Banned in Boston (album)
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| Banned In Boston | |||||
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| Compilation album by GG Allin | |||||
| Released | February 1988 | ||||
| Recorded | 1978-November 1984 | ||||
| Genre | Punk rock | ||||
| Length | 72:31 | ||||
| Label | Black & Blue Records | ||||
| Producer | Peter Yarmouth. | ||||
| Professional reviews | |||||
| GG Allin chronology | |||||
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Banned In Boston is a compilation CD (and later, vinyl LP) from punk rock singer/songwriter/performance artist GG Allin, released in 1989 (although it was compiled and sent to the manufacturing plant in the winter of 1988 and gives a copyright date of that year). It was also the first ever GG Allin title to be released on compact disc but the release on CD included additional material not on the vinyl version Black and Blue released.
The CD was compiled by Black and Blue Records owner Peter Yarmouth with cooperation from GG Allin, since the two previous 7" releases had started to garner interest after the infamous Cat Club show in NYC and all the press in Village Voice, Flipside and other punk rock fanzines. Yarmouth kept getting asked by GG to put out a CD and this was the first one.
At the time, Allin's notoriety was already established at a fast pace due to his continued outragous stage antics throughout the United States along with his Black and Blue releases, the two album releases for Homestead Records, You Give Love a Bad Name and Freaks, Faggots, Drunks and Junkies and the cassette album on ROIR Hated In The Nation (which has the three live songs played at the abbreviated set in NY City's infamous Cat Club show). Allin never stopped speaking or working with Yarmouth, despite telling interviewers that Yarmouth had not paid him a cent in royalties on the video GG Eats His Own/Live & Pissed (a charge refuted by Yarmouth when he said he "paid" GG by the terms of GG's contract giving GG a percentage of the units pressed instead of on retail sales after expenses). Yarmouth had rights to the sound recordings master tapes from Allin's pre-Homestead releases; GG approached Yarmouth in 1983 to bankroll his recordings and begin a national advertising campaign that included ad's in Option, Flipside, Ben Is Dead, RIP, Maximum RockNRoll, Real Life In A Big City, Boston Rock, and many more publications that also paved the way to GG's infamy. Black & Blue's first release was an Allin recording, the Live Fast Die Fast EP, and Black and Blue had since been reissuing Allin material in various analog formats that GG assisted in putting together. GG told Yarmouth that trashing his label was something he would always do, and would do with other labels so he should not take it personal. GG and Yarmouth were good friends and in touch with each other up to a week before his death. GG took pride in the fact that he pissed in Homestead Records president Gerald Cosley's hair (according to GG) and on Yarmouth's leg (at the infamous Populus Pudding show that was filmed when GG was under contract to Homestead). The whole GG and Yarmouth not speaking to each other is a myth. GG was always in touch with Yarmouth even when incarcerated via collect calls to Yarmouth and letters sent via postal mail. Black & Blue Records' phone bills and letters prove this where the whole not working together is a fabrication that has no justification. Allin even stayed at Yarmouth's home in the late 80's prior to the infamous show at The Rocket in Providence RI.
Looking to both stretch out the material he had for the first-ever GG Allin CD (due to the CD format holding 70 minutes of material Yarmouth wanted to give fans a good bang for the buck)and attract collectors of Allin's work to a compilation of previously released material, Yarmouth took the initiative and came up with a professional-sounding recording of Allin and his first band, The Jabbers, playing what was a "full set" of material at the popular Boston nightclub The Channel. The last time they played The Channel the set lasted three songs with one of the infamous "Goon Squad", Mick Horgun, dragging GG off the stage and kicking him in the head till security pulled him off GG. Yarmouth cleared things up with security pointing out that the perpetrator was on the guest list and part of the show (the bouncers were not amused). The Channel never booked Allin again after that show.
The show featured on the CD along with the interview pre and post show were all from the same night in the early 80's (probably 1981 or 82). Rather than add track marks to the beginning of every song Yarmouth incorporated all seven live recordings as one 15-minute-plus track on the CD (excluding two cover songs, The Stooges' "I Wanna Be Your Dog" and the New York Dolls' arrangement of Bo Diddley's "Pills", both of which remain unreleased), and framed this track with pre-and-post-show interviews with GG and the band. The interviewer (creepy fact) was DJ Uncle Pete Davis, who committed suicide a few years later. Another interview note is that one of the people answering questions was a fan/roadie, not a member of The Jabbers.
For the previously released material on the CD, Yarmouth presented most of Allin's first album Always Was, Is And Always Shall Be (with the exception of "1980's Rock and Roll", which GG insisted not be included on the CD because he hated the song and felt it was his worst song ever), as well as the single "Gimme Some Head" and the EPs Live Fast Die Fast, No Rules" and You Hate Me And I Hate You. Of these recordings, only Always Is... "No Rules" and You Hate Me... are actually by GG and the Jabbers. Live Fast Die Fast was done by Allin and a few of the now defuct Jabbers along with the drummer from a local hair-metal band called the Flying 69, while "Gimme Some Head" was Allin's already legendary collaboration with former MC5 members Wayne Kramer and Dennis Thompson along with members of The Jabbers.
In a bit of revisionist history, Yarmouth and Allin credited production on all of the recordings to "Dick Urine", the fictitious production credit from GG's early post-Jabbers cassette self-releases that later became the collective pseudonym for Allin and Yarmouth when Eat My Fuc was recorded and released, and claimed on the back cover of the CD, in a parody of standard early compact disc technical notes, "We haven't tried very hard to improve the sound." In reality, the sound was improved when the compiled CD was mastered at Bernie Grundman's mastering facilities, but it sounded punk to say that it wasn't. While many might question Yarmouth spending money on such poor source material, the audio quality of the CD was optimized.
This compilation would see re-release in a couple of different variations over the years. In 1993, the entire CD would be released with a different front cover (from photos Yarmouth took in 1983 and later of Allin) under the extended title Insult & Injury Volume 1 - 1977-1982 Banned In Boston, and the contents of same would also be split into two different CDs in 1998 as Banned In Boston, Volume 1 and Volume 2, with Volume 1 containing the studio recordings and Volume 2 featuring the live tracks and interviews. These versions are still available from Black & Blue Records today.
[edit] Track listing
- Dead or Alive
- Interview
- Live Boston
- You Hate Me and I Hate You
- Gimme Some Head
- Don't Talk to Me
- Automatic
- Nuke Attack
- Bored to Death
- Assface
- Interview
- Live Fast Die Dast
- Livin' Like an Animal
- Loudenbomber
- I Need Adventure
- NYC Tonite
- No Rules
- A Fuckup
- Gimme Some Head
- You Hate Me and I Hate You
- Bored to Death
- Beat Beat Beat
- One Man Army
- Assface
- Cheri Love Affair
- Automatic
- I Need Adventure (1980 Version)
- Don't Talk to Me
- Unpredictable
- Radio Interview (unlisted on the CD tray liner)
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