Show #188 September 26, 2026 Jeff Conolly Tribute

Dedicated to Dolly and Boston Rock & Roll Legend Jeff Conolly!

 

Dolly- Lyres On Fyre 

Jezebel- The Teddy Boys Jezebel 

Help You Ann- Lyres Help You Ann 

First Time is the Best Time- DMZ First Time Is The Best Time

Lift Up Your Hood- Bum Wanna Smash Sensation! 

Mighty Idy (JJ Solo)- DMZ The Lost Studio Sessions 1978 

Thinking of Me- The Gnomes More 

In My Town- Runarounds Waiting For The Hurricane 

First Thing Tomorrow- The Rousers A Treat Of New Beat 

Next Position Please- Cheap Trick Next Position Please 

^Nobody But Me- The Human Beinz Nuggets: Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era, Vol. 2 

How Do You Know?- The Lyres How Do You Know? 7" 

^Tired Of Waiting For You- The Kinks Tired of Waiting For You  

Buried Alive- Lyres AHS 1005 

The Way I Feel About You- The Pete Best Combo Beyond The Beatles 1964-66 

You Won't Be Sad Anymore- Lyres Lyres Lyres 

*Don't Give It Up Now- Willie Alexander Play New Rose For Me 

*Help You Ann- The Chesterfield Kings - Help You Ann/She Told Me Lies 

*She Pays the Rent- The Nomads She Pays The Rent 

*How Do You Know- Classic Ruins Room Starts Spinning 

You're So (Phisticated)- Uni Boys Uni Boys 

Tomorrows Tears- Riptides Powerpearls Vol. 7 

Tell Me Something I Don't Know- Sloan B Sides Win Vol. 3 2003-2011 

Tonight- Squares feat. Joe Satriani Squares 

>You're Gonna Miss Me- 13th Floor Elevators Nuggets: Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era - 1965-1968 

I'm Tellin' You Girl- Lyres On Fyre at the Rusty Nail 1985 

>Soapy- Mickey & The Clean Cuts Soapy 

On Fyre- Lyres A Promise Is A Promise 

>What A Girl Can`t Do- The Hangmen What A Girl Can't Do 

She Pays The Rent- Lyres Lyres Lyres

 

^Power Pop Peak(s):    #8 Billboard Hot 100 2/3/68

                                          #6  Billboard Hot 100 4/18/65

 

*SacroSet:  Lyres Tribute

 

>Power Pop Prototype(s) (Songs The Lyres Taught Us):  1966, 1965, 1966  

 

Obituaries about the great Jeff Conolly who passed away on July 31, 2026 had his age at either 70 (New York Times) or 69 (Boston Globe and others).  The Times is correct- they aren't "the paper of record" for nothing.  They mentioned he had rejected his DMZ-era nickname "Monoman," which came from his love of obscure 60's punk records that were often recorded in mono rather than stereo.  That was news to me but I haven't lived in Massachusetts since 1992 and only got to see him play
 once since then at an October 2000 Budget Rock Showcase 
at Thee Parkside in San Francisco.  The Times obit also said his subsequent band was called "Lyres," no "The."  The thing is, my friends and I ALWAYS called them "The Lyres."  It's true they are "Lyres" on all the early albums but Exhibit A in my defense is their first single from 1979 on Erik Lindgren's Sounds Interesting records.  We were fans of Conolly's first band DMZ so we bought How Do You Know? the month it came out and the band was "The Lyres" from then on.  I rest my case- though I did remove "The" from the album song listings above.  (My wife says I should include a reference to my OCD here- I wonder why?)

 

About ten years ago I was record shopping with Cousin Rich at a store in Plymouth, Mass and we were talking to the owner, who was around our age.  I told them I've wondered if the Boston rock & roll from my high school/college years (roughly 1978-1986) was objectively the greatest in the city's history or did it just feel that way since it was my time.  The Record Store Guy was pretty adamant that this was the golden age of Boston rock and nothing before or since has even come close. 

 

While still in high school Rich and I had started listening to legendary Boston bands The Real Kids (who gave us our namesake song "All Kindsa Girls"), Nervous Eaters, La Peste, Mission of Burma, The Atlantics, The Neighborhoods, Classic Ruins, and The Lyres.  While I got to see all but La Peste, The Neighborhoods, Lyres and Classic Ruins were most active after I got to town in 1982 and I'd try to see them every time they'd play.  During those years, a lot of Boston bands were as big a draw as the out of town touring groups.  Check out this 1985 ad for Boston club The Channel- a huge space with 1700 person capacity.  Half the groups listed are Boston bands including those playing the benefit, Lyres, Neighborhoods, New Man, and Down Avenue.  Outside of New York and LA, it's hard to imagine a club this size would book so many local bands today. Based on the slow and steady creep of DJ nights and tribute bands I'm seeing in Bay Area clubs it's certainly not happening here and I doubt it's any different in Boston.

 

DMZ in their "Flirting With Glam" phase

Whether or not Record Store Guy is right about our time being the "best time" for Boston Rock, I am so grateful for all the great shows I got to see.  While I was still in high school my friends and I had taken the T to several all-ages shows, hardcore matinees, and the like. When I moved to Boston in fall 1982 and got my fake ID it opened up a whole new world.  DMZ were before my time but I got to a ton of  Lyres shows and got to see Jeff Conolly's manic front man antics on many occasions:

• a notorious perfectionist, he would change the settings on his guitarist's amp and often yell at his band on stage.  One of my all-time favorite Boston drummers Paul Murphy, a member of both DMZ and numerous Lyres lineups was often the target of Conolly's wrath- Murphy had the patience of a saint.
• For a few years rock station WBCN did weekday lunchtime concerts at the club Metro.  I'd take the T to Kenmore, run over the Pike to Landsdown Street, see a 45 minute set and T back to work.  One memorable show was Lyres who, perhaps due to the aforementioned, were playing without Paul Murphy.  Undeterred, Conolly kept time on a vodka bottle with a drumstruck, something I saw do a few more times even with Murphy back on drums.
• On March 12, 1986 at WBCN's 18th Birthday Bash- Lyres opened for Aerosmith at arena Worcester Centrum,  Rather than spread out on the huge stage they played packed in tight next to each other, using no more space than they would have at clubs like Cantones or The Rat.  This was also the first time I heard them do the the slow, soulful nearly 5-minute version of "She Pays The Rent" from Lyres Lyres.  In front of Aerosmith fans.... at an arena!  It is still one of the ballsiest things I've ever seen a band pull off- Lyres were fearless!

Danny, Paul, Jeff, Rick

Freshman year at Emerson I did a radio show on WERS called Niteklub, and the show coordinator was dating local guitarist Danny McCormack who had been in The Transplants and Mighty Ions.  I met him at the station, then got to talk to him after an Ions show at Cantones, notable because after a teetering drunk smashed the microphone into his teeth, from the stage Danny coldcocked the guy without missing a beat on guitar.  Later that year, Jeff Conolly asked him to join the lyres and Danny ended up being with the band for just a few years but this period included their brilliant first and second albums On Fyre and Lyres, Lyres and is perhaps the longest tenure of any guitarist in the band's 47 year history.  Like I said, Conolly was tough on band members as proven by the band's Rock Family Tree.  That said, while several early 80's Boston bands had toured the U.S., Lyres is the first one I know of to make it

Danny w/Lyres in 2008

overseas to places like France, Spain, Germany, and The Netherlands.  Danny had great stories about Jeff and the places they played.  As the Cantones drunk incident proves, Danny was not one to be messed with.  I've no doubt that like any guitarist, it bugged the crap out of Danny when Jeff fiddled with the dials on his guitar amp during shows but I bet seeing the world in a first-class rock band was a worthwhile trade-off. Researching this post, I was happy to see Danny back with Lyres On Fyre lineup for several shows in the intervening years including one in front of 17,000 people at 2005's Little Steven's International Garage Rock Festival in Randall's Island, NY.

 

Jeff Conolly's reputation as a testy dude was legendary.  In the late 80's I was dating a woman several years younger than me who was assigned to interview Jeff for Providence weekly The Nice Paper.  Not wanting her to get blindsided, I told her several stories I had heard over the years about Jeff's prickliness so she was more than a little nervous heading over to his Charles St. apartment for the interview.  Turns out it was all for naught, he was a perfect gentleman- politely answering all her questions and  playing several records for her during their time together.  She told me one of her first questions was along the lines of "So, you have this reputation for being..." and before she could finish, Jeff said "an asshole?" and laughed.  He even let her take a picture of him in his Buzzy's Fabulous Roast Beef sweatshirt, something he had taken to wearing around town and in at least one other newspaper photo session.  (Buzzy's was right around the corner from Jeff's, near the Charles St. Jail and Mass General, that was open late.  In college I dated a girl who lived a few doors down on Cambridge St. and more than a few late nights ended at Buzzy's where you'd see people you'd just been with at the club, jail guards, off-duty nurses, cabbies -a cross section of Boston carnivores- it was a cool place.) 

I only had one personal interaction with Jeff Conolly, sometime in the mid-80's at Mystery Train records on Newbury Street.  Not being cute and blonde myself, I didn't know how much stock to take from my girlfriend's pleasant experience interviewing him.  I should have realized that first and foremost, Jeff Connolly is a record geek, just like me.  On this day he

wasn't fixated on some garage rock obscurity, the record he was full-on raving about was Big Star's second album Radio City from 1974.  This was years before The Bangles recorded Radio City's September Gurls for their 1986 album A Different Light or The Replacements recorded "Alex Chilton," their ode to Big Star's frontman, for 1987's Pleased To Meet Me.  The copy in Mystery Train Jeff was rhapsodizing over was the Ardent original so it was way out of my price range but I never forgot his praise so

in 1986 when UK label Big Beat released a Big Star CD including their first two albums, #1 Record and Radio City, I snapped it up and soon got to hear what he'd been talking about.  It was life-changing.  I have been a Big Star fan ever since and #1 Record is one of my all-time favorite records. (I should mention that in 1986 CDs could only be 75 minutes long so to make the CD, Big Beat cut "In The Street" and "ST 100/6."  How in the name of all that is holy could you cut "In The Street"?!? It is an absolute classic, going on to become the theme for That 70's Show in 1998!)

 

Emerson, WERS, and The Boston Rock Scene (both seeing bands and playing in a few myself) completely eradicated the stink of loserdom I carried throughout high school and helped make me the person I am today.  I met my wife in the late 80's when we were both working at WMJX.  During our early "just friends" phase, we went to see Barrence Whitfield & the Savages at The Channel and the night we passed the point of no return on "just friends" was after a Zulus show at The Rat.  I've no doubt we saw Jeff Conolly and Lyres as well, though the specifics are hazy.  Jeff and the scene he represented loom large in my life and for that I will be forever grateful.

Click the link below to stream/download this week's show:

ALL KINDSA GIRLS #188 Jeff Conolly Tribute