Puffy But Not Soft: The Tufted Puffins

The Tufted Puffins are out with a fine new album, Old, Loud and Puffy. Beyond the clever title -- we’ll get to that later -- the album sports no shortage of cool songs in the classic Garage-Punk/Proto-Punk mold.

The band is new, but actually, not really. The combo is made up of veterans of Cleveland punk bands going back decades, including Sleazy Jesus and the Splatter Pigs, and Zen-Luv Assassins, as well as many bands with names we’d be a little skittish about printing here. 

Calling any band “Garage-Punk” is the height of imprecision. That designation can apply to sounds ranging from full on 1966 fuzz-and-Hammond-ed-out sounds to the thrash echoing that of late ‘70s CBGB.

While the band clearly feels no obligation to tether itself to a particular pre-conceived notion of a sound, guitarist and singer Mike Baker gave Garagerocktopia one of the best explanations yet on this blog of exactly what Garage-Punk is, as well as where The Tufted Puffins fit into that milieu.

“To me, the term ‘Garage’ implies a link to the 60s rough pop bands like The Animals, early Stones, The Kinks, The Seeds,” explained Baker, talking to Garagerocktopia by email. “It’s almost an innocence. Bands were about teenagers dancing first and foremost. It was about partying and fun, drugs and sex but in a positive way. It’s a friendly attitude that is really the opposite of what punk was.”

And while ‘60s Garage bands like the Chocolate Watchband and the Count Five are continuously cited, by artists, fans and press alike, as a major forerunners to punk, Baker sees a sharp distinction, a happy, carefree vibe in the ‘60s that was a world apart from a much darker one in the mid-’70s.

“Punk was very tribal,” said Baker. “It was us against them. It was a circling of the wagons. It was basically the same structures as Garage but with a new angry energy. It wasn’t just about dancing -- OK, maybe it was a little -- but it was more about getting out aggression and railing against the BS.”

“Garage-Punk is somewhere in the middle. For us, we still love that full adrenaline energy and weirdness of punk, but I think we would rather have people like us now than be afraid of us. We’re drifting toward the positive side as much as old punk rockers can. I don’t want to shock you with anything more than that you can’t believe how well we can pull it off on stage.”

The band also includes bassist Ken Brown; Tom Huff on guitar and Markymoon on drums.As has been noted by several other bands we’ve profiled here on Garagerocktopia, A giant consideration for the music can be Father Time. Many bands have said they just can’t do what they used to do in their 20s -- nor do they care to. Baker explained how the Tufted Puffins approach might be different than it has with other bands. 

“My earlier bands all had an axe to grind,” Baker explained, “Whether political or cultural, and were heavy on theatrics and a lot more clownish. This band is just a rock and roll band. It’s all about wild. fast, energetic music. No agendas beyond that. It’s glorious fun!”

Huff also had some thoughts on what he looks to do musically today as opposed to what he wanted in decades past.

“A couple things come right into my thoughts,” said Huff. “First is that being in this band I've learned the power of the simple ear-worm hook. I attribute this to Mike. In my past music life I almost always strove for weird over catchy. Catchy is so fun for me now. Secondly I have been on a tone search for about 15 years now and am finally really happy with my guitar tones and equipment. Doing this tone quest has made me a better player.”

While we generally try to not involve ourselves with politics here on Garagerocktopia, Punk has often had a politically/socially component that at times has been quite intense. A little bit of that surfaces on Old, Loud and Puffy. For the most part, though, the album is mainly intended just to be a good time to listen to.

“This is a rock and roll band. The main thing we are going for is loud, fast, fun music and energetic, impressive shows,” said Baker. “That being said, I can’t totally cut ties with my past. I did write “Bang Bang”. That’s a straight in your face scream about gun violence and the incredibly stupid idea that we are better off with more people armed. The rest of the songs are pretty much tongue in cheek goofiness with smoking guitar riffs and thundering drums.”

Though Garage-Punk isn’t often thought of as the strongest medium for songwriters, with even half a listen to the new album, the importance of songwriting becomes apparent. As anyone who’s ever listened to Bob Dylan can tell you, a good song can wipe out an artist’s shortcomings. Baker discussed the importance of songwriting for he and the band as artists.

“So far I’ve written all the lyrics,” said Baker. “This is because I don’t have a good singing voice and the only way I can justify being the guy in front of the mic delivering the words is if I put my whole self into it and use every vocal trick, emotion, movement and inflection to sell the hell out of it.”

“But saying I wrote these songs doesn’t sit right with me,” Baker added. “I bring sketches to the band, how the chord progression goes, where accents are, where the hooks are. This is like bringing a skull to forensic reconstruction experts. These guys are great musicians and really creative. We all take our parts and build them out from there. The songs take shape. Everyone plays what they feel. We shape it a bit and whittle out any rough spots and they’re done. It’s a very democratic process and a very democratic band. I’m very proud of these songs. But these are really good songs because it’s a good band. The songs are nothing on their own."

Expounding on that ideal, Baker talked about some of the songs on the new album.

“I love ‘Messin’ Up My Mind’ just for the energy and it’s so fun to play. Plus we went nuts in the recording studio creating a gospel choir and weird percussion with just us (and Ken’s daughter Maddie). This was so much fun to record and I think it came out great.

"'Bang Bang' came out really powerful. This may be the best song on the record. It’s getting the most play from what I can tell. This is a really serious topic for me. I lost a lot of people I loved in a gun incident years ago. The devastation that causes is overwhelming and wide spread. I have no tolerance for gun fetishists."

"But the one that blows me away that it is even on this record is' In America.' I wrote this song maybe 30 years ago. I’ve just kept it in my head all that time. I tried to work it into a couple of bands but it never worked. I even got some musicians in a studio once to try to record it and failed miserably. I had pretty much given up on it actually making it into the world but when we started practicing and we all got a feel for each other I thought I’d give it a try. These guys got it immediately." 

"I was in the studio alone with the engineer, Mark Kline, and we were trying to get a vocal sound. He stopped me and asked me what I was really thinking about this take. I told him that I loved everything about it but I’d always heard the verse vocals as being more psychedelic sounding, more Syd Barrett and different in tone to the chorus. He made some adjustments and added some effects and really got the sound I’d always imagined. So I did the take hearing all the effects and it changed the delivery to make it softer and dreamier. I’m so happy with this song!”

We have talked to other bands from Cleveland, and some have expressed a desire to follow the examples of the Cramps and the Dead Boys and move on to other locales. Baker says once upon a time, he was a member of that club as well, but the passage of time has changed his mind.

"My time of wanting to get big and move out of Cleveland was about 30 years ago," recalled Baker. "It didn’t happen. I know people who it did happen for. For some it went well. For others it ended badly. It’s important for musicians and artists in general to be ambitious and I hope band get everything they go after."

"But now I’m in a band knowing that that ship sailed a long time ago and I’m happier than when I was really pushing for it. I’m able to look at any opportunity that comes our way as an amazingly fortunate gift. The only real goal we have is to keep playing good shows and recording good songs. I thought about how many people dream about being in a band and never do it. I’ve done it all my life (on and off). How lucky is that?"

"I couldn’t be prouder about being a Cleveland musician. This town has always supported it’s musicians. There have always been venues for whatever weird thing you want to develop. There has always been a community of bands and musicians helping each other out. I know the time that I will still be able to do this is limited. I hope it’s for quite a while yet but I can’t count on that. But I really feel like Cleveland will let me do this until I can’t anymore. The tribe of musicians will let me go out proud. I hope before that day comes that I will have earned a Beachland Tavern funeral."

One of the biggest challenges for bands has always been how to get their music out to the masses. This has always been vexing, whether dealing with corporations or going the DIY route. Add to that the ever-changing formats. The Tufted Puffins have tried something that, to our knowledge, nobody else has, and seem happy with the results.

"We have no freaking idea how to distribute music now," Baker confessed. "Downloads are no good. CDs don’t sell. Hipsters are soon going to figure out how awful cassettes are. We took a chance and put our record out on a credit card sized USB. That allows us to put both mp3 and wav files on it, so you can burn your own CD if you want. It also had room for a booklet and some videos."

"So far we’ve gotten good responses from people who bought them. The price point on them is great and you can do small orders. Other bands should check this out. We might be on to something."

Back to that album title. Baker said it had multiple significance. Part referred to being such longtime Punk musicians. Mainly, though, it was a play on words, sort of cribbing the title of another Cleveland band, from another decade, that made a permanent mark on rock and roll.

"It’s an homage to the Dead Boys record Young, Loud, and Snotty, Baker admitted." It links us back to the place and time where this music originated and we were all inspired by it. It’s so Cleveland!"

The Tufted Puffins have not been Garagerocktopia's only visit to Cleveland. Check out our feature on the Venus Flytraps.

Don't Forget to listen to Garagerocktopia Radio, alternating with Blue Mood, Tuesday nights on KUCR Radio, 88.3 FM Riverside, California. We play artists like The Tufted Puffins, plus many others who have appeared on our hallowed pages.

We have some other features already in the works here at Garagerocktopia. Artists have been sending us some very cool stuff. As always, we don’t make any guarantees in stone but we’re happy to say we’ve gotten a lot of very promising music sent to us, and we’re always happy to spread the word about about bands that are playing the way-out kinds of music we profile here. Send us a line and we’ll talk.

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