The Fleshtones
1/10/06

If The Fleshtones once proclaimed themselves Roman gods, they were surely less interested in being objects of worship than in providing a soundtrack for toga parties. They've been carrying the garage rock torch for nearly thirty years, and still know how to set the house on fire. For vocalist/keyboardist Peter Zaremba, guitarist Keith Streng, drummer Bill Milhizer, and bassist Ken Fox (a relative newcomer with only 13 years as a Fleshtone), there is no rock but Super Rock, a high-energy blend of '60s punk strut, U.K. freak beats, and backfield-in-motion soul—music that's serious about not being serious.

The group joined the rock pantheon in the early 1980s with several acclaimed albums for I.R.S. Zaremba was tapped to host MTV's alternative-rock program The Cutting Edge. For a while, it looked like garage and psychedelia might once again sweep the nation—a heady time recently recalled on Rhino's Children Of Nuggets boxed set. While most of their contemporaries have long since faded away, The Fleshtones will surely be around to play "Taps" when most of the current retro-rockers (Hives, Vines, Strokes, et al) are laid to rest.

The band survives by channeling the freewheeling spirit of the 1960s rather than simply donning its clothing and haircuts; that's what makes The Fleshtones revivalists and not mere copyists. And if the group's shows are like revival meetings, Zaremba is the evangelist-in-chief. With the quartet out in support of the recent Yep Roc album Beachhead (their 13th studio release), we caught up with its amiable frontman to spread the gospel of The Fleshtones.

You once said The Fleshtones wouldn't have been the same if they hadn't come from Queens. For those of us who aren't native New Yorkers, could you paint a picture of your home borough?
It's a collection of what you might call small towns, really. It was a lot of people looking for something to do. You spent a lot of time just hanging around, playing records, trying to throw your own parties.

I met Keith in Flushing High School. We were friends and realized we were into a lot of the same things—TV shows like Lost In Space—and totally dissatisfied with the type of music that was coming out. He knew [original bassist] Marek from Maine, and Lenny (our drummer at that point) was from Flushing High as well. Although we didn't form in high school, we all knew each other. We all went to the same nightclubs and same rock 'n' roll shows. You ran into a lot of the same people because they were all collecting records—because they were so dissatisfied with what was on the radio and mainstream music.

What sort of records did you like?
The groups we were obsessed with then were The Kinks, The Yardbirds, The Move, and of course The Stones and The Beatles. And then as we started wearing out all of those records, we were saved when people like The Dictators, The Modern Lovers, and the Ramones came along. The Ramones, in particular. Finally we saw people on stage who looked like normal people to us. They weren't wearing feathered boas or platform shoes. When we saw the Ramones, it just became so obvious that we had to make the move. Within weeks we had gotten the Fleshtones together.

What are your favorite memories from those days?
There's so many—there was a lot going on. One show that really clicked was The Fleshtones, The Last, and The Unclaimed; it happened somewhere in Culver City. That show was like, "Oh yeah, there's other people like us." The Fleshtones always existed a little bit outside of the mainstream of all of this stuff. Not so much off the beaten path as trying to hack our way through the underbrush all by ourselves.

People would pick up on what we were doing, but it was always a select few. I remember Steve Wynn running after our van as we were pulling out of The Tropicana. He was still a clerk at Rhino or something. He'd just pressed a few copies of his very first EP and wanted us to hear what it sounded like.

You describe your style as "Super Rock." What distinguishes that from ordinary rock?
Ordinary rock is very ordinary, in most cases. We try to lean towards the bombastic a bit, the histrionic flourish, the big beat, the directness. Gang vocals, chanting, tom-toms—all that good stuff. Noodling generally is not a part of Super Rock.

We were listening to all of these records when we were growing up. Some of them were Australian, some from Jamaica, some from Africa or influenced by African records. Some of it was English. They were all different, diverse styles, but there's an active ingredient in all of that music. We would try to take all of those things that made us like all of this music that we liked, and use those elements in our own music. Once you sort of mush them all together—it could be anything from disco to ska—those active ingredients become Super Rock.

How did The Fleshtones wind up on the Yep Roc label?
We came to be on Yep Roc around fifteen years ago. We'd played a frat party in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania which was so infamous that it went down in local history as the "Gettysburg Address" of The Fleshtones. The one great frat party that we ever played. We were in the living room of the frat house and they locked the doors because the police were trying to get in to unplug us—and the police came in through the windows right behind us as we were playing! The next day the head of the student entertainment committee who'd hired us for that show said, "When I get out of school I'm gonna start a record label so I can sign The Fleshtones." And sure enough, years later he did exactly that. His name's Glenn Dicker; he founded Yep Roc Records and signed us for the album before this one, Do You Swing?

Those gang vocals on Beachhead give it a sort of "band of brothers" feel. Is that a key part of your appeal to fans?
It could be. I think part of the appeal is the simplicity, but also that we really reach out. That's not a cliche, and I don't mean it in a funny way. We do not create a wall between us and the audience in any way. Even in the early '70s, we thought it was a weird thing happening in rock when we saw that arrogant, "rock star" type of thing. We just wanted to put together a band, play for parties, play music that we liked. Our fans know that.

You worked on Beachhead with two producers. Did that make things easier or harder?
Easy, really easy. Both Rick and Jim bring something different to the songs and approach them just a little bit differently, but both of those guys are into the same types of music and the same types of sounds.

And they both contribute guitar to the record.
We didn't want a fifth member, but we did want them both to play a certain type of guitar that they could do better than we could do. In Rick's case a little bit of hot rod-style guitar, and in Jim's case a little something like Cream—sort of that heavy, Detroit kind of a lead. Rick in particular is a huge collector of vintage guitars and instruments. He happens to have an old Wurlitzer electric piano that has a wonderful sound; we used that on a few things. What Jim does more than the guitars is that he mikes things in more of an old fashioned way. That makes your instruments sound different. Both of them are wonderful to work with, great guys. And there was no problem at all integrating the two bodies of work.

You've got a big anniversary coming up. Have you got any plans for a special 30th birthday bash?
You know, we don't. We damn well should think one up, because that's an important birthday for any band. Pretty amazing, actually—I mean I'm amazed when I think about it.

We have no plans to change, that's for sure. I mean, what would be the point? We're doing what we enjoy and hopefully we'll be able to share it with more people. A lot more—that'd be nice! I would say that if anyone can think of a special thing that we should do for our birthday or that they might want to do for our birthday, they should get in touch. Let's see what people have to say.