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Die laughing
Lost City Angels pay tribute to a fallen comrade
BY CARLY CARIOLI

Later this month, Boston’s darkest-hued punk-pop outfit, the Lost City Angels, are hitting the road with Australian punkabillies the Living End. But before they go, they’re playing a gig in memory of a fallen comrade. If you’ve been to a Lost City Angels show, you may have encountered their opening act, a middle-aged (and often visibly drunk) stand-up comic who went by the name Styles Bitchley, and whose inebriated routines could play as anti-comedy in the vein of Andy Kaufman and Neil Hamburger. Styles, whose real name was David Blaney, died this past February at age 46 after suffering a heart attack at T.T. the Bear’s Place, just before an LCA performance. "He died exactly the way his mother did," says LCA drummer Adam Shaw. "His mother died the week after her 46th birthday at a VFW hall in front of all her friends." This Friday the band returns to T.T.’s to play a benefit show in his honor; Blaney’s family has refused to accept any donations, but the proceeds will be given to a charity of their choosing.

"In a way, we had given him a second life, we’d hung out with him and we’d become great friends with him," Shaw continues. "Styles was an infamous character at a bar called the Triple D’s in JP. I heard he was this out-of-control old punk-rock dude who loved to smoke pot. I get this note from him one day, an envelope with two joints saying, ‘Check out my stuff.’ But his brother told me, ‘You’ve really gotta check out his record collection.’ So one day I went over there, and I was floored. We’re talking about a 40-year-old dude with the sickest records I’d ever seen. He had first pressings of everything on Taang!, Clash first pressings, shit sealed that he’d never listened to. Thousands upon thousands of seven-inches, tapes, videos, albums in chronological order. We just hit it off.

"One time he brought out this sketchbook, and it was titled ‘The Bombity of Styles Bitchley.’ It was filled with tons of these disgusting fucking jokes. Ruthless shit. Most of which couldn’t be repeated in front of women and children. But it was hilarious. And to top it, he said he had this band in his head called Styles Bitchley and the Bodybags. We said, ‘Dude you’ve got to open for us.’

"He ended up opening the first-ever Lost City Angels show at the Middle East. He was scared shitless. Comes out in this black tux, blue ruffled shirt, totally hammered. Went out and got completely assaulted by the crowd, but he was tearing into them at the same time. It was the funniest thing I’d ever seen. I remember my girlfriend saying to me, ‘What are you doing to that poor guy?’ He came off stage and said, ‘I’ll never do that again.’ But we talked him into it. The second time we opened for Fear, and he loved Lee Ving. He wanted Lee Ving to watch him, and Lee sat on the side of the stage, dying laughing. Afterward, Lee went up to Styles and said, ‘That was great!’ And Styles was drunk, he was saying, ‘Lee, Lee, I love you!’ Made his fucking night."

Blaney never quite got over his stage fright. He often drank to calm his nerves; one night, he arrived on stage so drunk, he forgot his entire routine. He sang a loud, boisterous song and then dropped his pants. "The night before [his death]," Shaw recalls, "I was at his house and he was talking about his funeral. We had been partying our asses off, and he said the weirdest shit. He said, ‘This is the band that’s gonna change things, it’s gonna change your life, you’ve got to continue doing this band.’ And then the next day, we lost him.

"That was a really weird night. We were added at the last minute to a Kings of Nuthin’ show. It was jam-packed, sold out. But I had an odd feeling in my stomach. I was setting up my kit, and someone came over and said Styles was having a seizure. I thought it was a joke, but I ran over and he was going into cardiac arrest." Shaw and two friends, one a merchant marine and the other an off-duty police officer, tried to resucitate him. "We started working on him, we got him back, he started breathing, and then the breath just started slowly disappearing. The EMTs showed up and I rode along to the hospital, but ultimately we lost him right there on the floor."

Lost City Angels play this Friday, May 21, at T.T. the Bear’s Place, 10 Brookline Street in Central Square; call (617) 492-BEAR. They’ll also play acoustic at the "Chords and Discourse" tribute to Social Distortion this Saturday, May 22, at the Paradise Lounge, 969 Commonwealth Avenue in Boston; call (617) 562-8814.


Issue Date: May 21 - 27, 2004
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