Jeff “Monoman” Conolly, front-man of the great Boston garage band Lyres has passed away after a battle with cancer. Conolly was under-appreciated in rock & roll lore, but a seminal figure in the Boston music scene and the garage-rock resurgence, not only with Lyres but with his previous band DMZ as well.
I saw Lyres in September, 1988 at The Blind Pig in Ann Arbor, after spinning their fantastic debut On Fyre since I was a sophomore in high school a few years earlier. It was visceral and raw and powerful as hell, but still had the hooks and melodies it took to pull me in.
His passing may not make the RIP segment at the Grammys or the 6 o’clock news, but those who know his music will remember him forever. RIP Jeff Conolly.
Ricki C.’s two cents; I first heard Mono Man when I sent away for the DMZ ep. that Greg Shaw’s seminal Bomp Records label released in 1977. (It’s mispelled Mono Mann, on the picture sleeve of that disc, incidentally.) I instantly fell in love with the Stooges-derived rama-lama of that band, and then naturally moved onto The Lyres (I always put a “The” in front, though I’m not sure that’s right) after. No matter which band it was, Mr. Connolly delivered the mayhem, in spades. I saw The Lyres once sometime in the 1980’s here in Columbus at Stache’s, an 85-person capacity club that the owner/promoter would occasionally pack about 300 people into, much to the fire marshal’s chagrin. It was common knowledge that Conolly was notoriously tough on his drummers, and - from the very beginning of the show - he was brow-beating the 20-something drummer about his beat-keeping shortcomings.
It was brutal, it was merciless. I felt so sorry for that kid. Finally about 7 songs into the set, Jeff FIRED the kid ONSTAGE. He ordered him off the riser, had the soundman set up a vocal mic at the drums and played drums himself for the rest of the set. I was standing right at the side of the stage and the kid had tears in his eyes when he walked past me to the dressing room at the end of the hall. I’ve always wondered if they put him on a Greyhound back to Boston the next morning, or gave him another chance. (There was no internet to give immediate answers to your every question in those bygone days.)
Either way, it was brutal, and perhaps not Jeff Conolly’s finest moment, but goddamn, he was as good a drummer as he was howler and songwriter.
Jeremy Porter lives near Detroit, fronts the rock and roll band Jeremy Porter And The Tucos, and plays acoustic shows all over the place. Follow him and them on Facebook to read his road blog about their adventures on the dive-bar circuit.
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