny Savior and the Jars parted company; he re-emerged as J.D. Buhl, and backed by his band The Believers (with Armin engineering and co-producing) released an album and some singles (including one of the Fantasy demos, “Do Ya Blame Me” as a B-side) on Germany’s Rag Baby Records.
Trimmed to a taut 4 piece combo with Mik taking over lead vocal duties, the band did a 3 song EP for the young Subterranean label, “Start Rite Now”, “Psycho”, and “Electric 3rd Rail” with Mike Fox of The Tools/ Code of Honor producing. Released in the summer of 1980, this was the Jars’ first single. The record sold well in the Bay Area’s many hip record stores and got a lot of college radio airplay, and was featured on the then-emerging Maximum Rock & Roll show on KPFA (late founder Tim Yohannon was an early supporter of the band). Reviews were positive, with many critics making note of the combination of "Nuggets-era garage band raunch,” Nervo’s “outrageously weird Farfisa organ fills,” and Mik’s “hilariously tinny” lead guitar. “Electric 3rd Rail” was in the FabMab/KUSF Rotten Record chart Top Ten for 4 weeks and ended up at 54 on for the entire year of 1980, just behind Elvis Costello’s “High Fidelity” and ahead of “Too Much Pressure” by The Selector.
Nervo: I took a shoddy Berkeley record shop called Music Faucet & turned it into a punk rock haven & hired Marc, who had been working at the legendary Rather Ripped Records. We turned the business around then we moved "up Telegraph", 1/2 block from UC Berkeley campus & renamed the store Universal Records. The owner, Ron Blakeman wanted to put some money into us, so we did a 2nd 45 on our own Universal label.
With Armin now working at Fantasy Studios as an engineer, The Jars secured Fantasy’s release on the 5 demo songs recorded the previous year. This allowed the Jars to remix (with a new lead vocal by Mik) the Jars original “Time Of The Assassins.” In October, the band went into Hyde St. Studios and (with co-producer and engineer Dan Alexander) recorded an instrumental, “Jar Wars,” that had become a staple in their live set. These two songs became the Jars’ second single, released on Universal Records on March 30th, 1981- which turned out to be the day Ronald Reagan was shot!
The single, which included a glorious pic sleeve designed by Grammy-winning artist and evil genius Hugh Brown, was very successful. Both songs got a lot of college radio airplay all over the country, and the single rose to 2 on the Rotten Record Chart.
In 1981, longtime friend Michael Montalto, who had played the occasional Jars gig, had been with J.D Buhl & The Believers, the Special Guests and 2.3 Children, and who had played at the very first Jars gig at the party when Nervo came to California, joined the band, bringing along skills as a top-notch guitar player and a fine voice for 3rd harmonies. (Mike was later to form The Movie Stars and also was a founder of his current band, the outstanding Americana honky tonk band Red Meat.
This lineup did more recording and was stable until the band’s final breakup in 1982, but that’s a story for another time...
The new True Margrit CD - The Juggler's Progress - is now available for pre-order, along with t-shirts and artwork, photo and drumheads, check it out here: http://bit.ly/7Cu8J
Next shows: November 5, Molly Malone's in West Hollywood, CA November 12, Fox and Goose in Sacramento, CA November 15, Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco, CA!
Our tour wraps up with the big show at San Francisco's best rock club, Bottom of the Hill! For the complete show schedule, check here: http://bit.ly/1UgGqQ
The new True Margrit CD - The Juggler's Progress - is now available for pre-order, along with t-shirts and artwork, photo and drumheads, as we get ready for our monthlong tour of the Great Northwest! Check it out here: http://bit.ly/7Cu8J
Look for us in Washington, Oregon and California between October 15 and November 15, when our tour wraps up with the big show at San Francisco's best rock club, Bottom of the Hill! For the complete show schedule, check here: http://bit.ly/1UgGqQ
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thank you for the add, i am slowly finding out about the SF scene (70's, early 80's) and I came to find your site....I will take time to study your sight and sample your music, dont feel I am disengenious when I say it is important (to me personally anyway) that musicians from that era are appreciated and remembered...not like you are gone or anything but you know what I am saying I hope, I have studied/heard/seen now fLIpper, Toiling Midgets, Contractions, Symptoms, Avengers, Mutants, Polkacide,etc....your careers do NOT go unnoticed or unappreciated by me.....
