Anybody Here Seen My Old Friend MOLLY Hatchet?

Just before Molly Hatchet went onstage, Keith Johnson—their road manager— escorted me to an unusually good seat. I was three, maybe four feet from where Dave Hlubek would be playing. Of course, the audience couldn’t see me behind the amps, but what the hell. A dramatic example of the power and prestige of the press.

Johnson looked over at a roadie. “Don’t fuck with this guy,” he warned, “he’s from Circus magazine.” Ross Marino

Like I was saying, this is sure an interesting job, albeit a bit low-profile. Of course it doesn’t really matter where I’m from, even though a lot of nice people have suggested possible places I might wanna go. What matters here is Molly Hatchet, the thundering voice of Jacksonville, Florida. You remember Molly Hatchet: they’re the ones with the Frank Frazetta album covers that probably make Arnold Schwarznagger think it’s time he got serious about pumping iron.

On the other hand, maybe you don’t remember them. Their latest product (No

Cuts...No Glory) came out 16 months after their last LP. Sixteen months in the record biz is about 57 years in real time. Guts finds the guys reunited with their original singer, Danny Joe Brown, after a two-album absence.

This is a good deal all the way around, since their two albums with D.J. are both platinum. Their third is gold, strictly on inertia, and their fourth is.. .let’s see, how can I best put this?...available. Meanwhile, the CBS/Epic album Danny Joe Brown And The Danny Joe Brown Band (that’s the one you’ve heard about that Danny Joe is on) was shipped with excels starch.

So happy times are here again. Or, maybe not. I got the story from Dave Hlubek—who started the band some 12 years ago, is one of their three guitarists, believes that Black Sabbath “sounds like the Devil’s music,” and owns 97 (no kidding) guitars of his own. Pretty much your musician-next-door. According to Hlubek, “Molly Hatchet is the last of our kind. It’s like all the other bands that are left in the South are watching the charts to' see how we do.-Because if we don’t do it, well, they haven’t got a prayer.”

Dunno about that, although Hlubek adds this: “We were the Metal from the South when we first came out. We opened the door for the Blackfoots and the .38 Specials. We were the heaviest of our kind after a decade of Allman Brothers > and we’re very, very proud to be carrying the Stars and Bars.”

That’s the Confederate flag, for you readers who don’t attend the University of Mississippi. The question before the house is: are the 1983-style Molly Hatchet closer to Bull Run or Appomatox? No Guts.. .No Glory is doing pretty well and even garnered the coveted thumbs-up from People magazine. Which made me wonder why MH was opening a show for Sammy Hatjar. Really, I’d need a detailed explanation of why anyone would wanna open a door for Sammy Hagar.

\ “We took the Hagar tour as a second choice,” Hlubek said. “We were in the bidding for the ZZ Top tour, but Bill Ham— their manager—didn’t want to take a chance on us. Because it’s not in vogue and it’s not stylish to be from the South now.

“We didn’t tour the U.S. when the album came out—we toured Germany, France and Switzerland. We packed the halls; we’re huge over there. Critics in Europe said,

‘Why are you over here first with a new album out in the States?’... well, it was a new album over there, too. No Guts.. .No Glory sold 20,000 copies in eight days in Germany. Eight days! And France, about the same numbers. That’s a lot for that market.

I will not play synthetic plastic music. — Dave Hlubek

“People ask us why we aren’t headlining. [Actually, they’ll headline most of the tour, especially in Stars and Bars-ville.] There’s a very good reason: this is 1978 all over again for us.”

Quite true, since they’ve been off the road for a spell, they’ve got a new rhythm section, and Danny Joe Brown—the man CBS/Epic likes to pawn off as “the Charles Bronson of rock ’n’ roll”—has returned to the fold. But I’ve begged a lot of questions so far, and I beg your pardon. The new Hatchet disc isn’t God-awful by any means, but it’s highly unlikely anyone will regard it a milestone, or even a yard-marker. The best tunes—“Kinda Like Love,” a sort of uptempo ballad and “Sweet Dixie,” a harmonylick dance number—deserve some airplay. A lot of the promo for Guts revolves around “Fall Of The Peacemakers,” though, an 8:06 ditty about nice people who are no longer living. CBS/Epic puts it this way: “(A) song that movingly relates the sadness and confusion over the senseless deaths of John Lennon and John F. Kennedy.” Hey, somebody tell ’em that murders aren’t the only things that are senseless. I mean it, are you moved by a line like: “Imagine we called him a dreamer?' We’re talking U-Haul junction here, fans.

None of this daunts Molly H.*, though, who had the considerable panache to play “Peacemakers” as an encore the night I saw ’em. Not only that, their second encore was “Crossroads” (as in God), which certainly gave the paying customers what you call a contrast. Well, maybe they’re halfway serious about this guts and glory scam.

It’s fairly clear we need to answer some questions about Molly Hatchet. I don’t mean which album Jagger liked (Take No Prisoners) , the awful truth behind the Danny Joe/Hatchet split (“It was planned...it was no different than the split between Kevin Cronin and REO”), or even why anyone would think three guitarists is a fine idea. Hell, this world’s seen the Blue Oyster Cult.

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I mean very deep questions, like relevance and your attendant phenomena. Mr. Hlubek is a religious person, which I presume gives him the willies about Black Sab. Stay with me here. Everyone knows that Sabbath have the same relationship with religion that Ronco has with haute cuisine i of course—except for Hlubek (who’s a Catholic, for What’s-His-Name’s sake) and maybe a couple dozen people selling flowers. Listen to this story.

“Black Sabbath, to me—they suck a big one. I think they’re sacriligious. This is only my opinion, but there’s no reason—when the good Lord gives you the luxury of success—to go in front of these impressionable people and give the sign of the beast.

“I saw them play in Hawaii, and it rained onstage. But on/y onstage when they were playing! The left side of the stadium caught on fire. And there was a granite Cross on a mountain, miles away...you could see it from the show. It was glowing white-hot while they were playing. I had to go there later on to make sure I wasn’t seeing things.”

Hmm, relevance. MH is in the same biz Duran Duran and Culture Club’s in. What’s the verdict on those hard workers? “Those kind of groups can kiss my ass. To me, that’s not relevant. Boy George can sing; he’s got a fine voice. He doesn’t have to play a fucking faggot. There’s groups that can make a good record, but I haven’t seen any of these new modern music bands that can fill a 12,000 seat hall.”

Ah, relevance. Scary sword-and-sorcery album covers. “We were being billed as bikers with guitars. The covers might’ve been cornball—but cornball enough to draw people inside. The Death-dealer (Molly Hatchet)—it was awesome; it drew you toward it. It was made to be threatening. And the first four albums follow that theme of struggle and victory.”

OK, that’s how Dave Hlubek sees things. You might not see things that way; it’s not perzactly my overview, either. But I’ll give the guy credit for opening his mouth, e.g., “I’ve been told I say too much” or “This is one of the first interviews I’ve done where I’ve said anything about the Deity.” Hey, it beats the hell out of talking about Joe Strummer’s anything.

I’ll grant that Hatchet are relevant in an abstract way. Like you, I tire of Limey art; it’s bands like MH that serve as nostalgic Frankensteins, remindings that this whole yip started in the Southern United States. “They’d better get used to us, ’cause we’re gonna be around for a long time,” Hlubek told me.

To a lot.of people, they’ve already been around forever. Whether they can prosper and grow is another question, given what is believed to be the state of the art. “I’ll admit to you, I’m secured of the future,” Hlubek said. “I’m scared of what I might do. We will not adjust or change—I just can’t be something that’s not me. I will not play syn. thetic plastic music.” All this while Sammy Hagar glow-in-the-dark T-shirts are being sold at 10 bucks a shot. ^