Denvoid 2: Keith Curts (Echo Beds, Fauxgazi, Junkdrawer, Subpoena The Past, Glass Hits)

Denvoid and the Cowtown Punks Volume 2: The Colorado Crew is coming out this year. Really it is. Sonny Kay and I have been slowly chipping away at it over the past 3-4 years. The problem is that this is a hobby and often takes a backseat to our jobs and families. On my end, living in Alexandria, Egypt makes calling folks across the pond tricky. Additionally, I'm in the process of relocating to Abu Dhabi for work; there are plenty of balls in motion. 

I'm obsessed with this project and feel lucky when I'm able to set aside chunks of time towards completing it even if it entails transcribing interviews in the front seat of a car on the way to Cairo. My bigger problem is that I want to include everyone and don't know when to stop. Typically, I interview one person and usually go, "Ohh, I should also interview this other person" and it avalanches from there. So here we are. forty plus interviews later and we're STILL hunting down the last couple of folks. As the project has expanded beyond the initial vision, it will easily overshadow the first Denvoid book in its massiveness (and star power) not to mention tons of artwork, photographs, flyers, etc. Unfortunately, not every band from that period (1988-1996) will be interviewed, but we are being conscious to include them in one form or another.

Q: When will Denvoid 2 be reseased?
A: Mid-December 2019. Not the ideal time, but it's the time I can get away from Abu Dhabi. We are contacting people to try and make this a special release. Ideally, we like to devote a weekend to this event with bands playing at different venues around Denver. My goal will be to release excerpts of interviews each week until the book release.

This first installment features Keith Curts. I've had the pleasure to play music with Keith from 1994-96 with both Junkdrawer and Llamas NoVa. When I met Keith in 1992 he was just starting out, I had seen his first band, So Far Gone play. The band was young, but everyone involved had an intense energy to them...although their set was technically sloppy, it was played with passion and sincerity and that's what mattered. They were heavily influenced by the DC sound that had pretty much infected every corner of the country - even in Longmont where So Far Gone was hatched from.

Keith's next band, Junkdrawer made room for me after I returned from living a year in Birmingham, Alabama. We played out often and even survived a three-week summer tour of the southwest and west coast. After Junkdrawer called it quits: Keith, along with Patricia Kavanaugh (Harriet The Spy), Sean Watson (Savalas drummer #3), Mark Bradin (Savalas drummer #2) and I  didn't waste any time in forming Llama NoVa. It should be noted that Tim Nakari (Small Dog Frenzy) played in the second incarnation of Llamas NoVa.

In 1996 Keith left Colorado for the bay area and played in a few band there including Subpoena The Past with Sonny. Upon his return a decade later he played in: Glass Hits, Fauxgazi (A Fugazi cover band that went on tour - check out the documentary here and of course his latest project Echo Beds.

Keith caught the playing music bug early and never stopped. He had always pushed himself to learn and grow in his endeavors. Always humble, approachable, and easy to strike-up a conversation with. Enjoy the excerpts of the interview.

Interviewed by Bob Rob (Medina)

Brush and ink drawing after a photograph from Jeff Davis

What did that whole Longmont scene look like to you?

There was our band and New Breed who was Andy Lefton on Bass, Jared Allen on guitar, Matt Sandau sang, and Mike McNaughton on drums. Mike eventually ended up in Linus. There was also a crossover metal band kinda like DRI, called Salacious Crumb. This guy Nick played with them and Jason Barlowe. Jason ended up playing bass in Linus. So there was this thread throughout the Longmont scene. There was another band with Mark Risius and Andy Brazycki and a couple of other people, they would go through different names changes, Fahrenheit 451 was one of their names at one point. There was also Caste who was Will Welty, Dan Parris, Pete Lyman along with Mike McNaughton. Mike and I went to high school together and he was the first one who turned me on to things like Godflesh and Nitzer Ebb. You know, I remember in 9th grade I was getting turned on to so many different things and it kind of kept going. Then you have this moment trying to figure out your music identity; Am I a new waver? Am I a punk rocker? You don't realize it's all under the same umbrella. Then you start putting it all together, like Godflesh is kind of a punk band, kind of an industrial band, kind of a metal band...

The few of us would take a bus into Boulder to catch a Savalas shows. We'd see people from Dead Silence walking around and that was weird because we were from this little podunk town and Boulder seemed like it was so much more grown-up because it had more of a scene. We looked-up to that. Seeing some of those bands were life changing, to get to experience Savalas, Belljar, Dig, Small Dog Frenzy… That was out big city experience. (laughs)

What was So Far Gone's first show? When did you guys actually start playing?

We would play in Jeb's dad's garage or like my parent’s basement when they went out of town and my step brother wasn't home. We’d play in other people's living rooms. I remember playing a show at a grange hall in Lafayette. The Offspring and G’rups played there at one point. We had local shows there too. We weren't a good band. At least I felt like I wasn't a good part of that band. (laughs). It was the thought that counted.

I remember Brian Gathy and I liking So Far Gone at the ballet studio show in Boulder.

Oh yeah! We did play that show because it was recorded! We played with Belljar and Dig. It was Dig's last show because their guitarist, Ken Smallwood was moving back to the East Coast. I vividly remember Brian Gathy smashing his bass into pieces, like splinters because he was so distraught that the band was ending. Later, I got to know Brian and understood that was how he was... I had never experienced anything like that before. I had never witnessed that kind of emotion that connected with music. I didn't get to see bands like Rites of Spring. I know Brian did since he was from DC. Watching Brian that night, I just connected with that. And Belljar’s set - Grant Gutherie just fucking wailing. That was an amazing time.

Like with So Far Gone, we didn't know what we were doing. We didn't do it long enough to actually get good at it. It wasn't like you listen to a bunch of records and then try to figure out how to play like that. We just played. There was no artifice and no roadmap. Dan turned me on to a lot of the Dischord stuff, “emo stuff” that just rang a bell with me. I immediately became inspired by all that stuff, but I couldn't play like that. We just all started playing. Andy Rothbard and Jeb had been friends forever, there were like fifteen when we started the band, I was 17, and Dan was 19. It really was a collaboration, a sum of its parts where everyone came in with something different. It was like creation for creation sake. That was it, it was really liberating to just play. The beauty of youth, not yet looking through the microscope.

Reflecting back on the on that show at the ballet studio, it's funny how some people had that “holy shit” moment seeing Brian smash his bass. I saw the appeal of witnessing someone shattering an instrument because they were consumed by the moment. I can tell you for certain that Sonny and I had a different “holy shit” moment as in, "Fuck, Savalas is about to head out on a three-week tour AND fucking Brian just smashed his bass. You know, we were like, “What an asshole.” (laughs)

Savalas was really good, you guys were older and knew how to play your instruments. You played shows, toured, had shirts with Chris Shary's artwork! If Chris Shary is doing you artwork that really meant something...Take this as a compliment, because it is, I never met anyone with tattoos before (laughs). Seriously, we looked up to you guys. We were like, "These guys know what's up." We're just fumbling around in the dark over here and that's fine because I'm seventeen and I'm allowed to do that. So I get it that you and Sonny were being practical while we were looking at Brian in awe. 

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I don't remember if we played after the Shudder To Think show. I didn't know if the recording was before or after the Shudder show, but I think that was it for the band.

So we have to talk a little bit about that too. At least just touch on it. There was a weird backlash between what was punk and what wasn't. That was a strain for our band, it wasn't like we were careering or on the fast track. It was around that time that some punk bands were getting picked up by bigger labels like Shudder To Think, Samiam...

And that Shudder To Think show was being boycotted by some of our friends because it wasn't punk enough!? It wasn't a punk show?  Huh, that really like confused me. I thought what we were doing was a punk band. The fact that we did it ourselves and didn't rely on anyone else. We wrote everything ourselves. You booked everything pretty much. It was all us, but that somehow wasn't punk enough. It kind of was a kick in the nuts, you know.

It was disheartening and reflecting back on it, it was petty. The whole DIY thing got really out of control, it was like the absurdity in the DIY culture that the TV show, Portlandia lampoons. When did punk start having rules, that's kind of an oxymoron. Who gives a shit if we played a $7 show?  

It became a very dogmatic thing.

Llamas NoVa 
Photo: Jeff Davis

Straight Edge in 88: promoting shows and putting out records.

Stepping up to the plate.

The overall realization within the punk and hardcore scene was that it couldn’t sustain the momentum from the early 80s. The raw energy element had grown progressively thin by the later part of mid-80s. The overall punk aesthetic had morphed away from its center in terms of music, dress, and attitude, and started mixing with other genres of music. By 1987, playing punk and hardcore was regarded as passé and frowned upon. In a conversation I had with Karl Alvarez (Descendents/ALL) concerning the stylistic changes in the 80s, he said something to the effect of how every band had changed sounds and moved away from punk, with the exceptions of his band and DOA who had both weathered the storm and continued playing punk non-stop for thirty plus years.  

On Minor Threat’s posthumous Salad Days 7” EP in 1985, vocalist Ian MacKaye scrutinized changes within the scene through an introspective recollection on the record’s title cut: “Wishing for the days when I first wore this suit, baby has grown older, it's no longer cute.” Similar sentiments were echoed in other bands songs including Dag Nasty’s “Never Go Back” on their debut Can I Say LP: “I'm looking at pictures and I'm thinking of those times, those times have changed man, and so have I.”

Dag Nasty represented a stylistic evolution in the punk scene. Driving at a more tuneful and melodic sound and shying away from the rough and tough hardcore grit, the members of the band spun from (Minor Threat, DYS). The resulting sound was what my friends and I started gravitating towards.

When I called Randy “Now” prior to my month-long excursion to the East Coast to inquire about bringing Dag Nasty and 7 Seconds to Denver, he was keen on having me bring his bands to Denver. Randy casually asked what happened to all the older promoters in Denver. I knew for a fact that both Jill Razer and Headbanger had distanced themselves from the scene and were both done with promoting punk shows. Honestly, I knew little about booking shows. I simply played in bands and had learned a few tricks of the trade by observing Jill and Headbanger. I naively approached the task with the attitude thinking promoting would be an cinch.

Cover of issue no. 2 to FlipOff. Collection of Author. 

I called my buddy Steve Cervantes, an old school LA Punk transplant living in the foothills of Denver, to see if he wanted to help me bring Dag Nasty to town. We were already collectively publishing our fanzine FlipOff -a nod to his homies who published Flipside back in Whittier. Becoming concert promoters seemed like a logical extension of our photocopied rag. While bands like the Germs, up until Minor Threat, was more his generation of punk, Steve was pretty open and excited by newer bands. To bring Dag Nasty and promote the show, we agreed I would do most of the legwork. His main interest in our joint adventure would be to help out financially. Steve had a real job, a wife, and was almost ten years my senior. He took me under his wing and shared stories about his involvement in the early days of Southern California punk. Steve gave me that push I needed to become a promoter and later, the encouragement to start a record label.

In late July, Dag Nasty rolled into town. I had secured the DAV Hall on East Colfax Avenue in Aurora plus a PA system for the event. The veterans running the hall were a bit skeptical when the punk rockers started trickling in. They asked for reassurance that kids wouldn’t sneak in alcohol or doing drugs in or near the venue. My high school pal, “Billy Idol” Brett agreed to work security. Brett’s task was to make sure no one damaged the PA or knock holes in the bathroom walls, and to keep booze off the property.

An hour after the show started, Steve and I were on edge because the band had a $750 dollar guarantee, but we barely pulled in $600 at the door. We were desperate for more people. Stepping out of the venue scanning the sidewalks on Colfax Avenue, hoping to spot a lost punk rocker looking for the show. We still had to pay for the PA and the hall. On top of that, the band was late, they finally showed up thirty minutes before they were scheduled to go on.

The bassist of the group, Doug Carrion, got out of the van with no apologies, nothing. The other guys piled out and wanted to start unloading. Doug sniffed me out pretty well, sensing he had the upper hand. He told his guys to stop unloading and demanded we pay them $750 before playing their set or they were going to get back in the van and drive to the next town.

The first show I promoted. Mohican Youth was a made-up band "Toledo" Pat and I created but never materialized. Collection of the author.  

This was the time I wished that I had had the wisdom of Headbanger or Jill. The conversation might have gone like this: “All we have is $500. Take or leave it.” I knew their next gig would be at least a nine-hour drive in either direction. $500 for relatively unknown band in a market like Denver was killer money. Instead, the way the real conversation unfolded was: Doug, Steve, and I walked over to the payphone near the club, called, and woke up their booking agent Randy “Now” on the East Coast. After passing around the phone for five minutes, we finally settled on a price and hung up. The three of us walked across the street to an ATM, and Steve withdrew money. We handed Doug $650. Back at the venue, Doug gave the rest of the band the green light to unload. The only parts I remembered about the band’s set was when they blew out the venue’s fuse box a couple of times. In the end, no smashed bathroom walls, no broken bottles. The kids had a great time, everyone got paid, but we lost our collective financial ass. I could hear Headbanger and Jill singing, “Welcome to the club.” Steve and I vowed we wouldn’t let another band take advantage of us like this again.

About a month later, the 7 Seconds show was set for the same DAV Hall. The morning of the show, I arrived to drop off the remainder of the deposit. One of the grumpy veterans told me he didn’t like the way we had moved the American flag off the stage the last time we had a show there He complained that the bottom corner of the flag had touched the ground. Of course, I apologized profusely. He disappeared into the back office and emerged with my initial deposit. “Sorry, we won’t be able to host your bands here tonight.” I raced over to the payphone and called Steve at work to tell him what had transpired with the venue. I drove home in a panic and flipped through the Yellow Pages, calling every hall and lodge in the hope that one would come through.  

Some cool kid had made this 7 Seconds flyer that I had to go around and take down because the show was moved. The original flyer I made for the show belong to Rich Jacobs and is featured in All Ages: Reflections On Straight Edge, a book released by Revelation Records. Collection of the author.  

Dave Clifford in his fanzine Given Time wrote: “7 Seconds actually showed, and it was a good thing. Bob Rob was almost in tears trying to find a place for the show, and luckily, the American Legion, run by the drunkest hick I’ve ever seen, let him do it there.” 7 Seconds and Justice League arrived early at my parent’s house. While my mom cooked and served the bands a late lunch, I told them what had happened in that morning. I was upfront when I asked them not to have high expectations in regards to people showing up and/or getting paid very much. 7 Seconds was cool and told me that anything towards gas would help; they just wanted to play for the kids.

Given Time, a fanzine created and published by Dave Clifford. Collection of the author. 

We caravanned from Aurora across Denver to the out-of-the-way American Legion Hall at the edge of Arvada. The punk rock phone tree and last minute flyering paid off: nearly 200 kids made it out to the show. My partner Steve’s favorite part of the evening was the handful of drunken old veterans piling out of the bar behind the main hall hooting, hollering, and dancing.

Sigh… It was time to make the donuts again, but more like recoup money from putting on shows. Any sensible person would have chalked up the losses and moved on. Instead, my stubbornness propelled me dig deeper, and further entrench myself into the realm of Denver punk. I dropped in at the donut shop and asked my manager for my old job back. Considering the lack of applicants flooding through the door hoping to land a graveyard shift frying donuts all night, she obliged. I signed some paperwork and was back at work the same night.

I felt slightly pathetic returning to my former job. I started thinking about several of my high school friends who were packing up and moving on to college. Then I thought about my coworkers, especially the baker who had trained me. At the ripe old age of 35, he had a reputation within the company and was respected by everybody. He was my sensei, the donut sage... I imagined myself with his sort of clout: a five star, go-nowhere, flipping donuts in the fryer in the middle of the night at 35. Fuck that! I just promoted a couple of punk shows and came off a 4,000-mile mind-blowing road trip. That first night back was a heavy dose of what I was returning to; it was the moment of clarity I needed. There was definitely more to life than living in the confines of Aurora, Colorado.

A couple of days later, I surprised my dad by telling him I wanted to enroll in fall courses at the Community College of Aurora. He was skeptical, but agreed to pay the tuition. (He didn’t think I would last more than a semester.) The trick would be to juggle a full load of college courses plus a fulltime job while promoting shows. Making donuts was the sacrifice, but it was the ticket, which allowed me to actively bring bands to Denver and eventually put out records.

The Changing of the Season

In the fall of 1987, I started making new friends in the scene. Arnold from the Acid Pigs approached me and asked if I would be interested in starting a new band with him and Jack of the Pigs. My former band, Idiots Revenge, had played together with them the year before. They were cool guys, and I dug their music, so I jumped at the opportunity to play bass in what was to become Short Fuse.

During the same time, through the shows I was promoting, I had became closer friends with Dave Clifford who played in Deviant Behavior in Boulder and a skater kid named Rich Jacobs from the Denver Tech area. I regarded the pair as the posi-straight edge crew. Although I wasn’t straight edge at the time, I admired what they were doing. Seeing people waste away in the drug and booze haze of the Denver scene had become counter productive to the creative process of making music. I latched on to Dave and Rich because they brought the fresh and raw energy the scene needed. We all looked up to what was going on with Dischord Records in Washington DC and admired their tight, cohesive, and self-supporting scene. We collectively imagined something along those lines happening in Denver.

The impetus for bringing like-minded positive kids together was the violence we were witnessing at shows and the adverse musical directions bands appeared to be taking. At the time speed-metal and paisley-hair rock was well underway. We wanted to move away from that and become immersed in music played with sincerity with a message. The group of kids who were mainly responsible for setting the stage for an emerging positive youth crew movement in the Denver/Boulder area were the 8 Flights Up/Splat! kids attending CU Boulder. They had tried to create a space and movement centered on positivism, living a substance-free life style, and aspects of vegetarianism.      

Colorado Krew artwork by Rich Jacobs. Collection of the author.

Bands echoing positive sentiments were gathering momentum all over the country in pockets like suburban New York City and Southern California. While 7 Seconds represented the old guard, even their sound evolved while they continued speaking on topics of equality, unity, and personal matters. Kids across America and Europe were picking up on this growing movement bands like 7 Seconds helped foster. New bands were popping up all over the map, and the kids were creating networks via touring, fanzines, and word-of-mouth.

My friend and I were swept up and excited by this infectious transformation. I was telling Rich about starting a record label to document music from Denver, along the lines of what Duane Davis of Wax Trax did, by releasing local bands on his Local Anesthetic label. Of course, there were other regional labels out there just as inspiring: Dischord Records in Washington DC and Touch and Go in the Midwest. Rich told me I should just go for it. Since the records would be financed by my donut-making paychecks, we deemed it appropriate for the label to be known as Donut Crew Records.

Colorado Krew 7" EP cover. Collection of the author. 

Rich and I thought the first release should be a 7” EP compilation showcasing newer, less established bands we already knew and were friends with. I called a couple of groups I had helped with shows such as, End of Story and Acid Pigs. Rich’s band, Atomic Dilemma, and his newer, straight edge group, Keep In Mind each wanted to contribute a track. Although, our recently put together Short Fuse band was relatively new, we recorded one of our songs for the record too. The project came together and was released in early 1988. 

By 1988, most of the people and bands that had been part of the early ‘80s Denver punk scene had changed musical direction or dropped out. Several scenesters had moved away to college or enter the workforce. My buddy Shawn befriended Choke from Slap Shot and wanted to bring the group to town for a New Year’s Eve show. We tried to collectively book them, but the show never materialized. As a consolation prize, Shawn and his brother booked rooms at the Westin Hotel in Downtown and invited Slap Shot to ring in the New Year with us…though the guys in band were straight edge. After downing several beers chased by bottles of Dom Perignon, Choke and company escorted Shawn and me to the toilet to vomit our indulgence. After worshipping the porcelain god, Shawn came up with the motto to start off the New Year: “Straight Edge in 88!” Giving up the booze made sense at the time plus most of my more recent friends already abstained from any sort of vices. It was time for me to move in that direction too and concentrate on booking shows and putting out records.  

Edited by Rory Eubank