O’Donoghue: Here's the question of the day. And if you could go to a major label and have artistic control, why wouldn't you do that? So it took until 1987 for the whole band to feel comfortable that we could "sell out," as it were, and get a major-label deal and do a record.Ĭamper Van Beethoven in 1986. We were starting to get a lot of people at our shows already - in some places, close to a thousand people. We weren't mainstream, but we were somewhere in between the niche movement that was punk rock and underground, more experimental stuff, and the more mainstream stuff. But I was getting this inkling that, in a way, we weren't really this niche thing. And there was this vote in the band, and everybody but me voted against it. IRS Records - which was R.E.M.'s label, and was kind of the "cool major" - wanted to sign us. It’s from our upcoming LP on IRS Records. Lowery: OK, so this next song we're gonna play is a song of great enduring strength and beauty. We were kind of like, “Well, that's kinda uncool, Chris.” But anyhow, we're driving down the road and the cops pulled us over, and they took him out and they searched him, held him upside down. Krummenacher: But anyhow, we were going to South Pasadena and Chris, like … I don't know what came over him, but he stole a ‘67 Barracuda and started driving down the road. He'll just stay up all night and eat syrup. Krummenacher: He likes to lap the syrup up off the plate. see, Chris likes to go to Carrows and order pancakes in the middle of the night. Krummenacher: Well, see, we were going to Carrows the other night in South Pasadena, and… Let’s tell some stories about Chris Pedersen. O’Donoghue: Jonathan Segal, Victor Krummenacher, Greg Lisher, and David Lowery of Camper Van Beethoven. Your drummer's not really in jail, are they?" Or they would have said something to undermine it, and she didn't. Someplace else, somebody would have been like, "Whoa, you're on your own there. So we say "He's in jail," right? And, I was like, "These poor people, they have no idea what's true and what's not true when they're listening to us." But she doesn't correct us when we say things like "Our drummer's in jail" and stuff like that. The poor people who first heard us on that first show, when we're talking about how our drummer's in jail.
Victor Krummenacher : Chris, out in that cell in South Pasadena, we miss you, Chris. Lowery: OK, well, this first song we’d like to do is a traditional Camper Van Beethoven song. O’Donoghue: Well, tonight’s the night we can tell the tales of Chris Pedersen. 15 countries all around the world, passport hassles, y’know, alimony and all this stuff. So we don’t have a drummer tonight, and we’re going to do a little acoustic set. Except our drummer couldn’t be here ‘cause he’s in jail, but we’re gonna tell you some more about that a little later. And it’s my pleasure to welcome to “SNAP!” and KCRW: Camper Van Beethoven. I’ve been looking forward to this ensemble for a while.
And I started listening to KCRW, and oftentimes her show, when I was driving around in Los Angeles. And I think I went to go see Downy Mildew, and I got introduced to Deirdre O'Donoghue, who, I was told, has a really cool radio show on KCRW.Ĭertainly, I remember going out with Deirdre and a couple other people before we were ever on "SNAP!" And she seemed to be around in the scene.
So, sometimes when we were in LA, there would be an in-store at Texas Records, and it was invariably some cool up-and-coming band. Also, we had done an in-store very early on at Texas Records in Santa Monica. In this episode of “Bent By Nature,” he shares how the band navigated their own transition from indie darlings to major-label recording artists.ĭavid Lowery: In 1987, I was living in Santa Cruz, but we were going down to LA a lot, partly because it was a great place for us to play shows. He explains that Deirdre’s show was just one taproot for a larger movement which was spreading across the country in the mid-’80s. with which you're seeing album sales, at least on a smaller level, but it's making a bump.Īmong the acts Deirdre discovered that year was a crew of self-described “pot-smoking hippies from Santa Cruz.” Camper Van Beethoven lit up the college circuit in 1985 with their breakout single, “ Take the Skinheads Bowling.” And they quickly became one of Deirdre’s firm favorites.ĭavid Lowery is Camper Van Beethoven’s guitarist and de facto frontman. Deirdre is talking with the LA Times’ music critic, Robert Hilburn, about the musical trends of 1985.ĭeirdre O’Donoghue: I don't think that the big, quote-unquote, "rock" stations can very much longer ignore the growing numbers of people who are listening to alternative radio stations all around the country.