Half Cocked

Phoenix article
May 26 - June 1
On the move:
"Bye-bye, Half Cocked"

(Reproduced entirely without permission from Cellars by Starlight by Brett Milano)

You always seem to learn juicy details about people just when they're about to leave town. So here's one about Half Cocked singer Sarah Reitkopp: she got a tongue kiss from Poison singer Bret Michaels when she was just 14. "I snuck backstage at the [mid-'80s] Ratt/Poison tour with my friend from high school," she admits over drinks with two of her bandmates at the Linwood Grill. "In hindsight they were so coked-out, but then I was just thinking, 'Damn, they're skinny.' I was only 14 and I looked it -- I mean, I look that way now, but I really did then. But Bret kissed me and gave me the tongue; they invited us back to the hotel but my friend had to go home. Then I told my mother and she freaked out."

The irony here is just too perfect: at the time Poison were a red-hot, hard-rockin', hell-raising band from Los Angeles. And if everything goes as planned, that's exactly what Half Cocked are about to become. After three years together in Boston, they're hightailing it out of here next week after a final show set for this Saturday (May 27) at the Middle East. Unlike many bands who try their luck in LA, Half Cocked are going with a first-class ticket. They're the first band signed to Automatic Records, a DreamWorks subsidiary label run by ex-Bostonian and Powerman 5000 singer Spider. The first release will be a reworking of Half Cocked's second Curve of the Earth album, Occupation: Rockstar, with a remix by star mixer Ulrich Wild and a few new songs. They've got high-powered management set up with Andy Gould, who works with Powerman, Monster Magnet, and Spider's brother Rob Zombie. They've got free plane tickets and a fancy hotel to stay in. Drummer Charlee Johnson has an endorsement deal already set up. Even Reitkopp's mom is happy. "She said, 'It's what you've always dreamed of -- go have fun.'"

Under the circumstances, they're about as sentimental about leaving Boston as one might expect. "Whoopee!" is bassist Jhen Kobran's first reaction to that topic. "Where's the plane? You guys need help flying it?" jokes Johnson. "I love Boston, but I'm looking forward to warm winters," says Reitkopp. "We'll never become an LA band, though, and I think that's a matter of attitude. I'm not getting collagen lips, and we're not getting breast implants. Especially not Charlee."

Pressed to get serious, Johnson admits he'll miss Boston just a little. "I've spent the last month being heartsick and seeing great bands, and I'll namecheck them -- Roadsaw, Quintaine Americana, Cheerleadr, RC Crimewave. But Boston is really music boot camp; you get your ass kicked out here. You haul your own gear, play to 10 people, and don't get paid. You learn what it's like to be in a band because the scene is so competitive. And really, we're skipping a level, which is weird. We're skipping the level of even shopping to a major label. Right now we're still used to calling the Middle East and asking them to book us."

If any outfit is ripe for a move to LA and a taste of rock stardom, Half Cocked are it. Like most of Boston's best loud bands (including the ones named by Johnson), they approach the music with a certain irony. They're aware that rock gets more ridiculous as it gets bigger and louder. But that doesn't stop them from buying into it wholeheartedly: they're in love with the noise, the decadence, the glamor. Few bands in town are so willing to flaunt their sex appeal -- at least, few bands who have any to flaunt. And it doesn't hurt that they write real songs, a skill Reitkopp honed in her previous band, Planet Jumper. Half Cocked have provoked some extreme reactions in their time: they made it to the final of last year's Rumble (as a wild card) but got blown off by one judge (namely Hits magazine's Karen Glauber) as "45 minutes of my life that I'll never get back." Some people just don't know how to have a good time.

Half Cocked's members have strong opinions about what rocks and what doesn't. At the Linwood, for example, cringes go around the table when a perfectly decent Cardigans track comes over the sound system. "This is Keebler music. I feel like I should be making cookies," Johnson offers. "She's got that little baby voice for the pedophile in you," adds Reitkopp. "To me, indie rock was never a genre in the first place," Johnson finishes. "And we've had an uphill struggle as long as we've been here, because we just play rock." Operation: Rockstar comes across as a blustery, confident album. But the band were in disarray before the sessions for it began. Guitarist Tony O'Neil was leaving to be a father. He was replaced by John Heatley and Jamie Richter (he the former 6L6 guitarist; she a 20-year-old upstart plucked from the Museum School). Although the album was never circulated to industry bigwigs, an advance copy was sent to Reitkopp's friend Spider, who went wild for it. Even now that everything's going their way, the members have too many memories of their previous bands (which also include Johnson's spell in 3-1/2 Girls and Kobran's in Malachite) to take anything for granted.

"We're gonna be back before we know it," says Reitkopp in a fatalistic moment. "I used to go to the Paradise a lot, and I remember what they always said: 'Be nice to us, because we see you on the way up and on the way down.'" Adds Johnson, "We're going out there as underdog out-of-towners, so the fight is on."

Still, the band are running high on confidence -- or at least the prospect of a few good times along the way. "We know too much to think it will be easy," admits Reitkopp. "But look: either we go out and become a multiplatinum band or we get to tour for two years on somebody else's tab. Any other time in my rock career I would have fucked this up, but now I'm ready." Johnson concurs: "Right, the timing is perfect for me. If I'd gotten this contract back when I was 24, they would have found me in a bathtub with six Asian midgets and a mountain of cocaine." Somewhere, Bret Michaels is smiling.