A Trip With Devo: Reflections of a Beautiful Mutant

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A Trip With Devo: Reflections of a Beautiful Mutant
http://www.punkfix.net/articles/atripwithdevo.html
by Todd Tobias (photos courtesy of Sarah Wooten)

In the early 1970抯, two musical streamliners and fat-carvers named Steve Reich and Philip Glass infiltrated classical music. At the same time, Rock and Roll was gorging itself on excess and would soon be begging for the same treatment. As with any new diet or exercise regimen, there was resistance at first. Music enjoyed being flabby. And people enjoyed flabby music, because it allowed them to wallow in their own emotional shit, something all babies enjoy doing.

In 1974, the members of Devo crashed out of their playpens with big ideas about biological destiny, leisure, fat-free music; as well as art, sex, primal noise and new traditions. More importantly, Devo made assaultive infectious music that was impossible to shrug off. You could hate Devo, be maddened by them and wish you could hate them, or you could hate them. Indifference was not an option. Devo separated the babies from the mutants. In the Devo lexicon, a mutant was anyone willing to abandon the playpens of greaseball culture on the left and corporate culture on the right, and take a chance on something new. The De-evolution for which Devo takes their name is a function of humankind抯 lazy attitude toward the adventure of living; a willingness to allow the coddling of corporate pop culture to retard the search for new traditions. An outrageous idea? ... Maybe for 1974.

Devo抯 strategy was ingenious. Instead of trying to confront the bloated monster of 1970抯 rock, and being summarily crushed, Devo acted like the giant was already dead. As it turned out, more people than they expected were willing to believe the same. Underground mutants everywhere began pulling their heads out of the sand. Devo knew that being merely reactionary was boring. To scream and play frantic tantrum-driven music would just be inviting people to find refuge in a new type of playpen. Devo knew it would be more fun and more interesting to simply offer a way out. And they made it easy for us to go.

People who thought Devo were just a novelty act weren抰 looking close enough. People like David Bowie, Brian Eno and Neil Young, some of Devo抯 early champions, understood. So what makes critics so docile these days when it comes to Devo? Was it the funny hats? Let me give you a personal perspective...

As with most people at the time, even youngsters like myself, my first reaction to Devo was to screw up my face and say 揾uh?? I was twelve then, and already fully dug into the mire of greaseball rock. Thanks to my big brother, Tim, who insisted on playing 換: Are We Not Men?...? every day on the turntable, my music allegiances were gradually subverted. Before I even realized it, I was a beautiful mutant.

I remember the moment when it hit me. I was doing my math homework when 揝hrivel Up?came on. While my conscious mind was distracted by equations, the music kidnapped another, more vulnerable part of my mind, and went running off to strange places, moving so fast that when the song was over, I had to go back and play it again to retrieve everything I missed. But, it was all so fleeting and strange. There was no way to get it back. I just had to keep listening.

To a brain conditioned by Foghat抯 揝low Ride? this was violent revolution. Growing up with music in the 1970抯 was like being coddled by a fat nanny who stuffed my face with cream puffs and chocolate. Everyone loves that stuff, including me, but for my own survival, someone had to come steal me away from my nanny抯 lap and make me do some jumping jacks.

General Boy (father of singer Mark Mothersbaugh抯 infantile alter-identity Boojie Boy) calls this new musical discipline 搑eductive synthesis? carving away the fat to reveal the hidden nutrition of music.

It was all about moving. Eventually it would be too much about moving, and re-invention, and new funny costumes. In the end, Devo got caught running in circles. But with no one there to take the torch and carry it in a new direction, what choice did they have?

Think of the recent success of the 揙 Brother Where Art Thou?soundtrack; an entire album of fat-free music. Once again, people are tired of the emotional coddling and cushy production of modern music. We want music to take us someplace interesting. So, what抯 stopping us?

First there is music that we discard and leave behind. Then there is the music like stuff in 揙 Brother?that leaves us behind and waits for us to catch up. Only we didn抰 catch up. That music didn抰 suddenly become great. The old train of hobos had to turn back because we were too fat and lazy to keep up. Ever since I抳e caught on to Devo, I抳e been eager to take a trip... any trip.

Devo took me to strange and interesting places, some of them inside my own head. Listen to the first two Devo LP抯 - 換: Are We Not Men??and 揇uty Now For the Future? The songs are like a string of weird dreams; dark, funny, dangerous and exuberant, all about masturbation, death, corporate zombies, religion, science, bad trips, and even some love songs. The music itself is so primal and sparse in rhythm and melody, but dense with texture. With their third album, 揊reedom of Choice? the focus became super-distilled pop infections like 揥hip-it? mutated enough to be Devo, but harmless enough to be played on the radio.

To those who don抰 get it, Devo will always be nothing but a musical sideshow that passed through and opened a few eyes and ears, then went away again. But like the 揙 Brother?hobo train, a show like Devo is bound to come back. Why?... Because every generation has their mutants; restless souls eager to escape the playpen. Mutants have needs like anyone else. They want to feel beautiful too. Hidden in Devo抯 funny costumes and other visual trappings was a celebration, where all the kids whose heads weren抰 exactly 搑ight?could come feel at home. Behind the sideshow was an enormous generosity. Some kids might not know it yet, but they need Devo.

The high point of my trip with Devo came in 1982, when the band came home (or as close to Akron, Ohio as they would dare to venture) to play at the Cleveland Music Hall. I was fifteen and had never been to a 搑ock?concert before.

When the first booming synthesizer notes from 揟ime Out For Fun?hit me, I felt the bass shake my chest cavity. I had never been literally moved by music before. The songs from their latest release 揙h No its Devo? continued to punch me in the chest until the giant video screen behind the band went dark, and for a few minutes everything was quiet.

The real Devo concert was about to begin. During the 搈atinee?portion of the concert, drummer Alan Myers (the human metronome) had been standing on his feet behind a row of electronic drum pads. When the roadie wheeled out the platform with the full acoustic drum kit, the audience went crazy.

The band came out in their 揇uty Now?skateboard gear, and charged into 揢ncontrollable Urge? 揋ates of Steel?and 揓ocko Homo? Eventually, and all too soon, they reached their climax with 揝mart Patrol / Mr. DNA? By then, I was addled with adrenaline. When Bob #1 jumped over his brother to skid to the edge of the stage on his knees to play that wolf-howl guitar solo on 揗r. DNA? his patch chord caught on Mark抯 leg and came unplugged. So when Bob threw back his head and opened his mouth for that first howl... no sound came out. My reaction was to howl myself... with laughter. A roadie jumped out to plug Bob back in, so he was able to finish with his trademark barrage of screaming dissonance, which we were treated to again later with the second climax; an encore of 揋ut Feeling? The song mutated beautifully from pile-driving rock to shapeless noise, which went on and on long after the drums, bass and vocals had fizzled out, leaving Bob #1 to have his seizure in the spotlight. I wanted the exquisitely ugly noise to keep going, but Bob ran out of juice.

So the band seemed to vanish over the horizon in the coming years. In truth, I believe they took the advice of their pal Neil Young and burned out. That was the impression left on me after their brief but exhausting concert. As General Boy once said to my friend Dean and I when we paid him a visit in the mid-1980抯- 揇evo has no plans to play Disneyland.?

So it would be up to some other spuds with their own brand of Devo energy to stir up the new generations of mutants and keep us tripping, in the post-modern sense.

Twenty years later, I抦 still waiting for them to show up. I have a feeling they will show up, and that their name will be Devo.