If somebody instructed Michael Ubaldini that dusty copies of his previous band’s information from 4 many years in the past would promote for lots of of {dollars} every, he in all probability wouldn’t have believed it. Not that anybody was actually dashing to inform him. Particularly not the internet-savvy younger followers of his obscure, ‘80s energy pop band the Earwigs that adopted him to his current day gigs as a singer-songwriter begging for copies of “She’s So Naive” pressed on 45s for a mere $20 every. To Ubaldini, 61, he (naively) thought he was getting the higher finish of the cut price.
“Some children got here as much as me at a gig one time and requested if I had any of Earwigs’ authentic 45s which had grow to be a collector’s merchandise however on the time I didn’t understand it,” stated the Orange County-based musician who nonetheless gigs often in OC and Nashville, Tenn. “I instructed em ‘yeah I received couple of these.’ They stated ‘Can we purchase em?’ So I bought them to the children for $20 every pondering I’d gotten a extremely good rating, however they need to’ve felt responsible about what they paid for them as a result of they had been providing to offer me another information on high of what they paid me.”
Not lengthy after the doubtful parking zone sale, Ubaldini went on-line to search out that the 45s packaged in flimsy, handmade cardboard sleeves with the picture of the band pasted on the entrance (generally known as the “alt sleeve” to the unique band emblem cowl) had been being bought for over $300 on websites like Discogs.
After his preliminary shock subsided, Ubaldini tried promoting the information himself. “I had a couple of extra and I put one on-line “bidding begins at $100, purchase it now for $350,” he stated. “I went to breakfast and got here again and any person purchased it.”
The Earwigs carry out at The Cuckoo’s Nest in Costa Mesa
(Courtesy of Michael Ubaldini)
The best quantity paid for a uncommon bootleg copy of the 45 file containing the catchy single “She’s So Naive” and “Right here Come the Earwigs” was bought on Discogs for about $500.
This revelation, alongside along with his want to lastly give his previous band a correct album launch, sparked a current revival for The Earwig’s largely forgotten legacy. On Saturday, The Earwigs–fronted by Ubaldini alongside the band’s authentic drummer Dave Reed, guitarist Oscar Munoz and bassist Jerry Adamowicz will play a long-delayed album launch occasion at The Mamba Sports activities Bar & Grill in Huntington Seashore for “The Earwigs—Orange County 1981: The Misplaced Debut Album” restricted version vinyl urgent. The primary two pressings bought out in simply 5 days by way of pre-order. Every of the pressings of 100 copies is made in a special shade that are being stocked in file shops from their native OC to London and Japan.
The once-popular band began in 1978 and performed at legendary Costa Mesa venue the Cuckoo’s Nest alongside celebrated bands from the early OC punk scene like The Adolescents, T.S.O.L., Agent Orange and Social Distortion. ”We had been a part of that scene however we weren’t a punk band—we had a little bit of a mod affect combined with the vitality of the Buzzcocks and the Ramones,” Ubaldini stated.
Although they by no means fairly slot in with the bands credited for bringing Orange County punk to the world, the pompadour grit that mixed Hamburg-era Beatles with sped-up bubblegum pop songs about teenage love and suburban angst carved a short second within the music historical past of the area.
So how did the Earwigs acquire this unlikely cult following unbeknownst to its founding member?
Ubaldini thinks it began when radio DJs like KROQ’s Rodney Bingenheimer and KNAC’s Sue Mink began taking part in the band’s music on their radio exhibits regularly within the early ‘80s. Followers recorded the tunes off the airwaves onto cassettes that received handed round earlier than they even had an official file to promote. Their songs grew to become wanted amongst followers of energy pop/ storage rock and sped-up rockabilly. The underground success was pushed by the catchy, saccharine-yet-explosive single “She’s So Naive.”
Although they had been getting airplay, the band’s album, which they recorded in 1981, didn’t see daylight as a result of the ill-fated Rock-A-Mod Data, which the recorded the album for, folded earlier than it might be launched.
The band’s authentic lineup (together with guitarist Ashton Rands and bassist Dave Hughes) broke up by 1982 as members grew up and went their separate methods, solely to reform with a barely completely different line up for a pair extra years earlier than permenantly calling it quits in 1984, by no means releasing any extra music. Ubaldini continued to play roots rock and honky-tonk music in OC and shaped a brand new band known as Thriller Prepare that received signed however solely lasted for one file. For years, late Occasions leisure reporter Mike Boehm championed Ubaldini as a dynamite frontman and songwriter.
“A tall, lean, dark-and-handsome, denim-and-leather sort, Ubaldini matches the old school mildew of the traditional rock ‘n’ roll insurgent in addition to anyone on the O.C. scene,” Boehm writes. “Thriller Prepare is constructed on sturdy previous fashions, stuffed with cranking, Stones-Creedence guitar riffs and rockabilly licks. It additionally is basically involved with that oldest of rock ‘n’ roll topics: unbridled, gleeful, exuberant sexual lust.” Ubaldini’s native success spent a few years gaining steam although by no means fairly taking off.
“In the meantime all this time I’d be taking part in in different bands or my very own initiatives there can be somebody within the crowd that might yell ‘Earwigs!’ at me,” he remembers. “‘Play some Earwigs!’ It at all times struck me as humorous. And I might by no means play these songs as a result of I’d written so many others since then.”
Through the years, Ubaldini says he’s gotten provides from quite a lot of small indie labels wanting to place out among the Earwigs’ previous singles. These had been largely unhealthy offers that promised little or no revenue for the songs Ubaldini wrote as a teen.
“I wasn’t gonna get something out of it [from any of these small labels], he stated. “I assumed I’d put it out sooner or later however I’m not gonna put it out and simply get ripped off. I’ve been by way of an excessive amount of in music to get ripped off once more.”
The unique lineup of the Earwigs: Michael Ubaldini, Dave Reed, Ashton Rands, and Tom Hughes.
(Courtesy of Michael Ubaldini)
Earlier this yr, Ubaldini, impressed by the revived curiosity in his music, lastly took the leap and began to remaster the previous album of 17 tracks that he by no means put out, opting to press it independently. A brand new batch has arrived in time for the band’s final one-off present to commemorate their unlikely cult standing. The frontman is happy to promote copies to die-hard native followers who helped hold his music alive.
“I simply wish to launch this Earwigs factor, it deserves its place, it’s a part of that point and all these children wanna hear it,” Ubaldini stated. As to why the music itself appears to have caught on even after the revivalists bands like Jet, The Strokes and The Strypes have come and gone, he attributes it to the timeless, straight-ahead nature of the music. “It looks as if the songs by no means received dated often because we stayed away from the synthesizers and we simply performed rock-n-roll.”
Ubaldini wonders if the thriller of the band that by no means made it huge is what saved individuals interested in his previous music. “Folks had recorded our stuff and made bootlegs of our music for all these years and it kinda took on a bizarre lifetime of its personal. It’s kinda thoughts blowing after I give it some thought,” he stated. “There was not one ounce of promotion or something. It was actually all due to the underground scene.”
