Falling Spikes / Fugs
Posted: 01 Dec 2024 23:37
I just found this page with some details about Falling Spikes gigs:
https://brunoceriotti.weebly.com/the-fugs.html
Wednesday, August 11, 1965: Auditorium, Broadway Central Hotel, 673 Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, New York
The Fugs, along with the Falling Spikes (soon-to-be the Velvet Underground), provided music live entertainment at a benefit held to raise money to provide bail for Dale Wilbourne, who had been arrested with Jack William Martin on a marijuana charge. The late poet and underground filmmaker Piero Heliczer was the master of cerimonies. There were about 200 people present. “The Fugs and others held a benefit at the Broadway Central Hotel for defendants Jack Martin and Dale Wilbourne,” confirms Ed Sanders in his autobiography. “Federal agents showed up outside the gig and harassed people! I’ll never forget the image of filmmaker Jack Smith, his face bloodied from a confrontation with the police outside the Broadway Central. He and others (but not The Fugs) were arrested at the benefit.”
Sunday, August 22, 1965: ‘A benefit for Jack Smith, Jack Martin, Dale Wilbourne, Irene Noland & Piero Heliczer,’ Village Gate (theatre), 158 Bleecker Street, Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York City, New York
After the arrests at the above mentioned benefit, “there had to be ANOTHER benefit,” explains Ed Sanders in his autobiography, “this one at Art D’ Lu-goff’s Village Gate, on the afternoon of August 22, at which The Fugs again performed.” One show, from 3:00pm to 7:00pm. Also on the bill: The Cineola Transcendental Orchestra, John Vaccaro, Beverly Grant, Baby Jane Holzer, Mario Montez, plus underground movies by Warhol, Vehr, Linder, Heliczer, Anger, Smith, Vanderbeek, Frank, Leslie, and others. “We used to play at benefits with a group called the Falling Spikes, and together we’d be called the Transcendental Simulematic Orchestra [sic],” recalls John Anderson in an interview with Jeff Pollock for the Yale University magazine The New Journal (February 9, 1969), “we’d play the background music for underground movies and light shows on dancing people, which was all starting at that time. The Falling Spikes eventually became the musicians for Andy Warhol’s group, the Velvet Underground.” So, according to Anderson, the Cineola Transcendental Orchestra billed for this benefit was actually an ad-hoc supergroup formed by the Fugs and the Falling Spikes together. Well, it could be true even if some evidence would prove otherwise. For example the Fugs and the Falling Spikes actually shared the bill at one benefit but it was the one which was held on August 11 so maybe Anderson was referring to that, and if so both were billed with their names as two separate groups and no mention of the Cineola Trascendental Orchestra. Also the latter group was instead billed for this benefit along with the Fugs as two separate groups and no mention of the Falling Spikes. Last but not least, the Cineola Transcendental Orchestra was also billed at another benefit held on August 19 but neither the Fugs or the Falling Spikes were mentioned.
https://brunoceriotti.weebly.com/the-fugs.html
Wednesday, August 11, 1965: Auditorium, Broadway Central Hotel, 673 Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, New York
The Fugs, along with the Falling Spikes (soon-to-be the Velvet Underground), provided music live entertainment at a benefit held to raise money to provide bail for Dale Wilbourne, who had been arrested with Jack William Martin on a marijuana charge. The late poet and underground filmmaker Piero Heliczer was the master of cerimonies. There were about 200 people present. “The Fugs and others held a benefit at the Broadway Central Hotel for defendants Jack Martin and Dale Wilbourne,” confirms Ed Sanders in his autobiography. “Federal agents showed up outside the gig and harassed people! I’ll never forget the image of filmmaker Jack Smith, his face bloodied from a confrontation with the police outside the Broadway Central. He and others (but not The Fugs) were arrested at the benefit.”
Sunday, August 22, 1965: ‘A benefit for Jack Smith, Jack Martin, Dale Wilbourne, Irene Noland & Piero Heliczer,’ Village Gate (theatre), 158 Bleecker Street, Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York City, New York
After the arrests at the above mentioned benefit, “there had to be ANOTHER benefit,” explains Ed Sanders in his autobiography, “this one at Art D’ Lu-goff’s Village Gate, on the afternoon of August 22, at which The Fugs again performed.” One show, from 3:00pm to 7:00pm. Also on the bill: The Cineola Transcendental Orchestra, John Vaccaro, Beverly Grant, Baby Jane Holzer, Mario Montez, plus underground movies by Warhol, Vehr, Linder, Heliczer, Anger, Smith, Vanderbeek, Frank, Leslie, and others. “We used to play at benefits with a group called the Falling Spikes, and together we’d be called the Transcendental Simulematic Orchestra [sic],” recalls John Anderson in an interview with Jeff Pollock for the Yale University magazine The New Journal (February 9, 1969), “we’d play the background music for underground movies and light shows on dancing people, which was all starting at that time. The Falling Spikes eventually became the musicians for Andy Warhol’s group, the Velvet Underground.” So, according to Anderson, the Cineola Transcendental Orchestra billed for this benefit was actually an ad-hoc supergroup formed by the Fugs and the Falling Spikes together. Well, it could be true even if some evidence would prove otherwise. For example the Fugs and the Falling Spikes actually shared the bill at one benefit but it was the one which was held on August 11 so maybe Anderson was referring to that, and if so both were billed with their names as two separate groups and no mention of the Cineola Trascendental Orchestra. Also the latter group was instead billed for this benefit along with the Fugs as two separate groups and no mention of the Falling Spikes. Last but not least, the Cineola Transcendental Orchestra was also billed at another benefit held on August 19 but neither the Fugs or the Falling Spikes were mentioned.
