Franklin's Garage to Stage
All things starting a musical band. From garage to stage getting your band going and beyond.
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Franklin's Garage to Stage
Echoes from the Wild Goose Bar
Eric Bogumil might have been just 17 when he joined our band, but his journey from garage rehearsals to the stage is nothing short of inspiring. With a little encouragement from friends and perhaps a touch of liquid courage, Eric found his footing in our musical ensemble back in 1987. Together, we revisit those electrifying early gigs, sharing tales of our debut at Duke's Wild Goose Bar and the unforgettable camaraderie of playing for an under-21 audience, all while balancing atop a precarious stage setup.
Managing the dynamics of a band can be as intricate as navigating a marriage, and that’s no exaggeration. We unpack the complexities of maintaining harmony within the group, drawing on personal stories from our time with Threshold. Eric and I reminisce about the importance of communication and the unspoken challenges we faced, from mental health struggles to the courage required to transcend our own limits. Alongside these reflections, we also recount some lighter moments that bring to life the vibrant local music scene we were once a part of.
As we share memories of outrageous stage outfits and makeup mishaps, we also delve into the stories behind our band Deadly Grin and the creation of "Man Made Sin." Our conversation touches on the ever-evolving music industry and the role social media plays in bridging geographical distances for potential collaborations. We conclude by expressing our gratitude to our supporters, whose contributions help us continue this creative journey and keep the spirit of our early music days alive.
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Hello and welcome to Franklin's Garage to Stage. My name is Rob Wardrums Franklin and my co-host is Dana Thunderbase Franklin. How you doing, man? Good, good, we've got a special guest with us today. I'll introduce him in a minute, but first a couple of housekeeping things we want to do. We had a couple of texts with questions, one from Chattanooga, tennessee but instead of addressing it here, I'm going to ask that you send us a text with your e-mail address so that we can get the information you requested from us. And I also want to thank. We've gotten a couple downloads from overseas and we'd love to hear from you guys both in the UK and Germany. So please do text us your email so we can get a hold of you. That would be outstanding hearing from you guys. So now I'm going to introduce our special guest today. Who are you, man?
Speaker 2:My name is Eric Bogumil. How's everyone doing out there?
Speaker 1:Cool, it's really good to hear from you, man, it's been a while. Huh, bogomil, how's everyone doing out there? Cool, it's really good to hear from you, man, it's been a while.
Speaker 2:Huh, it's been quite a long time, man. It's been decades. Where's the time gone? Yeah, exactly so if you could give us a brief description of how you know us and how did we get together. Well, let's see. You guys were my first band, I'm going to guess the year being probably 86, 87.
Speaker 1:Exactly yeah, it was, it was, it was 87.
Speaker 2:Was it 87? Yeah, yeah, I couldn't figure. I was trying to figure that out the other day. I was 17 years old and scared, shitless, and you know I had a buddy who was in another band, his name was Mark Grover and he sort of you know. You know, if it wasn't for him actually really just pushing me to do it, I don't know if I would have actually jumped into it. It was, you know, he gave me the confidence to know that you can do this, you know, and he kind of set me up with a PA and, um, I was off and running with some, uh, older guys that could get we're over 21 and I was 17 and I grew up really fast.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I remember you were. You were just a pup back then. But I'll tell you what man. We were listening to some of our old material. For our first couple of times we played out which is what this episode is about is hitting the stage. But you were our first singer when we actually started playing in bars and we were, like I said, we were listening to some of our old tapes and, dude, you were amazing. You sounded excellent.
Speaker 2:Thank you, I'd love to hear those. I haven't heard those in, like I was saying, probably 40 years. I mean, I've got one video of us from years ago but you know the audio is not great. Yeah, back then Maybe we can reconnect and listen to some of that stuff one day.
Speaker 1:Of course. Of course, I do have one question for you. Our previous episodes were about basically just starting in a garage or rehearsal place and getting a band together. What do you remember from back?
Speaker 2:in those days of us first getting together, what I remember is, you know, kind of just walking in the room and everyone looking at me and I was like OK, now it's time to make it happen. And you know I was pretty nervous and I was kind of holding back a little bit. And then I think it was you, rob, who said come on, man, have a fucking couple beers. And after I had a couple beers I loosened right up and started, you know, hitting some of those high notes that I was always been famous for, and you know we were off and running.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you did an outstanding job. You know we were off and running. Yeah, you did an outstanding job. Hey, dana, refresh our memories of how we actually hit the first bar that we ever played in with this guy here.
Speaker 3:All right. Well, we played at this place called Duke's Wild Goose Bar. It was a bar, basically inside this mall, and there was a steakhouse that they were kind of affiliated with, and about 9 o'clock they shut it down and they let bands jam there. So I knew the bartender that worked there from a previous job and I ran into him somewhere at Del Mar's or one of the other clubs that we were out at, and we just started catching up and I mentioned, well, we're getting this band together and we'd like to come, and he's like well, I'm a bartender at this, at this bar, and we're looking for bands. So you know, I told him the kind of stuff that we were doing material we were doing and and he's like well, let's set you up. And there we were.
Speaker 3:It's like our first. I believe it was in january of 87 and we we booked a weekend there and we just, you know, the funny thing about it is, you know most of it, like I said, it's a bar and most of our crowd at the time, um, you know, the funny thing about it is, you know most of it, like I said, it was a bar and most of our crowd at the time, you know, friends of ours, friends of Eric's and stuff, and a lot of them were under 21. So we had probably about 100 people that were ready to come in there and watch us and about a good 50 or 60 of them got turned away at the door. So that part kind of sucked, but it was a good experience.
Speaker 1:Eric, what do you remember about that that show at the wild goose?
Speaker 2:duke's wild goose bar. I remember you guys remember how small the stage was yeah, up on top of, up behind the bar we got. We had to kind of get up up high, kind of up over the, up over the bar in the one corner there, and I remember there wasn't much place to move around for us, especially with having five guys up there.
Speaker 1:And do you remember the pics that we took? Remember we were on the dance floor and my fiancée at the time her brother took the pictures of us.
Speaker 2:and what a group we were Older guys, guys, younger guys I remember I think I still have one picture of that, just you know being on like an old flyer. But you know, any other pictures you have I'd love to. I better be careful what I wish for, because what I was wearing it was you know I just going to address that.
Speaker 1:We all kind of looked. We were all really different kind of guys, but we all totally looked different.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I was again going back to Mark Grover who kind of pushed me into it. You know, I would go over to his house before we were playing and he'd let me kind of rummage through his wardrobe Because I didn't have anything. I didn't anything. I eventually ended up buying some stuff. I was basically wearing his clothes. I had his old PA. It was pretty wild, that first show. I remember looking up in the crowd and then he's standing there. I'm like, oh my God, my mentor, the guy that I just didn't want to mess up too bad in front of him.
Speaker 1:You did excellent, man, but going back a little bit, After a couple shots of whiskey.
Speaker 2:I think Rob, again, I think again. Rob, you helped me out tremendously by telling me to go take a couple shots of whiskey beforehand.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm glad I could help man. Hey, going backwards a little bit. What do you remember about our practices Because we're kind of going through a thing again where we've had some difficulties with personnel but what do you remember about our practices back then?
Speaker 2:I remember we were in a basement somewhere off you know the Wells area over there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, you mean Dana's house.
Speaker 2:You know, and I remember you know, it was a really cool setup. I thought for, you know, we didn't have to have, you know, a heater like in a storage unit, or you know, we had a pretty good I thought. I don't know who lived there, maybe both you guys.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was both of us, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I remember, geez. I remember Neil and his curly locks flying around um. Who else was in that?
Speaker 1:it was gary bohanan, right right neil schlachter me and dana and you and then us, yeah. What impresses me, though, is, uh, the amount of tunes that we actually learned in such a short amount of time. It seems like with bands we've had recently, it's it's hard to get, you know, get through learning one set where, back then, we I think we had with four or four- or five sets 40 songs oh yeah, that was a lot of a lot of material.
Speaker 2:a lot of it was, um, you know, some of it was, if you guys correctly, there were some songs I refused to do.
Speaker 1:I couldn't get oh yeah, I think we all did that.
Speaker 2:I couldn't do Johnny Be Good, so, if you remember, gary had to sing that one yeah. I think you know, back with my ego or whatever you call it, it wasn't metal enough for me. It was like I'm not doing that and now, looking back, I'm like, hey, asshole, you know, that was like the beginning of rock and roll, so good job not doing that no-transcript.
Speaker 1:It was amazing, and you never read off notes or anything like that. A lot of singers nowadays are looking at their iPad just to remember their damn lyrics.
Speaker 2:What helped a lot was a lot of the songs I already knew. Some of them I was not too familiar with, like Swords and Tequila by Riot. I didn't know that one. I know we did some songs that were way out of my vocal range. Dokken some Scorpions, Iron Maiden, Did we do.
Speaker 1:The Trooper yes, we did, yes, we did yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, I'd like to, if you guys know, send me the songs we did, because if you say in 40, I can only remember maybe 10.
Speaker 3:Oh, yeah, oh, we'll definitely do that, we've got some old set lists laying around somewhere, oh yeah, oh, we'll definitely do that.
Speaker 2:I still got some old set lists laying around somewhere.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I'd love to see them. I can't remember I don't really remember I don't think we had any.
Speaker 2:We didn't have any originals, did we?
Speaker 3:We had one, but me and Rob were just talking about that. I still don't remember the name of it.
Speaker 1:I don't even remember how. Okay. But also kudos out to you, Eric, because you were the one that actually got the material to the people that published that book, Reno Rocks, and if it hadn't been for you we wouldn't even have gotten in that book, and I will shoot a picture of that to our website. But how did that all come about?
Speaker 2:Well, let me think about that.
Speaker 1:I might have a copy around here somewhere I've got a copy of the book. I was just wondering how you actually got the material to get us in that book.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, Do you guys have a copy of the book or no?
Speaker 1:Yes, we do.
Speaker 2:Oh you do. I didn't know if you were able to obtain one. Geez. The guy who put the book together his name's Mike Mantor. Him and his wife, jerry Foster McCarroll, um have been involved in the Reno music scene since, you know, way before we were rocking. He goes back into like the mid fifties, sixties. Yeah, I saw that a book on the first part of the decade called Rock and Reno. That was the first one and this is Rock and Reno 2, the sequel, and he was putting it together. He was a friend of mine on Facebook and I saw what he was doing and we were talking and he said any flyers, any information you have or any bands that you were ever in, we'd love to put them in there. So I got a couple different bands in there, I think.
Speaker 1:Cool, yeah, well, we appreciate you doing that, because we were in a couple bands after that, as you know, like Monolith, where we played for quite a while and of course, nobody was there to represent us. So I appreciate you representing us with vices back then.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and if I would have known about it I would have definitely had you guys give me more information. But we kind of had lost contact over the years.
Speaker 1:So at that point, well, what else do you remember about your experience with vices?
Speaker 2:Well, let's see, I was 17. I had Rob. You gave me your old ID. I don't know if you remember that.
Speaker 1:I don't.
Speaker 2:Because you know I couldn't get into the bars. We were worried.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, yeah, I remember that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I wasn't going to be able to play because I was so young, so I had your old ID. I can't remember how old it said I was 27 or something.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know I'm older, yeah it looked nothing like me.
Speaker 2:Nothing like me, you know. But here's the funny thing is, nobody ever asked me or questioned me in the clubs we played. But I was able to use that ID to get into bars moving forward. So thank you for that Of course.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you for singing with us. Like I said, you were outstanding.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I grew up really quick. I had an ID that said I was however old and yeah, let's just say the girls taught me a lot. Don't tell the older girls.
Speaker 1:So after Vices, what kind of became of you? What did you do in Reno?
Speaker 2:A couple things. I think. I don't even remember why I left the band, but I think it was to form another band with Mike Mello and Eric Alvarez called Lewd Vagrancy. I think they're in that book as well. I don't know if you've looked it up under my name, that book as well. If you I don't know if you've looked it up under my name you know and same old story. You know drugs, girls the same thing. That ruins every band.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, we've experienced that quite a bit.
Speaker 2:You know. So it was just kind of continuously trying to put together different projects here and there. And you know I had some that were. I had a band called threshold where we played quite a bit and, um, you know, it just never seemed to, it's so hard to get four or five people on the same page. If only I knew now what I know, then, you know, I think I'd be able to facilitate it a lot better, and I think I'd be able to communicate a lot better, because bands are all about communication.
Speaker 1:You know exactly, exactly, we didn't really.
Speaker 2:You know every band I was in, we really never talked about things that really needed to be talked about, which was, you know, even stuff like, you know not to sound too sappy, but you know mental health, you know addiction, things, people. You know we were all going through but nobody ever talked about it exactly you know what.
Speaker 1:It's a perfect segment from our last episode, because that's exactly what we talked about. It's so hard to get four or five guys together on the same page. It seems like it's harder and harder nowadays.
Speaker 2:When you think about how even everybody compares it to a marriage, and it's so true. You know how hard is it to really get along with your, your wife, girlfriend, and make a relationship last for longer than you know, a couple months or whatever. It's the same kind of thing but you're dealing with four or five different personalities. You know different backgrounds, different. Everyone's got their own ideas, everyone's got their own music they want to play. So you know, to collaborate it really takes. You know, the communication part of it's huge and back then it was, you know was never talked about. You'd sit down, you'd have a band meeting, but it was never.
Speaker 2:You know, usually you know how band meetings go one or two people did all the talking, right yeah, yeah, the other people kind of just were, couldn't wait to get it over with so they could go do whatever they were doing.
Speaker 1:Right and didn't really address the real problems, just talked about tunes they were going to do. Yeah, exactly, we discussed that in our last episode too, so I'm glad you're kind of reinforcing that, dana. What do you remember from back in the days with Eric?
Speaker 3:You know it's like you said. I remember, of course, the basement of our house. That was the ultimate place to practice, because we'd wake up and just walk downstairs and start playing every day. Then I just remember that, especially that first show, how nervous and excited that I was, and I'm sure everybody else was. And you know, once you get that first couple songs down, you know then the nerves are gone and then you just start kicking it out. But, um, yeah, it's.
Speaker 3:You know that first band was. You know, something I'll I'll never forget. And you know, I mean you were way more experienced than me. You know, of course I think gary and neil too I was kind of there with eric is my first real band. You know, I mean, you were way more experienced than me. And you know, of course, I think Gary and Neil too I was kind of there with Eric. It was my first real band. You know, I was nervous as shit and you know I was about a tenth of the player that I am now. You know it was just starting out, so I was afraid every song I was going to fuck up and everybody was going to look at me like what are you doing? But Like what are you doing. But we pulled it off Eric for being the newbies in the band.
Speaker 2:We did okay, we did. Okay, we fake it until you make it Exactly.
Speaker 3:Exactly. I mean for you it was a little bit harder because you know you're the front man and you know I could hide behind the guitar sound if I missed a note or damn even a whole measure.
Speaker 3:You'd be like, oh okay, I'll just slide back in next time, but uh, it was. You know it was, it was fun, it was. You know. I recommend it to any young musician out there that is maybe a little hesitant to get something going or to go forward. It's like you're never going to get better by playing by yourself at home. You know, you've, you've got to push your limits to, you know, and that's that's what you and Advices did for me is it got me going and it pushed me, like I said, learning 40, 50 songs in a matter of a couple of months. You know, now it's like we're trying to get guys together just to get past seven or eight songs.
Speaker 2:It's killing us.
Speaker 3:But it was a good time.
Speaker 1:Hey, eric, we have this thing we call special segment oh shit, oh shit and it's basically saying something that was either embarrassing or funny, or something during either a practice or an episode, or I mean, or during a performance. So I'm going to let Dana lead off with this one, but as he's doing that, think about something that was embarrassing to you on stage, or fun, or fun, or yeah, just out of the usual yeah, and mine goes, it's not really practice or stage related, it's uh, you know it's.
Speaker 3:It's kind about the relationship part of it which, um, you know, if anybody's in the local band scene they know that. You know it's a small circle and everybody knows everybody. And eric, this is kind of this kind of falls in line with you and me actually, and rob, we uh we met at del mar once, which is the local hangout where all the cool bands played, and we go there every weekend and party. And we walked into the front door and and at the at the time I was like the first time I started dating this one girl and she was working at a little side stand there selling some beer, and I walked up there and started talking to her and of course Rob was there and you walked by and me and Rob were just I don't know, I forgot what we were talking about, and you're like, hey, it's Franklin's. And then this girl looked at me because, like I said, we were just starting to date. She's like you're one of the Franklins. So I'm not sure exactly what you said to her about us, but and you'll remember her because it's funny, because you actually went out with her too.
Speaker 3:Her name is Joy, and, and the funny story about that that even goes even a little bit deeper is that my wife now used to hang out at your house because her and your sister were really good friends, and her name is robin. She used to hang out with your sister all the time. I forgot your sister's name. She said tracy, tracy, yeah, yeah and, and I don't know if you remember a little girl named robin that used to hang out with your sister, but she's now my wife and she's she told me to tell you hi oh, rob, what's her last name, or what was her last?
Speaker 1:it was uh cabinas at the time cabinas yeah too many to remember, huh I don't remember her.
Speaker 3:You know, see. Well, she remembers you.
Speaker 2:So you made an impression well, yeah, you know I not to sound egotistical, but you know, all my sister's friends were like trying to get with me. You know, I don't know if she was so like I purposely just ignored them all. I just did not want to have anything to do with her friends, or you know it was just weird, but that's cool. That's a small circle, yeah it really is.
Speaker 1:I'm going to say that again.
Speaker 2:So you and you met Joy there, or you were dating her. I didn't understand that part.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I met Joy at actually this place called Hooters that I used to work at. We all know Hooters.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and she told me that she worked at Del Mar. So I went there to visit her that one night and I guess you dated her in the past. And another funny thing is Joy and robin, my wife. Now we're actually really friends. So it's just a small circle. Everybody knew everybody in the music scene and you know, to make it even smaller is like you know, robin's brother, kevin, was in local bands and I knew him even before. I knew that he had a sister that I ended up marrying. So it's just a strange small circle and and it's not like that anymore out there.
Speaker 3:I mean you know nowadays, you know it's, it's people just don't get. People don't get out like that I mean it's.
Speaker 1:It's a whole different world out there now okay, well, my it's not as social yeah, well, my experience was actually at this, uh, this bar. We were talking about our first um, first outing with vices, um, at this wild, what was it called dukes? Yeah well, anyway, we're playing there and, uh, halfway or I guess our first break we took um, my fiancee at the time was there and she brought her mother and she was kind of tucked right around the corner and I had never met her. So here here I am, first time playing out with spandex on and a tiger stripe, you know jacket and all this crap, and I'm introduced to my future mother-in-law. So that was a kind of my embarrassing moment at that time. We first played out how about you, eric? What do you got?
Speaker 2:uh, let me think about that. I think I'm not sure if it was the first or second show. Right Got off stage, you know, went up to the bar feeling good, feeling like, okay, you know, I killed it, sat down with between a couple of girls and they're talking to me and I'm thinking, oh yeah, this is great. You know all the girls love me and you know all the girls love me and you know all this stuff. This is great. And mid-sentence I can't remember her name, but you know she says she goes, wait, wait, wait. She goes. Your makeup is running, sweet, and I guess my eyeliner that I was wearing was running down my face. She got a napkin and dipped it in some water. So here I think I'm being this stud and I think she was probably older and she's thinking she's helping out this little boy because his makeup's running.
Speaker 3:It was like, oh my God, oh, that's great Alice Cooper in the making.
Speaker 2:Yeah, your makeup is running sweetie. Like I was this little boy, you know, it was like I was like crawling under a rock.
Speaker 1:Okay, Well, we have a song that you sent us from one of your bands after us that we're actually going to use for the pre-, mid and rollout segments of this episode. Is there anything you want to tell us about that song and that band? I believe it was called. What was the name of that tune? You sang man Made Sin.
Speaker 2:Man Made Sin.
Speaker 1:Can you tell us about that band?
Speaker 2:The name of the band was Deadly Grin. Same kind of deal Hard to get four or five people to commit. So you know, we we weren't together very long, but we did write quite a few originals that were really good, and the song I sent you is not really finished. That was just like a recording from a rehearsal. You remember we used to put the old boom box in the middle of it.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, this was a little different. You know, we had a. I think we had a four or an eight track ready to go, I don't know.
Speaker 1:It actually sounds very, very good.
Speaker 2:But it came out okay for just being a practice. But you know I hear a lot of gaffes in there.
Speaker 1:Well, we're our own worst critics, that's for sure. So so what have you been up to, uh, lately? What's your? What was your last project?
Speaker 2:it was deadly grin. That was. That was the band. You know. We still kind of working with the guitar player. His name is jeff stewart, um great guitar player from the bay area. He um, you know, I mentioned this him. He said he would be interested in coming on if you guys would have him.
Speaker 1:Oh, of course. Yeah, the more musicians that come on, the better, because we're trying to get information out there for new bands, like what we experience, what they can expect to experience, and basically try to help them out, if we can too, with some of our experiences.
Speaker 2:Well, it's a medical issue, so it's hard for us to kind of get together too much. But you know he grew up in the Bay Area. He's a couple years older than me but you know he was friends with like all those guys in Metallica Testament. Like he's got stories, he's got pictures, you know, with him and some of these guys from back in the day. So he was really immersed in the scene and you know he had a great band. I can't remember the name of them now but uh, they were kind of the second wave of the the bay area thrash metal scene okay, very good um, and they were really good.
Speaker 2:You know, he's kind of underrated. You know a lot, of, a lot of musicians that are the best musicians I've ever heard are not famous. Yeah, exactly, exactly they weren't in the right place at the right time. They weren't. You know, a lot of things have to go right for you to actually quote unquote.
Speaker 1:Make it, yeah, and with social media. Now you have to be. I mean, you have to have a million hits to even get listened to Nowadays.
Speaker 2:I'm I'm completely oblivious to what goes on with that sort of thing. But, yeah, so now you know we're still trying to work on some of these songs that we have, but, uh, it's been hard to get together and you know, without a drummer you know it's even tougher. I'm trying. I got, uh, some drum software that I use, but I'm not that great, no drummer in a box got any closing things to say.
Speaker 2:Eric, we're just about out of time here, but I want to say it's been. I know it's actually awesome to reconnect with you guys.
Speaker 3:I'd like to stay in touch. Yeah, I mean, there's ways to collaborate now long distance, so we might have to throw some ideas back and forth at each other and get something going.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm game for that If we can figure it out. I mean, I had another bunch of guys around the country that I used to play with that were talking the same thing. So you know, I'm up for anything. And I was in another band called Bulletproof and my old guitar player is up in Washington and he's trying to figure something out how we can do something long distance. But I'd be more than happy to try to get a couple of Vices original songs down or something there. You go.
Speaker 1:So for anybody out there listening that's got any information, for us, that's the best way to be able to send files back and forth, to be able to jam with each other. We'd appreciate any feedback you have. So, once again, please do text us your emails so that we can communicate with you, and if you want to be a guest, please contact us. Dana, do you have any closing?
Speaker 3:statements. I'd like to thank all the people out there that are contributing to the website and helping us out financially. That keeps us going and helps us get guests and stuff, and just thanks for all your support. Appreciate it. And, eric, thanks again for joining, for all your support.
Speaker 1:Appreciate it. And, Eric, thanks again for joining us today as a guest. It's been a pleasure talking to you. I really miss our days of jamming together because you were outstanding. I know we were all pretty experienced back then, but listening to the tapes like we were just doing earlier, me and Dana- we actually did some pretty good work for our age and experience levels.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Thank you guys for having me. I appreciate it. Hey, hold on a minute. We're going to close here. So once again, everybody, please do text us and we also have a link on our website to support us if you feel the need to be able to help us out to get more guests, because software is not cheap nowadays. So, thank you everybody. Have a good night.
