A recording of The Magic Band playing Dropout Boogie has been released on a CD compliled by Matt Groening, All Tomorrow's Parties Vol.3.1. (ATPRCD16) Recorded in concert during a lunar eclipse over Long Beach California in 2003, this track has not previously been made available. Other artists on the album include Deerhoof, Elliot Smith and Iggy and the Stooges. Sonic Youth perform the Simpson's Theme and a Matt Groening poster is included in the package.

Posted by derek@beefheart.com at 11:45 AM  - 2 comments - post a comment

Announcements that three of Don Van Vliet's former associates are being honoured have recently been made.

Mo Ostin, former head of Warner, is cited by the President of The Recording Academy as, "a true pioneer of the contemporary music era whose life's work has had a profound impact on the artists he has helped develop and the fans around the world who have benefited from their inspired creativity." One of these artists was Captain Beefheart and many people believe that Captain Beefheart's best work was indeed done during his Warner-Reprise tenure. On February 8th, after the 48th Annual GRAMMY Awards, Mo will be presented with the President's Merit Award in honour of his contribution to the landscape of modern music.

On March 13th The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame will induct Herb Alpert & Jerry Moss in the Lifetime Achievement Award in the Non-Performer category. It was A&M who first signed Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band and who released the two singles, Diddy Wah Diddy and Moonchild. It was also A&M who wanted nothing to do with Safe As Milk. On hearing the demo tapes Jerry Moss reportedly showed Don Van Vliet the door, saying, "It sounds like a movement." Don's version was that Moss had said that Electricity sounded too negative, which was a much more bankable quip. Jerry Moss is now a successful racehorse owner whose horse Giacomo won The Kentucky Derby in 2005.

Gary Lucas is the proud composer and performer of two of the cuts on Jeff Buckley's album Grace, which readers of Q magazine have just voted 13th Greatest Album Ever. Jeff was the former singer in Gary's band Gods and Monsters, and according to Gary was a big Beefheart fan. His father Tim Buckley had been managed by Herb Cohen, as had Don. No Captain Beefheart record was voted into the 100 Greatest Albums Ever, which makes me wonder just where these Q readers have been all their lives.

Don Van Vliet has not yet received a record industry award.

Posted by derek@beefheart.com at 5:07 PM  - 0 comments - post a comment

BBC 6Music broadcast an archive interview last week from 1980, conducted by David Hepworth.

Don was in bullish mood - not at his wittiest or most charming in my humble opinion, desperately asserting himself as a legitimate composer and artist and lashing out at those who he saw as a threat. Genius, without doubt, but not a very genial one on this occasion.

Nevertheless, it's classic Beefheart and Michael Alderson has very kindly, painstakingly transcribed the whole thing for you. Many thanks to him for his trouble, and to Marc Riley's Mint for making the air-time to broadcast it.

Incidentally, this week's archive interview on Mint is with Neil Young, another one not to miss.

Posted by Graham Johnston at 7:36 PM  - 3 comments - post a comment

Here is a cover scan of the forthcoming documentary DVD Captain Beefheart Under Review which is in the final editing stage and will be available in March '06, on the Chrome Dreams record label.

The film traces Beefheart's entire career and uses rare footage and contributions from numerous Beefheart associates and Magic Band members. Contributors include John French, Mark Boston, Moris Tepper, Elliot Ingber, Ira Ingber, Jerry Handley, Doug Moon, Eric Drew Feldman, Gary Marker and Gary Lucas.

Posted by derek@beefheart.com at 1:50 PM  - 5 comments - post a comment

Michael Traylor, the Magic Band drummer, has sent a link to his new website. If, like me, you have difficulty opening http://www.swampmonk.com/ then try this link instead http://www.swampmonk.com/home.html

Check out his picture gallery for some photographs of The Magic Band on tour.

Posted by derek@beefheart.com at 1:37 PM  - 1 comments - post a comment

Today is Don Van Vliet's 65th birthday. All of us here at beefheart.com would like to send Don our sincere congratulations and very best wishes. Today's world of contemporary music would be a hollower place without him and, let's face it, this website would be a whole lot less interesting too.

Poet, artist, raconteur, visionary, musician, environmentalist, genius and booglariser extraordinaire, we salute you!

Posted by Graham Johnston at 9:14 AM  - 20 comments - post a comment

John French sent us news of the death of Alex Snouffer, aka Alex St Claire, guitarist, drummer and a founder member of Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band.

John wrote, "I talked with Jerry Handley, who was probably the closest to Alex. Jerry just lost his Dad and Alex was at the funeral a couple of weeks ago. We reminisced about the early bands that were the forerunners of the Magic Band. "

Steve Froy's full obituary for Alex Snouffer was added to this site on 9 January.

Posted by derek@beefheart.com at 11:16 AM  - 8 comments - post a comment

BBC radio's 6Music will be airing an archived Don Van Vliet interview this weekend on Sunday 8th January on Marc Riley's Mint.

I don't know yet which interview it is exactly, but you can listen live online at 10pm (GMT) or whenever you want to via the "listen again" facility for up to one week after broadcast.

Many thanks to Simon Pardoe for the tip off. I usually try to listen to Marc Riley's shows anyway as they are always entertaining and he is a big Beefheart fan. You might have to endure an occasional tune by Coldplay but there is always tonnes of good stuff as well.

Posted by Graham Johnston at 9:35 AM  - 3 comments - post a comment

After I'd posted Leon Rubenhold's story about the time he played with Captain Beefheart (see the entry for 07 December here), Leon sent another mail detailing the first time he came across Don and The Magic Band. Here is what Leon wrote:


Thanks for posting my Beefheart experience story. Unfortunately there are no photos or tapes of the time spent with him.

Actually my first encounter with Beefheart happened when I was sixteen. In Los Angeles in the 60's there was an event held for a number of years called the Teenage Fair held in Hollywood at the Palladium on Sunset Blvd. In 1966 I was in attendance with some band mates and we watched this blues band called Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band perform and they played a set of searing blues tunes from Howlin Wolf and all the other blues artists. I was impressed with the singer (Beefheart) who sounded just like Howlin Wolf and played great Harmonica. This was about a year before his first and probably only AM radio hit of "Diddy Wah Diddy" came out.

Then about 2 years later I was in a Blues band called the Outlaw Blues Band. We were being considered for a contract with the Kama Sutra label under Bob Krasnow. We were competing with Beefheart who they were also considering. Beefheart got the nod and my band later signed with Bob Theile for ABC Bluesway for a two album deal.

Also there was a couple of things that happened with Zappa that I omitted. He gave me a nickname which I won't mention because I found it kind of offensive, and even though it wasn't an expensive meal he made us all pay individually for that lunch at the Mexican restaurant at his invitation!


thanks again Leon

Posted by derek@beefheart.com at 10:44 AM  - 1 comments - post a comment

The whole beefheart.com site is currently moving from one host to another. Everything will still be available exactly where you're used to finding it here at beefheart.com (and beefheart.org too) but you may notice a few technical glitches as we settle into our new home and get everything working again behind the scenes.

I will post a comment here when I'm sure everything is working again. In the meantime, thanks for your patience.

Posted by Graham Johnston at 8:03 PM  - 4 comments - post a comment

Back in October, Norm Wheeler wrote in with his notice of a Captain Beefheart film show which took place in Austin, Texas. Owing to some technical malfunction or other I did not receive his mail until very recently.

Anyway, such is the Texan interest in Captain Beefheart that the same film show is being held again tonight at the same venue (for details click here) so I thought it would be appropriate to let you read Norm's mail as a sort of preview to tonight's event.

BBC documentary surfaces in Austin, Texas

Last night (2005-10-10) the 1997 BBC documentary The Artist Formerly Known as Captain Beefheart was shown at the "Alamo Drafthouse Downtown" in Austin,Texas, a venue that specializes in art/indie/rare films. It was the only scheduled showing. I have no idea how their copy was obtained. Also shown was a music video of the Captain and the Magic Band performing "Electricity"on a beach; this was described as being "from French television". Finally, the Anton Corbijn film was also shown.

The showing was almost completely sold out (~260 seats), unusual for their "Monday, Music Night" programs. What I found interesting was that the audience was primarily young folks in their 20s and 30s. There were only scattered old codgers like me (age 64). Furthermore, when the BBC program ended the audience applauded, which is rarely the case in USA movie theaters (except in Los Angeles first-run theaters, where applause is traditional if the film was enjoyable).

Best wishes,-- Norm Wheeler

Posted by derek@beefheart.com at 11:21 AM  - 0 comments - post a comment

The idiotbastard mailed to let me know that the January edition of Guitar and Bass magazine contains an article about Captain Beefheart.

I have not yet seen this but I've been told by somebody else that the title is Secrets of Beefheart Songwriting. Just what secrets are revealed, I wonder?

Posted by derek@beefheart.com at 11:05 AM  - 0 comments - post a comment

Some previously overlooked performances by Don Van Vliet have recently been documented by Bill Lantz, one of the world's foremost Zappa-ologists.

In September 1975 The Abnuceals Emuukha Electric Orchestra was put together to present a series of orchestral pieces written by Frank Zappa. Michael Zearott was the conductor and Frank produced and recorded most of these shows. Forty musicians were assembled by Zappa with help from Earle Dumler and Mike Altschul. One of the orchestra members was Don Van Vliet who played soprano saxophone.

If anyone has access to recordings from this project we'd be very interested to hear them.

The full story is published here: http://users.cableaz.com/~lantz/pages/emuukha.html

Thanks to Fire Party member brainpang for spotting this.

Posted by derek@beefheart.com at 11:03 AM  - 5 comments - post a comment

Kelly Shane and Woody Compton's website Is This Tomorrow contains what they say is "The Finest in Contemporary Picto-Literature!"

Their two part Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band strip condenses the entire history of the band into just twelve frames, six of them here and the other six here.

Posted by derek@beefheart.com at 10:39 AM  - 0 comments - post a comment

On Friday 6 January from 22:15 to 23:30 BBC Radio 3's show Mixing It features alternative music in Los Angeles. The presenters Mark Russell and Robert Sandall meet film composer Jon Brion, hip hop producer Madlib, guitarist Nels Cline, sound artist Akira Rabelais, and drummer John French.

You can listen to the programme at the Mixing It homepage for one week after the broadcast.

Posted by derek@beefheart.com at 10:14 AM  - 1 comments - post a comment