The Screeching Electric Guitar Page

And so we found ourselves in San Francisco, down underneath the superstructure of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, looking for the locations of outdoor shots used on a recent episode of "Nash Bridges".

This led to cruising by the location of the new downtown baseball park, which, when it is completed in a couple of years, is going to be one of the most beautiful baseball parks, ever. You'll be able to look out through the outfield on to the waters of San Francisco Bay. If you happen to get a small missile through the security gates, you might take a shot at a passing oil tanker during those slow and sleepy late innings.

We ended up driving down around the location of the new ballpark, and then out along Third Street through the industrial-wasteland Superfund-sites that run paralleling the Bay; relics of a time when San Francisco actually had an industrial base.

And then it hit me: I recognized the area as the location of the rehearsal studio that I shared with "Happy" Dave Thompson back in 1982 when we were in the band "Dave". (it was Happy Dave, and me (Dave), and a drum machine named "Dave".)

I had been playing bass for less than six months, having switched over from playing guitar after having determined that my severe lack of talent on six strings was holding me back. I felt a move to just FOUR strings might help advance my chances of getting a good band up and running.

And there it was: a run down, three story warehouse out at 22nd and 3rd Streets. We used to pay $6.50 per hour to rent a room up on the third floor of this dump from this guy named Ian, who was managing this band named FLIPPER. Flipper had the rehearsal space after us; they were a great band and are still putting out CDs today, although their guitar player, Will Shatter, died of a heroin overdose.

The band BEFORE us, the one that was never ready to leave when it was our turn to take over the room was a little rockabilly band named Silvertone. They were OK, but not NEARLY as gnarly as Flipper. Their lead singer, Chris Isaak, has gone on to have a fairly successful career.

I hadn't seen this dumpy warehouse in almost seventeen years, and it sure brought back the memories of that time and place; a time when I was making a noise that I hoped would destroy the world.

It just doesn't get any more NOSTALGIC than that, does it?

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