Argh Fuck Kill: The Story of the DayGlo Abortions (42 page)

After Spain, the bands made the lengthy drive to Switzerland—not as long as the drive from Vancouver to Calgary, but long nevertheless. The musicians began to get sick, and Willy came down with bronchitis. “We all took turns getting a nasty cold,” the bassist remembers. In such close quarters, viruses spread quickly.

Gymbo describes how the rock n’ roll lifestyle can be tough on the immune system: “After shows, I’d crash so hard. There’d be people who wanted to hang out and party, or like, wanting to fuck, and I’d be ‘gimme a second.’ You drink so much alcohol throughout the day, but then you sweat it all out onstage and you’re almost sober.” With every high, a low must follow, and sickness on the road is especially hard to endure.

Although Willy eventually found an effective naturopathic remedy, Gymbo was ill when they reached Freiberg, the scene of the spaghetti incident with GBH in 2002. The band went out and did the show, but the singer claims that Bonehead wanted to do an extended encore. “The people just wanted to see The Accused, so I couldn’t see the point of doing a third song,” he recounts. Apparently, Bonehead disagreed. “Gymbo split before we finished and went down-stairs to change,” recalls Willy Jak. After the gig, Bonehead and Gymbo got into a noisy shouting match, with many ugly words exchanged on both sides. Gymbo insists that he was too sick to continue. “I just couldn’t do it anymore,” he says, remembering the blowout that appears to have irreparably damaged his position with the group. “I wrapped myself with towels—I thought I was gonna die.” Willy doesn’t see it quite that way, calling Gymbo “a bit of a prima donna.” The bass player does admit, however, that his esteemed colleagues can get a bit carried away. “We’d be leaving the stage for the third time, and they’d want to play another encore.” Clearly, there are several sides to the story.

At any rate, the band rolled out the next day and, though everything was seemingly back to normal, a poisonous undercurrent remained. “I could just tell that something was gonna happen,” recalls Willy. “I mean, Bonehead is
the
guy, know what I mean?”

The bad blood remained, but with only several shows left, the tour went on. What else was there to do? The boys were on their way to Rotterdam when they learned that someone had been murdered at the venue the night before and the show had been cancelled. Although this wasn’t Chris’s fault, The Accused guitarist Tommy Niemeyer had a meltdown over the sloppiness of the bookings. “Tommy freaked out and was screaming about how shitty the tour had gone. Maybe he ran out of speed,” Gymbo quips. Perhaps, but it is also possible that the guitar player was sick and run-down like everyone else. “The tour was totally disorganized,” Gymbo readily admits.

Gymbo flew back to Toronto and the other DayGlos returned to Victoria. Though the boys rested awhile, summer was still at its zenith when the band decided to play a small handful of dates in western Canada. Willy claims that Gymbo was given the opportunity to do the tour but refused. “He said he was going to the cabin with his girlfriend or something. If he’d shown up for those dates then maybe everything would have been okay.” As it turned out, Gymbo would never play with the DayGlo Abortions again. Thirteen years of chaos and insanity had finally come to an end.

In the fall, Gymbo started getting emails from Cherokee, who assumed he would be with the DayGlos when they played Montreal and Toronto. Wondering why he hadn’t been invited, the singer phoned Bonehead but got the answering machine. He claims to have left several messages, none of which were returned. The dates in Ontario came and went and still no call. By now, Gymbo knew something was terribly wrong. “Murray sent me a message on MySpace explaining that he didn’t want to fire me, but felt that he wasn’t in front of the band as much as he would have liked.” What Gymbo didn’t know was that the message he received was the shortest of three that Cretin had laboriously composed. “My computer kept freezing up, and I lost a really long letter telling Gymbo how I respected all he had done for the band. But he was starting to do shit that was pissing me off,” Cretin explains.

Gymbo, for his part, feels that Cretin subconsciously invites disaster in his life. “Murray would never bring a second guitar, so he’d have to change strings in the middle of the set, and he wouldn’t get rid of his wife. He seemed to be a magnet for tragedy.” Though Cretin and Angie had parted ways by now (but not for good), the singer never suffered for a lack of drama in his life.

At any rate, the rift between Gymbo and band was impossible to mend. “I knew something was up, but they just left me hanging,” says Gymbo, recalling his high state of anxiety. The singer claims that Bonehead eventually sent him a harsh email accusing him of treasonous behaviour and “other weird stuff.” “Basically, Bonehead dumped me on the internet like I was some dumb chick. I think he was trying to justify firing me by making up a bunch of nasty shit. I felt like a schmuck.” For Gymbo, the endless roller coaster ride that is the DayGlo Abortions was over. The band had started as a trio in 1980, and now, twenty-nine years later, they were once again a three-piece.

Meanwhile, Cretin was enjoying his return to the limelight. “I think he was starting to feel that he wasn’t important anymore,” guesses Willy. “He felt that he was being pushed out of the group.” Although nothing could be further from the truth, it is obvious that with Gymbo gone, Cretin would again be the central figure. Not just that, but the DayGlos also appreciated the extra money. Not only could they divide the pay three ways instead of four, but they also saved money on airfare. “At that point, the stars just kinda came into alignment,” recalls Willy. The streamlined DayGlo Abortions were in busi-ness.

In Toronto, Gymbo was feeling hurt. Friends would ask if he was still getting royalties, and this would evoke more pain. Eventually, a friend hooked him up with David Steinberg, an entertainment lawyer who had played drums with the Dead Boys following the departure of Johnny Blitz. “David got me to write a list of songs I wrote, and he sent it to Bonehead with a demand for royalties. That was the only way I could get in contact with him,” claims the singer. For Steinberg, it was simple math: “As a member of the group, Gymbo was entitled to receive royalties. Records were sold, money was made. Where is Gymbo’s share? To me, that’s a basic summary of the issues.”

Bonehead and Cretin were furious, naturally, accusing Gymbo of treason and backstabbery. Angry emails flew back and forth for months and, though Steinberg was not involved in the actual settlement, the singer finally accepted an undisclosed lump sum after signing a document in which he agreed to relinquish ownership of the material and to stay away from DayGlos shows. “People probably thought I was trying to sue the band, but I just wanted something for the effort I’d put in,” the ex-DayGlo explains. “One fucked up thing is that I still have dreams about being with the DayGlos, which really bothers me. I feel so happy to be away from all that drama, yet I still relive it in my dreams.”

Though some hard feelings still exist between the two parties, Cretin has since moved on. “We shook hands and let it go,” says the DayGlos frontman. “Life is too short for that shit.” Gymbo is also glad to put old grudges to rest. “I still consider Murray to be my friend,” he says, glad to end the war. Even Bonehead has grown weary of the conflict and, when the DayGlos played the last Kathedral show in Toronto on January 9th 2010, he and Gymbo went out later and drank into the wee hours. “Bonehead asked me to sing a couple songs the next night, but I felt weird about it and didn’t go,” says Gymbo. The drummer also gave Gymbo a hug before he left. “I was shocked, but it was cool that Bonehead was in a good mood, because it could have been an ugly scene,” recalls Gymbo. Old wounds slowly fade.

The DayGlo Abortions continued to play as a trio, flying out for shows whenever a promoter was willing to spring for airfare. They visited frozen Whitehorse, where the fans were so starved for entertainment they wouldn’t have minded if Bonehead sang instead of Cretin. These days, the band never sleeps in the van. “The first thing they do when we roll into town is get a hotel room,” says Willy Jak, sounding just a bit disgruntled. The band would return home with more money if they didn’t spend so much on accommodations, but Bonehead and Cretin don’t like to rough it anymore. Still, the band will go anywhere if the beer is free. Even warm beer is soon drinkable when placed in a tub of ice onstage.

Willy found time in January to join Harley aka Jeff Harding in the Frostbacks with Lost Jonny from the Rod Iron Haulers and Merlin from the Keg Killers in January of 2008. Like Cretin, Willy needs side projects to fill those gaps between DayGlos shows. A man must stay busy.

Later in 2008, following Bonehead’s break-up with long-time girlfriend Mel Schedel, the DayGlos did a fairly extensive American tour with The Accused. Because of Bonehead’s border problems, Blind Marc filled in for the drummer. Despite the split, Bonehead continues to golf with Mel’s father. It would seem that good golfing partners are more difficult to find than girlfriends are. The game must go on.

At least Bonehead was able to get out of Victoria for a while when he and The Cretin returned to Australia for Nigel Halloran’s 40th birthday. Local bass player James Fliptop stood in for Willy Jak, and the band played two shows. Later, Bonehead managed to squeeze in a few rounds of golf while Cretin made the party circuit. The two don’t hang out much these days.

Just a year later, upon learning that Nigel had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, Bonehead and Cretin made another trip to Australia to say goodbye. “Nigel plans to die onstage while high on acid,” says The Cretin, who clearly approves. Though the intrepid Ozzie won a brief respite in May, he eventually passed away from the disease on July 10th, 2010. “There is something seriously wrong with anyone who doesn’t like Nigel,” insists Cretin. He will be missed.

These tales of mayhem and music could go on indefinitely, but many of those stories are not yet written. “Cretin and Bonehead haven’t got enough props for their part in the evolution of punk rock,” says Willy. “They’re more important than people give them credit for.” It seems unlikely that such things keep The Cretin awake at night, and he has never expressed regret at not being nominated for the Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame. Rather, the veteran frontman spends more time worrying about how he might be able to put some food in the fridge.

The legacy of the DayGlo Abortions is significant, and they have spawned a new generation of angry punk bands such as Alcoholic White Trash, Lesbian Fist Magnet, The Keg Killers, and many others. By lasting thirty years with little label support and no professional management, the DayGlos have defied all the odds and broken all the rules. In that time, they have endured every possible disaster and still managed not only to tour the world but to maintain a positive attitude as well. Cretin, at this point, has committed himself for the long haul, and pledges to keep playing until the end of time. “I’ll be up there in my wheelchair,” promises the frontman, which isn’t so farfetched given his penchant for injury. The world needs the DayGlo Abortions, if only to give it a kick in its uptight and self-righteous ass. More than ever, the world needs to laugh at itself, and the band is forever willing to get that party started.

Although the DayGlo Abortions have written a handful of new songs, the band has not recorded the material, and no date has been set for a new album. In the meantime, Unrest Records is remastering the DayGlo Abortions’ back catalogue for re-release on CD. A bidding war between EMI and Sony Music Entertainment for exclusive publishing rights has not yet materialized.

A longhaired and anxious-looking doorman inside the Cobalt Hotel takes cash from underage girls with false IDs. The crumbling old bar is humid and dark, reeking of stale beer and sweaty bodies packed tightly together. At least the leaky pipe that dripped raw sewage onto unsuspecting patrons has been fixed, but there are plenty of other bad smells to take its place. Mold, mildew, bleach, piss, and good ol’ puke compete with each other to form a toxic and heady brew. Those with delicate constitutions would do well to avoid this bar and its fragrant customers, at least for a few months. Change is coming to the Cobalt Hotel, none of it good.

Behind the scarred, wooden bar, Wendy Thirteen serves drinks with grimfaced efficiency. Despite the fact that today is Wendy’s birthday, the manager/ bartender seems more surly and hostile than usual. At the end of the month, the Cobalt Hotel will close its doors, only to be “reborn” as a dance club for hipsters and douchebags. No longer will such acts as the DayGlo Abortions and SNFU have a place to play. Instead, an endless succession of disc jockeys with intentionally-misspelled names will spin vapid dance music for suburban kids with too much cash and no imagination. Even this will not last, because the gleaming towers that crowd the hotel on all sides will eventually swallow the place whole. Yuppies will open pricey wine bars, and sleek BMWs will line the street. The Cobalt Hotel and its scurvy punk patrons will be nothing but a rancid memory.

No one wants to think about any of that depressing shit tonight. Tonight, everyone wants to get drunk and have a good time. Even Wendy is looking forward to the rest of the evening, though no one would be able to tell that by looking at her. Several of the bartender’s favourite bands have already played, and only the DayGlo Abortions have yet to perform. When they leave the stage, dripping with sweat, the bar will close and another party will begin. Various musicians and favoured patrons will stay behind to drink until the sun comes up. The Cobalt—the dark and dingy cavern she shares with many rats, fleas, and cockroaches—is Wendy’s living room. The rats, unlike Wendy, will move into the nearby condominium towers when the hotel is gone.