“We are united”
was Uberfall’s rallying call for scene unity. The members of the band seemed to
have links to all aspects of the scene from skinheads, to punks, to goths and
even befriending artists and experimental musicians. The reach of their friendships
and connections were vast and varied.
Once the group
formed, it was impossible to get away from noting the band’s kin to a swastika
logo spray painted in alleyways and dumpsters around the Capitol Hill neighborhood
and beyond. Uberfall was even a household name amongst detectives within the
Denver Police Department as I learned firsthand sitting in the back of an
unmarked car along with two friends being questioned about the so-called
Uberfall gang. To read about the incident click HERE. The band certainly found
themselves in many spotlights.
Musically, the
group’s niche was stop on a dime crisp sing-alongs. That didn’t keep the band
from experimenting with slow dergy and sometimes noisy tunes. Uberfall recorded
a 10-song demo that never saw the light of day due to a lack of funds for a
properly release. Plus the continuous line-up changes plagued the band since
the group’s inception. One of the running jokes was, “Raise your hand if you’ve
never been in Uberfall.”
Uberfall was
more than a one-liner. The depths of their sideline controversies and
shenanigans were largely disconnected from their music. One of the
misconceptions was that they were merely a band, when in fact the group’s in-your-face
guerrilla art tactics generated strong reactions from the public and authority
figures. Big John and Flye were basically the visionaries of the band.
Eventually one strong personality inched out the other and everything downward
spiraled from there. All the ingredients were there to create a legacy, but the
band couldn’t maintain their charismatic mojo that made them a momentary
sensation. Big John, Flye along with Carl shed some insights to the inner
working of what it was like to be in Uberfall.
An early line-up of the band. Original photograph from DMT fanzine. Brush and ink drawing by Bob Rob (Medina) |
Your origins?
Big John: I grew up in Cheyenne, Wyoming. I was part of Wyoming’s first hardcore punk
rock band, Spontaneous Down Syndrome. We played our first gig in Colorado at a
nice place. They had a deli tray and beer waiting for us. We were really
impressed. They called us and asked us to come down and play, we were like,
“Sure.” Then they asked if we wanted anything special. So we said, a 12-pack of
good imported beer and deli tray with an assortment of meats and cheeses. When
we arrived at the show, they took us into the back and pointed us to our
dressing room, “The beer is in the fridge over there!” I looked over at Paul
Howard and said, "Oh my God, they were being serious." I think that's
the night I met Pete Flye and we started hanging out. Anytime we'd play Denver
I'd stay over at Flye's house. Paul had other friends in Denver he stayed with.
That's how we got Uberfall going. I didn't want to live in Cheyenne anymore.
The town was really boring in comparison with the scene in Denver. We played
about 5-6 gigs in Denver before I finally moved.
How did you get into punk being in Wyoming?
Big John: My parents got a separation and my mom and I moved
into an apartment. One day I'm in the apartment and hear music coming from the
next-door neighbor. It sounded really cool and I liked it. I wasn't shy at all,
I put down the book I was reading and walked over to the neighbor’s house and
knocked on his door. He opened it and I said, "Wow, what kind of music is
that?" He said, "Punk rock." This guy was an English teacher at
the high school I was going to. So the guy who would later become my teacher
introduced me to punk rock. At that point I had been mostly listening to the
Velvet Underground, David Bowie, and Iggy Pop.
And you Flye?
Flye: I got a scholarship to a private school and that is
where I met Carl. I started going there in the 4th grade. Carl and I
started hanging before I got kicked out in the 8th grade. I didn’t
do well academically plus I wanted to grow out my hair, which they didn’t allow.
So we had a special meeting during which I told them art and music shouldn’t be
mandatory classes. I eventually went to vocational school and Carl also went
there. At the time he had turned me on to Bad Religion, Circle Jerks… I met the
skins because of little Sammy who went to the same school. I befriended Sumo at
Wax Trax, he was the guy that didn’t have any attitude. He would always give me
fliers trying to get me to go to shows. I had wide spectrum of friends.
I went to school with the
original bassist, Mike Lee. Since he knew I was taking art classes, I think by default
asked me to design a sticker for the band. While I was in Biology class trying
to draw the perfect skull with the Uberfall logo on the forehead, my teacher,
an Orthodox Jew walked past my desk and kindly asked me not to draw what she
thought resembled a swastika. Would you consider the band’s logo as a way to
stir the pot, to make people feel uneasy?
Big John: The name came about because our drummer Matt Johnson
had a party one night. We were trying to think of a name for our band and Matt
grabbed a German dictionary and said, "I'm just going to randomly open a
page and the first word I put my finger on will be our band name.” Flye and I
thought, "Ok, that sounds cool." He opened it up, spun his finger around
and put it down in the word, uberfall. When we saw the definition, “to overthrow”
we collectively thought, “That’s cool!” Out of that we were trying to make a
logo, and the U and the F together looked kind of like a swastika and thought
it was pretty hilarious. We went ahead with that. It was meant to be a red
herring, make people think one thing then have it mean something totally
different.
Flye: The
logo definitely served its purpose. You want a symbol that draws attention and
demands an explanation. Something easy to draw on a school desk, spray paint on
a wall or paint on a jacket. Most of all, with punk rock, you need controversy.
Look at bands like Dead Kennedys...now it's almost a household name. It’s very
offensive. Same thing with their logo...how many kids had that logo on their
jackets and couldn't name one DK album? The UF logo may have been somewhat of a
joke, but I considered it more of a promotional gimmick.
Did you get a lot of shit for that?
Big John: We got tons of shit for that! Anytime we had our
jackets with our logo painted on them people would get so mad. It was great for
us-we loved for people to get mad; it was attention. I know it got the local
police a little worried. I thought that was just awesome.
Did they think you were some sort of gang?
Big John: Yeah, they thought we were some type of
underground neo-Nazi punk gang. Then the whole Christian’s thing happened.
Christian and Omar took over a space on Larimer Street, which they
appropriately called Christian's. It was basically a commune with a bunch of artists,
punk rockers, and weirdoes living there. The brothers had been separated from
their parents when they were young and put into a home for boys where they were
mistreated by the staff. The staff would tell them stuff like, "You know you
need some new sheets for you bed since they are really dirty and maybe you'd
like another blanket, but we don't feel good giving that to you unless you tell
us something really private about your lives." The brothers would tell
them things and then they would use those things to keep them in the home instead
of finding them a place to live outside of the system.
There was an former military guy living at Christian’s and
knew how to make bombs and stuff like that. He left brochures and pipe bomb
making materials outside everyone's door one day. Christian and Omar got into
making them. Omar sent one to the head of the program that he and his brother
had basically been trapped in when they were kids. It was suppose to detonate
when she opened the package, but it didn't. They found out the Federal Postal Inspector
and the FBI was looking for them so they disappeared. Nobody knew the pair’s
whereabouts. They were good about not telling anybody. Since they couldn't find
them, they decided to investigate all of us. That's when the government came up
with the gay neo-Nazi conspiracy theory and linked Uberfall to it.
Gay neo-Nazi conspiracy theory?
Big John: They knew Christian was gay so they just threw the
rest in there. They thought that Uberfall was some sort of organized neo-Nazi
recruiting arm of something larger. I don't know what they thought, but they
figured we were a part of it. Their one-way window vans were parked out in
front of Christian’s and in the parking lot behind it. I remember when I had to
go in and talk with the FBI and the Federal Postal Inspector. There was this camera
image of Mike Lee on the back bumper of one of the vans shaking it. They were,
"You know this illegal, and this is considered interfering with an
investigation." I said, "Mike just thought it was a random person's
van, he didn't know it was the FBI. “You're in such secret vans, how could we
know you guys were the Feds?" One of them tells me, "You're a real
smartass."
Some of this came out in Westword, the article was titled: Pipe Dreams.
Big John: A lot of it did come out. You know, the Feds even
had our phones tapped. We'd make-up fake conversations pretending to know were
Christian was, stuff like, "He's in Hawaii now" The FBI would later interview
somebody else and say, "We know that Christian is in Hawaii, which island
is he living on?" We were passing around bogus information; it was pretty
funny.
What happened to Omar and Christian?
Big John: Well, they both got caught and went to prison for
a long time. I don't recall the outcome after that.
They were born to be institutionalized-from a home for boys to prison?
Big John: It's sad. They were both really nice guys. I just
think the system fucked them up.
Do you also think the attention you got from the police was partially
due to all the band's logos painted everywhere?
Big John: It was. We'd make little propaganda fliers and randomly
put them up in different places around town that would say stuff like: The time for the revolution is now. We
did stuff just to fuck with people and authority. We knew they were watching,
so we wanted to give them something to do.
They should be out there fighting crime instead of chasing a bunch of
punk rockers wasting taxpayer’s money.
Big John: I was into graphic art before I knew it was called
that. It was like a little hobby making propaganda fliers. I would only make 10
or 15 and take spray adhesive and put them up in different parts of town in
places like Cherry Creek.
Did the attention help popularize and propel the band?
Big John: Definitely. It was band propaganda for sure. The
more shit we could stir the more people were interested.
At what point did you finally stop playing in Uberfall?
Big John: I thought about why I left Uberfall…then went,
“Oh, yeah” and remembered the band having different people in it all the time.
It was a revolving door of members. It wasn't even the same band anymore.
Towards the end when I left it was like 5 months of different people. It was
just Flye and I.
I left shortly after I joined Idiots Revenge. I was also
doing my project Control Corporation, which was techno/electric stuff. We had
those lovely samplers and stuff like that. That was mainly my project and sometimes
Scott Hosterman would join along. We really didn't play out as a band more than
once. I also did this industrial project with Flye and a couple of other
people. It was basically this percussion thing with found objects from around
the Packing House. We thought making sound with the objects would be
interesting and it was.
Carl:
I honestly don’t remember leaving the band. The place where we were practicing
got sold or the renters got evicted and it took me like 2 months to get my
drums back. As I recall that time was kind of a hiatus for UberFall. I was
going to this Shamanic church at the time, and I got Mike Lee involved and he
disappeared for like two weeks on some crazy camping spirit quest. Those are
the last things I remember about my time with the band.
Denver was a hotbed for experimental music, My theory is I think
underground music in Denver had an art element to it because early punk shows
happened in spaces like the Pirate Art Gallery, and later the Art Department,
Flash Flood Art Space, The Core…beside people in Colorado were somewhat
isolated from the coasts and didn’t have any sort of templates to follow. Do
you think there was a strong relationship or a correlation between the two?
Big John: I really think there was. I met Bert Bodnen, Hugh
Caney and Paul Dickerson at Christian’s and really got along with those guys and
they started introducing me to industrial music. I was over at Kelly Cowan’s
house and I picked up one of his records and asked him about it? He said I
wouldn't like it. I said, "It looks really interesting, would you play it
for me?" It was SPK. I liked it. He
was shocked and asked if I wanted to listen to other stuff. And I was,
"Yeah." It was through meeting them how I became involved with
industrial/experimental music.
What was the relationship between punk/hardcore/industrial music in
Denver at that time?
Big John: Those guys were interested in the punk scene
because it was underground. I think though that they met other people. They had
access to people putting on shows, like Headbanger.
I remember asking Mike Lee what he was doing one evening, and he said
we're having a band meeting with our manager? That sort of caught me off guard.
At the time, I didn't think local punk bands had managers. Managers seemed
anti-punk in a way. He described it to me that all the members sat around and
talked about stuff. I guess in today's terminology, it sounded like you guys
had group therapy with a life coach (LAUGHTER)...I don't know, maybe because
the band was a revolving door of band members. Perhaps Big John and Pete Flye
were just difficult people to be in a band with and you needed that mediator to
make sure the band got along.
Big John: Was Carl Frank one of our drummers?
He was the drummer on the band's demo!
Big John: Oh, now I remember Carl. We had gone through so
many drummers. It was like that mockumentary Spinal Tap. We had a manager. We
met these two guys from Nederland, CO: Dan Lockridge and Robert Hall. They were
fun to hang out with and both had a lot of money. When we met Dan he was
talking about wanting to manage and record bands. When he said "record"
Flye and I both looked at each other and asked Dan if he wanted to be our
manager. He casually said, “Yeah, ok." That's how we got into the studio.
It was great because we didn't have to look for shows anymore, he just found
them for us.
Flye: Dan also opened Flash Flood Art Space. We helped him
clean-up the place and made it so bands could play gigs in there. As for
Uberfall playing shows, a lot of times we would throw our guitars into a car
and show up to gigs and ask if we could play. Maybe borrow another band’s drum
set and amps. Sometimes Dan would slightly manipulate other bands into letting
us borrow their equipment. That’s what happened at the Flash Flood show that
Nate mentioned in his interview. We weren’t on the bill and while everyone
waited for Bum Kon to play, we got on stage and did a couple of songs. We
probably played a 10-minute version of Sex and Violence.
Carl:
I got to record with UF on this session and it was a really good time. We were
recording at Barking Spider in Boulder and staying with the band’s manager in
Nederland. We talked about releasing it, but I think I had moved on before that
came to fruition. I don’t think anyone had money at the time for
duplication and artwork.
Uberfall's first show was my band's first show too, at the Packing
House. We opened, but you guys already had a fan base, so you went on 4th or
5th. I think you blazed through your set and people wanted more. So you played
Oi! Uberfall twice.
Big John: We thought the 10 songs would be enough. When
you're playing everything speeds up. The three-minute songs turn into a minute
and twenty second song. As for people coming to see us that night, it was Pete
Flye’s doing. He was a kid that people liked. He was super social and got out
there told people about coming to see his band.
Flye:
One of my main objectives was scene unity. Not only did I really like the
Oi! sound, but I really loved the early L.A. stuff and the whole D.C. movement.
We tried to incorporate these influences to draw a wide fan base. We also tried
to book shows with bands with different followings and sounds, not only did
this draw a diverse crowd but it allowed people to hear us and other bands that
normally wouldn't. I loved playing shows with Mau Mau 55, Human Head
Transplant, A.S.F. etc.
In
the beginning, Uberfall was more punk than Oi!
Your look and Oi! sound didn’t develop until later. It seemed that the
band was hitting its stride both in image and music. Describe that time.
Flye: We
all pretty much had or hands in the mix when we made songs. Sometimes I would
show up with some lyrics and John or Mike would come up with a melody. There
were times John would show up to practice with a whole song. "Oi!
Uberfall" started out as a bass riff Mike came up with and I wrote the
lyrics. Carl would always have good input on tempo and structure of songs. As
the band slowly disintegrated I was leaning towards the Oi! sound and was
looking for members to fill that genre...that was my big mistake, looking for
members to fit the mold instead of letting members mold the band like we did in
the early days.
It was difficult to find a practice space especially since
we had problems keeping members. We shared a practice space with H.H.T. on 11th
and Broadway above a beauty salon. Later in the band’s career I told a guy he
could be our manager because his mom or aunt let us practice in their basement.
The name, logo, the charisma of the band members seemed to be the
initial success of the band. Uberfall seemed like that band that had potential
to go far, but it never did.
Big John: What happened to us is we...certain people in the
band started taking it too seriously and started to show a lot of ego. Every
time we had good band members, an argument would happen and they would quit.
And we had to go back looking for replacements. With every new batch of people
they progressively were less talented. I think what we had when we first
started was great with a lot of potential. Even after the 2nd or 3rd generation
still had the potential but it just got worse.
The more Oi! version of Uberfall. Original photograph unknown. Brush and ink drawing by Bob Rob (Medina) |
I hear you on that. I know by 1986, Flye even recruited me to play in
the band and we went over to some death rock guy's house. He was decked out in
his black clothes and white make-up. After trying him out, Flye and I get back
into the car and earnestly asked me what I thought. It was hard to imagine that
guy playing those songs. To me there were always two different Uberfall bands.
At the beginning there was the casual, come as you are, let’s have some fun and
spray paint our logo around town, type of band. Then there was the later period
Oi!/street punk looking guys Pete had recruited that were good as well, but the
band couldn’t maintain the momentum. The band eventually took a dip and seemed
to be trying out anyone who had a car and equipment. I understand wanting to
keep a band on life support, but in retrospect I think Flye should have taken
his talent and done something different.
Big John: It just got way to serious. I think in our punk
scene, the more fun you had, the more successful you were. Sure, you did your
practices and tried to become better, but the main thing was just to have fun.
Like the Lisa Geyer song, Bad Girl?
Big John: That was just fucking with Lisa.
Flye: She wanted that song dedicated to her and always asked
us to play it for her. That’s why we put that song on the demo. Come to think
of it, the music from that song was from of Big John’s old bands. I think he
might have done that with several of our songs.
Yeah, when John joined my band, Idiots Revenge he would say such and
such part was from one of his old bands. We even took an old Uberfall song,
played it backwards at a slow tempo. John was a master at recycling melodies.
Flye: (Laughter). Yup.
John, one of the interesting aspects about your personality is that you
are a cross between a conceptual and performance artist in that you come up
with these ideas and you try to see how far you can get away with things. Even
when you played in Idiots Revenge we had that song ‘Not My Fault’ and you would
target Anarchy Annie, and the A.S.F. girls, who in turn thought we were a
sexist band. We totally weren't!
Big John: You’re right we weren't, that's what was funny. I
remember being at a party and Annie came up to me and said, "Why are you
guys such dicks, why do you have to be such a dick? And I said, "Why are
you even saying this to me?" And she goes, "Your music, you're just
nasty sexist dicks" Finally, I go, "You take our music seriously? Can't
you tell when somebody is poking fun at you, we don't really want to make anyone
angry, we're just teasing." I'm not going to be singing, “Stop your
bitchin' and get back in the kitchen” and be serious about it. I'm not a
caveman. So she finally understands it's a joke. After that conversation they
all liked us. I like to push the envelope and do little pokes at people and see
the reaction. I never mean any harm. It's more along the lines of, “Lets see
what they do if I do this.”
Burn any bridges with this approach?
Big John: I think it's about a 50/50 deal. I burnt some and
made others stronger.
After making the demo did you want to make a record and go out on the
road?
Big John: We were hoping to put out a record and there was
some interest. I don't know what happened to that. Dan was actually a good
manager and he grilled the label with questions and told us that we wouldn't
have been happy with the deal and we would get screwed in the end. In
retrospect being screwed wouldn't have been that bad if it got our record out.
(Laughter) I don't know, we had our principles back then. We did play out of
town like Boulder, Ft. Collins, and Greely...a poorly attended show.
In the interview I did with Ted of Dead Silence, I asked him what went
down between his band and Uberfall. What was your version of that?
Flye: I think the interview you did with Ted was the first
time I heard about Kevin referring to me as a Polish Nazi. Dead Silence was
putting on a benefit one time and we reached out and offered to play. They
didn’t want bands playing they thought would bring out the skins. In the true
Oi! fashion, like on the Oi! compilation albums John wrote a poem about that
incident then we wrote a song called Dead Silence. At shows, John would read
the poem before going on into the song. One of the lines in the song goes, “Waited
for a call but all we got was dead silence." We had fun like that.
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