Naked Raygun
So I’ve seen a couple of places now that Naked Raygun will be reuniting to play the Riotfest this November in Chicago. And now it seems the question everyone is asking is “Will John Haggerty be playing?!??”. The hell if I know. If I was a gamblin’ man I’d bet no; Naked Raygun did a couple of reunion shows in 1997 with Haggerty’s beleagured replacement Bill Stephens on guitar, and unless their is some kind of cosmic alignment I don’t see Jeff Pezzati and Haggerty reuniting (not that I know anything more about their split than anyone else). So yeah, you want Raygun you’re most likely getting Bill Stephens on guitar - I’m sure it will be fun regardless…
You most likely know the story here, but I’ll give it the nickel setup. Stephens was recruited to fill the void created after Haggery left to form Pegboy and was the guitarist for the band’s much maligned Raygun… Naked Raygun. Years later it’s tough to fault Stephens as you can barely hear his guitar due to the terrible, muddy production. In contrast, the band’s last batch of songs are pretty decent. In 1997 Raygun re-recorded 4 songs from their last demo session and released them along with a bunch of other goodies as The Last of the Demohicans. The songs were mostly solid and represented a big improvement from Raygun… Naked Raygun. Here’s three of the four, the highlight being “Hot Atomics”:
Naked Raygun - Off The Edge.mp3
Naked Raygun - Hot Atomics.mp3
Naked Raygun - The Way It’s Supposed To Be.mp3
And just to be fair to Stephen’s, below are a couple of live Naked Raygun favorites from the 1997 reunion shows that feature that big “Chicago Sound” guitar (from Free Shit!)
Naked Raygun - I Don’t Know.mp3
Naked Raygun - Treason.mp3
Naked Raygun - Vanilla Blue.mp3
Naked Raygun - Surf Combat.mp3
Naked Raygun - New Dreams.mp3
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According to the “Going Underground” book, the split between Haggerty and the rest of NR was due to Pezzati’s wife being the band’s manager (John wanted a professional, the others were content with what they had). When NR reunited in 1997, I read an interview with Pezzati in a Chicago newspaper and he said something like John has some sort of problem with the NR legacy or something like that and Pezzati wasn’t sure why that was. Anyway, I’d say that John most likely won’t be playing Riot Fest.
great post,
thanks!!!
Fuck Yeah! The mighty Raygun will be playing live once again. Now hows about the Haggerty and Durango joining in.
Santiago Durango rents at my video store i work at. Next time he comes in to rent video games i shall ask him. I know he did the Big Black one a couple weeeks ago so he might be exhausted. Big Black does that to people.
I can confirm that the lineup at Riot Fest will be with Bill Stephens and not John Haggerty. Yes this is sad, but still … NAKED RAYGUN! FUCK YEAH!
How about getting Camilo Gonzales and Jim Colao back along with Santiago Durango?
It ain’t gonna happen, but one can dream, I guess.
reunions with no fresh sound suck!
if you broke up FACE IT!
it broke my FACE.
thanks.
Somebody please take this kids “Death to false Blogs” computer away. Thank you.
great post! for those interested, here’s where
to get your raygun pool stick:
http://www.coldwarskateboards.com/nakedraygun/
“muscle beach is now pork chop hill!”
The new cd from Jeff’s new band the bomb is pretty good http://www.myspace.com/bomb1
Raygun played a warmup show at The Cobra Lounge Thurs night. Stephens was on guitar. They were fucking great!!!!
yea the thursday show was amazing, i got a damn bloody nose! hehe..it was awesome..cant wait for the Nov 5th show..
Is there any chance you could post the Pegboy-Fore! EP?
I wouldn’t watch “Naked Raygun” without John H even if they were playing at George Bush’s funeral!