As the ’70s collapsed and the ’80s stuttered into life, the old New York scene had gone international and a new breed of no-wave punks were getting funky and angular: Glenn Branca; DNA; Teenage Jesus & The Jerks; James White & The Blacks / The Contortions; Suicide, et al, and all the acts they would spawn and / or influence.
Unheard by most save for the hip cognoscenti, these artists lived free and dirty, desperately scrambling to get ahead of one another and rise above the malaise in a stinking, rotting Big Apple of the day.
Within the periphery of this periphery, Social Climbers made sounds that were of their environs yet remarkably unique, leaving an indelible stamp on the scene while somehow managing to slither undetected out of all the history books. A downtown New York art band as much as any other, Social Climbers also claimed midwestern roots and actual musicianship that many of their contemporaries lacked, and in trade dismissed and essentially protested the snotty pretensions that drove many others within the scene. Social Climbers are an absolute post-punk blueprint: fat bass (often two), guitar, drum machine (dubbed “the monkey”), feverish vocals, and organ.
Their lone, self-titled album is agitated and impossibly wild, yet danceable and composed. Opener “Domestic” begins with a tripped-out syncopate of soft electronic drums before a massive bass thwomps onto it; farfisa cuts through the off-beat. Mark Bingham’s attitudinal vocals soon fly in, setting the tone for the record: “She has her friends. She has a job. She has her reasons. She had a dream but now she really can’t remember it.” “Chicken 80” follows with true punk funkiness; it also claims what is surely the most memorable, can’t-get-it-out-of-your-head melody on the record. Things slow to an anxious pace with “Western World,” then go sultry, dub and danceable with “Chris & Debbie.” “Palm Springs,” the album’s central instrumental, pushes up-tempo, layered, drum-machine pulses with repetitive bass/guitar melody before droning to a close. “That’s Why,” “Ernie K,” and “Hello Texas” each offer short blasts of proto-typical no wave; the album closes Jean Shaw’s turn at lead vocals on the brooding burner, “Taipei.”
Gulcher Records initially released the album as a triple 7″, and the band embarked on a busy performance schedule. These shows were of the typical punk club variety (like at Mudd Club with John Lydon lurking) but also consisted of any of the following: a 5-hour long performance comprised of “World Pop Classics” including alarming takes on Terry Riley’s “In C,” Television’s “Little Johnny Jewel,” and the theme to John Carpenter’s Halloween; performing with a diaper-wearing comedian; putting card-board cut-outs of themselves on stage while pumping prerecorded songs through the PA; having John Scofield sit in to improvise.
Despite the above hi-jinx, plus relatively extensive touring, and a 3 month residency at La Bamba on the Lower East Side, Social Climbers struggled to get the same attention from those they were provoking. Their record was barely picked up by the local underground rock distributor, as is common in a crowded scene, and the group disbanded in 1982. Their one artifact is as earnest as it is fractured and terrifying. And it’s here, again, sounding as relevant today as it did when it was of the moment; perhaps, even more so.
Describe New York City in the late ’70s/early ’80s.
MB: Broke, dirty, fun.
DC: Wide open; lots of different types trying their hand at almost anything; not much money; lots of clubs legal and illegal opening and closing toleration / encouragement for all sorts.
Who and/or what were the primary influences on your music?
MB: Olivier Messiaen, Muddy Waters, Bert Williams, Roscoe Holcomb.
DC: Saw The Beatles on Ed Sullivan; heard funk record at Chicago citywide youth conference and saw black kids dancing to it; heard Erik Satie on Blood, Sweat and Tears 2nd record; discovered 1st week at Harvard university that I couldn’t be a creative mathematician.
Did you see yourselves as part of any scene?
MB: No.
DC: Punk / new wave / downtown NYC avant-garde art.
Why flexi discs? Was it a decision based on lack of money, or an artistic statement?
MB: 7″ 33’s , not flexi -discs… no statement, not about $… seemed a good way to present the music.
DC: Not my decision, didn’t really get, went along with anybody that was interested in promulgating our efforts.
Tell us what you have been doing these past three decades.
MB: Does anyone really care ? Sincerity is the first casualty of capitalism.
DC: Writing, recording, arranging, playing, producing music, running a recording studio. Won a Grammy last year.
Please name your favorite works of art (music, books, paintings, poetry, etc.)
MB: All Dan Simmons, Gesualdo, dont care about paintings, Blake.
DC: Where to start? I can’t or won’t. Oh, ok. Favorite blues piano players: Thelonious Monk, Professor Longhair, Jimmy Yancey; Favorite Composers: Erik Satie, Bach – Gymnopedies (Satie), Cantata 82 “Ich Habe Genug” (Bach). But really how do you pick, even among a single composer’s works.
Favorite writer: Vladimir Nabokov – Lolita, Speak Memory, Pnin, Pale Fire, The Defense, Laughter In The Dark.
David Foster Wallace essays are a big recent favorite, love Henri Matisse’s “The Piano Lesson”.
Movies: love Fritz Lang – early silents and later talkies.
Poetry: well, Yeats, I suppose. Basta!
Are you fans of the internet?
MB: Of course.
DC: Yes.
Name a building you love and state why.
MB: United Fruit Company on St Charles Ave. Reminds me of all the evil that has started in New Orleans and spread across the earth. Starting point of CIA activity with Dulles and Lodge Bros… helped over throw Arbenz in Guatemala, started the crazy people taking over US / earth that we see in full flower today.
DC: Wrigley Field, childhood memories.
What is America’s greatest gift to the world?
MB: Louis Armstrong.
DC: An example of a government formed on articulated, written principles.
Democrats or Republicans?
MB: Fuck ‘em all.
DC: If you mean what am I, where are my sympathies – Democrat.
