Don't Forget Rock Roots

I understand the angle used by Gary Singh in his piece "Scene Unseen" (Cover Story, Nov. 14) about San Jose's largely unknown underground punk scene. He wanted to focus attention on this overlooked counterculture. But in declaring his underground picks for San Jose's Rock Hall of Fame, I think it should be noted that Metro has never really focused attention on San Jose's larger Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

   A nice touch would have been an inset piece describing the Doobie Brothers' house on 12th Street, San Repas Board and Care on San Fernando where Alexander "Skip" Spence of Moby Grape spent many of his twilight years, or Chateau Liberte, the notorious biker bar just outside of Los Gatos which saw performances by Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, and other legends. It would also be interesting to see local landmarks associated with the Count Five, a band which helped establish garage rock as a genre, and the Chocolate Watch Band. This local rock history is now largely forgotten. I spent an afternoon with Moby Grape documentary filmmaker Tony Hall recently in San Jose, and we could find no one who knew where the Doobie Brothers house was actually situated.

 Sometimes there seems to be a sense in the punk rock community that rock history begins with the Sex Pistols and the Clash, and everything that happened before is largely irrelevant.

Douglas Hawes

San Jose

As Average As Ever

Re "Scene Unseen." Greetings from the Big Sleazy: Where nothing is easy. Wow! All I can say is thank you to Gary for his article that he wrote about me and I have to say that I am incredibly honored to have been mentioned amongst the others. Please know that after a short retirement from Djing, I'm bringing the San Jose sound to New Orleans. You have an amazing history of music in San Jose that needs to be spread. (Syndicate of Sound, Diesel Queens, Soul Senders, Joey Myers!) So rally around the flag boys and let it be known that San Jo will be dancing in the second line.

Laissez les bons temps rouler!

Andy Average

New Orleans, La.

One Issue Too Late

Re "The Liquidator" (MetroNews, Nov. 7): Your article about ticket terminology (scalpers vs. retailers vs. corporate scum) came one issue too late. I wanted to purchase Loge tickets for Jersey Boys and found the Curran and Ticketmaster websites out, so I googled and did ten minutes of looking. Many sites appeared to have 2–8 tickets for that day, ranging in price from $150 to $226 a ticket. I used Clickitticket and opted for the $150 seats. I was at the very end of the transaction when they said they needed a 15 percent service fee and a FedEx fee, which added $60 to my total. I grumbled and paid more for these than I have for a Broadway show, figuring they were the best seats at $150. When the tickets arrived 5 days later, they were $96 tickets, which meant clickitticket "retailed" me $108 plus the extra $45. Ticketmaster has long done an upcharge on their events, but nothing like this. I will never again use online 'retailers', even when I'm traveling to New York.

Mark Messersmith

Mountain View

Scare Tactical

I just wanted to thank you. The list of all the things going on tonight (Events, Oct. 31) really helped me with planning on what I am going to do. Thanks for making it so easy!

Sam

San Jose

It Really Is That Time Already

I support John Edwards' candidacy because he strongly supports our troops. First, he wants to bring the troops home from Iraq as soon as possible. Second, he is very angry about the mistreatment the Administration is dealing out to our returning medically disabled troops. The actions of the acting Surgeon General of the Army, Maj. Gen. Gale Pollock, parroting the Administration's efforts to save budget dollars by denying medical care is unconscionable. No other candidate has stood up and as forcefully called on the Administration to account for its actions.

Gerald W. Hunt

San Jose

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