What started four years ago as a party to mark the 20th anniversary of Club Congress has morphed into a four-day celebration of local music, sustainability and vinyl. The fun starts Thursday night with the TAMMIES at the Rialto Theatre, then moves across the street to Hotel Congress, where more than 40 bands, including the Meat Puppets, Sleepercar, Calexico and Sergio Mendoza Y La Orkesta, will rock Friday through Sunday.
Local cowpunk rocker Al Perry estimates that he owns 3,000 records, plus a couple thousand CDs and scores of 78s and MP3s.
The vinyl treasures are packed tightly into white-painted wood shelves that line the living room of his casita a few blocks northwest of the University of Arizona campus. Several paintings of the Last Supper — one in 3-D — hang on the wall, along with Brian Wilson posters. A 9-foot-4-inch surfboard sits on top of one of the shelves.
On Sunday, Perry will host the third annual Al Perry's BBQ as part of Hotel Congress' HoCo Fest. The four-day celebration of music, sustainability and vinyl will feature a performance by Perry and some of his friends.
Perry won't actually be manning the grill this weekend, but he is excited about the Sonoran barbecue that the hotel will be serving up for $8 a plate.
There will be pulled chicken, carne asada, rice and beans, calabacitas and fresh tortillas.
"Last year they ran out before I could get any," Perry says.
The fest will include a record sale, and last year Perry picked up a copy of an album by Charles Wright of Charles Wright and the Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band fame.
On a recent Saturday afternoon, the wild harmonicas and howling vocals of the 13th Floor Elevators' "You're Gonna Miss Me" play on the stereo. This song, by a psychedelic-rock band from Austin, Texas, peaked at No. 55 on the Billboard singles chart in 1966, and 34 years later it was featured in the opening scene of "High Fidelity."
Perry, who lives alone and has a Bridget Bardot poster above his bed, says he identifies with that movie's record-store-owner protagonist, played by John Cusack. But one aspect of the film doesn't ring true.
"He's a record collector and he gets a girlfriend," Perry says. "That's kind of far-fetched right there."
Perry's a self-described loner who is recognized everywhere he goes. A surfer landlocked in the desert. A vinyl fanatic living in an age of digital downloads.
It's not easy being Perry. Yet no amount of half-empty venues, broken hearts or frozen dinners can dull the 52-year-old's passion for introducing folks to Arizona rock.
A staple of the Tucson music scene for nearly 30 years, Perry has quit his front-desk job at Hotel Congress, stopped doing data entry and embraced a semiretirement that largely consists of reading album booklets, listening to records and taking to the stage and the airwaves to advocate for local musicians long forgotten.
As the host of Al Perry's "Clambake," a radio show that airs Tuesdays from 6 to 8 p.m. on KXCI, he plays an eclectic mix of rock 'n' roll with a focus on Arizona artists.
Perry's friends all describe his knowledge of Arizona rock 'n' roll as "encyclopedic."
Terry Owen, whose stage name is Fish Karma, says Perry's songs are a testament to his love of rock.
"Some people adopt a particular form of music because it's popular," says Owen, who gave the world "Swap Meet Women" in the '80s. "But Al's always been able to mix genres, and it's never seemed affected."
Stop by Perry's casita and you're bound to leave with a collection of burned CDs — artists that you've probably never heard of but who once put Arizona on the rock 'n' roll map.
Ed Nossum, a guitar and bass player for the Distortionists, says Perry was eager to teach him about old-school rockers from Arizona and beyond.
"He sent me a batch of CDs with a variety of stuff. Hank Williams. Beach Boys outtakes. Mattie May Thomas. Roy Orbison. Soupy Sales. People I'd heard of and people I'd never heard of."
In real life, Perry doesn't own a dog. But in a comic book about Perry by local artist Howard Salmon, he does.
"I felt that a dog would be a good vehicle for him to vent about music," Salmon wrote in an e-mail that appeared on the blog titled "The Range." "Otherwise, he'd be just talking to himself, and that would be too creepy, even though it might be true!"
Occasional band mate Loren Dircks (of the band Gila Bend) says Perry is passionate about the things that he likes.
"Al likes to find that brilliant thing in the spaces that everybody missed and then yell at the people who walk past, like, 'What's the matter with you for not seeing that?' "
Perry says there's nothing more rewarding than teaching people about great local music.
"There is a really strong Arizona music scene that most people are not aware of," he says. "And I sort of take it that that is my little . . . c'mon . . . what is the word that I'm looking for?"
Itch? "Not an itch, but that's my little diatribe, it's my little. . . ."
Lecture? Speech?
"It's just something that I'm trying to turn people on to."
For nearly 30 years, Perry has been entertaining Tucson audiences. He moved to Tucson from Phoenix in the late '70s to study biology at the University of Arizona, but he soon found he was spending more time playing gigs with the Subterranean Blues Band in bars such as Pearl's Hurricane, the Night Train and Nino's than he was in the library.
Over the years, he's played in a number of bands, including the Psyclones, the Hecklers and the Cattle, whose record "Cattle Crossing" got its fair share of radio play in Canada in the 1980s.
Perry moved to the Bay Area in 2000 and landed a gig as an assistant manager of a youth hostel. He didn't get along with his boss and returned to Tucson after a couple of years — but not before he learned to surf.
"There's nothing more fun than riding a wave," he says. "Once you're done, it's so addictive — you've got to go do it again."
Perry says he's not much for touring, but he has played in Europe a handful of times and really enjoyed being a part of the 2005 We Got Cactus Tour, which played to sellout crowds in France and featured local acts Al Foul and The Pork Torta.
So far, mainstream success has eluded Perry.
"Man, I've never had any hits," Perry says. "I'm really not a very good businessman. I've never pursued things like record labels."
While Perry's songs have never made him much money, they've won him respect from other musicians.
Calexico co-founder Joey Burns says his group's sound borrows from classic Perry.
"I think what really stuck out for me, coming from L.A., was here was somebody who was really influenced by the classic honky-tonk, like Porter Wagoner and Hank Williams," he says.
Former Aerosmith manager Tim Collins says 80 percent of Perry's songs could be hits, if he only marketed himself better.
"Then again, I've been affiliated with some of the biggest rock acts in the world and all of them are pretty miserable," Collins says. "So maybe he's smarter than all of them?"
Perry's been a frequent collaborator with the likes of Burns and John Convertino (Burns' fellow Calexico co-founder), as well as Fish Karma and Gila Bend. He's released a couple of solo albums (1995's "Losin' Hand" and 2004's "Always a Pleasure"), and he recently came out with a three-track session EP recorded with Grammy-winning Arizona audio pioneer Jack Miller, who has also recorded Duane Eddy, Henry Mancini, the Rolling Stones, The Limeliters and The Monkees, among many others.
Local musician Michael P. Nordberg played drums on the three-track EP and lauded Perry's no-nonsense approach to studio recording.
"He sat there with his very dark glasses on, and his guitar in his lap, mildly strumming, and when he figured everyone was ready, he counted off the songs," Nordberg says. "When the song would end, he'd say the title of the next song, and we were off on another take. After the session, me and the bass player, David Roads, got in the car and drove back to Tucson, and Al returned the next day with the whole album ready for pressing. Said he just let the tape roll, and sang his leads one after another. Al doesn't play around. He wants it done right away."
Calexico co-founder Burns says Perry was the inspiration for his group's song, "The Ride, Part II."
"So many times I've gone to see Al working at the front desk at Congress because I wanted to talk about music and I knew there was a lull in the shift," he says. "I'd go late at night to find out what he was listening to."
Club Congress booker David Slutes says having Perry work the front desk was like having a celebrity around.
"Cat Power would walk into the lobby and say, 'Hi, Al.' "
Perry quit his hotel job about a year ago saying it was time.
On Sunday, Perry will take the stage with Burns and Convertino, as well Love Mound's Mike Mihina.
"Those guys, they're such good friends and such a great band, and it'll be loud and about as much fun as you can have playing music," Perry says.
Perry started hosting the KXCI show in the mid-'90s. He says he lives for the time he spends in the DJ booth.
"It's just fun to turn people on to music. I love all this weird obscure (stuff) that people aren't going to hear. I don't even know if people like my show much. People like to hear what they're familiar with, and I'm the exact opposite of that.
"I've got this huge collection of old, vintage Arizona music. Rex Allen. Jim Boyd. All this stuff. I'm always playing it because I want to turn people on to it."
Which is Perry's favorite Arizona band? He mentions the Swigs, a band he saw at the Red Room two nights prior.
"That's what I like about rock music; it's noisy and it's interesting and it rocks.
"I'll just get my flashlight and I'll yell them out at you," he says as he springs off the couch and heads into his dimly lit bedroom and crouches down in front of a shelf. He riffles through a couple hundred vinyl records and shouts out the names of his favorites.
The Hacienda Brothers, Phantom Limbs, Chuck Wagon and the Wheels, Calexico, Black Sun Ensemble . . . Perry's list goes on and on.
"Alice Cooper is from Phoenix. Al Casey is another guy from Phoenix. Sanford Clark, who had a big huge hit with 'The Fool,' is from Arizona. Dusty Chaps. Duane Eddy. There's all kinds of great stuff from Arizona."
Perry wants people to discover great bands from the Grand Canyon State, but he doesn't want them to forget about him, either.
"I want to release a 10-CD box set for Al Perry," he says. "I've got so much (stuff) that never got released. And like cool live tapes and like goofy interviews."
Perry says he's optimistic that the box set will see the light of day next year.
In the meantime, you can catch Perry in concert at HoCo. He'll also play a free show Sept. 23 in the lounge at Plush.
And you can hear him every Tuesday night on the radio, spreading the gospel.
"There's a darn fine music scene in this town, considering the town is this size," he says.
Amen.
The life and times of Al Perry . . . record collector extraordinaire and surf maniac without an ocean
Here are some of Perry's thoughts on everything from dating to Tucson's music scene, as told to Caliente reporter Coley Ward while listening to records in Perry's living room.
Perry on music:
"Music, man, music is the only thing that really, like, jazzes me. It's the only thing that's ever (expletive) been reliable to me. I like surfing and I like girlfriends, but music is the only thing where you could consistently, not always consistently, but for the most part you could count on it."
Perry on owning a big record collection:
"Gotta have them. Why? Why not? Because it's fun to have a good record collection. It's nice being able to pull whatever you want. You want to hear Stevie Wonder's "My Cherie Amour," and you just walk over and there it is. You don't have to worry about downloading it off iTunes. Plus vinyl is so much cooler."
Perry on surfing:
"I love surfing. If I could do anything I wanted to do, I'd surf. I'd never pick up a guitar again."
Perry on organizing his record collection:
"Everything is alphabetical. Because you end up, like, doing it and then you end up with this Ray Charles record. Where do I put that? Does it go under R&B? Does it go under jazz? Under pop? So I do it alphabetical, and even then I end up with things out of place."
Perry on his addiction to buying music:
"Look at this box set. It wasn't even that expensive. I am a sucker for this kind of (stuff). I am a sucker. If somebody wants to get money out of me, they just have to put out a box set and I'll reach for my credit card. It's sickening. It's disgusting."
Perry on Tucson audiences:
"They're hit or miss, man. I'm sitting there playing the lounge at Plush and this (expletive) blond sorority girl comes up and she doesn't even wait for me to finish the song, she comes up while I'm playing and says, 'Don't you know any nice music?' Because I do a lot of heartbreak and honkytonk and breakup songs, and sad music. And it just totally demoralized me. So I looked at my list and I say, 'Ummm . . . let's see . . . no. I don't know any. Sorry.' And then I played murder ballads and the saddest songs I knew."
Perry on live music:
"I hate to say it, because everybody loves iTunes. But disco, the Internet and iTunes kind of wrecked it all."
Perry on food:
"I just eat frozen dinners and crap. Or I just go out. When you live by yourself, it's a drag to cook. You've always got leftovers and you've got to do dishes, so why bother?"
Perry on love:
"I don't have a philosophical objection to marriage. I'm kind of a loner, and I prefer to be by myself, and if I had a girlfriend she's going to move in here, and she's probably not going to dig it too much, so I won't bother. Maybe I'll date or something, but I'm not going to inflict myself on somebody."
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