NIHILISTIC

The act of capturing audio onto a playable medium has fascinated me since my father – who had a penchant for salvaging cast-offs – lugged home a disc-based recorder. I can no longer visualize the machine ( Wilcox-Gay Recordio ? Dictaphone? Some other brand?) but recall the blue mylar flexidiscs slipped into a front-facing slot and the attached microphone passed around the dining room table. An eve...

For 30 years I was involved with legendary New Jersey freeform radio station WFMU , mostly hosting my phone-in talkshow Aerial View (which is still around and can be heard Friday nights, 6 pm Eastern Time, on thehoundnyc.com ). I’ve slowly been digitizing hundreds of Aerial View airchecks on cassette, DAT ( D igital A udio T ape) and MiniDisc and recently stumbled on the one I’m highlighting here:...

Pictured above is my Dubbing Station, placed in our small home office within arm’s length of the massive tanker desk I picked up years ago cheap. While working on one project or another I’ll often multitask by digitizing a few of the cassettes, minidiscs and DATs stashed on shelves and in metal cabinets nearby. The audio is sent out of a Denon cassette deck, Sony MiniDisc machine or Marantz Portab...

Hey Chris,  Greatly enjoy your tales of the Nihilistic’s and the trials and tribulations of a working band and your ultimate escape from L.I. Anyway, like many dozens of disaffected L.I. suburbanites back in the day, I was a Nihilistics fan. Anyway, I would occasionally bring my Walkman to shows and record, which leads to the point of this email. I recorded your missing video show from My Fathers...

Back on March 12, 2021 on my show Aerial View I interviewed legendary music journalist ( The Big Takeover ), musician ( Even Worse ) and friend Jack Rabid. I’m repurposing the show here as a NIHILISTIC Pod because I can! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nihilisticbook.com

On August 18 of this year I visited my long-time friend Jeff Maschi at his place in Milltown, NJ (that’s us, above) and recorded this conversation. Jeff spills on any number of Nihilistic-adjacent topics. Salute! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.nihilisticbook.com

The first NIHILISTIC Pod included audio of a call to a friend to tell him about Mike Nicolosi threatening my life over the phone. This was on the heels of Mike trying to choke me to death circa 1999 or 2000. I just found ANOTHER call to ANOTHER friend covering the same territory. Listen and shudder. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to...

This NIHILISTIC Pod features an interview first heard on my talk show Aerial View March 19, 2021. Tony Rettman , author of NYHC: New York Hardcore 1980 – 1990 , was my guest and I turned the tables on him. Tony had interviewed me at length for the book (there’s an entire chapter on the Nihilistics) and now it was his turn in the hot seat. We cover a wide range of subjects, so enjoy. Note: I’m usin...

This NIHILISTIC Pod features edited audio from an episode of my talk show Aerial View titled Reminiscing . Originally heard over WFMU-FM in 1991 (and not since because the air check runs forty-five minutes and Aerial View is sixty minutes long), it’s the first time I discussed the Nihilistics publicly since the disastrous 1989 “reunion”. Listen for a phone call from Terre T. of Cherry Blossom Clin...

The part that sticks in my mind more than any other is this: we're crawling over the Manhattan bridge, on the outer roadway, there's a light drizle and I'm looking at the buildings far below, wondering "Who the hell lives in there?" I remember feeling under the weather, a cold coming on, and wishing the damn gig was already behind me. It was November 11, 1984 and The Nihilistics were due at CBGB –...

NOTE: This NIHILISTIC Pod is adapted from an August 19, 1994 aircheck of my WFMU talk show Aerial View entitled “Frankenstein”. I’ve never been able to re-run this show because only half the program was captured initially: there’s no Side B. Luckily, Side A has the entire story I’d written about Vickie, the much older (thirteen years!) woman I met at a Nihilistics show and the first person I ever...

An important key to early momentum for The Nihilistics is radio airplay. In 1981 “Noise the Show” host Tim Sommer gets our demo cassette (perhaps via Lyle Hysen of Damaged Goods fanzine and The Misguided) and plays it over WNYU-FM, leading to increased recognition and gigs. In the next two years we make more pilgrimages to New York University’s student radio station. This episode of NIHILISTIC Pod...

Some of you may know I host a talk show – Aerial View – now heard Fridays, 6 PM on thehoundnyc.com . Back on April 9, 2021 I interviewed Ron Rancid of The Nihilistics and thought I’d do a little crossover episode here on NIHILISTIC. Presented here as you would’ve heard it live, here’s Ron Is On. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bon...

That’s me, circa 1989, visiting in Hoboken, NJ, wearing a Betty Page bondage T-shirt, apparently. This is the only picture (many remain in storage )I found of me from that pivotal year. Why pivotal? It was my last gasp with The Nihilistics. I’d been living in New Jersey (Tenafly, not Hoboken yet) three years when someone from the band (not sure if it was Mike or Ron) cajoled me into coming back to...

When I was twelve, thirteen, and just learning to play guitar, I met this kid Billy Kammerer through my friend Glenn Katz. Billy’s family – including two cute, older sisters – lived in a split-level on Glenn’s street, the newest block in Lindenhurst (so new the phone lines were underground – no telephone poles!). With a canal out back and a Boston Whaler (Mercury outboard) at the dock, Billy’s fam...

This episode of NIHILISTIC Pod documents a trip Keith Hartel and I (pictured above) took Saturday, July 15 to Bulletproof Music Studios in Hazlet, NJ to see The Nihilistics on a bill with Fear Gods . What a strange damn night. I’ll write all about it for Friday’s installment of NIHILISTIC (BTW, I’m hoping to put out a pod every Monday and some writing every Friday). As always, please spread the wo...

I’ve always intended for NIHILISTIC (the newsletter) to have an audio component (video, too, if necessary). This first NIHILISTIC Pod (I debated several names, almost went with NIHILISTIC NEWS but didn’t) was recorded spontaneously into my phone Tue., July 4, 2023. I did my usual Independence Day vigil (listen to the episode to find out why) on our stoop as people streamed up the block towards Bou...