Hand poured.

Hand poured.

TMA — Portrait of a New Jersey Punk Band (or Something Like That)

It’s impossible to explain the 1980s to anyone who didn’t live through them. After a decade like the ‘70s where anything went and no one gave a shit about what they looked like, the early ‘80s embraced conservative dress and ideas, which was no better personified than with Huey Lewis’ banal decree that it was, indeed, ‘hip to be square.’ Anyone with a brain—or a rock ’n’ roll heart—knew the decade was wrong. Music had to suck if it took videos to break music stars. But reality was, radio to the right of 92 on the FM dial, was too timid to play anything new and/or interesting. Punk rock became the necessary evil until too many boneheads saw it as a means to violence. By ’87 punk bands were either broken up, playing ‘roots’ music or a harder hybrid of punk and metal. Only your sense of humor got you out alive.

The Jersey punk scene--whether called NJHC or not--was a quick blast of great bands every bit the equal of their SoCal contemporaries. (New Jersey is essentially Los Angeles with shittier roads and weather.) Except in true Jersey style, no one knew how to self-promote beyond the local scene. And living in the shadow of NYC meant that anything good was quickly absorbed by the punks next door. I was a latecomer and never made the scene. But I bought the records and knew Glenny Danzig had turned corny. The Misfits had been a great band. Adrenalin O.D. had the chops and the laughs but never the production they deserved. Bodies in Panic and Mental Abuse had their followings. Bedlam were out of control. Sand in the Face were out of state. And TMA (which stood for the original trio of Tom, Mike and Al, but also ‘Too Many Assholes’ once their fourth member, Dave, joined the band) had a killer album called What’s for Dinner?  I borrowed it off my buddy Jon, who didn’t mind spending $8 on albums that never came close to half an hour of music.

“Nancy” aka “(I’m In Love With) Nancy Reagan,” was a perfect punk anthem. It also appeared on an iconic NJ punk collection called Hardcore Takes Over that featured bands who played at the Bloomfield, NJ dive, The Dirt Club. That track alone would’ve made them NJ one-hit-wonders on par with Detention’s “Dead Rock ’n’ Rollers.” But the TMA album also gave us the title track, “Love Is All Around,” known as “The Mary Tyler Moore Theme” (also covered by Husker Du), “I Forgot,” “Bag Lady Love” and, my other personal fave, “Shit Don’t Stink.”  

Released in 1987, Beach Party 2000 reflects how the decade played out for punks. Inspired amateurism evolved into greater competency and power -- and an insistence on adding more reverb. ("Don't Waste Your Time" sounds like Agent Orange, though Mike Wattage claims Killing Joke became a major influence.) Because TMA had always been better musicians than their choice of genre suggested, they tried new sounds.  The artwork grew darker, more likely to capture the punk-metal-crossover crowd that preferred stuff that looked heavier and foreboding. More important to the band, the delinquent attitude stayed the same. Unfortunately, they also went back to being a trio, losing the vocal power of Dave Oldfield.  Eventually, the band went the way that bands do. (This is assuming you don't have an endless stream of ‘replacements’ to keep the rip-off in place).

The tired joke, “You’re from Jersey? Which exit?” came about because the compact state has highways running through most of its interesting towns. Because we were kids, we thought these towns were dead, lame places. Some were more than others. But the angst and dissatisfactions were just indications that we were alive. Songs like the ones here—written and played out of a logical hate for the mainstream culture surrounding us —are proof that, Oscar Wilde to the contrary, youth is not wasted on the young. It’s always up to the individual. Tom, Mike, Al and Dave had a blast and I, for one, am fucking glad they had the sense to get it down on tape.

—Rob O’Connor (2015)

“Who are these guys?  Well, whoever they are, they really shred.  TMA play totally fast, gnarly thrash with lots of hooks ‘n’ tunes.  Tight and clean, too.  The lyrics are typical ‘punk rock’, bitchin’ ‘n’ moanin’ ‘bout  everythin’.

—Tim Yohannon, MAXIMUMROCKNROLL (Nov. 1984)

“I have nothing but amazing memories from my days in the early ’80s with TMA.  I loved playing them on my radio show at the Rutgers University radio station, WRSU.  Their songs are great and show off their sense of humor about everything from politics to everyday nonsense.  

They were my friends.  We did some really crazy shit together and always had a blast.  I would carry their equipment into their shows and they would carry my records in when I DJ’ed in those clubs. Their shows were complete chaos.  I saw young punks wiping out on floors full of spilt beer while moshing to their madness... and much more.  They were both fun and dangerous, but never took themselves too seriously.  

The Jersey hardcore scene never got the respect or exposure it deserved, and especially TMA. I’m reallly happy to see this reissue. TMA is a band that deserves to be known!”

—Matt Pinfield, WRSU / MTV

I mean seriously, who wants to read a bunch of whiny old guys go on and on about how great things were before you were born? Not me, and I’m one of them! So let me be straight about this, before your eyes glaze over: The great thing about Mike and Tom and Al and that other guy was that they Did. Not. Give. A. Whatever. And in that sense, maybe they were The Most Jersey of all the Jersey bands in that era (yeah, suck it Bruce).  

New Jersey has a pretty great track record when it comes to musicians actually, but don’t expect it to ever get the ‘scene’ respect of a New Orleans or Memphis--it’s too dispersed and more to the point, too overshadowed by the civic egos of New York and Philadelphia. But in the ‘80s it seemed like everyone was in a band, half the time just because it was something to do. You kids now have videogames and unboxing videos, but don’t expect your review of Mariocart 3000 to be reissued 20 years from now. Just sayin.

And it’s important to understand just how intense people were about music then--genres and subgenres weren’t just dorky details to mull over, they were lines in the sand. So TMA started off as a straight-ahead thrash punk band but as the hardcore scene divided itself into groups that took themselves too seriously, or not seriously at all, Tom, Mike, and Al realized they didn’t really want to belong to any club that would have them for members (and Dave obviously didn’t even want to belong to that club). And that’s when things got, I think, a lot more interesting. New Jersey was such a crazy stew of musical ideas back then, we had rockabilly revivalists, jazz heads, punk poppers, metalheads and avant whatsis all bumping into each other on the daily, and if you were cool, you’d build an audience. Didn’t even matter that much if you were nothing like the last band or the next one. Just don’t be boring. Please, FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY, don’t be boring.

So, it was the second album era, when Tom and Mike infused the proto-goth of Killing Joke and the Chameleons, not to mention some Link Wray/Dick Dale vibes, that I think they created something pretty unique.

Not that they cared much. TMA could never motivate themselves to tour and really were almost impeccably, exquisitely unambitious. With a few exceptions--The Smithereens, Ween, Monster Magnet, Bouncing Souls--we all were.

We drank beer. We liked beer. Do you like beer?

—Eric Gladstone (2019)

Original 1983 TMA Bio / Press Release

Rising from the post-industrial wasteland of Northern New Jersey like a raging chemical conflagration, TMA raise the ennui and desperation of beer, burgers and  TV culture to new and highly humorous levels.  A fierce, quick-fisted musical foursome specializing in lyrical mockery and malice, TMA shuns stances and styles in favor of slam-bam, f**k you man music that leaves no listener unfazed.

TMA’s origins lie in the teenaged enlightenment of Tom Emanuele and Mike Demko at the hands of such acts as the Ramones, early Black Flag and the Sex Pistols.  Starting the band at the age of 15, TMA’s two co-visionaries declared “never mind the bullshit, here’s our music” and have since remained true to the founding principles of punk as the band coalesced with the joining of drummer Al Rosenblum and singer David Oldfield.  Honing their sound at “hick parties” where they shared stages with Lynryd Skynryd cover bands, TMA immediately polarized listeners with a sound that’s only grown more lean, mean, muscular and efficient through assaulting audiences with their cheeky fervor.

One of the prime bands from New Jersey’s hardcore scene, TMA eschew uniforms and politics for a rollicking rampage through the poses and pretensions of modern culture and music.  Not content to sit on their artistic duffs and conceptualize, all four members of TMA work day jobs and practice nearly every night, resulting in music that’s made simply for its own sake.  Along the way they puncture today’s fashionable stances (check out “Surf Nazi” and “You Crack Me Up”), lay waste any social idiocies (as on “Astrological Geek” and “Acid Head”) and wreak havoc on the culture of our age (with songs like “What’s for Dinner?,” “The Mary Tyler Moore Show Theme” and the love song “Nancy”—an ode to our first lady).  With like “Penniless,” “Brain of My Own” and “I Am,” TMA add new meanings to the concept of “my way” that Frank Sinatra and Paul Anka never dreamed of.

TMA—four young men with purpose and power, and the means to make it stick.

Original 1987 TMA Beach Party 2000 Bio / Press Release

What would happen if Annette Funicello was kidnapped by a gang of mutant scuba divers?  That’s the musical question posed by TMA on their excruciating new album, Beach Party 2000.

Sick of being sick, bored with being bored, TMA have returned with an LP 14 tracks long that forms the only possible sequel to their 1983 debut, What’s for Dinner?  It’s a concept album, sort of.  Just what the concept is, no one’s saying.

Whether silly or serious, Beach Party 2000 proves the power-crunching sounds of TMA have as much appeal in ’87 as they did when What’s for Dinner? was released to raves from Jello Biafra and Maximum RocknRoll, among others.  Not just a critic’s choice, though, Dinner? sold (and continues to sell) impressively.  And, according to rumors, it spawned a TMA fan club in the Midwest—ironic, since TMA from Edison, New Jersey, have only rarely played outside the Tri-State area.

So, just what have they been doing for the past four years?  Ask guitarist (and producer of Beach Party) Mike Wattage and he’ll tell you, “We’ve been touring Mexico with Charo.”  Closer to the truth is that they’ve tightened up a a trio, since the departure of vocalist Dave Oldfield  for a more normal lifestyle.  The loss has only strengthened their sound.

Onstage these days, Al Rosenblum’s tight rhythms form a backbone while Wattage, standing like an executioner, grinds generous feedback out of his Marshall stacks.  Bassist Tom Emanuele has a more soft-spoken approach, until he steps up to the microphone, inevitably wearing a Chameleons or Killing Joke T-Shirt.

These groups are among the sounds you might hear coming out of Beach Party 2000, as well as anything from Duane Eddy and th Ventures to Red Lorry Yellow Lorry, Motorhead and T.S.O.L.  But don’t dare ask TMA what their influences are.  They’ll probably tell you, “We have none—we created music.”

TMA’s Beach Party 2000 is a clambake for the apocalypse!

What’s for Dinner? 1980s press clippings.

Beach Party 2000 1980s press clippings.