I Don't Need Your Kind of Fun
A rare and unreleased 40-year-old Silly Killers demo—recorded in the basement of a house shared by members of the Fastbacks and with a 19-year-old future Rock & Roll Hall of Famer on drums—offers insights into Seattle's early punk scene.
By Todd Matthews | Dec. 1, 2024
Copyright © 2024. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright © 2024. All Rights Reserved.
Silly Killers' drummer Tim Gowell, vocalist Eddie Huletz, guitarist/co-founder Chris "Slats" Harvey, and bassist/co-founder Gary Clukey in Seattle's University District ca. 1982.
(PHOTO COURTESY EMILY RIEMAN)
1. — "Wanna be a rock star? Drum for the Silly Killers."
Recording an album in the dank, unfinished basement of a North Seattle home is hardly comparable to the Beatles at Abbey Road, Jimi Hendrix at Electric Lady Studios, or Nirvana at Sound City. But in February 1983, members of the punk band Silly Killers crowded into such an unremarkable space—low ceiling, noisy furnace, spare bedroom—to record a demo in hopes of finding a new drummer.
Nirvana. Pearl Jam. Soundgarden. These bands come to mind when you think about Seattle music. But roughly a decade before those headliners, fledgling punk bands like 10 Minute Warning, the Accüsed, Bootboys, Fartz, Fastbacks, Living, Refuzors, U-Men, Vains, and others comprised much of Seattle's early 1980s punk scene—late teens and early twenties (mostly) male musicians playing loud and angry punk rock for their friends at rented halls and community centers. These were DIY shows with blown-out amps and "a buck a band" cover charges (three bucks would get you in the door to see three bands).
The Silly Killers were a part of that scene, playing all-ages shows at Oddfellows Hall and St. Joe's Hall on Capitol Hill, Ground Zero and the Metropolis in Pioneer Square, the Central District’s Polish Hall, Beacon Hill's Serbian Hall, Seattle Center's Mural Amphitheatre, and Queen Anne's Dez's 400, the Norway Center, and Munro's Dance Palace. They even opened for touring bands like Black Flag, D.O.A., Hüsker Dü, and Social Distortion when they rolled through Seattle.
When asked to recall some of the earliest and most influential shows he attended, Pearl Jam lead guitarist Mike McCready listed Van Halen and KISS at Seattle Center, Motörhead at the Paramount, and the Silly Killers at the Laurelhurst Fieldhouse (McCready, in his mid-teens, recalled watching the show through a window with a friend while standing outside in the dark).
"[The Silly Killers] were certainly a big part of my music history in the early 1980s," Fastbacks guitarist Kurt Bloch told me. "The Silly Killers probably did as well as they could. They got to play some great shows with some cool touring bands. They worked pretty hard [and] did a fair amount of shows."
Formed by bassist/songwriter Gary Clukey and guitarist/songwriter Chris "Slats" Harvey in 1981, vocalist Eddie Huletz and drummer Tim Gowell rounded out the Silly Killers.
The Silly Killers didn't make music history when they recorded that basement demo 40-plus years ago. But the demo was recorded in a home rented by bassist/vocalist Kim Warnick and guitarist/vocalist Lulu Gargiulo, members of the pioneering power-punk quartet the Fastbacks. The session's fill-in drummer, Duff McKagan (19 years old at the time), went on to play bass in Guns N' Roses and was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2012. The Silly Killers’ lead guitarist, Chris "Slats" Harvey, achieved some level of local celebrity in later years just for being, well, Slats—an inimitable and charismatic presence in Seattle's bars, clubs, and rehearsal studios throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, often wearing his signature, all-black "uniform" of a New York Dolls T-shirt, leather jacket, skinny jeans, and a wide bolero hat. And the band's only studio EP, released more than 40 years ago, fetches several hundred dollars on Discogs and eBay today.
With the basement demo in hand, the Silly Killers' co-founder and bassist/songwriter Clukey placed a classified advertisement in The Rocket's March 1983 issue--Wanna be a rock star? Do it, drum for the Silly Killers. Must be willing to: do originals, travel, practice, play fast and loud. Gary 522-8361. The band seemed poised to find a new drummer and play more shows, but the Silly Killers broke up by year's end. Still, that unreleased basement recording is a rarity when you consider the Silly Killers' entire catalog, which consists of a four-song EP and two tracks on a compilation cassette released in 1983 and crowded with 20 songs by 11 bands.
In spring 2024, I reached out to Clukey, who is 69 years old and lives a quiet life in Colorado. I wanted to learn more about the band and its enigmatic guitarist, Slats, who died in 2010. We exchanged letters and emails initially, then spoke by telephone. During one of those conversations, Clukey mentioned the basement demo. "I've carried that cassette back and forth across the country for the past 40 years," he explained. "I didn't give a copy of that tape to anyone other than Slats."
Could I listen to it?
"It's nothing personal, but I don't want my songs co-opted by someone you may be inclined to share it with," he replied. Fair enough. After further letters and phone calls, Clukey surprised me: "I have the basement tape digitized. Hell, you might as well hear it." One week later, the demo arrived on CD in my mailbox. Surprised and delighted, I dusted off an old CD player, loaded the disc, and pressed play.
Nirvana. Pearl Jam. Soundgarden. These bands come to mind when you think about Seattle music. But roughly a decade before those headliners, fledgling punk bands like 10 Minute Warning, the Accüsed, Bootboys, Fartz, Fastbacks, Living, Refuzors, U-Men, Vains, and others comprised much of Seattle's early 1980s punk scene—late teens and early twenties (mostly) male musicians playing loud and angry punk rock for their friends at rented halls and community centers. These were DIY shows with blown-out amps and "a buck a band" cover charges (three bucks would get you in the door to see three bands).
The Silly Killers were a part of that scene, playing all-ages shows at Oddfellows Hall and St. Joe's Hall on Capitol Hill, Ground Zero and the Metropolis in Pioneer Square, the Central District’s Polish Hall, Beacon Hill's Serbian Hall, Seattle Center's Mural Amphitheatre, and Queen Anne's Dez's 400, the Norway Center, and Munro's Dance Palace. They even opened for touring bands like Black Flag, D.O.A., Hüsker Dü, and Social Distortion when they rolled through Seattle.
When asked to recall some of the earliest and most influential shows he attended, Pearl Jam lead guitarist Mike McCready listed Van Halen and KISS at Seattle Center, Motörhead at the Paramount, and the Silly Killers at the Laurelhurst Fieldhouse (McCready, in his mid-teens, recalled watching the show through a window with a friend while standing outside in the dark).
"[The Silly Killers] were certainly a big part of my music history in the early 1980s," Fastbacks guitarist Kurt Bloch told me. "The Silly Killers probably did as well as they could. They got to play some great shows with some cool touring bands. They worked pretty hard [and] did a fair amount of shows."
Formed by bassist/songwriter Gary Clukey and guitarist/songwriter Chris "Slats" Harvey in 1981, vocalist Eddie Huletz and drummer Tim Gowell rounded out the Silly Killers.
The Silly Killers didn't make music history when they recorded that basement demo 40-plus years ago. But the demo was recorded in a home rented by bassist/vocalist Kim Warnick and guitarist/vocalist Lulu Gargiulo, members of the pioneering power-punk quartet the Fastbacks. The session's fill-in drummer, Duff McKagan (19 years old at the time), went on to play bass in Guns N' Roses and was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2012. The Silly Killers’ lead guitarist, Chris "Slats" Harvey, achieved some level of local celebrity in later years just for being, well, Slats—an inimitable and charismatic presence in Seattle's bars, clubs, and rehearsal studios throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, often wearing his signature, all-black "uniform" of a New York Dolls T-shirt, leather jacket, skinny jeans, and a wide bolero hat. And the band's only studio EP, released more than 40 years ago, fetches several hundred dollars on Discogs and eBay today.
With the basement demo in hand, the Silly Killers' co-founder and bassist/songwriter Clukey placed a classified advertisement in The Rocket's March 1983 issue--Wanna be a rock star? Do it, drum for the Silly Killers. Must be willing to: do originals, travel, practice, play fast and loud. Gary 522-8361. The band seemed poised to find a new drummer and play more shows, but the Silly Killers broke up by year's end. Still, that unreleased basement recording is a rarity when you consider the Silly Killers' entire catalog, which consists of a four-song EP and two tracks on a compilation cassette released in 1983 and crowded with 20 songs by 11 bands.
In spring 2024, I reached out to Clukey, who is 69 years old and lives a quiet life in Colorado. I wanted to learn more about the band and its enigmatic guitarist, Slats, who died in 2010. We exchanged letters and emails initially, then spoke by telephone. During one of those conversations, Clukey mentioned the basement demo. "I've carried that cassette back and forth across the country for the past 40 years," he explained. "I didn't give a copy of that tape to anyone other than Slats."
Could I listen to it?
"It's nothing personal, but I don't want my songs co-opted by someone you may be inclined to share it with," he replied. Fair enough. After further letters and phone calls, Clukey surprised me: "I have the basement tape digitized. Hell, you might as well hear it." One week later, the demo arrived on CD in my mailbox. Surprised and delighted, I dusted off an old CD player, loaded the disc, and pressed play.
(CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT) Between 1981 and 1983, the Silly Killers searched for a drummer in The Rocket, shared a bill with fellow punk rock luminaries, performed at downtown Seattle's Showbox, recorded a demo tape, and released a four-song EP. (SHOWBOX / DEMO TAPE PHOTOS COURTESY GARY CLUKEY)
2. — "In a house without corners, the devil can't catch you."
Before there were the Silly Killers, there were the Zipdads, a nascent punk band comprised of four teenagers: guitarist Slats, who had a Gibson SG, a Fender amp, and a few years of Village Music guitar lessons to his credit; Duff McKagan, Andy "Freeze" Fortier, and Scott Dittman. In his memoir How To Be A Man (And Other Illusions), McKagan described the Zipdads as more a punk rock lifestyle than a musical statement, adding, "The fun we had together really set us apart and was the thing other people and bands wanted to be a part of. Slats was always the instigator at the center of the fun."
The Zipdads played Seattle and Vancouver (British Columbia) shows—including a two-night set in July 1981 with Hüsker Dü at a downtown Seattle club—but were largely short-lived, with Fortier leaving for the Vains, Dittman for the Cheaters, and McKagan for the Fastbacks. By year’s end, bassist Gary Clukey and Slats tapped drummer Tim Gowell and vocalist Eddie "Trash" Huletz to form the Silly Killers.
Clukey was 26 years old (by contrast, Slats, Gowell, and Huletz were in their late teens) and new to Seattle after growing up in California and Alaska. He earned a bachelor's degree in economics from the University of Washington and held a day job working at a downtown Seattle law firm. Clukey was also a lifelong music lover of everything from the Beatles to Black Sabbath, and he spent weekends browsing University District record shops, seeing shows, and hanging out with friends from the Vains and the Fastbacks. He also shared a rented house in the View Ridge neighborhood with the Fastbacks' Kim Warnick and Lulu Gargiulo.
Slats was born and raised in Seattle. Mary Ann Sedgwick, his mother, graduated from Radcliffe College in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and moved to Seattle in the 1950s to earn a master's degree in Russian Literature. His father, David Harvey, graduated from Harvard and landed a job teaching English at the University of Washington. The couple wed in the summer of 1955, and Mary Ann gave birth to Chris on March 14, 1963, in Seattle.
It wasn't long before David met and fell in love with fellow UW English teacher Jocelyn Gilbertson. Slats' parents divorced, and David married Jocelyn on September 3, 1966, in Seattle. When Jocelyn landed a teaching job at SUNY Albany, Slats' father sold his prized record player to help fund the cross-country move.
In the summer of 1969, David, Jocelyn, and their one-year-old daughter Kerridwen (nickname: Didi) settled on 100 acres of hilly and rock-encrusted Canadian farmland two hours west of Ottawa, in the former logging community of Barry's Bay, Ontario. The plan? Live off the land while selling an unpublished anthology of American poetry and studying the Whole Earth Catalogue. The property had no electricity or running water. The well water was polluted and undrinkable. Broken jars, old clothing, empty whisky bottles, and eight mouse-eaten mattresses filled the old farmhouse. The roof leaked.
"They didn't know what they were doing," Didi told me during a phone interview from her home in Ottawa. "My dad was an idealist, and my mom went along with it."
The Zipdads played Seattle and Vancouver (British Columbia) shows—including a two-night set in July 1981 with Hüsker Dü at a downtown Seattle club—but were largely short-lived, with Fortier leaving for the Vains, Dittman for the Cheaters, and McKagan for the Fastbacks. By year’s end, bassist Gary Clukey and Slats tapped drummer Tim Gowell and vocalist Eddie "Trash" Huletz to form the Silly Killers.
Clukey was 26 years old (by contrast, Slats, Gowell, and Huletz were in their late teens) and new to Seattle after growing up in California and Alaska. He earned a bachelor's degree in economics from the University of Washington and held a day job working at a downtown Seattle law firm. Clukey was also a lifelong music lover of everything from the Beatles to Black Sabbath, and he spent weekends browsing University District record shops, seeing shows, and hanging out with friends from the Vains and the Fastbacks. He also shared a rented house in the View Ridge neighborhood with the Fastbacks' Kim Warnick and Lulu Gargiulo.
Slats was born and raised in Seattle. Mary Ann Sedgwick, his mother, graduated from Radcliffe College in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and moved to Seattle in the 1950s to earn a master's degree in Russian Literature. His father, David Harvey, graduated from Harvard and landed a job teaching English at the University of Washington. The couple wed in the summer of 1955, and Mary Ann gave birth to Chris on March 14, 1963, in Seattle.
It wasn't long before David met and fell in love with fellow UW English teacher Jocelyn Gilbertson. Slats' parents divorced, and David married Jocelyn on September 3, 1966, in Seattle. When Jocelyn landed a teaching job at SUNY Albany, Slats' father sold his prized record player to help fund the cross-country move.
In the summer of 1969, David, Jocelyn, and their one-year-old daughter Kerridwen (nickname: Didi) settled on 100 acres of hilly and rock-encrusted Canadian farmland two hours west of Ottawa, in the former logging community of Barry's Bay, Ontario. The plan? Live off the land while selling an unpublished anthology of American poetry and studying the Whole Earth Catalogue. The property had no electricity or running water. The well water was polluted and undrinkable. Broken jars, old clothing, empty whisky bottles, and eight mouse-eaten mattresses filled the old farmhouse. The roof leaked.
"They didn't know what they were doing," Didi told me during a phone interview from her home in Ottawa. "My dad was an idealist, and my mom went along with it."
(LEFT TOP/BOTTOM) David Harvey's DIY octagonal farmhouse as imagined and as realized; (RIGHT) Slats' stepmother Jocelyn, stepsister Kerridwen, and father David inside the farmhouse.
(COURTESY KERRIDWEN "DIDI" HARVEY)
One day, Slats' father was leafing through an issue of Popular Mechanics when he saw an advertisement for a build-it-yourself 1,400-square-foot, octagon-shaped log cabin house. He paid $10 for the design and spent nine months constructing the home, adding his signature flourishes along the way. There were no interior walls or corners—just one giant, open-air room. He repurposed cedar logs from the farm's crumbling outbuildings, stones from the property's terrain, and parts from abandoned automobiles strewn about the property. A wheel from a Model A Ford topped the building's center post into which roof beams were bolted. A window from a 1964 Dodge automobile served as a skylight.
David wrote a magazine article describing the construction (and reasoning) behind this odd home. Explaining the lack of interior walls, David wrote, "As our neighboring farmer has told us: 'In a house without corners, the devil can't catch you.'" As for what qualified him to build a DIY house, David quipped, "The only curious qualifications I brought to the job—apart from [building] a treehouse at age nine—were a compulsive determination and a devotion to work, the latter largely the inheritance of Nineteenth Century grandmothers."
Slats spent many childhood summers visiting his father, stepmother, and half-siblings Didi and John, born in 1972.
"We would have a lot of fun," Didi recalled. "I enjoyed having an older brother [in Chris] and exploring the farm. He was fun and easygoing, open to something completely different than what he was used to in his everyday life. It was a blast. We were young kids, and he related to us—not like an older brother but like a caring soul. He had a soft personality."
"Chris was tall, skinny, and cool," John told me during a Zoom interview from his home in Canada. "He had an amazing leather jacket and kind of stylish hair. He certainly looked punk rock. I thought, 'Oh, that’s a cool look. We don’t see that here.'"
Those summer visits continued after the family left the farm and moved, first to Toronto, then later to Ottawa, in the mid-1970s.
John described similarities between Slats and their father. Both were charming and could hold a room. Both enjoyed music—David liked jazz, classical, and some blues; Slats favored punk rock. Physically, the two were starkly different. Slats was tall and lean, with a full head of hair; David was heavyset, bald, and over six feet tall, with massive hands.
"My dad was a complicated guy, with a fantastic sense of humor and dynamism, but also a critical and often argumentative side, which came out mostly when he drank," Didi explained. "At the best of times, he was a riot and was also very loving. He had some demons, but I also knew he loved us completely."
"Chris and our dad weren't close," Didi said. "In those days, when couples separated, the child usually lived with their mother. It was no contest. That very much happened with Chris. His mom was his primary caregiver, and our dad was not super involved. Even at the best of times, I wouldn't have called them 'close.'"
David failed to earn the Canadian accreditation required to teach English at the college level. Instead, he taught English part-time in high school, drove a taxi, and took freelance editing and writing jobs. Jocelyn was the breadwinner, landing a steady, well-paid job with the Canadian Council for the Arts.
"Sometimes, my dad would send Chris money," John told me. "It wasn't much, but our dad didn't have much. He stopped sending money at some point because he was told Chris used it for drugs."
"My dad was quite frustrated with Chris," Didi added.
David wrote a magazine article describing the construction (and reasoning) behind this odd home. Explaining the lack of interior walls, David wrote, "As our neighboring farmer has told us: 'In a house without corners, the devil can't catch you.'" As for what qualified him to build a DIY house, David quipped, "The only curious qualifications I brought to the job—apart from [building] a treehouse at age nine—were a compulsive determination and a devotion to work, the latter largely the inheritance of Nineteenth Century grandmothers."
Slats spent many childhood summers visiting his father, stepmother, and half-siblings Didi and John, born in 1972.
"We would have a lot of fun," Didi recalled. "I enjoyed having an older brother [in Chris] and exploring the farm. He was fun and easygoing, open to something completely different than what he was used to in his everyday life. It was a blast. We were young kids, and he related to us—not like an older brother but like a caring soul. He had a soft personality."
"Chris was tall, skinny, and cool," John told me during a Zoom interview from his home in Canada. "He had an amazing leather jacket and kind of stylish hair. He certainly looked punk rock. I thought, 'Oh, that’s a cool look. We don’t see that here.'"
Those summer visits continued after the family left the farm and moved, first to Toronto, then later to Ottawa, in the mid-1970s.
John described similarities between Slats and their father. Both were charming and could hold a room. Both enjoyed music—David liked jazz, classical, and some blues; Slats favored punk rock. Physically, the two were starkly different. Slats was tall and lean, with a full head of hair; David was heavyset, bald, and over six feet tall, with massive hands.
"My dad was a complicated guy, with a fantastic sense of humor and dynamism, but also a critical and often argumentative side, which came out mostly when he drank," Didi explained. "At the best of times, he was a riot and was also very loving. He had some demons, but I also knew he loved us completely."
"Chris and our dad weren't close," Didi said. "In those days, when couples separated, the child usually lived with their mother. It was no contest. That very much happened with Chris. His mom was his primary caregiver, and our dad was not super involved. Even at the best of times, I wouldn't have called them 'close.'"
David failed to earn the Canadian accreditation required to teach English at the college level. Instead, he taught English part-time in high school, drove a taxi, and took freelance editing and writing jobs. Jocelyn was the breadwinner, landing a steady, well-paid job with the Canadian Council for the Arts.
"Sometimes, my dad would send Chris money," John told me. "It wasn't much, but our dad didn't have much. He stopped sending money at some point because he was told Chris used it for drugs."
"My dad was quite frustrated with Chris," Didi added.
(LEFT) The Silly Killers co-founder and guitarist Chris "Slats" Harvey as an infant with his mother Mary Ann ca. 1963. (MIDDLE/RIGHT) Slats spent many childhood summers during the 1970s on a Canadian farm with his father David, step-mother Jocelyn, and step-siblings Kerridwen and John.
(CANADIAN FAMILY PHOTOS COURTESY KERRIDWEN "DIDI" HARVEY)
When the Silly Killers formed in 1981, Slats was 18, Didi was 13, and John was nine. At that age, the half-siblings' relationship was more complicated, with Slats increasingly interested in the punk rock scene. He dropped out of school after the 11th grade and completed his GED. In some ways, Slats had outgrown those summertime visits. "There wasn't much for us to relate to," Didi explained. "Progressively, we became more distant. At some point, Chris just didn't visit us anymore."
When not spending summers of his youth in Canada, Slats lived with his mother in Seattle's Montlake neighborhood, just south of the University of Washington Husky Stadium and the Lake Washington ship canal. Before he became known as Slats, Chris was known as "Harv" among his friends, including David "Nick" Scott, who met Slats in third or fourth grade at the private K-12 Bush School near the city's Washington Park and Madison Valley neighborhoods. Even in middle school, Slats already showed his puerile and rebellious streak.
"We were like invading aliens from another dimension," Scott explained during a two-hour phone interview from his home in Los Angeles. Slats' core group of Bush School friends included Scott, who later played drums in POPDeFECT, and other future members of Seattle's early 1980s punk bands. "We were completely at odds with the rest of the class. The other kids were just, like, 'Oh, man. Not that bunch.' Harv was this weird, quippy, sarcastic guy who would mock the French teacher, Mr. Gagnon." In the eighth grade, a classmate checked out a record player from the Bush School's library and played Led Zeppelin albums during lunch.
One of Slats' high-school friends credits Scott with creating the nickname Slats. "Slats was calling Nick 'Fats,' and Nick turned it around and started calling him 'Slats' because he was tall and skinny," this friend told me. "Somehow, that name stuck. That's the story Slats told me when we were teenagers."
"I have not thought about this in a million years, but I totally remember," Nick marveled when I shared this story with him. "He was as skinny as a rail. He would say, 'Whatever you say, Fats.' I would say, 'OK, Slats.' It was a tit-for-tat thing.”
Scott lived in North Seattle's Laurelhurst and View Ridge neighborhoods and attended Roosevelt High School. Slats lived in the Montlake neighborhood and attended Garfield High School across town in the Central District. But the pair remained friends—hanging out on the Ave, taking music lessons at Village Music, and carousing on weekends, often at Laurelhurst Park, where Slats, Scott, and others would drink cheap liquor looted from their parents' stashes and spin on the merry-go-round to ramp up the alcohol's dizzying effects.
One night, the drunken teens were out late and wandering the Montlake neighborhood when a homeowner called the cops. Squad cars arrived, red and blue lights scattering the teens. According to Scott, officers nabbed all of them except for Slats, who ran down an unfinished portion of the State Route 520 floating bridge and dived into Lake Washington. "It was insane," Scott said. "He could have gotten hypothermia! He could have snapped his neck on the way down! It was like nothing could kill him."
In his memoir, McKagan, who described becoming "fast and all-of-the-time friends" with Slats when the pair met as teenagers in the late 1970s, recalled hopping the UW salmon hatchery's fence with Slats in the middle of the night and filling a bucket with live fish to be frozen at home and eaten later. They would have succeeded if not spotted by a security guard. Slats clutched the bucket, scaling the fence with it in his hands. "One of the funniest memories I will ever have is of him driving the car back to my apartment with his left hand on the wheel while punching the flopping salmon with his right," McKagan wrote. "He had a running commentary with those fish all the way home, saying they almost got us into big trouble, and now they would pay the ultimate price."
Like many teens in the early 1980s, Slats hung out on the Ave in the University District. Photographer Michael Lavine, a Denver resident who enrolled at Evergreen College in Olympia in 1982, spent the spring of 1983 photographing the Ave’s punks, a scene he described as "an exotic underworld filled with a motley cast of characters expressing their own individuality through rebellion and anarchy" in the afterword to his 2009 book Grunge, which features a collection of these photos. A 20-year-old Slats appears in three images in the book, ironically flexing in his leather jacket, sporting a severe scrape across the bridge of his nose, a shiner over his right eye socket and brow, and surrounded by fellow friends and Ave punks.
"Slats was a good spirit, fun-loving, and always up for a good time," Fastbacks bassist/vocalist Warnick told me. "He'd be over at our house all the time to practice or meet up before going out to punk shows. We had cable, so everyone, including Slats, would come over to our house to watch MTV."
While Slats' father was somewhat estranged, Slats' relationship with his mother was tight. Mary Ann often cooked dinner for Slats and his friends, and Slats always spoke highly of his mom. One friend recalled joining Slats and his mom on a camping and fishing trip when they were teens.
"She would forgive him for anything," Scott said. "She just utterly loved him, and the feeling was mutual. Later on, even in the throes of his most insane and horrific drug addiction, she was always there for him."
By 1981, Seattle's DIY punk scene thrived, but Slats needed a band. "You could just see it in his eyes," Scott said. "He needed that kind of outlet."
The Silly Killers would fill that need.
When not spending summers of his youth in Canada, Slats lived with his mother in Seattle's Montlake neighborhood, just south of the University of Washington Husky Stadium and the Lake Washington ship canal. Before he became known as Slats, Chris was known as "Harv" among his friends, including David "Nick" Scott, who met Slats in third or fourth grade at the private K-12 Bush School near the city's Washington Park and Madison Valley neighborhoods. Even in middle school, Slats already showed his puerile and rebellious streak.
"We were like invading aliens from another dimension," Scott explained during a two-hour phone interview from his home in Los Angeles. Slats' core group of Bush School friends included Scott, who later played drums in POPDeFECT, and other future members of Seattle's early 1980s punk bands. "We were completely at odds with the rest of the class. The other kids were just, like, 'Oh, man. Not that bunch.' Harv was this weird, quippy, sarcastic guy who would mock the French teacher, Mr. Gagnon." In the eighth grade, a classmate checked out a record player from the Bush School's library and played Led Zeppelin albums during lunch.
One of Slats' high-school friends credits Scott with creating the nickname Slats. "Slats was calling Nick 'Fats,' and Nick turned it around and started calling him 'Slats' because he was tall and skinny," this friend told me. "Somehow, that name stuck. That's the story Slats told me when we were teenagers."
"I have not thought about this in a million years, but I totally remember," Nick marveled when I shared this story with him. "He was as skinny as a rail. He would say, 'Whatever you say, Fats.' I would say, 'OK, Slats.' It was a tit-for-tat thing.”
Scott lived in North Seattle's Laurelhurst and View Ridge neighborhoods and attended Roosevelt High School. Slats lived in the Montlake neighborhood and attended Garfield High School across town in the Central District. But the pair remained friends—hanging out on the Ave, taking music lessons at Village Music, and carousing on weekends, often at Laurelhurst Park, where Slats, Scott, and others would drink cheap liquor looted from their parents' stashes and spin on the merry-go-round to ramp up the alcohol's dizzying effects.
One night, the drunken teens were out late and wandering the Montlake neighborhood when a homeowner called the cops. Squad cars arrived, red and blue lights scattering the teens. According to Scott, officers nabbed all of them except for Slats, who ran down an unfinished portion of the State Route 520 floating bridge and dived into Lake Washington. "It was insane," Scott said. "He could have gotten hypothermia! He could have snapped his neck on the way down! It was like nothing could kill him."
In his memoir, McKagan, who described becoming "fast and all-of-the-time friends" with Slats when the pair met as teenagers in the late 1970s, recalled hopping the UW salmon hatchery's fence with Slats in the middle of the night and filling a bucket with live fish to be frozen at home and eaten later. They would have succeeded if not spotted by a security guard. Slats clutched the bucket, scaling the fence with it in his hands. "One of the funniest memories I will ever have is of him driving the car back to my apartment with his left hand on the wheel while punching the flopping salmon with his right," McKagan wrote. "He had a running commentary with those fish all the way home, saying they almost got us into big trouble, and now they would pay the ultimate price."
Like many teens in the early 1980s, Slats hung out on the Ave in the University District. Photographer Michael Lavine, a Denver resident who enrolled at Evergreen College in Olympia in 1982, spent the spring of 1983 photographing the Ave’s punks, a scene he described as "an exotic underworld filled with a motley cast of characters expressing their own individuality through rebellion and anarchy" in the afterword to his 2009 book Grunge, which features a collection of these photos. A 20-year-old Slats appears in three images in the book, ironically flexing in his leather jacket, sporting a severe scrape across the bridge of his nose, a shiner over his right eye socket and brow, and surrounded by fellow friends and Ave punks.
"Slats was a good spirit, fun-loving, and always up for a good time," Fastbacks bassist/vocalist Warnick told me. "He'd be over at our house all the time to practice or meet up before going out to punk shows. We had cable, so everyone, including Slats, would come over to our house to watch MTV."
While Slats' father was somewhat estranged, Slats' relationship with his mother was tight. Mary Ann often cooked dinner for Slats and his friends, and Slats always spoke highly of his mom. One friend recalled joining Slats and his mom on a camping and fishing trip when they were teens.
"She would forgive him for anything," Scott said. "She just utterly loved him, and the feeling was mutual. Later on, even in the throes of his most insane and horrific drug addiction, she was always there for him."
By 1981, Seattle's DIY punk scene thrived, but Slats needed a band. "You could just see it in his eyes," Scott said. "He needed that kind of outlet."
The Silly Killers would fill that need.
3. — "I would wait out the whole Silly Killers set to hear that song."
Clukey rented space at the Laurelhurst Fieldhouse for the Silly Killers' first live show in the fall of 1981, charging two bucks at the door and sharing the bill with the Vains. Clukey's friend and co-worker at the law firm, Ben McMillan (who would later become the frontman for Gruntruck and Skin Yard), designed and airbrushed a DIY Silly Killers T-shirt, which Clukey wore during the show. The band performed a short set with only a handful of songs.
"I think we made a pretty good showing of who we were and could be as a band," Clukey said. By year's end, the Silly Killers traveled to Vancouver, BC, with the Fastbacks to perform with D.O.A. at the Arcadian Hall.
"I don’t know if it was Slats so much as it was Gary who was always gung-ho about putting on shows and saying, 'Let’s try to do something,'" Bloch recalled. "Nobody was booking our bands [the Fastbacks and the Silly Killers] at rock clubs because it was 'unsavory' music and too punk rock for the masses."
Seattle music historian Dennis R. White described the Silly Killers as "exceptionally entertaining live," with Slats thrashing on the guitar, vocalist Huletz feigning indifference, and Clukey and Gowell playing with abandon. He added, "It might even be misleading to call the Silly Killers 'hardcore' since their music and performances did not follow the formula most early hardcore bands did. The singing could be nuanced instead of a constant, disembodied, supposedly traumatized suburban scream. The songs were actually melodic at times. It might be more appropriate to call the Silly Killers a great little rock and roll band that found its place among punk rock."
Clukey agreed.
"We had some punk elements, but we were pretty much just a straightforward rock band," he said. "That's all we ever thought of ourselves as, to tell you the truth."
"I think we made a pretty good showing of who we were and could be as a band," Clukey said. By year's end, the Silly Killers traveled to Vancouver, BC, with the Fastbacks to perform with D.O.A. at the Arcadian Hall.
"I don’t know if it was Slats so much as it was Gary who was always gung-ho about putting on shows and saying, 'Let’s try to do something,'" Bloch recalled. "Nobody was booking our bands [the Fastbacks and the Silly Killers] at rock clubs because it was 'unsavory' music and too punk rock for the masses."
Seattle music historian Dennis R. White described the Silly Killers as "exceptionally entertaining live," with Slats thrashing on the guitar, vocalist Huletz feigning indifference, and Clukey and Gowell playing with abandon. He added, "It might even be misleading to call the Silly Killers 'hardcore' since their music and performances did not follow the formula most early hardcore bands did. The singing could be nuanced instead of a constant, disembodied, supposedly traumatized suburban scream. The songs were actually melodic at times. It might be more appropriate to call the Silly Killers a great little rock and roll band that found its place among punk rock."
Clukey agreed.
"We had some punk elements, but we were pretty much just a straightforward rock band," he said. "That's all we ever thought of ourselves as, to tell you the truth."
The Silly Killers performed roughly two dozen shows in Seattle, San Francisco, and Vancouver, BC, between 1981 and 1983.
Between February 1982 and December 1984, Jeff "Jo Smitty" Smith ran the Seattle punk rock fanzine Attack, which often included Silly Killers shows and recordings.
"[The Silly Killers] were great," Smitty raved in his review of the band's March 12, 1982, show at Serbian Hall (the lineup also included Malfunktion, Extreme Maggots, Extreme Hate, the Rejectors, and the Fartz). "They played real songs instead of acting like jerks or 'tuning' their guitars. The guitarist cooked! They mix the bass loud, which is unusual, and they remind me a lot of the Sex Pistols, except they seem to like the audience, while the Pistols hated the people who made them stars. They were the band of the evening." Like most punk-rock shows in Seattle circa 1982, this set was thunderous and rowdy, with young people, mostly guys, pushing and shoving in the pit in front of the stage. Smitty witnessed a few fights. A hurled beer bottle smacked a friend's face. A half-dozen cops mocked the punks. "Nothing like a little blood to remind one he is at a punk show," Smitty reported. "Most people weren't paying much attention to the music. It was basic, youthful, mundane hardcore."
Independence Day in 1982 marked one of the most raucous Silly Killers shows. Held at the Norway Center, the lineup included Vancouver's Subhumans and Los Angeles hardcore bands Nig-Heist, Saccharine Trust, and Black Flag (with frontman Henry Rollins). The audience included K Records founder Calvin Johnson, who reviewed the show for Sub Pop's newsletter (Johnson's take on the Silly Killers set? "Thoroughly dull"), and future Mudhoney frontman Mark Arm, who reviewed the show for Attack.
"The Silly Killers played a good set of Damned/Sex Pistols-influenced heavy metal/punk-rock," wrote Arm. "If they were in England in 1976, they might have started something, but I doubt it. They probably would have sounded like Uriah Heep. The guitarist [Slats], bassist [Clukey], and drummer [Gowell] are more than capable players. I was surprised by the lukewarm reception they got. I think they deserved better. They could be a great band."
Arm included this show as one of his favorites that year, though he seemed put off by Silly Killers frontman Eddie Huletz's posturing—announcing to the crowd that he was drunk, holding the mic like Johnny Rotten, and walking around "smiling with a cigarette and half-closed eyes like Sammy [Davis, Jr.]." Later that evening, two folding chairs hurled from the crowd nailed Black Flag's Greg Ginn in the head, according to Arm's reporting, and three "weenie punkers" set upon one of Arm's friends during Saccharine Trust’s set, bashing him in the face.
Rollins recalled this show's amped and violent energy in his memoir Get in the Van: On the Road with Black Flag. "We were backstage after the show," he wrote. "I was still shook up from playing. A girl came in and started talking to no one in particular. No one knew her, and no one wanted her back there. We could be pretty unsociable at times. I remember sitting back there, trying to get my mind back from the music. She looked at me and told me to cheer up. I threw a folding chair at her. I barely remember doing it."
Often, Clukey signed the leases and paid the deposits to rent community centers and halls for the Silly Killers to perform in. That also meant Clukey lost his deposits or was banished when punk bands destroyed the rooms, experiences documented in the Silly Killers' song "Who Your Friends Are," which Clukey wrote.
"You'd rent a hall, get a sound system, get your bands, put up posters, and maybe break even," Bloch told me. "Then there was a crew of people—bored kids looking for something to smash up—and you'd have to pay the hall for that. Often, there would be no profit generated of any sort."
"It was 'pretend it's Los Angeles and break glass' night," reported Attack editor Smitty in his review of the Silly Killers' March 12, 1982, show at Serbian Hall. "Someone had stacked a large amount of beer bottles on a side ledge. A person of doubtful intelligence thought it appropriate to push them all off. The hardwood floor was ground to bits by the glass, which, coupled with the beer stuck to your shoes, was a mess. It remains to be seen if the hall will rent again or not."
An equally memorable (but less nihilistic) Silly Killers show occurred on August 20, 1982, at Seattle's Ground Zero. The lineup included Mr. Epp and the Silly Killers opening for Southern California punk bands Social Distortion and Youth Brigade, who were touring America and Canada for the 1984 documentary Another State of Mind. According to one friend, Slats was proud to share a bill with Social Distortion and even claimed Mike Ness raved that the Silly Killers were the best band Social Distortion played with on that tour (Slats also told people he made a cameo in the film, though I couldn't spot him).
Clukey told me he dropped acid before performing and then "tripped my brains out" during that show. He also pounded Olde English 800 malt liquor to take the edge off. Still, he added, "We played a pretty good show. We loved Social Distortion. It was a big deal for them to come to Seattle. I remember somebody from the audience saying, 'Alright! Heavy Metal!' while we played our set. It had to have been somebody from Social Distortion or Youth Brigade because nobody in Seattle would say that about Silly Killers."
I asked Clukey to share memories of other notable Silly Killers shows:
December 29, 1981, at Arcadian Hall in Vancouver, BC, with D.O.A. and the Fastbacks — "Vancouver had a vibrant punk scene, and this was a pretty good-sized place. Dale Wiese and a guy named 'Phil Spectacle' put on many shows. Duff, who was staying in a hotel with Eddie while the rest of us were sleeping on Dale's floor, told Eddie that bands never played on time, so he was chilling out drinking beer. It's time to go on stage, and Eddie's not around. We told the audience our singer was killed in a car crash on the way up from Seattle. Dale came up and sang. He just totally went off the cuff and improvised. We had no lyrics written down. By the time Eddie showed up, we were done with our set. I was so mad at Eddie."
March 12, 1982, at Serbian Hall in Seattle, WA, with Malfunktion, Extreme Maggots, Extreme Hate, Rejectors, and the Fartz — "[Malfunktion] was [the late Mother Love Bone singer] Andy Wood's band. He was really young. He was always just so happy at the shows. He acted like Paul Stanley of KISS onstage. It was great! We would always be happy to see each other. I liked putting on shows with Mr. Epp, U-Men, and Malfunktion. We were all very supportive of each other." NOTE: In an interview published in the December issue of The Rocket, Wood commented, "When we opened for bands like Silly Killers, we'd come out with our wild hair and makeup, and people thought we were a novelty comedy band."
November 6, 1982, at Munro’s Dance Palace in Seattle, WA, with Dayglow Abortions, Bootboys, and Hobo Skank— "Slats got into a fight with Big Jim of Hobo Skank over a girl named Jenny. She was Big Jim's girlfriend and Slats' ex-girlfriend. They were both drunk off their asses. Hobo Skank had a song called 'Clukey's Shoes,' which maybe made fun of my white Beatles boots from Goodwill."
March 11, 1983, at Sound of Music in San Francisco, CA, with VKTMS, Men in Black, and Plastic Medium — "Duff had gone down with us to play drums. A strong contingent of Bopo Boys tagged along. Eddie decided he would come running out onto the stage. As it turns out, I was standing on the mic cord, which came flying off the microphone and landed on the floor. It's tangled in my feet. Eddie's up there singing, but nobody could hear him, which is probably just as well. That show was a total disaster. I think they paid us 40 dollars. We ran out of money on the way back. We had to stop in Tacoma and ask for money from someone to get back to Seattle. That was also the trip where Duff, Slats, and I went to Berkeley to see a show, and I had to drive everybody home because they were passed out drunk. I had to find my way back to this little apartment where we were staying with 10 other people, and I had only been there once. I had no idea where I was going, but I drove right to it, probably because I was a Boy Scout growing up and had a good sense of direction."
September 6, 1983, at Metropolis in Seattle, WA, with Personality Crisis and YBGB — "That was my attempt at being a lead singer. I've seen the videos on YouTube. They're not terrible. I was trying to be funny, but I sucked at being a singer—if you could call it singing."
"[The Silly Killers] were great," Smitty raved in his review of the band's March 12, 1982, show at Serbian Hall (the lineup also included Malfunktion, Extreme Maggots, Extreme Hate, the Rejectors, and the Fartz). "They played real songs instead of acting like jerks or 'tuning' their guitars. The guitarist cooked! They mix the bass loud, which is unusual, and they remind me a lot of the Sex Pistols, except they seem to like the audience, while the Pistols hated the people who made them stars. They were the band of the evening." Like most punk-rock shows in Seattle circa 1982, this set was thunderous and rowdy, with young people, mostly guys, pushing and shoving in the pit in front of the stage. Smitty witnessed a few fights. A hurled beer bottle smacked a friend's face. A half-dozen cops mocked the punks. "Nothing like a little blood to remind one he is at a punk show," Smitty reported. "Most people weren't paying much attention to the music. It was basic, youthful, mundane hardcore."
Independence Day in 1982 marked one of the most raucous Silly Killers shows. Held at the Norway Center, the lineup included Vancouver's Subhumans and Los Angeles hardcore bands Nig-Heist, Saccharine Trust, and Black Flag (with frontman Henry Rollins). The audience included K Records founder Calvin Johnson, who reviewed the show for Sub Pop's newsletter (Johnson's take on the Silly Killers set? "Thoroughly dull"), and future Mudhoney frontman Mark Arm, who reviewed the show for Attack.
"The Silly Killers played a good set of Damned/Sex Pistols-influenced heavy metal/punk-rock," wrote Arm. "If they were in England in 1976, they might have started something, but I doubt it. They probably would have sounded like Uriah Heep. The guitarist [Slats], bassist [Clukey], and drummer [Gowell] are more than capable players. I was surprised by the lukewarm reception they got. I think they deserved better. They could be a great band."
Arm included this show as one of his favorites that year, though he seemed put off by Silly Killers frontman Eddie Huletz's posturing—announcing to the crowd that he was drunk, holding the mic like Johnny Rotten, and walking around "smiling with a cigarette and half-closed eyes like Sammy [Davis, Jr.]." Later that evening, two folding chairs hurled from the crowd nailed Black Flag's Greg Ginn in the head, according to Arm's reporting, and three "weenie punkers" set upon one of Arm's friends during Saccharine Trust’s set, bashing him in the face.
Rollins recalled this show's amped and violent energy in his memoir Get in the Van: On the Road with Black Flag. "We were backstage after the show," he wrote. "I was still shook up from playing. A girl came in and started talking to no one in particular. No one knew her, and no one wanted her back there. We could be pretty unsociable at times. I remember sitting back there, trying to get my mind back from the music. She looked at me and told me to cheer up. I threw a folding chair at her. I barely remember doing it."
Often, Clukey signed the leases and paid the deposits to rent community centers and halls for the Silly Killers to perform in. That also meant Clukey lost his deposits or was banished when punk bands destroyed the rooms, experiences documented in the Silly Killers' song "Who Your Friends Are," which Clukey wrote.
"You'd rent a hall, get a sound system, get your bands, put up posters, and maybe break even," Bloch told me. "Then there was a crew of people—bored kids looking for something to smash up—and you'd have to pay the hall for that. Often, there would be no profit generated of any sort."
"It was 'pretend it's Los Angeles and break glass' night," reported Attack editor Smitty in his review of the Silly Killers' March 12, 1982, show at Serbian Hall. "Someone had stacked a large amount of beer bottles on a side ledge. A person of doubtful intelligence thought it appropriate to push them all off. The hardwood floor was ground to bits by the glass, which, coupled with the beer stuck to your shoes, was a mess. It remains to be seen if the hall will rent again or not."
An equally memorable (but less nihilistic) Silly Killers show occurred on August 20, 1982, at Seattle's Ground Zero. The lineup included Mr. Epp and the Silly Killers opening for Southern California punk bands Social Distortion and Youth Brigade, who were touring America and Canada for the 1984 documentary Another State of Mind. According to one friend, Slats was proud to share a bill with Social Distortion and even claimed Mike Ness raved that the Silly Killers were the best band Social Distortion played with on that tour (Slats also told people he made a cameo in the film, though I couldn't spot him).
Clukey told me he dropped acid before performing and then "tripped my brains out" during that show. He also pounded Olde English 800 malt liquor to take the edge off. Still, he added, "We played a pretty good show. We loved Social Distortion. It was a big deal for them to come to Seattle. I remember somebody from the audience saying, 'Alright! Heavy Metal!' while we played our set. It had to have been somebody from Social Distortion or Youth Brigade because nobody in Seattle would say that about Silly Killers."
I asked Clukey to share memories of other notable Silly Killers shows:
December 29, 1981, at Arcadian Hall in Vancouver, BC, with D.O.A. and the Fastbacks — "Vancouver had a vibrant punk scene, and this was a pretty good-sized place. Dale Wiese and a guy named 'Phil Spectacle' put on many shows. Duff, who was staying in a hotel with Eddie while the rest of us were sleeping on Dale's floor, told Eddie that bands never played on time, so he was chilling out drinking beer. It's time to go on stage, and Eddie's not around. We told the audience our singer was killed in a car crash on the way up from Seattle. Dale came up and sang. He just totally went off the cuff and improvised. We had no lyrics written down. By the time Eddie showed up, we were done with our set. I was so mad at Eddie."
March 12, 1982, at Serbian Hall in Seattle, WA, with Malfunktion, Extreme Maggots, Extreme Hate, Rejectors, and the Fartz — "[Malfunktion] was [the late Mother Love Bone singer] Andy Wood's band. He was really young. He was always just so happy at the shows. He acted like Paul Stanley of KISS onstage. It was great! We would always be happy to see each other. I liked putting on shows with Mr. Epp, U-Men, and Malfunktion. We were all very supportive of each other." NOTE: In an interview published in the December issue of The Rocket, Wood commented, "When we opened for bands like Silly Killers, we'd come out with our wild hair and makeup, and people thought we were a novelty comedy band."
November 6, 1982, at Munro’s Dance Palace in Seattle, WA, with Dayglow Abortions, Bootboys, and Hobo Skank— "Slats got into a fight with Big Jim of Hobo Skank over a girl named Jenny. She was Big Jim's girlfriend and Slats' ex-girlfriend. They were both drunk off their asses. Hobo Skank had a song called 'Clukey's Shoes,' which maybe made fun of my white Beatles boots from Goodwill."
March 11, 1983, at Sound of Music in San Francisco, CA, with VKTMS, Men in Black, and Plastic Medium — "Duff had gone down with us to play drums. A strong contingent of Bopo Boys tagged along. Eddie decided he would come running out onto the stage. As it turns out, I was standing on the mic cord, which came flying off the microphone and landed on the floor. It's tangled in my feet. Eddie's up there singing, but nobody could hear him, which is probably just as well. That show was a total disaster. I think they paid us 40 dollars. We ran out of money on the way back. We had to stop in Tacoma and ask for money from someone to get back to Seattle. That was also the trip where Duff, Slats, and I went to Berkeley to see a show, and I had to drive everybody home because they were passed out drunk. I had to find my way back to this little apartment where we were staying with 10 other people, and I had only been there once. I had no idea where I was going, but I drove right to it, probably because I was a Boy Scout growing up and had a good sense of direction."
September 6, 1983, at Metropolis in Seattle, WA, with Personality Crisis and YBGB — "That was my attempt at being a lead singer. I've seen the videos on YouTube. They're not terrible. I was trying to be funny, but I sucked at being a singer—if you could call it singing."
(LEFT) Slats and Gary Clukey ca. 1982; (CENTER) Eddie Huletz and Clukey perform at Seattle Center's Mural Amphitheatre ca. 1982; (RIGHT) Clukey and Slats at Laurelhurst Fieldhouse ca. 1981.
(PHOTOS COURTESY CLUKEY)
The Silly Killers were popular--according to White, the band "had already become stars in their own right among Seattle's punk community"—with some fans arriving to shows with SILLY KILLERS spelled out in metal studs on the backs of their jackets.
"I remember seeing the Silly Killers live and being pretty proud of old Slats Harvey up there," Bush School classmate Scott told me. "He had become 'Slats' by that time, for sure. Harv from the Bush School was long gone. What made Slats spectacular was his bravado, his sheer charisma."
"They were a good band," Warnick told me. "I don't remember there being a lot of solos in the Silly Killers, but Slats was a solid rhythm guitar player. He had a Gibson SG and loved the UK Subs and their guitar sound. Silly Killers were friends of the Fastbacks, so we would go see them all the time, even if we weren't on the bill. That's just how it worked in those days."
In his memoir, McKagan described Slats as "the one the rest of us wanted to be like. He had the good looks and charm that all the girls fawned over. He never gloated or preened in his status as the coolest guy in the room, and that very thing made him even cooler."
Scott's favorite Silly Killers song is "Not That Time Again." Slats wrote the music, Clukey wrote the lyrics, and Slats' creative riffs are front and center. "I would wait out the whole Silly Killers set to hear that song," Scott said. "Slats had moments of brilliance, and that song is one of them, for me."
Still, Slats was an emerging guitarist with a lot to learn. Scott told me, "Slats wasn't some amazing virtuoso or anything. But that doesn't mean he wasn't good enough for the job. What he lacked in musicianship, he made up for with oodles of charisma. People loved him."
McKagan shared that opinion in his memoir. "Slats was never one of the most skilled guitar players, but he crafted his own sound back in our day," he wrote. "When he formed the Silly Killers, his sound and sense of songwriting were really starting to take shape."
"I think [Slats] was [a good guitarist]," Bloch of the Fastbacks told me. "There was sort of a regular, base-level level ability you needed in order to have a band because the music everybody played was fast and hard. The most noteworthy thing about Slats' playing was that he always sounded good. Slats just always sounded really tough. How an instrument sounds boils down to the actual player and how good your rhythm is when playing guitar. Whatever band Slats was in, he always sounded loud and tough, with a tight rhythm, not that sort of washy sound where a lot of punk guitar players just washed over everything. It all sounded cool. Slats rocked on guitar."
By 1982, the band was ready to record that distinct sound.
"I remember seeing the Silly Killers live and being pretty proud of old Slats Harvey up there," Bush School classmate Scott told me. "He had become 'Slats' by that time, for sure. Harv from the Bush School was long gone. What made Slats spectacular was his bravado, his sheer charisma."
"They were a good band," Warnick told me. "I don't remember there being a lot of solos in the Silly Killers, but Slats was a solid rhythm guitar player. He had a Gibson SG and loved the UK Subs and their guitar sound. Silly Killers were friends of the Fastbacks, so we would go see them all the time, even if we weren't on the bill. That's just how it worked in those days."
In his memoir, McKagan described Slats as "the one the rest of us wanted to be like. He had the good looks and charm that all the girls fawned over. He never gloated or preened in his status as the coolest guy in the room, and that very thing made him even cooler."
Scott's favorite Silly Killers song is "Not That Time Again." Slats wrote the music, Clukey wrote the lyrics, and Slats' creative riffs are front and center. "I would wait out the whole Silly Killers set to hear that song," Scott said. "Slats had moments of brilliance, and that song is one of them, for me."
Still, Slats was an emerging guitarist with a lot to learn. Scott told me, "Slats wasn't some amazing virtuoso or anything. But that doesn't mean he wasn't good enough for the job. What he lacked in musicianship, he made up for with oodles of charisma. People loved him."
McKagan shared that opinion in his memoir. "Slats was never one of the most skilled guitar players, but he crafted his own sound back in our day," he wrote. "When he formed the Silly Killers, his sound and sense of songwriting were really starting to take shape."
"I think [Slats] was [a good guitarist]," Bloch of the Fastbacks told me. "There was sort of a regular, base-level level ability you needed in order to have a band because the music everybody played was fast and hard. The most noteworthy thing about Slats' playing was that he always sounded good. Slats just always sounded really tough. How an instrument sounds boils down to the actual player and how good your rhythm is when playing guitar. Whatever band Slats was in, he always sounded loud and tough, with a tight rhythm, not that sort of washy sound where a lot of punk guitar players just washed over everything. It all sounded cool. Slats rocked on guitar."
By 1982, the band was ready to record that distinct sound.
The Silly Killers performed roughly two dozen shows in Seattle, San Francisco, and Vancouver, BC, between 1981 and 1983.
4. — "Our songs were always about sarcasm."
In the early 1980s, American Music in Seattle's Fremont neighborhood ran print advertisements in The Rocket inviting bands to record their music. If you bought a keyboard or a Marshall 100-watt stack, the music shop would offer four hours of studio time and press up to 1,000 copies of a single on vinyl. One memorable ad touted, "You could spend $1,520 to fly to LA to record your album . . . or you could spend 10 minutes to drive to American Music [to record for $20 per hour]."
The pitch was enough to lure the Silly Killers into an American Music studio in 1982 to record a four-track, seven-inch, eponymously titled EP—an effort Clukey bankrolled. Eric Barger produced the EP, a choice that would prove odd years later when Barger became a minister and loudly denounced punk and rock 'n' roll. "I don’t have any recollection of recording that project," Barger told me. "I did a lot of them, but the shorter the project, the less probability I would have gotten to know the players. Sorry to be of no assistance."
Clukey told me, "Slats and I later joked that we drove him to Jesus."
The EP is one of the early releases from Bloch's No Threes Records. "My involvement in [the Silly Killers EP] was more about finding a place to get the records made, a printer to print the covers—whatever you call that job—just finding ways to do things rather than being a record mogul telling them what songs to do and how to play," Bloch told me. "It would be a long shot to consider [No Threes] an actual label. We did everything we could to make it seem like it was a real record label but, in effect, it was sort of a thing bands put on their records to make it appear that you were on a real record label."
The EP is utterly punk rock, from its unique cover art (an eerie and grainy still of wrestler Tor Johnson from his appearance as the zombified Inspector Daniel Clay in the 1957 Ed Wood cult classic Plan 9 From Outer Space), to its logo (thin, stretched, and crooked lettering drawn, cut, and glued together by Slats, with help from a friend in the graphics department at Garfield High School), to its inside sleeve with lyrics and an iron cross in black ink on red paper, to its photo of the band posed in front of a boarded-up storefront on the Ave, taken by Slats' high school girlfriend Emily Rieman.
The pitch was enough to lure the Silly Killers into an American Music studio in 1982 to record a four-track, seven-inch, eponymously titled EP—an effort Clukey bankrolled. Eric Barger produced the EP, a choice that would prove odd years later when Barger became a minister and loudly denounced punk and rock 'n' roll. "I don’t have any recollection of recording that project," Barger told me. "I did a lot of them, but the shorter the project, the less probability I would have gotten to know the players. Sorry to be of no assistance."
Clukey told me, "Slats and I later joked that we drove him to Jesus."
The EP is one of the early releases from Bloch's No Threes Records. "My involvement in [the Silly Killers EP] was more about finding a place to get the records made, a printer to print the covers—whatever you call that job—just finding ways to do things rather than being a record mogul telling them what songs to do and how to play," Bloch told me. "It would be a long shot to consider [No Threes] an actual label. We did everything we could to make it seem like it was a real record label but, in effect, it was sort of a thing bands put on their records to make it appear that you were on a real record label."
The EP is utterly punk rock, from its unique cover art (an eerie and grainy still of wrestler Tor Johnson from his appearance as the zombified Inspector Daniel Clay in the 1957 Ed Wood cult classic Plan 9 From Outer Space), to its logo (thin, stretched, and crooked lettering drawn, cut, and glued together by Slats, with help from a friend in the graphics department at Garfield High School), to its inside sleeve with lyrics and an iron cross in black ink on red paper, to its photo of the band posed in front of a boarded-up storefront on the Ave, taken by Slats' high school girlfriend Emily Rieman.
More than 40 years after its release, the Silly Killers' eponymously titled four-song EP is a collector's item fetching several hundred dollars on eBay and Discogs.
(EP PROMO PHOTO COURTESY CLUKEY)
The EP is often called Knife Manual, but Clukey insists it’s eponymously titled. It’s a quick listen--four songs in less than eight minutes—with an intro of someone laughing maniacally. I asked Clukey to offer insights into each track:
Knife Manual (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "I worked at a downtown Seattle law firm, couriering stuff to the courthouse and other law firms. I would pass this big magazine store and look at the titles in the window. One magazine was called Knife Manual. What kind of person subscribed to Knife Manual? So, I wrote a song about it. Two Green River Task Force detectives knocked on my U-District apartment's door a few years later. They thought I was singing about myself because I had written the song in the first person. I had to take a polygraph to prove I was not the Green River Killer."
Not That Time Again (Music by Slats; Lyrics by Clukey) — "This song is basically about how I hated to get up in the morning and go to work."
Social Bitch (Music/Lyrics by Slats) — "This was all Slats, an old song he wrote."
Sissie Faggots (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "This wasn't an anti-gay song. It was a song about stereotypes. It sounds mean, but it's just sarcasm. I never had any mean intent toward gay people. It was really about making fun of the gay guys who lived across the hall from my apartment. I would go over and share a few pills and a beer with them once in a while. When the Silly Killers went to San Francisco to play, I sent a copy of the EP to one of the city's music magazines. The reviewer, Jello Biafra of the Dead Kennedys, liked it except for that song. He thought it was totally insulting. I never had a chance to explain myself to him."
The EP was reviewed by Maximum Rocknroll ("A neat 'garagey' record, the Silly Killers sound somewhat refreshing"), Attack ("A great combination of heavy metal and thrash"), and The Rocket ("A raw slice of Seattle life in the form of this four-song EP, presented no-holds-barred by this heavy-handed but speedy quartet. Rockin' disc!"), often couching praise with caveats due to the problematic nature of the song lyrics and titles. Maximum Rocknroll noted, "[T]he lyrics—yecch! I'm getting real sick of all this sexist and homophobic shit coming out now. Just because you guys are insecure about your own sexuality, you don't have to foist it on others"; Attack noted, "[The EP] sounds fine…if you pay no attention to the lyrics."
"Our songs were always about sarcasm," Clukey told me. "We always intended to get a rise out of people. Slats and I were both smart-asses."
Local music historian White noted, "More strident members of the public had no sense of irony and considered the Silly Killers to be misogynistic and homophobic. Of course, it was all provocation as part of their schtick." White argued the band reveled in the provocation, taking the piss out of fans and foes alike. "On several occasions, the band used what seemed to be misogynistic images to promote their shows. The images drew the wrath of those who didn't see it as funny or as a stunt to heighten the Silly Killers' image in the public eye. Needless to say, they managed to anger Seattle's feminist and lesbian communities often."
It's worth noting that equally edgy songs were performed by some of the period's most famous punk bands, including Black Flag ("Slip It In," "White Minority," "Drinking and Driving," and "Gimmie Gimmie Gimmie"), D.O.A. ("Full Metal Jackoff" and "Rich Bitch"), and Social Distortion ("Mommy's Little Monster").
Today, the Silly Killers' EP is coveted by niche record collectors, selling for several hundred dollars on the rare occasion it's listed on eBay or Discogs. Not bad for a record that sold for three dollars by mail when it was released more than 40 years ago. In his book Sonic Boom: The History of Northwest Rock, from "Louie Louie" to "Smells Like Teen Spirit," local music historian Peter Blecha grouped Silly Killers with the Wipers and the U-Men as "fun Northwest punk era groups whose records would be recognized as some of the earliest murmurs of a musical movement that would soon rise up from the Northwest and conquer the world."
Perhaps its value derives from McKagan singing backing vocals on one track. "Duff's vocals are only on our record because he came to the studio with Kim [Warnick of the Fastbacks], Andy [Fortier of the Vains], and other friends to watch us make the [EP]," Clukey recalled. "There was no intention of him being on the record other than that he was there and was asked if he wanted to sing backup vocals for the fun of it."
The EP is one of the early releases from Bloch's No Threes Records, a label that released recordings by pioneering Seattle punk bands like the Cheaters, the Vains, and the Fastbacks. That might make it coveted by record collectors. According to Bloch, punk singles from the late 1970s and early 1980s, especially by Seattle bands, are in demand among collectors and music fans. "I understand why people are looking for that [EP]," he added. "It hasn’t been re-issued and it's a cool part of Seattle music history. I wish I still had a box full of them."
Knife Manual (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "I worked at a downtown Seattle law firm, couriering stuff to the courthouse and other law firms. I would pass this big magazine store and look at the titles in the window. One magazine was called Knife Manual. What kind of person subscribed to Knife Manual? So, I wrote a song about it. Two Green River Task Force detectives knocked on my U-District apartment's door a few years later. They thought I was singing about myself because I had written the song in the first person. I had to take a polygraph to prove I was not the Green River Killer."
Not That Time Again (Music by Slats; Lyrics by Clukey) — "This song is basically about how I hated to get up in the morning and go to work."
Social Bitch (Music/Lyrics by Slats) — "This was all Slats, an old song he wrote."
Sissie Faggots (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "This wasn't an anti-gay song. It was a song about stereotypes. It sounds mean, but it's just sarcasm. I never had any mean intent toward gay people. It was really about making fun of the gay guys who lived across the hall from my apartment. I would go over and share a few pills and a beer with them once in a while. When the Silly Killers went to San Francisco to play, I sent a copy of the EP to one of the city's music magazines. The reviewer, Jello Biafra of the Dead Kennedys, liked it except for that song. He thought it was totally insulting. I never had a chance to explain myself to him."
The EP was reviewed by Maximum Rocknroll ("A neat 'garagey' record, the Silly Killers sound somewhat refreshing"), Attack ("A great combination of heavy metal and thrash"), and The Rocket ("A raw slice of Seattle life in the form of this four-song EP, presented no-holds-barred by this heavy-handed but speedy quartet. Rockin' disc!"), often couching praise with caveats due to the problematic nature of the song lyrics and titles. Maximum Rocknroll noted, "[T]he lyrics—yecch! I'm getting real sick of all this sexist and homophobic shit coming out now. Just because you guys are insecure about your own sexuality, you don't have to foist it on others"; Attack noted, "[The EP] sounds fine…if you pay no attention to the lyrics."
"Our songs were always about sarcasm," Clukey told me. "We always intended to get a rise out of people. Slats and I were both smart-asses."
Local music historian White noted, "More strident members of the public had no sense of irony and considered the Silly Killers to be misogynistic and homophobic. Of course, it was all provocation as part of their schtick." White argued the band reveled in the provocation, taking the piss out of fans and foes alike. "On several occasions, the band used what seemed to be misogynistic images to promote their shows. The images drew the wrath of those who didn't see it as funny or as a stunt to heighten the Silly Killers' image in the public eye. Needless to say, they managed to anger Seattle's feminist and lesbian communities often."
It's worth noting that equally edgy songs were performed by some of the period's most famous punk bands, including Black Flag ("Slip It In," "White Minority," "Drinking and Driving," and "Gimmie Gimmie Gimmie"), D.O.A. ("Full Metal Jackoff" and "Rich Bitch"), and Social Distortion ("Mommy's Little Monster").
Today, the Silly Killers' EP is coveted by niche record collectors, selling for several hundred dollars on the rare occasion it's listed on eBay or Discogs. Not bad for a record that sold for three dollars by mail when it was released more than 40 years ago. In his book Sonic Boom: The History of Northwest Rock, from "Louie Louie" to "Smells Like Teen Spirit," local music historian Peter Blecha grouped Silly Killers with the Wipers and the U-Men as "fun Northwest punk era groups whose records would be recognized as some of the earliest murmurs of a musical movement that would soon rise up from the Northwest and conquer the world."
Perhaps its value derives from McKagan singing backing vocals on one track. "Duff's vocals are only on our record because he came to the studio with Kim [Warnick of the Fastbacks], Andy [Fortier of the Vains], and other friends to watch us make the [EP]," Clukey recalled. "There was no intention of him being on the record other than that he was there and was asked if he wanted to sing backup vocals for the fun of it."
The EP is one of the early releases from Bloch's No Threes Records, a label that released recordings by pioneering Seattle punk bands like the Cheaters, the Vains, and the Fastbacks. That might make it coveted by record collectors. According to Bloch, punk singles from the late 1970s and early 1980s, especially by Seattle bands, are in demand among collectors and music fans. "I understand why people are looking for that [EP]," he added. "It hasn’t been re-issued and it's a cool part of Seattle music history. I wish I still had a box full of them."
The Silly Killers' 1982 EP was reviewed by Attack, Maximum Rocknroll, and The Rocket. (ATTACK REVIEW COURTESY JAY HINMAN)
In addition to their four-song EP, the Silly Killers contributed two songs—"Nothing to Say" and "Big Machine"—to the What Syndrome compilation cassette released in 1983 by Deux Ex Machina. McKagan drums on both songs, which Bloch recorded and produced in the basement of the Fastbacks' house. Maximum Rocknroll founder Tim Yohannan described the compilation as "a necessary addition to anybody's collection” in the magazine's March/April 1983 issue. Mark Arm, writing in the April 1983 issue of Attack, said of the Silly Killers' tracks, "I like it much better than their EP. The music is pretty great, but I wonder what the words actually say." Another Attack reviewer named Dana added, "[Big Machine] is better. It sounds more like their style."
Again, I asked Clukey to offer insights into each track:
Nothing To Say (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "This is my song about being a corporate person. You go to work every day working for nothing except your pay. I majored in economics, so everybody thought I was supposed to be a businessman. But I majored in economics because I liked economic theory. I tried the businessman thing, but it never worked for me."
Big Machine (Music/Lyrics by Slats) — "That's a really rockin' Slats song. I always liked playing it."
The What Syndrome compilation cassette, too, is a collector's item, fetching up to $250 on Discogs and eBay. It also includes tracks by the Rejectors, Accused, Fartz, Solger, 10 Minute Warning, and Mr. Epp & The Calculations.
Still, six songs—four on the band's EP and two on the What Syndrome compilation—comprise the Silly Killers' entire music catalog. That changed earlier this year when Clukey told me about the band's unreleased demo recorded in February 1983.
Again, I asked Clukey to offer insights into each track:
Nothing To Say (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "This is my song about being a corporate person. You go to work every day working for nothing except your pay. I majored in economics, so everybody thought I was supposed to be a businessman. But I majored in economics because I liked economic theory. I tried the businessman thing, but it never worked for me."
Big Machine (Music/Lyrics by Slats) — "That's a really rockin' Slats song. I always liked playing it."
The What Syndrome compilation cassette, too, is a collector's item, fetching up to $250 on Discogs and eBay. It also includes tracks by the Rejectors, Accused, Fartz, Solger, 10 Minute Warning, and Mr. Epp & The Calculations.
Still, six songs—four on the band's EP and two on the What Syndrome compilation—comprise the Silly Killers' entire music catalog. That changed earlier this year when Clukey told me about the band's unreleased demo recorded in February 1983.
The Silly Killers contributed two songs to the 1983 What Syndrome compilation, which was reviewed by Attack and The Rocket. (ATTACK REVIEW COURTESY JAY HINMAN)
To be clear, the demo's production quality is poor, and the recording setup is hardly ideal. Clukey recorded the entire session on an eggshell-colored Ampex cassette tape labeled "Carlin," as it initially held a recording by comedian George Carlin, and loaded into his boom box. Huletz's vocals and the songs’ lyrics are barely discernable.
And yet, it's a blistering, 30-minute set of 12 songs—four from the band's EP, two from the What Syndrome compilation, and six others, both old and new. The band's energy is contagious. McKagan's drumming injects power into the songs. Slats' clever guitar riffs and screaming solos are earworms. "Big Machine" starts with Slats' and Clukey's growling and sonorous guitarwork before jolting to a frantic chorus. "Know Your Zip Code" is bass-heavy and plodding at first, with Slats' sword-like guitar slashing ominously in the background before eventually speeding up and laying out. "Nothing to Say" bleeds into "Social Bitch" with barely a break.
The band is loose, offering jokey and self-deprecating between-song banter. Huletz asks for a cigarette. Clukey and Slats joke about playing to an empty room. Before the band tears into "Sissie Faggots," Clukey quips, "Homophobia, here we come. This is for everyone insecure about their sexuality." The recording ends with Clukey sarcastically hollering, "Thank you! Good night!"
I asked Clukey to offer insights into some of the basement recording's new songs:
Know Your Zip Code (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "This is from a quote by the 1960s acid guru Timothy Leary. It's about the importance of not losing track of where you are. Big Jim and I were 'shrooming' and went up to the UW campus to walk around one night. When we were ready to leave, I couldn't remember where I parked my car."
The Bitch — "We recorded this for the What Syndrome compilation, but it wasn't included because it's a Slaughter and the Dogs cover song. We also played this song at our shows. I had the Slaughter and the Dogs single, and Slats really liked how hard it rocked."
Dirty Little Boys (Music by Slats; Lyrics by Clukey) — "This was our answer to someone spray-painting 'Silly Killers Are Rapist Dogs' on a wall in the University District. Look, we're not rapist dogs. We're just dirty little boys."
You Don't Think That's Funny? (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "This was my put-back to people taking us so seriously. Our songs were meant to be sarcastic."
Who Your Friends Are (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "This is about me renting halls, making posters, and putting on shows. People would come, trash the place, and I would lose my damage deposit."
Clukey noted the differences between drummers Gowell ("very technical and smooth, he was a good drummer totally into Rush and Neil Peart") and McKagan ("the band sounds more powerful with Duff, and the newer songs sound a bit heavier and rougher"). I mentioned the prevalence of Slats' guitarwork. "He was pretty creative for not being a technical guitar player," Clukey said. "He put some really cool stuff down."
Overall, Clukey seemed pleased with the recording. "If you ignore the vocals, Slats, Duff, and I sound pretty good together," he said. "Musically, the basement tape is a good indication of how heavy we could be."
And yet, it's a blistering, 30-minute set of 12 songs—four from the band's EP, two from the What Syndrome compilation, and six others, both old and new. The band's energy is contagious. McKagan's drumming injects power into the songs. Slats' clever guitar riffs and screaming solos are earworms. "Big Machine" starts with Slats' and Clukey's growling and sonorous guitarwork before jolting to a frantic chorus. "Know Your Zip Code" is bass-heavy and plodding at first, with Slats' sword-like guitar slashing ominously in the background before eventually speeding up and laying out. "Nothing to Say" bleeds into "Social Bitch" with barely a break.
The band is loose, offering jokey and self-deprecating between-song banter. Huletz asks for a cigarette. Clukey and Slats joke about playing to an empty room. Before the band tears into "Sissie Faggots," Clukey quips, "Homophobia, here we come. This is for everyone insecure about their sexuality." The recording ends with Clukey sarcastically hollering, "Thank you! Good night!"
I asked Clukey to offer insights into some of the basement recording's new songs:
Know Your Zip Code (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "This is from a quote by the 1960s acid guru Timothy Leary. It's about the importance of not losing track of where you are. Big Jim and I were 'shrooming' and went up to the UW campus to walk around one night. When we were ready to leave, I couldn't remember where I parked my car."
The Bitch — "We recorded this for the What Syndrome compilation, but it wasn't included because it's a Slaughter and the Dogs cover song. We also played this song at our shows. I had the Slaughter and the Dogs single, and Slats really liked how hard it rocked."
Dirty Little Boys (Music by Slats; Lyrics by Clukey) — "This was our answer to someone spray-painting 'Silly Killers Are Rapist Dogs' on a wall in the University District. Look, we're not rapist dogs. We're just dirty little boys."
You Don't Think That's Funny? (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "This was my put-back to people taking us so seriously. Our songs were meant to be sarcastic."
Who Your Friends Are (Music/Lyrics by Clukey) — "This is about me renting halls, making posters, and putting on shows. People would come, trash the place, and I would lose my damage deposit."
Clukey noted the differences between drummers Gowell ("very technical and smooth, he was a good drummer totally into Rush and Neil Peart") and McKagan ("the band sounds more powerful with Duff, and the newer songs sound a bit heavier and rougher"). I mentioned the prevalence of Slats' guitarwork. "He was pretty creative for not being a technical guitar player," Clukey said. "He put some really cool stuff down."
Overall, Clukey seemed pleased with the recording. "If you ignore the vocals, Slats, Duff, and I sound pretty good together," he said. "Musically, the basement tape is a good indication of how heavy we could be."
5. — "A part of Seattle won't look the same."
With a demo tape in hand, the Silly Killers were poised to find a new drummer, play more shows, and possibly record another record. By the end of 1983, however, the band broke up, the casualty of young and capricious bandmates prone to arguments (frontman Huletz quit and rejoined the band several times, with Clukey singing during his absence) and driven more by an affinity for alcohol, cocaine, and heroin—Slats and Clukey, especially—than rock star ambitions. "Heroin destroyed our band," Clukey told me.
Bloch described a short-lived punk scene drawing maybe 50 people to each show, hardly sustainable for many of the area's punk bands. "It was tough," he explained. "I suppose that's why so many of the bands, by about 1982, decided to do other things. In some ways, it was like beating your head against the wall. That's not to say we didn't have a great time. There were tons of great shows and great bands. It was a fun time. But maybe there just weren't enough people involved to keep it going."
After the Silly Killers broke up, Slats joined a couple of short-lived bands, Cheatin' Death and Itchy Brother, playing Silly Killers songs Clukey wrote with Clukey's blessing. Cheatin' Death played shows at the Lincoln Arts Center in Belltown, the Golden Crown downtown, and Pioneer Square's Central Tavern. The September 1986 issue of The Rocket noted the band was in the studio working on its first EP. The Central Tavern's October 1986 live music schedule included Green River (October 2), Cheatin' Death (October 4), Young Fresh Fellows (October 8), and Soundgarden and Faith No More (October 10). Itchy Brother played a show at the Golden Crown in January 1985, and the band placed a classified advertisement for a "high-power, rock-action vocalist" in the October 1985 issue of The Rocket. Otherwise, both bands were short-lived.
Clukey quit music and tried to kick his addictions to cocaine and alcohol. At his intervention, a fellow musician he respected told him that the Silly Killers had become a parody of themselves toward the end of the band's run. "That really hurt, even as true as it was," Clukey told me.
Unable to stay clean in Seattle, he moved into his parents' home in New Jersey, "right across the river from New York City, where there's obviously no cocaine whatsoever," he told me facetiously. "I ended up just being an even bigger coke addict out there."
He returned to Seattle in 1987, hoping to get away from his East Coast cocaine addiction. Instead, he reconnected with Slats, who was using and dealing heroin. "Slats and I were a mess by this point. We did a lot of dope and, in my case, cocaine again, too. That stuff is the devil's own."
Clukey left Seattle for good in 1989, settling in Colorado, where he sardonically told me, "I now live happily ever after." Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, he spoke with Slats by phone every few months, learning about his old friend's harrowing tales of slinging dope on Capitol Hill and other drug-related legal run-ins, many of which are documented in publicly available King County Superior Court records. Throughout the 1990s, he paid fines or served home detention and community service for dealing and using heroin.
By the mid-1990s, Slats was rail thin, gaunt, and frail. At six feet tall and weighing 135 pounds, his physical appearance alarmed friends, family members, and others. After one drug-related arrest in 1995, Slats faced up to five years in jail and a $10,000 fine. A judge reduced that sentence to 30 days of home detention for reasons that offer insight into the severity of Slats' addiction. According to publicly available court records, Slats suffered from a host of maladies—chronic bilateral lower-extremity cellulitis, chronic pain, and recurrent abscesses. A public defenders' report noted, "Confinement could result in worsening infections. Also, the defendant's condition risks infection to the jail staff and inmates, and they strongly prefer not to house him."
Slats' father, David, underwent triple-bypass heart surgery at age 46 in 1978 but died of heart failure 12 years later. Slats and his mother, Mary Ann, traveled to Ottawa, Canada, to attend the funeral service.
"Chris was an absolute mess," Slats' half-brother John told me. "We didn't recognize him. Somebody tapped me on the shoulder and said, 'Is that your brother?'" John recalled Slats' incredibly frail presence. He clutched a cane and leaned on his mother to physically support him, but he still sported a rock star aura. "He had a stylish Guns N' Roses look. He embodied rock 'n' roll in all its glory and pain."
Slats' half-sister Didi had similar memories. According to Didi, Slats and his mother stayed at the same hotel as some of Didi and John's extended family members, who had spotted Slats earlier.
"My mom's sisters warned me before Chris arrived at the funeral home: 'He's not going to look like you remember,'" Didi told me. "As a young man, Chris was very handsome. He was in his late teens and still looking great the last time I saw him. When he showed up at our dad's funeral, I was blown away. Chris came with his mom, which was appreciated. But I think it might have also been necessary for him to get to the funeral physically. I think she was caring for him. We were very surprised. He was very thin. He told me, 'Punk music brought me into the world of drugs.' He connected the two things in his mind. Even though he loved the music, he knew it came with a bunch of other baggage he also adopted. He was very clear and open about his substance-related struggles."
Slats was a local celebrity in some circles during the 2000s. Seattle’s alternative weekly newspaper, The Stranger, tracked Slats' Capitol Hill whereabouts in a regular column and online forum. The Capitol Hill Seattle Blog included Slats among those who should appear on a fictional "Capitol Hill Seattle $1 Bill." WIRED magazine's feature article about urban eccentrics included an interview with Slats, who said, "It's kind of strange when I go in a bar, and everyone's taking a picture of me, or I walk down the street, and they're yelling my name. I'm just living my life, and all of a sudden, it's like, 'Whoa, what's going on?'" One 2009 Capitol Hill Block Party vendor sold T-shirts with Slats' image. A local website invited Seattleites to report celebrity sightings, which often included Slats spotted at a live music venue ("Kickin' it in the green room, of course"), a local bar ("He was in a booth, and I bought him a drink"), or a rehearsal space ("Fixing a guitar with a lit cigarette sitting on the stairs next to him").
On November 15, 2009, Slats was running for a cab when he slipped, broke his hip, and landed in a hospital emergency room, according to The Stranger, which also reported he nearly had one of his legs amputated before doctors surgically implanted a steel rod and plates. Capitol Hill's Comet Tavern hosted a benefit concert on December 6, 2009, to help cover Slats' medical bills. Three months later, The Stranger reported Slats had died at 1 p.m. on March 13, 2010, one day before his 47th birthday, adding, "A part of Seattle won't look the same without him around."
One person online recommended donating Slats' bolero hat to the Experience Music Project, or EMP (now the Museum of Pop Culture, or MoPOP). Another person noted it started to rain at 1 p.m. on the day he died. Someone else posted a photo of their tattoo of Slats. KEXP-FM 90.3 played Silly Killers songs. Seattle Met noted, "On Saturday afternoon, one of Seattle's rock 'n' roll legends, Christopher 'Slats' Harvey, died after what friends are calling a difficult bout with cancer. RIP, Slats."
In a column for Seattle Weekly, McKagan wrote, "I had seen him around at shows and elsewhere over the past 10 years, but always tried to avoid him because our paths had grown too far apart and I was frankly dubious and protective of my life, not being a good friend. To be honest, I don't know what we would then have had to talk about. But I could have tried. I should have tried."
Clukey added, "I don't remember the last time I spoke with him on the phone, but it took quite a while for me to find out he had died. I read it in an article online and was quite saddened by it. Another Seattle heroin casualty. His poor mother. She loved him so much."
Slats' death inspired memorial concerts at local dive bars and a fundraiser to inter his ashes among the remains at Capitol Hill's historic Lake View Cemetery.
A small group of people, including Slats' mother, Mary Ann, and McKagan, gathered on Capitol Hill to remember Slats. "It wasn't a big event or anything like that," one of Slats' friends told me. "I remember his mom stood to speak, and she was adamant that people understand that he had not been doing drugs, that he had gotten clean years earlier. She wanted people to know that he had died of cancer, not a drug overdose."
On The Stranger's "Where's Slats?" Forum in 2005, one person reported seeing Slats at drug recovery programs, "double and even triple-dipping during sharing sessions." Another person noted in 2007, "He's been off the junk for two years but still likes his liquor."
"It might have been almost a year before the news that Chris died worked through the family chain," Slats' half-brother John Harvey told me. "My initial reaction was, 'Oh, that's sad.' But I also couldn't believe he lived that long. When we saw him at our dad's funeral in 1990, Chris looked like he could go that day. That's how sick he was. Maybe he looked sick because he'd just been on a plane and couldn't fix. But he looked like he weighed about 80 pounds in 1990. Now, he lived 20 years after that with that addiction. It's amazing—and probably good genetics."
Slats' half-sister, Didi, added, "The last time I heard from Chris was in 1994 or 1995. An aunt passed away and left a small inheritance, so we were in touch. I regret we didn't have more of a relationship. It was John's wife who found out Chris died. It was at least a couple of years after his death when she was looking around on the internet and found several articles and obituaries. I was touched by the fact that he seemed to have touched several people meaningfully. That gratified me. That's what you’re supposed to do in your life, right? Touch people's lives. Another thing I realized from reading Chris' obituaries is how close he was to his mom and how much his mom was in his corner. That was also gratifying to read."
Three years after Slats' death, his mom, Mary Ann, died in Seattle on December 14, 2013, at age 80.
"It's nice that Chris is remembered," Slats’ half-brother, John, told me. "His addiction shouldn't be glossed over. It was a part of him. It's the reason he died so young. But he was this mini legend, this local character. Nobody would've known him if he had been a boring, stay-at-home guy."
To my mind, Slats is a lot like other inimitable and iconoclastic Seattle artists—poet Steven Jesse Bernstein, musician Richard Peterson, and the Gits' Mia Zapata.
Today, only the deepest dive into Seattle's music history annals proves the Silly Killers' existence. "Maybe that's for the best since my song lyrics were never taken as intended anyway and would get me banned in today's world," Clukey told me. "They got us in enough trouble back then."
Bloch told me McKagan's connection to the Silly Killers might bestow the band some notoriety. But the band might only be on your radar if you were in Seattle's punk scene between 1980 and 1982.
But the Silly Killers aren't entirely forgotten.
Silly Killers EP tracks are still in rotation on Maximum Rocknroll’s online radio shows. In 1992, Gas Huffer covered the song "Knife Manual" on a split seven-inch single with Mudhoney, who covered "You Stupid Asshole" by the Angry Samoans. Four years later, Redrum Records included the song "Knife Manual" in its Killed By Death #12 compilation CD of American punk rock. The compilation's cover art features the same Silly Killers EP cover art.
SugarBuzz Magazine recently raved, "The Silly Killers [EP] had a sound unlike anything else produced at the time it was released. Despite being firmly rooted in the late 70s and early 80s style of punk rock, perhaps the best label for the Silly Killers would be proto-hardcore. The EP is a ripper, bits of hardcore and surf-influenced rock all glued together with catchy, snotty punk."
If you visit Capitol Hill's Comet Tavern, scattered among the bar’s various tchotchkes—a plastic statue of Hamm's cartoon bear mascot and a glowing neon "R" for Rainier Beer—is a ceiling-mounted, 64-square-foot mosaic comprised of roughly 7,000 multicolored bottle caps forming the sublime and smiling face of Chris "Slats" Harvey, who peers down on people seated in the southeast corner booth.
Bloch described a short-lived punk scene drawing maybe 50 people to each show, hardly sustainable for many of the area's punk bands. "It was tough," he explained. "I suppose that's why so many of the bands, by about 1982, decided to do other things. In some ways, it was like beating your head against the wall. That's not to say we didn't have a great time. There were tons of great shows and great bands. It was a fun time. But maybe there just weren't enough people involved to keep it going."
After the Silly Killers broke up, Slats joined a couple of short-lived bands, Cheatin' Death and Itchy Brother, playing Silly Killers songs Clukey wrote with Clukey's blessing. Cheatin' Death played shows at the Lincoln Arts Center in Belltown, the Golden Crown downtown, and Pioneer Square's Central Tavern. The September 1986 issue of The Rocket noted the band was in the studio working on its first EP. The Central Tavern's October 1986 live music schedule included Green River (October 2), Cheatin' Death (October 4), Young Fresh Fellows (October 8), and Soundgarden and Faith No More (October 10). Itchy Brother played a show at the Golden Crown in January 1985, and the band placed a classified advertisement for a "high-power, rock-action vocalist" in the October 1985 issue of The Rocket. Otherwise, both bands were short-lived.
Clukey quit music and tried to kick his addictions to cocaine and alcohol. At his intervention, a fellow musician he respected told him that the Silly Killers had become a parody of themselves toward the end of the band's run. "That really hurt, even as true as it was," Clukey told me.
Unable to stay clean in Seattle, he moved into his parents' home in New Jersey, "right across the river from New York City, where there's obviously no cocaine whatsoever," he told me facetiously. "I ended up just being an even bigger coke addict out there."
He returned to Seattle in 1987, hoping to get away from his East Coast cocaine addiction. Instead, he reconnected with Slats, who was using and dealing heroin. "Slats and I were a mess by this point. We did a lot of dope and, in my case, cocaine again, too. That stuff is the devil's own."
Clukey left Seattle for good in 1989, settling in Colorado, where he sardonically told me, "I now live happily ever after." Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, he spoke with Slats by phone every few months, learning about his old friend's harrowing tales of slinging dope on Capitol Hill and other drug-related legal run-ins, many of which are documented in publicly available King County Superior Court records. Throughout the 1990s, he paid fines or served home detention and community service for dealing and using heroin.
By the mid-1990s, Slats was rail thin, gaunt, and frail. At six feet tall and weighing 135 pounds, his physical appearance alarmed friends, family members, and others. After one drug-related arrest in 1995, Slats faced up to five years in jail and a $10,000 fine. A judge reduced that sentence to 30 days of home detention for reasons that offer insight into the severity of Slats' addiction. According to publicly available court records, Slats suffered from a host of maladies—chronic bilateral lower-extremity cellulitis, chronic pain, and recurrent abscesses. A public defenders' report noted, "Confinement could result in worsening infections. Also, the defendant's condition risks infection to the jail staff and inmates, and they strongly prefer not to house him."
Slats' father, David, underwent triple-bypass heart surgery at age 46 in 1978 but died of heart failure 12 years later. Slats and his mother, Mary Ann, traveled to Ottawa, Canada, to attend the funeral service.
"Chris was an absolute mess," Slats' half-brother John told me. "We didn't recognize him. Somebody tapped me on the shoulder and said, 'Is that your brother?'" John recalled Slats' incredibly frail presence. He clutched a cane and leaned on his mother to physically support him, but he still sported a rock star aura. "He had a stylish Guns N' Roses look. He embodied rock 'n' roll in all its glory and pain."
Slats' half-sister Didi had similar memories. According to Didi, Slats and his mother stayed at the same hotel as some of Didi and John's extended family members, who had spotted Slats earlier.
"My mom's sisters warned me before Chris arrived at the funeral home: 'He's not going to look like you remember,'" Didi told me. "As a young man, Chris was very handsome. He was in his late teens and still looking great the last time I saw him. When he showed up at our dad's funeral, I was blown away. Chris came with his mom, which was appreciated. But I think it might have also been necessary for him to get to the funeral physically. I think she was caring for him. We were very surprised. He was very thin. He told me, 'Punk music brought me into the world of drugs.' He connected the two things in his mind. Even though he loved the music, he knew it came with a bunch of other baggage he also adopted. He was very clear and open about his substance-related struggles."
Slats was a local celebrity in some circles during the 2000s. Seattle’s alternative weekly newspaper, The Stranger, tracked Slats' Capitol Hill whereabouts in a regular column and online forum. The Capitol Hill Seattle Blog included Slats among those who should appear on a fictional "Capitol Hill Seattle $1 Bill." WIRED magazine's feature article about urban eccentrics included an interview with Slats, who said, "It's kind of strange when I go in a bar, and everyone's taking a picture of me, or I walk down the street, and they're yelling my name. I'm just living my life, and all of a sudden, it's like, 'Whoa, what's going on?'" One 2009 Capitol Hill Block Party vendor sold T-shirts with Slats' image. A local website invited Seattleites to report celebrity sightings, which often included Slats spotted at a live music venue ("Kickin' it in the green room, of course"), a local bar ("He was in a booth, and I bought him a drink"), or a rehearsal space ("Fixing a guitar with a lit cigarette sitting on the stairs next to him").
On November 15, 2009, Slats was running for a cab when he slipped, broke his hip, and landed in a hospital emergency room, according to The Stranger, which also reported he nearly had one of his legs amputated before doctors surgically implanted a steel rod and plates. Capitol Hill's Comet Tavern hosted a benefit concert on December 6, 2009, to help cover Slats' medical bills. Three months later, The Stranger reported Slats had died at 1 p.m. on March 13, 2010, one day before his 47th birthday, adding, "A part of Seattle won't look the same without him around."
One person online recommended donating Slats' bolero hat to the Experience Music Project, or EMP (now the Museum of Pop Culture, or MoPOP). Another person noted it started to rain at 1 p.m. on the day he died. Someone else posted a photo of their tattoo of Slats. KEXP-FM 90.3 played Silly Killers songs. Seattle Met noted, "On Saturday afternoon, one of Seattle's rock 'n' roll legends, Christopher 'Slats' Harvey, died after what friends are calling a difficult bout with cancer. RIP, Slats."
In a column for Seattle Weekly, McKagan wrote, "I had seen him around at shows and elsewhere over the past 10 years, but always tried to avoid him because our paths had grown too far apart and I was frankly dubious and protective of my life, not being a good friend. To be honest, I don't know what we would then have had to talk about. But I could have tried. I should have tried."
Clukey added, "I don't remember the last time I spoke with him on the phone, but it took quite a while for me to find out he had died. I read it in an article online and was quite saddened by it. Another Seattle heroin casualty. His poor mother. She loved him so much."
Slats' death inspired memorial concerts at local dive bars and a fundraiser to inter his ashes among the remains at Capitol Hill's historic Lake View Cemetery.
A small group of people, including Slats' mother, Mary Ann, and McKagan, gathered on Capitol Hill to remember Slats. "It wasn't a big event or anything like that," one of Slats' friends told me. "I remember his mom stood to speak, and she was adamant that people understand that he had not been doing drugs, that he had gotten clean years earlier. She wanted people to know that he had died of cancer, not a drug overdose."
On The Stranger's "Where's Slats?" Forum in 2005, one person reported seeing Slats at drug recovery programs, "double and even triple-dipping during sharing sessions." Another person noted in 2007, "He's been off the junk for two years but still likes his liquor."
"It might have been almost a year before the news that Chris died worked through the family chain," Slats' half-brother John Harvey told me. "My initial reaction was, 'Oh, that's sad.' But I also couldn't believe he lived that long. When we saw him at our dad's funeral in 1990, Chris looked like he could go that day. That's how sick he was. Maybe he looked sick because he'd just been on a plane and couldn't fix. But he looked like he weighed about 80 pounds in 1990. Now, he lived 20 years after that with that addiction. It's amazing—and probably good genetics."
Slats' half-sister, Didi, added, "The last time I heard from Chris was in 1994 or 1995. An aunt passed away and left a small inheritance, so we were in touch. I regret we didn't have more of a relationship. It was John's wife who found out Chris died. It was at least a couple of years after his death when she was looking around on the internet and found several articles and obituaries. I was touched by the fact that he seemed to have touched several people meaningfully. That gratified me. That's what you’re supposed to do in your life, right? Touch people's lives. Another thing I realized from reading Chris' obituaries is how close he was to his mom and how much his mom was in his corner. That was also gratifying to read."
Three years after Slats' death, his mom, Mary Ann, died in Seattle on December 14, 2013, at age 80.
"It's nice that Chris is remembered," Slats’ half-brother, John, told me. "His addiction shouldn't be glossed over. It was a part of him. It's the reason he died so young. But he was this mini legend, this local character. Nobody would've known him if he had been a boring, stay-at-home guy."
To my mind, Slats is a lot like other inimitable and iconoclastic Seattle artists—poet Steven Jesse Bernstein, musician Richard Peterson, and the Gits' Mia Zapata.
Today, only the deepest dive into Seattle's music history annals proves the Silly Killers' existence. "Maybe that's for the best since my song lyrics were never taken as intended anyway and would get me banned in today's world," Clukey told me. "They got us in enough trouble back then."
Bloch told me McKagan's connection to the Silly Killers might bestow the band some notoriety. But the band might only be on your radar if you were in Seattle's punk scene between 1980 and 1982.
But the Silly Killers aren't entirely forgotten.
Silly Killers EP tracks are still in rotation on Maximum Rocknroll’s online radio shows. In 1992, Gas Huffer covered the song "Knife Manual" on a split seven-inch single with Mudhoney, who covered "You Stupid Asshole" by the Angry Samoans. Four years later, Redrum Records included the song "Knife Manual" in its Killed By Death #12 compilation CD of American punk rock. The compilation's cover art features the same Silly Killers EP cover art.
SugarBuzz Magazine recently raved, "The Silly Killers [EP] had a sound unlike anything else produced at the time it was released. Despite being firmly rooted in the late 70s and early 80s style of punk rock, perhaps the best label for the Silly Killers would be proto-hardcore. The EP is a ripper, bits of hardcore and surf-influenced rock all glued together with catchy, snotty punk."
If you visit Capitol Hill's Comet Tavern, scattered among the bar’s various tchotchkes—a plastic statue of Hamm's cartoon bear mascot and a glowing neon "R" for Rainier Beer—is a ceiling-mounted, 64-square-foot mosaic comprised of roughly 7,000 multicolored bottle caps forming the sublime and smiling face of Chris "Slats" Harvey, who peers down on people seated in the southeast corner booth.
Silly Killers' bassist/co-founder Gary Clukey, drummer Tim Gowell, guitarist/co-founder Chris "Slats" Harvey, and vocalist Eddie Huletz in Seattle's University District ca. 1982.
(PHOTO COURTESY EMILY RIEMAN)
6. — Silly Killers Shows
NOTE: The following is a partial list of Silly Killers performances based on show posters, author interviews, and additional research. —TM
- Fall 1981 — with the Vains @ Laurelhurst Fieldhouse (4554 Northeast 41st Street), Seattle, WA
- Nov. 6, 1981 — With U-Men and "Aaiiee" @ Laurelhurst Fieldhouse (4554 Northeast 41st Street), Seattle, WA
- December 11, 1981 — with the Fastbacks and the Living @ St. Joe's Hall (18th Avenue East and East Aloha Street), Seattle, WA
- December 29, 1981 — with D.O.A. and the Fastbacks @ Arcadian Hall (East 6th Avenue and Main Street), Vancouver, BC
- January 22, 1982 — with U-Men @ UCT Hall (5th Avenue North and Aloha Street), Seattle, WA
- February 5, 1982 — with the Sissors @ Polish Hall (18th Avenue East and East Madison Street), Seattle, WA
- February 13, 1982 — with the Living and the Deans @ Salmon Bay Eagles Hall (20th Avenue Northwest and Northwest Market Street), Seattle, WA
- Feb. 19-20, 1982 — With Immortal Majority and Contraband at Smilin' Buddha Cabaret (109 East Hastings Street), Vancouver, BC
- March 2, 1982 — with the Accused and Bootboys @ Oddfellows Hall (915 East Pine Street), Seattle, WA
- March 12, 1982 — with Malfunktion, Extreme Maggots, Extreme Hate, Rejectors, and the Fartz @ Serbian Hall (4352 15th Avenue South), Seattle, WA
- March 19, 1982 — with Joe Despair, the Refuzors, and U-Men @ St. Joe's Hall (18th Avenue East and East Aloha Street), Seattle, WA
- May 1, 1982 — @ Seattle Center Mural Amphitheatre (305 Harrison Street), Seattle, WA
- June 8, 1982 — with Hüsker Dü and the Living @ Dez's 400 (400 Mercer Street), Seattle, WA
- June 10-12, 1982 — with the Living @ Dez's 400 (400 Mercer Street), Seattle, WA
- July 4, 1982 — with Saccharine Trust, Subhumans, and Black Flag @ Norway Center (300 3rd Avenue West), Seattle, WA
- July 30, 1982 — with the Fastbacks, the Living, and Lou Rudolph @ Rosco Louie (87 South Washington Street), Seattle, WA
- August 14, 1982 — "Dance for Brittle Brains" with the Living and Fatal Disease @ Smilin' Buddha Cabaret (109 East Hastings Street), Vancouver, BC
- August 20, 1982 — with Mr. Epp, Youth Brigade, and Social Distortion @ Ground Zero (202 3rd Avenue South), Seattle, WA
- September 6, 1982 — with Personality Crisis @ Metropolis (207 2nd Avenue South), Seattle, WA
- September 9, 1982 — with the Fartz, Fear, and Code of Honor @ Showbox (1426 1st Avenue), Seattle, WA
- November 6, 1982 — with Dayglow Abortions, Bootboys, and Hobo Skank @ Munro's Dance Palace (912 Elliott Avenue West), Seattle, WA
- March 11, 1983 — with VKTMS, Men in Black, and Plastic Medium @ Sound of Music (162 Turk Street), San Francisco, CA
- April 16, 1983 — "Battle of the Bands" with Renegade, Eclipse, and Nexus @ Crossroads Skating Center (16232 Northeast 8th Street), Bellevue, WA
- May 21, 1983 — with the Fastbacks and 10 Minute Warning @ Fox Island Schoolhouse (690 9th Avenue), Fox Island, WA
- September 6, 1983 — with Personality Crisis and YBGB @ Metropolis (207 2nd Avenue South), Seattle, WA
- October 6, 1983 — "Street Kids Benefit" with Shanghai Dog, the Fastbacks, 10 Minute Warning, and Moral Crux @ Metropolis (207 2nd Avenue South), Seattle, WA
Todd Matthews is a Seattle writer, editor, and journalist whose work has appeared in over two dozen publications in print and online over the past 25 years. His music-related journalism includes in-depth interviews with YES drummer Alan White, album/poster designer Art Chantry, and rock journalist Gillian G. Gaar; a feature profile of Goodness/Hammerbox lead singer Carrie Akre; an oral history of The Rocket and the magazine's connection to Seattle's Capitol Hill neighborhood; and oral histories of Seattle's late/great record shops such as Bomb Shelter, Broadway Record Centre, Fallout Records & Skateboards, Mount Olympus Imports, Orpheum Records, The Record Library, and Rubato Records. His journalism is collected online here.