Monday, May 7, 2012

Buddy Holocaust - Live 1981 Dartmouth College

       Here is one of my favorite nihilistic cassettes, and the rumors that follow this recording only push the intensity of these songs.  As the story goes (which does remain under skepticism)  Bill Tate, aka Buddy Holocaust, played one dinner theatre program at Dartmouth College, sporting military uniform.  This cassette is a recording of that performance.  The seriousness of this performance is still unknown. Shortly after it is said that he dropped out of Dartmouth and drove home, peddling his tape along the way and throughout Southern California.  He later died driving his car off of a bridge, an apparent suicide.
      I remember playing the song "We Need Another Kent State" to my high school English class for a discussion on protest and anti-protest music.  Needless to say, after telling the story of Bill Tate, many of the students class gave me strange glances and didn't speak to me much for a week or two, but my teacher loved it.
      But enough about awkward high school stories.  I got this off soulseek long ago there is no artwork to be had with it. This recording has always been a strange love of mine, and hopefully you will enjoy it too.

enjoy...hopefully,
-j


Buddy Holocaust - Live 1981 Dartmouth College
1.  We Need Another Kent State
2.  Give me your love, or I'll destroy the world
3.  We will retake Saigon
4.  Concrete and steel
5.  We have our reasons
6.  Laura
7.  Chip and claire
8.  Kindness and violence
9.  And declared war on violence
10.  Forced to kill on PCP
11.  Hiroshima
12.  Fight kill die love
13.  It's good to see you again
14.  World Without Moscow
15.  Those who play
16.  He wants to save us from ourselves
17.  The grunt
18.  Judy 
19.  Kill for your dreams
20.  Coathanger blues 
21.  I guess that showed us
22.  These morons have to go
23.  And I haven't decided
24.  Stop all military aid





5 comments:

  1. Well, you have done a wonderful public service. I'd wonder, in this Bob Roberts meets George Orwell decade, how seriously his shtick would be taken today.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wow! So, I'll go right into the story: I am 27 years old, working as a carreer record store manager in Montpelier, Vermont. In April of 2013, I was at a friend, Kathy's home in Cambridge, Massachussetts discussing the recent hit documentary "Searching For Sugarman" about lost/discovered pop songwriter Sixto Rodriguez. Kathy mentioned that the story reminded her of a guy named Buddy Holocaust, whom she had a cassette tape of. I was immediately interested and we talked about him for sometime at her kitchen table. The story has been haunting me for some time now and I am trying to find out so much more about this person! In particular, I want to find a photo of him. Here is what I know/believe about Bill Tate and his recording:

    1.) My friend Kathy received the cassette from a friend named Charlie in July of 1982 (one year after the recording date) while she was staying off-campus at Dartmouth. She showed me the cassette and though I forget if it was Chrome,Hi-Bias, or standard audio it was a copy of Charlie's cassette that had been taped from the master tape, which (supposedly) belonged to Bill Tate/Buddy Holocaust.

    2.) Charlie was a personal friend of Bill Tate while they (Charlie and Bill) both went to college at Dartmouth. Kathy doesn't recall Charlie sharing much information about him besides what I can attempt to share here.

    3.) My friend Kathy was the person who brought the cassette to Princeton, where her friends played in on the college radio show. (many references online lead to this as being a big initial resurgence in interest for the Buddy Holocaust cassette.)

    3.) Bill Tate went to Dartmouth for 9 terms, ending (presumably) in the early fall/late summer of 1981, shortly after this recording was made.

    4.) Bill Tate performed under the character "Buddy Holocaust", which was a sarcastic interpretation of American right-wing stereotypes and had a scathing take on the pervasive "Preppy" culture of the era (as made clear in the recording). He himself was most likely a left-leaning or possibly Libertarian. He studied and became engrossed with Nietzche. I do not know whether or not he had written more songs under his own name, or with a different persona.

    5.) Bill Tate was born on September 3rd, 1960 and died on November 2 or 3 of 1981. He was 21 years old.

    6.) Eric Weisbard has the most cumulative information regarding Buddy Holocaust, though online, not all of his writing can be viewed:
    http://books.google.com/books?id=VOpvPZVYmSIC&pg=PA219&lpg=PA219&dq=%22buddy+holocaust%22&source=bl&ots=rh4FLpgeXI&sig=pK2TAs6YaD_VSLW6aeIHBHoAoUc&hl=en&ei=uoV0TMeeIoGB8gblr_m9Bw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=10&ved=0CDcQ6AEwCQ#v=onepage&q=%22buddy%20holocaust%22&f=false

    Again, I am searching for a photo of Bill Tate, preferably from the Buddy Holocaust performance! If there is one available (any detectives out there?) I would be in deep gratitude to whomever can find one. Thanks so much, this blog is fantastic!!!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Picture: http://1982.dartmouth.org/s/1353/clubs-classes-interior.aspx?sid=1353&gid=19&pgid=2313

      Delete
  3. I was Bill Tate's roommate in college. I have a large amount of information about him but after reading the legend of his life on the internet I am not sure I want to change it. It is amazing that people that never knew him are still talking about him. I still mourn his loss.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Please fill in the details, sedation. There are folks who would like to know more than the limited sketches of Bill floating out there currently.

    ReplyDelete