for Greg Shaw

I'm way behind what I planned to write in this blog, but hey,
who's keeping track?

However, although it was late 2004 that I learned
from listening to Little Steven's Underground Garage radio
show that Greg Shaw had died, I haven't forgotten the
sadness I felt.

I never met Greg personally, but we corresponded a little
bit and I read both his science fiction fanzine METANOIA
as well as his music fanzine WHO PUT THE BOMP,
eventually shortened to BOMP.

I first understood how provincial I was when I mentioned
to Greg that the Gary Puckett and the Union Gap had held
a concert in St Louis and he wrote back asking whether
anyone had gone.

Of course I didn't consider them a big deal, but any live
concert to me was a big deal at that time. I didn't realize
that, living in San Francisco, Greg was so used to having
most of the greatest names of rock either in the area or
constantly visiting and playing, that the idea of wasting
time at a Gary Puckett and the Union Gap concert was
just too ridiculous to him.

In return, I sent him a great book by a former rock and
rock musician turned Christian fundamentalist detailing
how rock and roll was deliberately leading teenagers
to the deliver.

He thanked me for it, though I'm not sure whether he
was amused or converted or just more set in his evil
ways.

Like so many others, I was knocked out by Lester
Bangs piece on James Taylor and the Troggs, but
within a few years I spent little tme reading the issues
of BOMP that appeared in my mailbox.

When Greg became manager of The Flaming Groovies,
I bought their first album. I liked "Shake Some Action"
though I never saw why he considered them the
greatest group since The Beatles.

I wasn't surprised many years later, when a local radio
station started playing Little Steven's Underground
Garage that he consistently gave Greg credit for
research for the show.

Of course Greg would be the perfect person to help
Little Steven put on a show of garage rock, past and
present.

overseas travel