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  THE BRIAN JONESTOWN MASSACRE

The Brian Jonestown Massacre 

  Available on 180 grm clear vinyl LP , comes in superb deluxe packaging  

Brian Jonestown Massacre burst into 2019 with the release of their 18th full-length album, just 7 months after their last one. The self-titled 9-track album is released on Anton Newcombe’s A Recordings on 15th March 2019. It was recorded and produced at Anton’s Cobra Studio in Berlin. 

The album was originally going to be released in September, but due to a hugely successful global tour – taking in USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Europe the release was delayed. 

Recorded this time last year, the album features Sara Neidorf on drums, Heike Marie Radeker (LeVent) on bass, Hakon Adalsteinsson (BJM / Third Sound & Gunman & Holy Ghost) on guitar and Anton Newcombe on multiple instruments. Also making a guest vocal appearance on ‘Tombes Oubliées’ is Rike Bienert who has sung on previous BJM albums. The band performed songs from the album throughout the European leg of the 2018 tour. 

Anton Newcombe has been a very busy man these past 5 years, having released 4 critically acclaimed Brian Jonestown Massacre albums and an EP, 1 soundtrack album and 2 albums with Tess Parks. All releases were fully recorded and produced at Anton’s studio. 

The Brian Jonestown Massacre track ‘Bon Bon’ was used in the 2015 Palm D’Or winner Dheepan. Anton penned the soundtrack for ‘Moon Dogs’, a film directed by multi-BAFTA nominated Philip John (Svengali, Downton Abbey, Being Human). 

Tracklisting 

1) Drained , 2) Tombes Oubliées , 3) My Mind Is Filled With Stuff , 4) Cannot Be Saved , 5) A Word , 6) We Never Had a Chance , 7) Too Sad To Tell You , 8) Remember Me This , 9) What Can I Say 

The Brian Jonestown Massacre full show live @ Festival La Route du Rock 2018 

[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ktqwum3PBJQ[/embedyt]

THE BRIAN JONESTOWN MASSACRE ‘HOLD THAT THOUGHT’

White vinyl 10″.

Release Date: 18/05/2018

Available on white 180 grm vinyl .

Pre Order Here or by clicking above image.

This is the new single which announces the band’s forthcoming two albums to be released this year.

The first track is “Hold That Thought” which comes from the album “Something Else” which is to be released on 1st June 2018.

The second track is “Drained” which will come from the self titled album that will be released in September of 2018.

Both tracks were recorded in Berlin & the band are announcing tours of the USA, Canada, Australasia & Europe throughout the year.

All tracks were recorded at Cobra Studios , Berlin in 2017 .

Tracklisting: Side A: Hold That Thought

SIDE B: Drained

THE BRIAN JONESTOWN MASSACRE ‘POL POT’S PLEASURE PENTHOUSE’ VINYL 2XLP

First time available on vinyl , the only ever time this album has been officially released was on  Burger Records  (which was limited to 500 cassettes) .

Recorded in 1990/91 on a 4 track at Anton’s home in San Francisco, it is best described in Anton’s own words. “when I left home and moved to san francisco, first thing on my mind was joining a band… the problem for me was that there were not any bands that would have me or even played the type of music I imagined I wanted to hear… so I decided to start my own… I would make small down payments at pawnshops for gear, buy recording machines, amps, guitars, whatever. within 3 months of teaching myself the 7 folk chords I use nonstop to this day, I had already taught a few new friends how to play as well and we were off. I used to make up songs everyday on the 4 track just to teach myself how to write… I understood what i liked about music, I just didn’t know how to pull it out of the ether and bring them into being. At the same time, I would make demo tapes and share them with friends… endless demo tapes… I would send them to magazines and record labels with no return address, just for the fuck of it. It was never my intention to actually release this music… for instance if i came up with a country song, I would finish it just to learn more about writing… I didn’t want to be in a classic country group, this is a document of my learning process. good times… this album is one such tape from 1990/91 I can’t remember. enjoy.”

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• November 17, 2021 Setlist

The Brian Jonestown Massacre Setlist at 8mm Bar, Berlin, Germany

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• Charmkins Attack Play Video
• The Real Play Video
• You Think I'm Joking? Play Video
• #1 Lucky Kitty Play Video
• Wait a Minute (2:30 to Be Exact) Play Video
• Don't Let Me Get in Your Way Play Video
• Do Rainbows Have Ends? Play Video
• The Mother of All Fuckers Play Video
• The Future Is Your Past Play Video
• Your Mind Is My Cafe Play Video
• Where Do We Go From Here? Play Video
• Abandon Ship Play Video

Edits and Comments

6 activities (last edit by FrankyDooDy , 23 Sep 2023, 15:30 Etc/UTC )

Songs on Albums

• #1 Lucky Kitty
• Don't Let Me Get in Your Way
• Wait a Minute (2:30 to Be Exact)
• You Think I'm Joking?
• Do Rainbows Have Ends?
• The Mother of All Fuckers
• Your Mind Is My Cafe
• Charmkins Attack
• Where Do We Go From Here?
• Abandon Ship
• The Future Is Your Past

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The Brian Jonestown Massacre Gig Timeline

• Oct 23 2018 O2 Forum Kentish Town London, England Add time Add time
• Oct 24 2018 Concorde 2 Brighton, England Add time Add time
• Nov 17 2021 8mm Bar This Setlist Berlin, Germany Add time Add time
• Nov 19 2021 Synästhesie Festival 2021 Berlin, Germany Add time Add time
• Mar 27 2022 Union Transfer Philadelphia, PA, USA Add time Add time

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2018 Primetime Emmy & James Beard Award Winner

How Anton Newcombe sees it, from The Brian Jonestown Massacre to Berlin

Oct 20 2020.

The founder of San Francisco’s notorious band The Brian Jonestown Massacre on sneaking into punk-rock clubs at age 11, finding a sound, and finding his way to Berlin.

Ah, Berlin. One of the most visceral pleasures I’ve had over the years has been crawling every quadrant of this great, open city, with friends, boozed-up surveyors charting mental mischief maps. Berlin is a city which even now, three decades after the wall fell, seems to delight in its openness. And we have taken advantage of that over the years—on bike, on foot, taxi, kayak in the western lakes, S-Bahn to the northern forests, U-Bahn through the dark middle. The city that used to be trussed up like a turkey is unbound and beckoning for any number of deep drinking nights. And that’s what it was on my final evening in this city this time, with this episode’s guest, musician Anton Newcombe, frontman of The Brian Jonestown Massacre, who lives now in Berlin, which keeps perfect pace with his open, productive mind.

After recording this episode in January, but still early on in the pandemic, Anton came down with COVID-19. As he texted me yesterday, he recommends avoiding it if you can. But since his recovery, he has been a beast in the studio, eating well and waking early and putting out prolific works in progress. You’ll hear in this conversation the kind of mind that just instinctually makes buckets of lemonade in a very lemon-filled year.

There are things that I miss [about the US], but they don’t exist.

Nathan Thornburgh: Cheers, man. Thanks for being here.

Anton Newcombe: How much do they pay you to drink this shit?

Thornburgh: [laughs] T his episode brought to you by Faxe.

Newcombe: Wow. Reminds me of… American beer.

Thornburgh: Yeah. I could see you were searching for a devastating insult. And you found it.

Newcombe: Well, not insulting, but it just reminds me of a malt liquor almost. It reminds me of Colt 45, it has the same exact taste.

Thornburgh: You’re from California, but not from San Francisco originally?

Newcombe: No, I’m not. I’m from Newport Beach, California.

Thornburgh: You have come a long way, baby.

Newcombe: Yeah, exactly. This little lemon fell far away from the tree, but that’s okay. There are things that I miss, but they don’t exist. So what can you say?

Thornburgh: We were talking about the ghosts of San Francisco, how the town just seems to be somewhere else and you can only remember what used to be.

Newcombe: I really feel it. I know very few people that still live there. Joel from my band and some people come out of the woodwork, and there was an Exodus for a while to the East Bay, and I know people there too.

Thornburgh: Well, the economy chased them over there too.

Newcombe: Yeah. Everywhere. Right. Everywhere I move becomes this amazingly popular place including here. It’s crazy.

Thornburgh: You mean this whole time it was you.

Newcombe: Yeah. It doesn’t matter where I go. It’s crazy. Portland, Oregon, you name it.

Thornburgh: I’m putting your ass in Bucharest and see if you can…

Newcombe: It’s like I’ve picked all these dodgy places to live, whether it’s Echo Park in Los Angeles or something and all of a sudden, next thing you know there’s a yoga studio. 

Thornburgh: This is the truth man. And then the times I’ve congratulated myself on having found a place that I feel is a nice balance of interest and costs… All of a sudden I look around and realize I’m not the only asshole with that idea.

When I moved to Prenzlauerberg there were no ATMs. They didn’t accept any cards of any kind anywhere on the East Side of Berlin.

Newcombe: When I moved to Prenzlauerberg there were no ATMs. They didn’t accept any cards of any kind anywhere on the East Side [of Berlin] and little things like that. And then you fast-forward to a couple of years ago and there were Patagonia pop-up stores and Tesla pop-up stores. This is ridiculous. They have this thing, sneakers and things. It’s like a Swedish firm. And it used to be this club that had a basement cave grotto thing and then the top floor, and it was called White Trash a Go Go, and it was a crap American-style restaurant. Chinese interior. It was just mad, right? But one day the landlord just said, “Okay, the rent is 27,000 Euro a month.” And the guy was like, “What are you talking about?” “Okay, get out.” And I was like, “Who’s going to pay 27,000?” All of a sudden it’s like Nike Exclusives. And then I’m thinking, “How the hell are they going to clear that off sneakers and then make a profit?” And then I started to see 120 people lined up as they launch each Weezy, Jeezy, whatever it is. I realized that it was all subsidized by the actual clothing companies.

It’s the same thing with nightclubs. It’s everything. They’re not making money off a two-euro Ladies’ Night. It’s an Absolute Vodka event or whatever. 

Thornburgh: That’s the thing. Like you said, they’re showrooms, they’re loss-leaders, and then how are you going to fight against that?

Newcombe: Well they can’t lose, and it’s the same thing in the record industry that when you hear about things that bucked the trend, this has been quite a while, but it’s like The White Stripes Seven Nation Army selling a million copies on vinyl, it’s just ridiculous. But when you have the right distribution behind you they can contact every store and say, keep one hundred copies because if you don’t sell them, you can have them.

Live music was only in bars, and you had to be 21 to drink. So that was the end of live music and that was the end of the youth culture.

Thornburgh: So you started out going to clubs in Newport Beach? 

Newcombe: Well, let me tell you the story. There used to be a place called the Cuckoo’s Nest in Placentia , down the street from my mom’s place and it was original punk rock, New Wave whatever happens kind of place, as crazy as Los Angeles or New York or anything. Of course CBGBs was a little bit before that obviously, you had Max’s Kansas City, and all that stuff was petering out, through the Velvet Underground with no Lou Reed, until the Dolls and the Ramones and everything else. 

But in the later 70s it was there for international acts. So I could just walk there in the middle of the night with my friends when I was 11 or whatever, and we figured out this trick that was pretty amazing, because you can’t go see bands generally in California since the Sunset Strip riots happened, in 1966.

Thornburgh: They closed it to kids?

Newcombe: W hat happened was, there used to be coffee houses that had Go Go bands. The venues were actually coffee houses as much as the Whiskey a Go Go, and there were age limits. And eventually there was a plan from the city council, because so many people were hanging out, that they were going to make a 10 p.m. curfew. And at that point there were riots. All the kids started protesting right on Sunset Strip. California changed the laws. So you had to be 21. Live music was only in a bar, and you had to be 21 to drink. So that was the end of live music and that was the end of the youth culture.

Thornburgh: That’s so crazy.

 Newcombe: Besides school dance, county fair. Seriously.

Thornburgh: How do I not know about it? Because that very directly affected my teen years.

Newcombe: But all of Southern California was like that, you know? Surf bands, The Safaris, everybody. All these different cities had their own coffee houses and clubs. 

Thornburgh: How’d you get around it as an 11-year-old?

Newcombe: I learned a trick. The punk rockers would stage dive, right? And so the bouncers would grab these guys and they would kick open the back door with a dude in the headlock to throw him out. So we would stand on either side of the door, against the wall. And inevitably, first song or the fast stuff comes on, the door kicks open. Some guy gets thrown out with the bouncer pushing him, and we’d just run in, and if you could get up the stage to jump off into the audience, or around into where everybody was and you were inside, we could just do that endlessly.

Thornburgh: You’re like a fucking woodland creature, looking for your any gaps.

Newcombe: So quick, you know what I mean? Like water gushing into the Titanic or something. 

Thornburgh: And then once you’re in the middle, who’s going to catch you out?

Newcombe: There’s no way they’re going to catch you.

Punk rock opened the door for a lot of other stuff.

Thornburgh: I t sounds like the punk rock clubs [were] your cultural escape. 

Newcombe: That was the music thing, because a lot of things aren’t really punk rock. Punk rock opened the door for a lot of stuff. I saw Magazine play, and PiL, and all these things very early. They’re not really punk rock, but they wouldn’t have happened without it. Johnny Rotten’s a perfect example. When you’re young, and you try to become Johnny Rotten, you become yourself. But if you try and be like Sid Vicious, you become like this glue-sniffing derelict. There’s like two totally different weird things about it. You can’t be like Johnny Rotten, because he’s just him.

It’s the product of giving yourself permission to be yourself. And some people are beautiful that way. They excel. Like what they have to offer is amazing because you can kid yourself and say, I’m just being myself by pretending I’m into The Jesus and Mary Chain, like 30 years later, wearing black sunglasses and a leather jacket, whatever it is you’re doing. But some people, a fair amount of people, whatever they’re doing, when they have no idea and they’re trying to come up with something, the first thing they reach for isn’t something else that they know. They reach into the fire of the unknown. You just use things. You got to understand a big part of everything else is copying other things. Like everything, it doesn’t matter what you see, people are feeding off of other things.

Thornburgh:   I think I understand what you’re saying. It’s like you are making conscious decisions to use whatever those influences are to find out who you actually are.

Newcombe: Well, most people hang very heavily on other things and they’re good at it. Most of the masters are very good at synthesizing combinations of other things that are beautiful.

Thornburgh: Where do you fall on that? Are you good at it? 

Newcombe: Well, I’m interested in different things. I’m less interested in blues music, so it doesn’t pigeonhole me that way. And I’m just interested in a blender of things, but it’s all sort of presented in this playable way of just the same equipment that The Beach Boys were using or something in the early 60s. So it doesn’t matter what I’m playing, it has nothing to do with them. It’s just possibilities, in the way that The Beach Boys were doing this Chuck Berry [sound], right? It’s squeaky clean, right? These 50s harmonies. And then all of a sudden, wow, they’re doing Pet Sounds and doing this mind-expanding thing, whatever the hell it is. I’m interested in those possibilities more. I would love to be able to rip that off, but I can’t, I don’t got it in me.

There’s the weight of the whole wannabe, when that’s true. Like you want to be something so much. Like this is what you want to do. But my thing started out because when the parents would be in LA, that’s an excuse for a party. So you were either talking somebody into having a party and then blowing out as crazy as it could possibly be. So we used to have this technique that I figured out, which was you get three pretty girls and you sit them down on little parking curb right next to the front of the liquor store and you wait for the construction guy to come pull up after work to get his beer. And you say, “Excuse me Mr, I’m trying to get laid, will you help me get some beer?”

Thornburgh: Who among us could deny that young man?

Newcombe: And it would work, it would work. I would get kegs, I would get whatever, all the time. So because people just, they really got a kick out of it.

I never thought I could play music from watching a clip of The Beatles or anybody else on TV.

Newcombe: Then the next thing would be like, “Oh, let’s have a band.” And it was all about making up bands, and you would just do that for parties. But it was next to impossible to get gigs for a long time.

Thornburgh: But that’s where you leave many people behind. It’s just seeing that party as a canvas, not just for getting laid, but for entertainment, for having some sounds and music, ideas popping in your head.

Newcombe: We were totally outlaws. All of our friends, our friends’ brothers, everybody was an outlaw. But that also made us the coolest people at the same time. So in the weirdest way there was a healthy subculture in Southern California.

Thornburgh: Right.

Newcombe: And it was crazy. You would see bands. And there would be a party and the band would be in the garage, a party is in the living room, and in the backyard, in community centers and it was just nonstop crazy. And that stuff is inspirational. I tell people this all the time. I never thought I could play music from watching a clip of The Beatles or anybody else on TV, watching Hee-Haw with my great-grandma or The Lawrence Welk show. None of that shit ever showed me that I could play music, or do that, in the way that if you grew up, with somebody like your grandma and all your cousins playing and had a history of it. You want to sing? Go ahead and sing along. You want to strum on the guitar? Please do. It’s a different situation. But once you see all these idiots, you’re like, I can do this.

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The Brian Jonestown Massacre  

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We were lucky to see The Brian Jonestown Massacre live on stage in Hamburg‘s Knust club. The show was great! So powerful and energetic, Anton singing and playing in a great shape (though spending some time with the retuning of the instruments ;-) ). Supported by Moogy who also sang „Anemone“, one of my favourite songs. The BJM played new songs from the new „Something Else“ album that sounds so very nicely „retro“ and many great songs from the earlier days (among others „Who“, „When jokers attack“). It was loud and very, very hot (due to an abnormal summer in Northern Germany). Joel cheered the audience with his tambourine and Anton even turned his fan to us, helping us with a cool breeze. Although The BJM played quite long, we were sorry to watch them leave (no farewell) and not return again for an encore. We waited as long as possible, but, maybe due to the exhausting temperatures in the club, remained unheard. Anyway, it was a wonderful gig and the size of the club allowed us fans to get in touch with the band. The light show was, as usual, very nice, too. I definitely recommend to go and see The BJM live, it‘s so worth it. The records are already awesome but live they are just brilliant and even better. By the way, „LeVent“ (A Records!) supported the show and they were really great, too, so it was a georgous evening.

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We were lucky to see The Brian Jonestown Massacre live on stage in Hamburg‘s Knust club. The show was great! So powerful and energetic, Anton singing and playing in a great shape (though spending some time with the retuning of the instruments ;-) ). Supported by Moogy who also sang „Anemone“, one of my favourite songs. The BJM played new songs from the new „Something Else“ album that sounds so very nicely „retro“ and many great songs from the earlier days (among others „Who“, „When jokers attack“). It was loud and very, very hot (due to an abnormal summer in Northern Germany). Joel cheered the audience with his tambourine and Anton even turned his fan to us, helping us with a cool breeze. Although The BJM played quite long, we were sorry to watch them leave (no farewell) and not return again for an encore. We waited as long as possible, but, maybe due to the exhausing temperatures in the club, remained unheard. Anyway, it was a wonderful gig and the size of the club allowed us fans to get in touch with the band. The light show was, as usual, very nice, too. I definitely recommend to go and see The BJM live, it‘s so worth it. The records are already awesome but live they are just brilliant and even better. By the way, „LeVent“ (A Records!) supported the show and they were really great, too, so it was a georgous evening.

I had heard that Anton had turned a new leaf with age, so I tried my luck. I'm not a fan of the meltdowns or the whining as some are. Alas, it was like visiting my racist grandparents whom seem to exist out of time. It's just a part of him, I guess.

He was one guitarist short (I'm not surprised), which he mentioned no less than 5 times to excuse the poor performance.

He berated his keyboardist.

He berated his lead guitarist.

He physically / forcefully adjusted his rhythm guitarists head position relative to the microphone they were sharing.

He did show a glimmer of levelheadedness here and there, but it was heavily outweighed. I don't know if the show was good. I know that it was OK until he kept pointing out everyone's flaws. I was too annoyed and distracted by the abuse. And in case anyone is wondering, he did fake a British accent live.

I was prepared for a 3 to 11 hour show, I think it was a little over two hours. Not blaming them, just putting that out there. Also, it's possible that the guitarist was legit not there for unrelated reasons and tensions were high due to having to come up with a new set list and rehearse on short notice. Also, no encore. I don't know.

Compared to the Dandys show last year, forget about it. No comparison. Dandys Rule OK.

The Brian Jonestown Massacre started their group in San Francisco in the late 80's. They had a heavy feel of psychedelic rock and other tones such as blues and raga.

When they come out on stage you could see they way about them and their music was pure to who they were and to the era they were playing in. They combined a variety of different instruments into their sets with such things as Indian drones, sitars, mellotrons, farfisas, didgeridoos and tablas. The lead singer comes out in a denim jacket and the rest of the group as a hippie and indie look to them. The stage is black until their lighting kicks in and then the whole feel and attitude changes.

Playing live they have a variety of things going on around them to entertain and amaze the audience. Bright colors flash and change giving a retro vibe to each song they play. When they play the move around a lot and have a vibe that can remind one of the Ramones and various others. The audience is filled with adoring fans and their numbers range in the hundreds. All of them moving and grooving with their set and really digging the sound. For when they played it was really something to have been seen, especially live.

Haydn Kramer

The Brian Jonestown Massacre last night. Swirling, Jangling, sumptuous guitar’s: raging with keyboards and rhythm lines roaring beneath, some say psychedelic, “shoe gaze”, folk-rock, or garage, but by any descriptive, adjective; a dreamy transcendent rock band with a bent toward perfection, (three songs good-naturedly stopped for broken strings). Since 1990 and always closely associated with The Dandy Warhols, (another killer band not enough people know about), liquid symmetry between the band Anton Newcombe formed in San Francisco, ethereal sounds and lyrics ended, without encore—-because, you knew they had completed something special when you floated out to the street.

BJM were awesome last night in their Brooklyn debut at the new Brooklyn Steel venue. Anton Joel Ricki and crew did not disappoint and treated the large adoring crowd to an evening of impromptu jam, trance, and psychedelia. They sprinkled their show with a catalogue of well known past songs as well as some more contemporary issued songscapes, with the crowd at times rocking and bopping. One disappointment show was cut short by curfew ending at 11PM and only two hours in length. However, Anton managed to cram in as many songs as he could in this alotted time. Can't wait to see them again!!!! Fred

PS: SongKick kicks song!!! Easy to use and no hassles. I love my songkick.

Ah, honestly one of my favourite bands, wish that I could say I enjoyed the show but it wasn't all that. They have such a huge discography there's basically no guarantee you'll hear any of the songs you like (I only knew a couple), and none of their music sounds anywhere near as good live. That coupled with bad bouncers and a couple of crazy fans lead to what was easily one of the worst gigs I've been to. Felt like I wanted to leave after a few songs. Still, glad I can say I've seen them, and I'll still proudly wear my BJM T-shirt, but I can't say it was worth the price of the ticket: maybe if you're out of it.

Not sure if the rolls of electric waves came from being in such close proximity to the stage or cacophony of sound, but BJM is still in my head and blood - thank god. If the spark can stay around a few more weeks I will be satisfied with this round but it will be far too long before I get to experience their melodies again in such capacity. Long live the beauty, majesty and evil that comes with The Brian Jonestown Massacre!

well, 4th show in the past year i have bought tickets for, but have had to miss due to personal matters, eating the ticket on...so, i couldn't tell ya. this one and luna def hurt the most, on that figurative "hit to the gut" level. :( as for the cost, i have given more to less worthy causes, so...hope it was as great asi imagine it would be. i do wish we transfer the tickets though. i could have made someone's night.

It was awesome!

We had the chance to sit and talk with Anton before the show about where he's been living and what he had planned for the future.

Very chill and intimate setting...

Then they played a Great set!

Overall, Great venue!

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The Strange World Of... The Brian Jonestown Massacre Julian Marszalek , October 26th, 2016 09:41

Julian Marszalek tries to talk to Anton Newcombe about the ten highlights of his musical career but ends up discussing the note the Earth vibrates at and his English family crest

Formed in San Francisco in 1990, The Brian Jonestown Massacre have gone on to become one of the most influential neo-psychedelic bands in the world. In the process they have shaken off the tag of 60s revivalists by forging ahead with an exploratory attitude that has seen them - under the constant leadership on Anton Newcombe and an ever-revolving cast of musicians - moving into a more experimental world of electronica and loops while always reaching for the outer limits.

They've also transcended the near-comic book perception of band of self-sacrificing clowns thanks to a prodigious work rate and a harnessing of the new media that has seen Anton Newcombe connect and communicate directly with fans. Be it demos, works in progress or the band's back catalogue, Newcombe is the first to let you know of what's happening.

Long sober and residing in Berlin with his family, Newcombe's presence and influence is keenly felt among any number of the psychedelic bands based in Europe, particularly, it seems, those of a Nordic bent. Little surprise, then, to see his restless creativity being harnessed by those that he's influenced and feeding their energy back to him.

With the band's 15th studio album, Third World Pyramid , set for release, Anton Newcombe tells tQ of the band's origins, collaborations and other facets that make up the modus operandi and Strange World Of The Brian Jonestown Massacre...

The Motivation

Anton Newcombe: I started this band because no one else would have me. There were no bands that existed that played the music that I wanted to hear. All of them were like, "We don’t like you." There was a very limited selection of bands when I moved to San Francisco and they were the sort of people who were influenced by Red Hot Chili Peppers. And if they were into 60s music then it was bands like The Mummies or some shit like The Morlocks where they’d play garage covers and I didn’t want anything to do with that, much as I loved those old songs. I never wanted to be defined as ‘retro’.

I liked stuff that was more rock & roll; anything that I could see was a bridge to what would become ‘alternative’. People were into Foreigner and suddenly decided they wanted to be 'alternative'. I didn’t like Pixies or any of that shit. All of these guys used to like bands like Black Sabbath. All the guys that loved Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath were the guys who used to chase me down the street because I was into Wire when I was 11 or 12. It was the kiss of death to have short hair then.

People don’t remember what it was like. At that time, in the UK, you were dealing with football hooliganism or the National Front, but in America you might end up with a gay hairdresser as a friend, or somebody who was only into The Cramps, or someone who was into punk rock. And you ended up hanging out with each other because it was you two against the world. Because all those rednecks would chase you down the street in cars. There was a huge level of aggression against sub-cultures.

Now we’ve got this whole other world that’s like mass hypnosis. It's a levelling mechanism known as conservatism. But when you get down to it, psychedelic music is mind-expanding and it has nothing to do with the trendiness of bands having a wah-wah pedal and wearing their girlfriend’s frilly shirt.

I’ve got the brains, you’ve got the looks

AN: I’d have worked with many more [artists] but my reputation precedes me. However they've got it all wrong. If you got on a tour bus with me, the first thing you’d see is that I’m really quiet. I try to talk people into doing all kinds of stuff: “You should help me put out your record. You’re going to search high and low but you’ll never get a better deal than this because I fought the whole world to be in the position I'm in now.” And they just don’t understand. They automatically fall for all that we’re-gonna-make-you-famous shit [that labels spin].

Here’s the thing about [Swedish psych band] Les Big Byrd. Those guys used to be in bands such as The Caesars and The Teddybears and they had number one hits in Europe. So [frontman] Joakim Åhlund and his brother write all this shit for Pop Idol but they can't get on the radio. The radio's attitude is, “You guys are over 40 so fuck you.” Les Big Byrd said, "We want to be on your label and we’ll even pay to use your studio.” They are producers and they have access to all of these crazy recording studios where they make music that is successful all over the world and they want to come to my studio? I’m like, “Well, OK, but this isn’t a commercial studio. This is my home.” So they showed up and I said, “So what are were going to work on?” And they said, “Well, we don’t know.” I was like, “What? You don’t have any fucking ideas?” I was really confused. So they start playing stuff and I said, “OK, check this out. If you don’t play that chord here but play this note instead then I can do something else that you can’t even comprehend. Just do as I say because you guys can’t even comprehend it.”

So fast-forward and I ended up playing with them. They went on tour opening for [Brian Jonestown Massacre] and they played all of the songs exactly as I told them. I was so amazed that they let me reinvent them. They got it and they were totally devoid of ego. We get each other on a deep level and that’s cool.

The Appeal Of The Drone

AN: The earth has a tone – it’s the key of A. All the planets are singing and when you’re using a radio telescope you can zoom in on planets because they’re all humming with their own tones. All the supernovas and suns are screaming out their own frequencies in the vast spectrum. All the atoms are humming so you just tap into it. All indigenous cultures all tap into these things; some people get it and some people don’t.

‘Malela’/’Salaam’

AN: Where is the ideal place for a novice to start with BJM? Probably on YouTube. Or start a dialogue with other people who know. Music is a personal thing but it’s also this thing where you can share it in a sub-culture with other people. You can have it either way. You could be listening to us while jogging or talking about it with other people down the pub, or putting 50p in the jukebox because you want to sing along to ‘Wonderwall’ because you’re in the mood.

It’s a weird dynamic of the full spectrum. I create a full spectrum by playing little tricks on myself like thinking about sad things and writing happy music and vice versa. Some of it is complete and some of it isn’t but I never really care. But I am interested in the juxtaposition of a sombre moment with a lot of aggression put into it. It’s pretty music but with unsavoury elements – starting with our band name!

Of Punning Song Titles And Band Names

AN: It probably comes from LSD when I’m trying to entertain myself. When you get into a certain frame of mind you don’t ever have to take psychedelics again, but if you want to be young in your mind then you’ve got to constantly entertain yourself. And I think it’s pretty funny that Paul McCartney is saying, ‘I Want To Hold Your Hand’ and I’m saying, “Oh yeah? Well, I want to hold your other hand!” It’s absolutely silly but I think that it’s funny because there are no rules and I’m not trying to have hit singles.

I’ve got this Half Man Half Biscuit approach but at the same time I’m deadly serious too.

Self-Censorship, Producers And The Art Of Quality Control

AN: I only want to please myself. I have another record coming out and it’s totally different to [ Third World Pyramid which is out this week]. The one out now is us wearing our hearts on our sleeve with a nod to the 60s and a foot in the 90s, but the next one is like a nocturnal krautrock homage to PiL’s Metal Box ... except it’s not; it’s a cornucopia of what happens next. It only exists because I wrote all of the songs at once. The one out this month is 45 minutes of my mind and the next one is 72 minutes of my mind.

I don’t use outside producers. With Strung Out In Heaven , I used an engineer and not a producer. He was my employee. I recorded the whole of that record by myself because everyone else was strung out on drugs. See, with an outside producer, it’s the exact opposite for me because I get the money in and money’s just another way of saying freedom. It set me on my life of freedom because I said, “I am the producer.” So that’s when the cheques starting coming to me instead of somebody else.

But for a little while I’ve been talking to Tony Visconti. Yes, I have. And it’s basically about the next time that I write a really good song, I’ll do it with him and to pass all the decision-making processes to him. In my head, I know that it’s me and him who are going to create the next ‘Cosmic Dancer’. He wants to do it. Next time that I have a song of that calibre I’ll refrain from recording it here. He’s so great and I have so much respect for the guy.

The Experiments With Loops And Electronics

AN: I started with keyboards before I started with anything. The thing was, everybody started calling me a ‘synthesizer faggot’. I never thought it was going anywhere because I was into all the cool shit. I never saw Depeche Mode getting as big as The Beatles. I never saw that they would become this 100,000-seat Rose Bowl thing. I never saw that coming. I never saw it becoming this convenience approach to music where every song goes, ‘dun-dun-dun-dun’. And that’s all that music is now.

Anglophilia

AN: Well, my last name is fucking Newcombe! We were landed gentry in the UK. We had a shield! You go to Westminster and there’s Newcombe House and all that shit. What does that mean? How Anglophile can I be? I’m an Anglo-Saxon.

Third World Pyramid by The Brian Jonestown Massacre is released on October 28 on a recordings

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Brian Jonestown Massacre’s Anton Newcombe: ‘People make me out to be a loser when I’m not’

Notorious for their onstage brawls and their imperious frontman, the San Francisco band have managed to survive 30 years of drink, drugs and drama. We catch up with them on tour

O ver more than 30 years, the Brian Jonestown Massacre have garnered a reputation like that of few other bands. The San Francisco group, led by Anton Newcombe, are known for their fecund creativity, violent volatility, chaos and magic – all of which are woven together to create music spanning psychedelia, shoegaze, country and garage rock. I have joined them for part of their UK tour. “Stop putting off a genius, you cocksucking dickhead!” yells Newcombe to a heckler during one of many guitar-tuning breaks in Brighton. “Go fuck yourself!” he spits to another.

Much of their reputation was cemented in the 2004 documentary Dig! , in which Newcombe delivered lines such as: “You fucking broke my sitar, motherfucker,” after an onstage brawl with his own band. The film is a maelstrom of drama, addiction, blown opportunities and a friendship turned rivalry with the Dandy Warhols.

The Dandy Warhols frontman, Courtney Taylor-Taylor, is the film’s narrator. He describes Newcombe as “the most craziest and talented musician I have ever met”. Of the band, he adds: “I’ve never seen them eat. All I’ve seen them do is drink liquor and snort drugs.”

Setting up for a show in Brighton.

Almost 20 years on, a few days before the release of the band’s 20th album, Your Future Is Your Past , the vibe backstage at a BJM show is more hummus than heroin. Newcombe kicked his habit many years ago. He describes quitting as “like running a marathon with the flu and then having Bruce Lee kick you in the chest”.

Today, Newcombe sips vodka sodas slowly and hurtles through packs of filterless cigarettes, on which he puffs as we walk from the soundcheck to the tour bus in Bristol. He is dressed in pyjamas, slippers and a Stetson, staying in this outfit until showtime, when he swaps the nightwear for denim, has a quick armpit wash in the tour bus sink, pulls on his cowboy boots, adds mounds of dangling jewellery and dabs on patchouli oil.

At 55, Newcombe has done what few expected of him – survive – and what even fewer thought possible – thrive. BJM are a self-sufficient outfit: they run their own label and studio, own their back catalogue and sell out their shows with ease. Despite being a cult band since their formation in 1990, their appeal has trickled down through generations. The crowd in Bristol is a sea of pogoing twentysomethings singing every word. Anemone , a cut from 1996, has become an unexpected hit, racking up nearly 80m streams on Spotify alone. Despite its slow-burn groove, it goes off like a bomb when they play it live. It was a favourite of Anthony Bourdain , who invited Newcombe to be in the Berlin episode of his TV show Parts Unknown. “Drenched in opiates and regret, I heard this song once and became besotted by it,” Bourdain once told Rolling Stone.

The band’s Ryan Carlson Van Kriedt (left) and guitar tech Shea Roberts prep for sound check.

It’s one of very few concessions to the past the band make live; mostly, they choose to play new material. “Some bands are happy to resign themselves to playing the hits, but that’s not me,” Newcombe says.

On the bus, Newcombe shows me his favourite bar-fight move: deliberately dropping his glass on the floor, causing the aggravator to look down, “then bam”, throwing his fist down. But Newcombe says he is done with bar brawls – even though someone threw a lit candle at him recently after an argument. “I don’t go to bars, because people want to provoke me and pick fights,” he says. “I see red. My natural tendency is to want to grab people by the throat and not stop. I can’t control how I react and nobody deserves what I am capable of unleashing just because they said something stupid. I’m much happier cooking and making music.”

Joel Gion and Anton Newcombe backstage.

Despite seemingly being a magnet for drama, one on one, Newcombe is welcoming and softly spoken. In Falmouth, we sit quietly and talk as the rest of the band disappear to a house party with some fans. They return at 6am; the tambourine player, Joel Gion, sleeps through the 5pm soundcheck later that day. “Oh man,” he says. “I fell out of my bunk while sleeping and didn’t even wake up.” He points to a badge he has sewn on to his bag that reads “Bushido” – literally, the way of the warrior, the moral code of the samurai rooted in discipline, loyalty and other virtues. “To remind myself not to get too fucked up on tour,” he says, laughing.

Gion has written a memoir, a task he says was assisted by the high-quality amphetamines he used to take in San Francisco. “That provided me with a memory sharpness,” he says. “I was able to remember far more than I expected.”

Is this the same speed given to Oasis on their first US tour, as documented in the 2016 documentary Supersonic, which caused Noel Gallagher to go missing and the band to break up briefly? “That’s it, baby! Ninja speed, Noel called it.”

Guitarist Ricky Maymi.

Newcombe and Gion on stage.

BJM were the support band at one show back then. “I knocked on the tour bus and Noel answered. I’m like: ‘Hey man, I have most righteous fucking crystal meth that you’re ever going to do,’” Gion recalls. Noel passed, but Liam was up for it; the substance was soon liberally distributed among the band. “They do all these coke-sized lines of this shit that you just need a little pinky of,” he says. “They stayed up for three days. On stage, they were just gone. Their jaws were working like old-fashioned train crankshafts.”

There is love in the band, but also palpable tension. On stage, Newcombe stops songs and lambasts members, declaring their playing to be “shitty” and “sloppy”. “Sometimes you gotta crack the whip – you’re only as good as your weakest link,” he says after a testy exchange in Brighton, before making an analogy of Ronaldo (himself) playing on a team of six-year-olds (the rest of the band).

Fans in Brighton pay homage.

It can create visible unease on stage – it’s like watching a storm cloud, waiting for thunder to crack. Sometimes the thunder is Newcombe’s ire; at others it’s the sound of a band locked into ferocious, immersive grooves. At their best, the band are mesmerising. But the constant stopping can kill the show’s momentum. “I have perfect pitch and it really bugs me,” Newcombe says, as we zigzag the streets of Brighton looking for hippy shops in which to buy more jewellery, before settling in a bar. “It’s better to stop a song in the first seconds and play it correctly than to play some bullshit for hours. The Rolling Stones do it every single concert – they sound nothing like the record.”

Newcombe gives off the aura of someone who feels he has beaten the system. “I’ve got a better deal than anybody in the world,” he says. “You don’t need validation from other people.”

As we toast to good health with a shot of Grey Goose, I ask if he feels that people hold misconceptions about him. “I’ve got this wild reputation,” he says. “But I’ve found it advantageous that people underestimate your intelligence.” Newcombe is apparently contradictory in this area. He is prone to bursts of boastful proclamations: “I’m a fucking genius, like one of these Mozart guys,” he says one minute, before offering: “I’m not saying I’m so great, or I cured polio, or whatever.”

The Brian Jonestown Massacre.

He is consistent in his fervent dedication to forging his own path. “I knew from being very young that I didn’t want to be like anybody that I knew,” he says. “I noticed people were just generally unhappy because they weren’t doing what they wanted to do. I decided I’m never going to be that person. Do what you want, it’s fine to be yourself. All the way you.”

The band briefly danced with record labels in the 1990s. “It went to shit,” says Gion. Newcombe says circumventing – and in some instances tormenting – the industry was a tactic. “I thought since everybody says yes, I’ll just say no,” he says. “It’s counterintuitive, but smart.”

This has led to accusations of self-sabotage. “Everyone’s like: ‘Oh, he throws it all away,’” he begins. “But the postscript of Dig! is that the whole industry collapsed. All the king’s horses and men, they’re gone. None of those people in that movie have a job in the business. People make me out to be a loser when I’m not.”

Taking a stroll on the prom.

That said, it’s clear he would like a taste of some of that world. “I would love to do Jools Holland,” he says. “I watch all the shit on there and laugh, because I could play 50 songs in a row that are better. Even if I could summon up enough composure to stand there and just be deadpan, it would be more intellectually stimulating, artistically relevant or historically fucking important.”

In the opening scene of Dig!, shot in 1995, a young Newcombe leans into the lens of a camera with wild, glaring eyes and declares: “I’m going to destroy this fucked up system. Let’s burn it to the ground.”

So, did he do it? He leans over, those same eyes staring at me through yellow sunglasses, the whiff of patchouli ever present. “That’s just what I did.”

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