[Previously: Ladies and Gentlemen, Introducing The Roommates!]

Ironically, the idea to go public was Scot’s. Scot has been the most private of the four, at times to the extreme. Frank went along readily, but Ted initially expressed guarded reluctance. With Scot and Ted doing most of the arranging and Frank providing cover and bail money, the proto-group soon found itself doing breakfast gigs at various New Haven coffee shops. Their first real break came in mid-September of 1978. After successfully covering some of the early rock artists at the Garbage Can Rally, (“We did it for the dart board,” Scot was said to have explained mysteriously at the time), The Roommates embarked on a stint which gave them local notoriety. Working the graveyard shift at The Post Office, a local bar, the group came away with one of their most prized possessions – a 17^th century solid oak library table. It was proudly displayed until just Continue Reading “The Birth of Something New”

Disclaimer

The following is a fictitious account. Any resemblance to real people or actual events is simply a figment of your paranoid imagination. Quite simply, none of this ever happened. It is not real. For that matter, how do you even know you are real? I should know. I was voted most likely to be a cartoon character, a position I still aspire to.

 Introduction to the 2012 Archival Publication

An artifact of the recently unearthed slushpile of Zig Jones, this piece comes from the early 1980’s, when leisure suits breathed their last, big hair was big and a long-forgotten band topped the pop-music charts. For a brief time, every pair of ears rang with the tunes of The Roommates, every pair of lips sang the melodies of The Roommates and every pair of eyes watched, read and absorbed all that was The Roommates. Discovered by Jones, The Roommates shot to instant glory when they first appeared on the famous rock host’s weekly show.

But The Roommates, inscrutable from the very beginning, left the scene just as quickly – and mysteriously – as they arrived. Indeed, the band is so thoroughly forgotten, there’s not a shred of evidence of their actual existence. Wikipedia contains no reference to their greatness. Popular search engines turn up nothing. Even the Library of Congress has no work copyrighted by The Roommates (which, given their infamous anti-establishment fervor, is only to be expected).

Although crafted in the documentary style he would later become famous for, it’s not clear if Jones wrote this or not. It was, however, accompanied with the only extant audio tape of Jones’ once popular Rock Waves show. The clip contains The Roommates’ first, and as far as we know, only appearance on the California-based syndicated program. This article will no doubt interest musicologists seeking to reveal the significant events during the still unexplained transition from disco to punk. What follows is the unedited version of the undated source document (believed to have been written in late 1984 or early1985). So, without further ado, Ladies and Gentlemen, Introducing…

The Short Ragged Life of The Roommates:

Punk Rock at its Best – and Worst

For two-and-a-half short years between the eighth and ninth decades of the twentieth century, society and culture witnessed and experienced what has been a cyclical event: the all-encompassing power of a flash of change in popular music. Each successive generation seems to have fallen under the awe-inspiring power of a musical deity, from Sinatra to Elvis to The Beatles to, most recently, The Roommates. (It is interesting to note the cycle skipped a beat in the seventies, perhaps a tribute to the formidable influence of The Beatles, and quite possibly at once both providing and explaining the reason for The Roommates’ sudden and dramatic rise.) It’s been over three years since they last Continue Reading “Ladies and Gentlemen, Introducing The Roommates!”