„Marvin would kick your ass for nothing. A true genius, Marvin was a pure original” said Iggy Pop about the extraordinary musician Marvin Pontiac. And if Iggy is so into him than I introduce that true genius to you.

THE STRANGE STORY OF MARVIN PONTIAC

He was born in 1932, the son of an African father from Mali and a white Jewish mother from New Rochelle, New York. The father’s original last name was Toure but he changed it to Pontiac when the family moved to Detroit, believing it to be a conventional American name.

Marvin’s father left the family when Marvin was two years old. When his mother was mental institutionalized in 1936, the father returned and took the young boy to Bamako, Mali where Marvin was raised until he was fifteen. The music that he heard there would influence him forever.

At fifteen Marvin moved by himself to Chicago where he became versed in playing blues harmonica. At the age of seventeen, Marvin was accused by the great Little Walter of copying his harmonica style. This accusation led to a fistfight outside of a small club on Maxwell Street. Losing a fight to the much smaller Little Walter was so humiliating to the young Marvin that he left Chicago and moved to Lubbock, Texas where he became a plumber’s assistant.

Not much is known about him for the next three years. There are unsubstantiated rumors that Marvin may have been involved in a bank robbery in 1950. In 1952, he had a minor hit for Acorn Records with the then controversial song „I’m a Doggy.”

Oddly enough, unbeknownst to Marvin and his label, he simultaneously had an enormous bootleg success in Nigeria with the beautiful song Pancakes.

His disdain and mistrust of the music business is well documented and he soon fell out with Acorn’s owner, Norman Hector. Although approached by other labels, Marvin refused to record for anyone unless the owner of the label came to his home in Slidell, Louisiana and mowed his lawn.

Reportedly Marvin’s music was the only music that Jackson Pollack would ever listen to while he painted, this respect was not reciprocated. In 1970 Marvin believed that he was abducted by aliens. He felt his mother had had a similar unsettling experience, which had led to her breakdown. He stopped playing music and dedicated all of his time and energy to amicably contacting these creatures who had previously probed his body so brutally.

Furthermore Marvin held the tribal belief that having a photograph taken of yourself could steal your soul, thus these candid shots are the only ones known to exist.

When he was arrested for riding a bicycle naked down the side streets of Slidell, it provided a sad but clear view of Marvin’s coming years. In 1971 he moved back to Detroit where he drifted forever and permanently into insanity.

He was killed by a bus accidentally in 1977.

His only album „GREATEST HITS” was released posthumously in 1999. And this unstable genius recorded his African rhythm and blues songs with such great musicians as Marc Ribot, John Medeski, Billy Martin, Eszter Bálint and many others.

GREATEST HITS first time on vinyl on NORTHERN SPY RECORDS

LISTEN TO IT ON SPOTIFY!

By the way. You can find some inconsistencies in this story. For example Eszter Bálint was 11 years old when Marvin Pontiac died, so it seems impossible that she could work with him. Well, the truth is that the character of Marvin Pontiac was invented by John Lurie because „for a long time, I was threatening to do a vocal record. But the idea of me putting out a record where I sang seemed ostentatious or pretentious. Like the music of Telly Savalas . . . I don’t sing very well, I was shy about it. As a character, it made it easier.”

Not long ago Lurie found some materials of Marvin Pontiac which were recorded when he was in a mental hospital. Those were released as The Asylum Tapes in 2017.

Do you know Luca? The colourful Italian musician from The Ultra Twist, Trio Banana, Trans Upper Egypt, Duodenum, Centauri, and RAWWAR? Who also is a visual artist who made clips for Ty Segall, Thee Oh Sees, Country Teasers and a lot of others. And has collages too:

PALI: Hey Luca! Long time ago that I did an interview with you (in the Ultra Twist times). Since you’ve moved to Rome from Siena, The Ultra Twist split etc. Anyway where are you living and what do you do there?

LUCA: Hi, Bro’! After Rome I moved to Milano where I lived four years. There, I did new band with old friends who lived in Milano too. The name of the band is Centauri, we make weird country/folk/psychedelic non-sense stuff.

I tried to continue to play with bands in Rome: Trans Upper Egypt, Trio Banana and Duodenum, but it was too difficult, so I quit TUE, ‘cause I didn’t enjoy more. Trio Banana is on-standby, we never really quit but we can’t play together now. But Duodenum is a very hard band to play often.

Number 71 Monobanda, the man who plays with me, got many bands too, and he lives between Napoli and Rome. Very hard to meet each other in a year, but we are like brothers, so for us play is something more than make gigs and shows. Duodenum will never quit.

In Milano I have started my solo project Tab_ularasa 2-3 years ago. I did many records and tape and maybe too many gigs around Italy. That’s my main project now, and I’m working on a new record. It will be very experimental and different from records done before. Hope to finish soon and to put out it after summer.

Tab_ularasa make punk/folk for children and crazy people. I play alone only with guitar and sing very weird songs in Italian. In the end of 2016 I have gone back to my countryside in Tuscany and I will stay here this year.

PALI: You have got a new band RAWWAR after Trio Banana split.

LUCA: Like I said before, Trio Banana never really split and maybe we will play in the future, but not now. But Trio Banana’s drummer Gabriele Doctor Dead and I never stop to play. When I come back to Rome we play in a rehearsal room. At the start we didn’t want to make a new band to make gigs but only keep to play together, have fun, write new songs and make records.

PALI: You and Dr Dead from Trio Banana, but who is your second guitar player, please introduce him!

LUCA: After few practices we did 9 songs and a cover (Don’t Make Me Kill Again from Urinals) then we decided to make records. I spoke about that with Michele Zufux from Ferrara, one of my best old friend from Ultra Twist time. He was in a fucking great band called Larsen. They’re almost unknown, but for me Larsen is one of the best Italian bands ever. Now he plays in For Food and Dead Horses also from Ferrara, different style of music but really great stuff. We spoke in chat about that, I sent him our songs, he liked them so much that I asked to join us with his guitar to record. We were in Ferrara on a weekend last October. We never play together before, and we recorded three songs of the 1st RAWWAR tape. It was a magic day, we did everything live with only two microphones like a live gig, so we were lucky too.

Some week later Alessandro, a new friend from Teramo, did a very great master and we put out the tape on Bubca Records last March. We wanted to make a 7” but was not money, and maybe there would have been even no sense, ‘cause we don’t play so much live. We live far each other and even here in Italy the situation is quite sad for a band who play garage/punk… There is a kind of little “mafia” to book gigs, and obviously we’re not inside that stuff. The bigger festivals prefer to give a lot of money to American mythological dead bands from the 90s instead to make a cool garage/punk underground festival with new bands. They live in the past. Here in Italy the majority of “underground” people live in the past. This is not punk/rock for me. I always hope to discover, listen and see new bands. Otherwise I’m just so happy to make this tape, to play music with my friends and that’s all. If people will ask us to play it would be better, but if not, nessun problema, we will keep playing in some garages that we enjoy much than play in a shitty venue or festival.

PALI: Not long ago RAWWAR put out its debut tape on your own Bubca Records. Those three songs remind me something like Cheater Slicks between Country Teasers and a bit like early Demon’s Claws. It’s rawer and more direct and less psychedelic than TRIO BANANA was. What do you think?

LUCA: From the start Gabriele and I wanted to make something more weird and repetitive like the old blues/punk stuff. The bands that you mentioned are some of my favorites, but we have tried to find our way to play RAW the primordial blues like did Cheater Slicks, Country Teasers and Demon’s Claws. We like so much Can’s first album, Velvet Underground’s weird stuff, Gun Club. We love too Neu, Oneida’s first records and so many other stuff, but when you make music you have to try to find your own way.

PALI: Please talk about the process of recording. I think you like to do everything as basic as you can.

LUCA: Sure! We recorded in this way ‘cause we did not even time to make it in a different way. I didn’t recorded RAWWAR, Mauro from For Food & Dead Horses helped us and Michele did the rest. We used a cheap multitrack recorder with two mics and we set the level of sounds just before start. I have learned lo-fi tricks from Falconx, the guru who has made my theremin and recorded many garage records in the 80s. If you want warmer sounds and really feel the people’s energy who play then the best way to record everything live, even the voice too. Sure it’s more difficult, ‘cause you have to know and try where put the mics, how sounds moving at the place where you record, and mostly you have to be lucky because when you play at high volume you can generate shitty feedbacks and distortions. Here in Italy we said “La Fortuna aiuta gli audaci”, I think in English they say: “Fortune favours the bold”, and maybe there is a Hungarian version too. (Of course: „Bátraké a szerencse.”) This time we were very lucky… hope next time too.

PALI: And your copy technic is unique I think hahaha! Do you buy some shitty tapes on a flea market and copy your music on it? How do you do this?

LUCA: Almost from the start, Bubca Records make tapes using second hand/recycled tapes. Now vinyl seems new fashion. There are some shitty dynamics to make it but if you don’t book a Euro tour it does not make a sense at all to print it. Making tapes it’s a kind of new little fashion, but it seems like to live in the past. CD is dead, the new world goes in a different way. Maybe we should discover new way to pass underground music. The task of the avant-garde in art has always been be ahead, but now young people make new stuff and invent things from very young age for multinational factories. The few people who make true DIY garage/punk stuff are like dinosaurs. We are dinosaurs, we’re going to extinct soon. I don’t care about that, I’m keeping to make my stuff but I hate nerd punks who think that the old way to make records is the True & Sacred. They are the Worst! For me, make records with second hand tapes is a kind of ironic action, and I don’t want to pollute the world with new plastic too, the worlds is already polluted enough. I find tapes in some flea markets and when I duplicate stuff I do not delete the end of the original music, so if you don’t like RAWWAR you can listen Laura Pausini, Tiziano Ferro, Adriano Celentano or classic music. Cheers!

PALI: You do all of artwork as well. Do you have got own copy machine?

LUCA: Yeah, I make artwork, collage or draw for my records. If I make a record for other bands I always ask them about the artwork, if they do not want to make it, then I do it. Almost all old Bubca Records stuff is a B/W xerox copy, but we did some colour cover too. Our first coloured cover was made for the first Trio Banana EP “Baby Save My Soul”. If a collage or a draw is colored we keep it coloured. I don’t have own copy machine, I just go to a cheap copy shop. To get a copy machine and buy ink is more expensive.

PALI: You booked last year a mini tour for The Rebel. How was that? What kind of guy Ben Wallers? I think he is one of the weirdest guys nowadays in the R’n’R underground. Is it right?

LUCA: Make a tour with Ben was one of the best things done last years. Ben is not so weird as he seems, he’s very kind, smart and cool guy. Making music is the most important thing in his life, like for me, so we have become true friends. I hope to make new tour with him sooner or later.

PALI: Please talk about the last few Bubca Records release!

LUCA: We’re not so active now as we were before, but I’m trying to keep Bubca alive. Before RAWWAR, the last record was Pist Idiots, an amazing new young band from Australia. I love them!

PALI: What are you main active project now?

LUCA: Main project is my solo project Tab_ularasa, but I hope to play more often with RAWWAR, Centauri and Duodenum. I enjoy more playing in a band that alone.

PALI: Please recommend us few cool Italian bands what are active now and you really like!

LUCA: My favorite Italian band is For Food from Ferrara. I love them from the start, they play furious noisy post punk music. Great songs, great atmospheres. They are true friends. Their first record is a masterpiece.

PALI: Future plans with RAWWAR? Anyway it’s a cool name! So rad.

LUCA: The name of the band was an idea from Michel. I suggested The Hobos but that sucks. Gabriele got no idea about that. Michele told us RAWWAR and then we were thinking: “AMAZING!!”. You can say RAWWAR like the lion of Metro Goldwyn Mayer does before an old Hollywoodian movie: ROUUUAURRR!!!

PALI: What’s your favorite local liquor?

LUCA: My favorite local liquor is a kind of stuff that you drink here after eating a lot. It’s called Nocino. It’s a walnut liquor made by monks, but not easy to find real Nocino. The best I had was in Teramo countryside last week!

Thanx Pali, I hope to come back soon in Budapest to play.

When Luca played first time there with The Ultra Twist at RNR666 party