Dead Moon: Off The Grid

Garage rock hero Fred Cole remembered.

A living counterargument to Lester Bangs’ fictional speculation on The Count Five’s wretched career had they not vanished after Psychotic Reaction, Fred Cole – author of Nuggets cornerstone You Must Be A Witch with The Lollipop Shoppe – really did keep going, spewing forth dozens of brilliant, urgent songs with inspirational adherence to rock’n’roll’s primitivist urges. His passage from pre-Shoppe combo The Weeds, through punk-era The Rats and his 20-year majesty in Dead Moon, on to his passing in 2017, is lovingly chronicled according to his own home-spun, fiery spirit. Initially, dodgy contracts left him and wife Toody struggling to raise their kids in Clackamas, Oregon, but from 1987 to 2006 Dead Moon survived as a feverish cult, with Toody on bass and drummer Andrew Loomis, their marathon shows measured by how long it took a candle to burn down atop a Jack Daniel’s bottle. This first non-US print of Off The Grid wonderfully celebrates Cole’s DIY individualism. A full discography is included.