Cleveland rocks!
A Reno-based record company searches the vaults of Cleveland’s punk past
While many record companies are constantly searching for the latest talent to sign, Frank Mauceri’s Smog Veil Records is looking for lost music from the ‘70s and ‘80s. Lost ‘70s and ‘80s punk rock from Cleveland, to be more specific.
Mauceri, 37, was raised in Cleveland and became part of its early punk rock movement, even joining the band The Dissidents as a drummer in 1980. But his career as a drummer didn’t last, mainly because he’d lied to the band when he said he knew how to play the drums. The band only kept him around long enough to find a new drummer.
But for Mauceri, Cleveland’s punk scene left an indelible mark on his soul. He began buying the records the bands were putting out. He stayed in the scene, hosting a college radio show at Ohio State, and eventually starting Smog Veil. At first, Smog Veil focused on putting out new releases, but that wasn’t where Mauceri’s passion lay.
“About three years ago, I made the conscious decision to see if there was any interest in re-releasing this music,” Mauceri says. “There really is a worldwide fascination with late ‘70s and early ‘80s punk rock.”
While the interest is there, the music isn’t always there. For Mauceri, finding the old releases is the most challenging part of the job.
“The real trick is the detective work,” he says. “Having to track down the master tapes. I have a pretty complete collection of the most prolific bands, like The Pagans and The Pink Holes. That’s fairly easy to come by. But some bands only appeared on really obscure compilation tapes.”
While Mauceri lives in Reno, he still has many contacts in the Cleveland area that he relies on. One of the tricks to finding music that is 20-25 years old is maintaining those contacts. Mauceri notes that one of the problems in finding old music is that people change and aren’t necessarily still involved in the punk rock scene.
“People retire from punk rock, move away and don’t want to be found,” he says.
But for Mauceri, there are still enough people with connections to the scene to put out some mostly unheard punk rock. For Smog Veil’s next release—and what Mauceri calls his biggest release yet—the record company is releasing an album by Rocket From the Tombs. If you haven’t heard of them, don’t feel bad. Most people haven’t. But it is quite possible you have heard one of their many songs that were later covered by other bands.
In later incarnations, Rocket From the Tombs became Pere Ubu and the seminal punk band The Dead Boys. While The Dead Boys are most often credited with such songs as “Sonic Reducer” and “Ain’t It Fun,” Rocket From the Tombs originally performed the songs. Pearl Jam later covered “Sonic Reducer,” and Guns N’ Roses covered “Ain’t It Fun.” Perhaps the most-covered Rocket From the Tombs song is “Final Solution,” first redone by Pere Ubu, and then by others such as Claw Hammer, Living Colour and former Bauhaus front man Peter Murphy.
Despite their songs being played by bands from a variety of genres, Rocket From the Tombs’ original works haven’t been heard by many people—something Mauceri is looking to change.
“It’s important to make available music which represents the beginning of Cleveland punk rock, and punk rock in general."