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I was in a short-lived Pink Floyd Cover band called Punk Floyd in 1994. I sang, Doug Hilsinger from my band Bomb played the amazing guitar and sang harmony, Chris MacKay from Helios Creed’s band played keyboards, Paul DellaPelle from Helios Creed’s band played drums, and Paul “Bean” Kirk from Helios Creed’s band played bass.
This recording is a 20-minute medley at a very cool all-ages warehouse, Klub Kommotion in San Francisco.
The music is not punk (If you want to hear my 1985 hardcore band the Beef People, go here. And if you want to hear actual punk covers of Pink Floyd, go here.)
We did play the songs faster than the Pink Floyd records.
It’s a board tape so the vocals on the first song and a half have no reverb, skip around if it’s too rough. lol.
I remastered this a bit from an MP3 made from a cassette dub of the ADAT board tape. lol.
This is just a presentation of an artifact, but the players are all top-notch.
Songs are, in order:
Breathe
Money
Welcome to the Machine
Wish You Were Here
Sheep
Pink Floyd Pigs (three different ones)
In the Flesh
Eclipse
Later the same week on Sept 9, 1994, Punk Floyd opened for Sublime at the same club, under the name “Breathe” for Roger Waters’ 50th birthday (he never showed up). Described here on the Sublime Wiki, “Blaine Kaplan – Sublime’s Co-manager & Booking Agent writes in Crazy Fool” (bolding mine, lol), describing the atmosphere:
But where I really got a feel for the Sublime scene was at this place called the Kommotion. It was a little, punk rock, art collective in the Mission District, somewhere between Folsom and Harrison on 16th, I think. It’s just a glorified practice room with some make-shift plywood bleachers on one side–about 40 feet long.
They had a multi-track live mixer, and some of the songs from the ‘Badfish’ EP came from Kommotion. I know ‘We Are Only Gonna Die for Our Arrogance’ was recorded at one of their shows there.
That was my first real experience going to some dirtbag, punk rock underground show, paying two bucks and walking in with a 12-pack. People were sprawled out, drinking jug wine– it was just crazy. It was cool, though. It was summer of ’94, and it was a really interesting point for the band. Not only were they big on the SoCal underground, but Northern California was vibing on them, too. Word was spreading all over. People weren’t really into reggae as much, but they knew when Sublime played, it was a party.”
I find it astonishing that a guy who managed and booked Sublime had never set foot in a warehouse show. But you know, some people make the music, and some people are bean counters culling money off the music for making a few phone calls… Often more money than the artists.
That sublime gig was recorded as an ADAT board tape, like all shows there, by the guy who ran the place, Jeff. (last name anyone?)
Lil Mike put out a 7-inch vinyl bootleg of the Sublime board tape of that show. He had the permission of a drunk / high Bradley Nowell (“Sure man! Fuck yeah, Lil Mike! Just send us 50 copies or whatever!”).
(Lil Mike is the guy who put out my an EP of my other side project, the Rolling Scabs Live at Gilman, also on YouTube here, it was members of Bomb with 2 twelve-year-old brats singing.)
MCA records later threatened to sue Lil Mike and made him turn over the remaining copies. But some are out there, Lil Mike was a promo machine. He was more likely to tell a store “Here’s 20 of ’em” if you sell ’em, maybe send me the money if they sell, or whatever!” And he’d skateboard all over town doing that in every store. Even stores that didn’t sell records. He’d also mail little stacks of ’em all over the world.
FYI, I didn’t stay to see Sublime at that show. Lil Mike told me they were “reggae surf rock”, and some gal from the show wanted to get with me. The gal sounded far more interesting to me than reggae surf rock.
— Michael W. Dean
p.s. Here’s my music now, it’s called BipTunia and it’s a lot better than Punk Floyd. You can listen to all 44+ albums free here. And here’s BipTunia covering “Us and Them” slower than the original.