Still Life with Cavedogs

The first time I heard the Cavedogs was in the winter of late 1988/early 1989 as I was driving around Boston listening to WFNX, the song was "Baba Ghanooj." Even though my car radio sucked, the song grabbed me, the vocals, the cryptic lyrics, that bass note that crashed through the floor. I thought, "whoa, that's good." At that time WFNX was playing it fairly often and I looked forward to hearing it. I asked around about the group but nobody seemed to know anything about them. By the late summer of 1989 WFNX started playing the song "Bed of Nails" and I really dug it. One afternoon I heard that the Cavedogs were going to be playing live in front of the Harvard Coop and before I went into town I took a sharpie marker to one of my pocket t-shirts;I drew a dog whistling in front of a cave and I pulled it on. I thought that the guys in the band would get a laugh out of my home made concert t-shirt looking down from the stage but something happened and they didn't show. I remember someone saying something about them getting a gig in New York City, and that was the closest I came to seeing the Cavedogs live. In October of 1989 I left Boston and moved to Puerto Rico and started working in the Caribbean National Forest. The shirt's gone now but I still have a picture of me with it on, standing with my crew during an expedition to look for an endangered species. In the winter of 1990 I came back to Boston for a visit and I bought "Joyrides for Shut-Ins" at the same Harvard Coop. A guy in the store told me that one of the guys in the band had worked there and that they were all proud of him. I took that CD back to Puerto Rico with me and it kind of became the soundtrack to my life. Whenever I had it on people would say things like, "Who's that?" "That's good." At that time I had a rooftop apartment right on corner of a popular surfing beach. The surfers who would walk by below my house took to hanging around there at the corner enjoying the music I played. I remember one time seeing a group of them smoking a joint and bobbing their heads to "Joyrides." I gave them a wave and I turned a speaker towards them and cranked up "Step Down." They all gave me surfer salutes and started dancing and jumping around!

In 1991 I moved to Florida and went to work at a wildlife refuge near Tallahassee. I kept hoping the Cavedogs would play a gig in the area because FSU attracted a lot of under the radar screen acts. They didn't (that I'm aware of) but I bought "Soul Martini" as soon as it came out in 1992. From the very first note of "Love Grenade" I was impressed. I thought for sure this was going to be their break out disc. I thought/still think it's brilliant. When I heard sometime later that the Cavedogs had broken up I was really bummed out. For some reason their music really spoke to me and I lamented all the great Cavedogs music that I wasn't going to be able to hear. I did however manage to put my hands on a copy of "Six Tender Moments" and those songs like "Glass Eye" made me feel even more sorry that the Cavedogs were to be no more. Throughout the 1990's I spent at least a couple of months a year working back in the Caribbean National Forest. I had this cool old house at the top of a mountain. At night I would listen to music and my two Cavedogs CD's were never far from the player. I once thought the guys in the band would get a kick out of it if they knew that their music was being played in this really remote location.

To wind up this horribly long autobiography with the Cavedogs, I'd like to say that I just found this web site and I'm encouraged that the group has reunited or kind of reunited and I want to thank the guys in the band for creating music that has given me years of enjoyment. If you guys ever make it to South Florida look me up at the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge in Naples, and It'd be my pleasure to take you out on a swamp buggy safari in the Everglades.

ALSO saw the DOGS open for DM and Mojo at Center Stage in ATL (I dont need to tell you how AWESOME that one was)...here's where my SECOND story comes in...a few months later, I'm working @ 6 Flags Over GA, as a Character Assistant -basically walking around with people dressed up as Daffy Duck and shit- and who do i see?!

Well, let's just say that Todd Spahr was rather shocked to be recognized all the way down in ATL...we chatted for a minute, parted ways, and the band broke up after the next album...well, that's how it goes...ps, Todd was roaming around 6 Flags with Matt Dubin, who worked on that tour with Dead Milkmen, as well as many other tours...if either of you two dorks read this post, email me !! I still have your cockrings!

The Cavedogs are the BEST, most UNDERRATED band of the AWFUL-nineties.