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It’s been decades … literal decades … since Woolworthy was an active band. Now, in 2023, they’ve returned with the guitar-driven power pop album, “Electric Heartbreak.” The release is less a return to form and more a continuation of all that’s come before.
Joining me for this chat, sometimes at different times, are:
Rudy Gonzalez – vocals/guitar
Rick Uncapher – bass
Mark Doyle – drums
Dave Suh – lead guitar/vocals
We talk about our history, dating back to my Q101 “Local 101” days, the band’s decision to pause and later return, and other names the band could have had.
AI-generated transcript (there will be plenty of errors, but it’s better than nothing)
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[“Carcón Carne”] It’s Carcón Carne. Let’s feed in this car. It’s Carcón Carne. And now here’s the star of our show, James Van Aster.
I’m recording this episode on December 1st and I’m here with the December Boys. It’s Woolworthy. Woohoo! Hey. Rudy, Rick and Dave are in the car with me. The band Woolworthy Power Pop Punk, a band from Chicago that went away for a long time, but now they’re back. They’re back with this album right here. Electric Heartbreak. Gorgeous. vinyl edition, fantastic return to form for Woolworthy. Mark Doyle, the drummer, will be joining us in progress. Little does he know, he’s gonna be profoundly uncomfortable when he gets in the back seat. But that’s what you get for showing up late.
We’ve done lots of weird stuff, so I’m sure he’s fine. He’ll be fine, yeah. He’s cuddled up with Rudy before.
So it’s been a while since we’ve all… Chatted and it’s funny. We have a mutual friend in the Chicago music scene who said I have a band from Chicago I think you’re gonna be interested in and then she shared the name well worthy. I’m like, oh shut the fuck up, of course
What year we talking?
I know well worthy. I love well worthy. In fact, we were all part of this one Visual aid this CD local 101 volume 2 Q101 put it out back in 99 maybe? Yeah. I produced it, Will Worthy was on it, Caviar was on it.
I got on there twice. I was really excited about it. Yeah.
Dave made two appearances, but we go back a little way. It’s a good comp.
It is a good comp. It is. Nash Kato was on it. Who else is on it? Yeah, Apocalypse Hoboken. That was still one. Nash Kato, yeah.
It was one of my proudest moments in Chicago radio was getting that song by Hoboken on the radio, Little Fingers, which is the most vulgar and profane. There’s one line in it where Todd Potts says something about, I want to suck a bucket of crud right out of you. I don’t think you can do that anymore. You can’t get away with that anymore.
It sounds about right. You probably can’t do it anymore either.
Well, what’s the adage? Write what you know. Yeah. So, why’d you go away? Why are you back? Why did we go away?
I’m not sure why we went away. It just kind of happened. Had you just at that point petered out? Well, we’re talking 2005. So Rudy and I started the band in… 94. End of 94. End of 94, 95.
If you’re watching this, I apologize.
Well, you know, there was a few things that were all kind of happening at the same time. When we broke up, we lost the tapes to the recordings that we did. uh… you know the other get the guys the bailing other bands as well and we’re just trying to juggle life we lost the tapes he just brought stuff up and get to the front of it no the different record of his is a lot of what is our is yet this is almost all the time studios we did six songs five songs we’re working on a record and the tapes were lost and i can only cut and that kind of hurt our hearts so uh… plus other things going on we just decided to break we never broke up for any reason of we didn’t like each other.
It wasn’t an acrimony like I hate you guys.
No, no. Lineup changes too. Lineup changes were happening. A lot of guitar players. Like Dave was, he was doing caviar and then another band. Yeah, then I… After that we had Alex from Machachos playing with us.
Everyone knows each other, everyone plays with each other at some point. You stay in the city long enough you’ve crossed…
You know what, I’d like to think that, you know, that entire time that Woolworthy was broken up until right now, it’s just like Pro Tools, we just cut that out and pasted them together. So that’s why this record now is literally just right after this last record, you know, because that’s what it sounds like. Twenty-one years. Yeah, we just edited that out.
Twenty-one years. And what did I say to you guys before we started recording? This album sounds to me like a Woolworthy album. Like, I mean, truly, to follow your metaphor, Dave, I mean, it’s like those 21 years didn’t happen, like this is just the natural next release.
Yes, and that’s why we got back together, is when I wrote these songs, I realized that these are very Woolworthy type songs, even though I was in another band, Dave and I were in the dead on after Woolworthy. And so when I wrote these songs, I thought these songs are for my brothers. I’ll put these to the side and wait for the time that we can work on them. And that 2023 became that year. So Rick and Dave, when Rudy said, check out these songs I wrote, was it just a given that you were jumping back in? Well, initially. when we started to jam, Rudy, I mean, it wasn’t like, hey, we’re getting Woolworthy back together. It was like, hey, do you guys wanna jam some songs in my basement? You know, I’m feeling out like just some songs you guys could help me record. I don’t know what I’m gonna do with it. I think deep down though, Rudy was yearning. He was yearning for friendship. Always yearning for that. Craving. Definitely could be. But I really think so. I knew I could lure them in with the music. That was my plan. But once we got into the songs, I think it was. clear and we’re like okay it was Mark it was me it was Rudy all of a sudden it was Dave it was you know it’s like okay this is just Woolworthy.
I realize you started out in 1995 the band got its name from Woolworth’s long departed department store there are generations now who are listening or watching who don’t even get that reference whatsoever Like, had you formed like ten years later, you could have been Moonoink, you could have been Dominix. You could have been Dominix. Jules.
Well, we’ve had a lot of misspellings with the name too. We’ve been called Walwathy, right? I mean, there’s, you know, there’s been all kinds of good stuff. It’s a hard name to say sometimes. It is.
Especially if you’re eating taffy. So again, Electric Heartbreak is the album. There are songs of Heartbreak. on this, I think, a lot of them.
Sure, there’s a few of them. There’s some songs of hope.
Where are the hopeful songs? Hang on.
Well, the bottle rocket’s a positive song. That’s a song about, you know. That’s true. That’s a good one.
You’ve written a couple songs about things that explode. Hand grenade, bottle rocket. My heart. I think hand grenade is the heartbreak part of it because that’s basically like a relationship exploding, right? Sure. And can we talk about that lead guitar on that song?
Yes. That Dave lead guitar?
It’s amazing.
But yeah, this song, Romance, is a hand grenade. Never had a chance to make it, always knew we detonated it. Pull the pin on the hand grenade. Ripping up valentines. But you know what, this song, like every other song, it’s a great guitar song. You’re a guitar band. and you just dial it in so beautifully together.
Thank you. I always felt that way too. When we first got together here tonight, our first coming together in like 20 plus years, we’re on a side street in Logan Square and you asked me a lot of questions about what we can and can’t do in the car. And I had to say, this is a sponsored show, we have to be responsible. And someone, I forgot which of you said, we do have a song in the album called Break the Law with you. So you’re predisposed to giving your finger to the man. Exactly, yes. I’m a delinquent and we could be fugitives. We could rob a bank or two. Oh, my sweet little turtle dove. That’s a good hook. That’s a good hook, the turtle dove hook. You’ve got these sweet Bonnie and Clyde vibes going on in that song. I really like the Bonnie and Clyde vibe. song because that song is about 20 years old but been rewritten a bunch of times. Really? Yeah. That was one of the ones that we lost and really brought it back with some changes. With different lyrics. Different lyrics. But I hadn’t heard the new lyrics at all Rudy and so when you finally laid them down I’m like this is really, I really like where this went. Yeah. It’s kind of fortunate that City Girls was the original title. I’m glad that song died because… break the law with you is way, way cooler. And when you serenade someone with lyrics like that, if that person is on board, you know you found the one. Exactly. Yes. You take her home. That’s it. You can go break a law first and then you take her home. I’m looking at my notes going back to Bottle Rocket. Sounds more positive than hand grenade. Okay, good. We covered that. That’s right. More positive. Yeah. Nobody died in that way. Where have all the glad girls gone? Again, big guitar riffs on this. What’s a glad girl? Well, that song, you know, it’s obvious. I ripped it off the title from the Glad Girls by Guided by Voices. And, you know, in their song they say, you know, glad girls, you know, they get you high, they’re always fun to be around. And so when I was writing that song, I was like, where are these girls? Because they seem to be gone from Chicago. So this was my anthem to… talk about bringing them all back. So James, I asked the exact same question in the studio. I’m like, what is a glad girl? He said, you know, there used to be all these cool chicks at the shows. I’m like, they’re all married with kids. That’s where they are. That’s where they went. They’re at home. But just in general, whenever I go out, I just don’t see the cool rock chick around anymore, that whole. identity is gone and so this song is an ode to them. They moved to LA. I’m trying to bring them out of the I know they’re out there you just got to pull them out of the… They moved to Naperville. They’re in Schomburg. Nothing wrong with Schomburg. I’m going to Ikea this weekend. I love a good Ligganberry soda. Speaking of the suburbs, James, I heard from someone you have a sandwich named after you. I do. Out in the out in the Burbs. Out in McHenry. So it’s about from where we are right It’s a hike. It’s worth it. It’s special. And it comes back when the need arises. Yeah. It gets pressed into service. Is it called the JBO? It is called the JBO. What’s in it? I’m so glad you asked. It is an open-faced sandwich on cornbread with pulled pork, bacon, coleslaw. Mike’s hot honey, and there’s another meaty thing in there too. I’m getting hungry. That sounds like a hand grenade for your heart. It absolutely is. And delicious. I talk about this a lot, album sequencing, figuring out what that perfect order is of songs. And I’m listening to this album, and I’m aware that you spent some time thinking about the sequence and how the songs flow, especially because we are ruined. is at the end. That seems like an appropriate, kind of an outlier, stacked up with the rest of the album. It’s an acoustic song about a ruined girl. This sounds deeply personal. It is deeply personal. It’s actually about an ex-girlfriend. I won’t say her name, but yeah, it’s almost completely about her, which is very rare for me. Most of my songs are pieces of people and not always about me at all. They’re pieces of lots of people, but this song is completely, completely about me. You have great, memorable turns of phrase. I had fallen because she dropped me. That stuck out. Also, a beautiful tornado. That’s a great way to describe someone. Thanks, James. Yeah, I like that. I think about my lyrics. They’re important to me, as the riff is, you know. Do you have more waiting to go, or did you reach a point where you’re like, this is it, this is who we are right now? A little bit of both, right Rico? I mean, we definitely have more. There’s definitely more songs to be working on that we’re going to start working on, but right now we felt like this was the appropriate amount of songs that we could get done to get the record out this year. and also kind of tells a story of where Woolworthy is today. I think, I mean, initially you proposed a certain amount of songs, and then once it turned out to be a Woolworthy record, that’s when we decided to pull some of those older songs that we lost from back, way back when. I think, I’m glad you reclaimed them. Yeah, had to. Yeah, there were some shotgun moments there though. Remember Rudy when you called me, you were like, Dave, you know, I need you to lay down some solos on this record or whatever, and then literally like two days later, Are you available right now? Like right now and you were like yes Like you know my am I was at my kids like you know party or whatever and I’m in jorts or something You know and I’m just like okay. What so you know and then I come to the studio and just like the next thing I know what I’m like doing take after take out. You know like and you know and It was just like, boom, get it done. Because there’s only so much time you have in the studio. Sure. You bring up a really interesting point, Dave. We all came up during a time when jorts were not problematic. I was wondering who was going to bring up the jorts. We grew up in a time where it was OK to wear carpenter jean shorts. But no, that’s toxic. I have a threshold of I don’t wear shorts unless it’s 80 degrees or more. Rudy never wears shorts. Never. I say if Elvis doesn’t wear shorts, Iggy Pop doesn’t wear shorts, I’m not wearing shorts. Iggy Pop doesn’t wear a shirt. Elvis wore shorts. He did. Only swim trunks. That’s not shorts. Oh, okay. If you’re showing some knee, it’s a short. They’re shorts. Short pants. You know, he did wear jeans. He did wear jeans. You never see Elvis. Saw Elvis in jeans shorts. So you had the release show a couple weeks ago, and I apologize. I know we meant to do this before the release show. How’d that go? How did it feel to get these songs out there in front of faces looking back at you? We torched the Montrose Saloon. It doesn’t exist anymore. Eric, thank you for letting us play there. Thank you for letting us destroy your establishment. So it was good. It was great. It was fantastic. It was last Wednesday. We had concerns, though, about how loud we could be, because Montresaloon is kind of a neighborhood bar. But I don’t think anyone cared by the time we started playing, so it was rowdy. It was good. So with that, the big kind of return show, the release show, out of the way, what’s next? I mean, I’m assuming there are more gigs coming. Trying. Yes, we’re working on more gigs. We just want to find the right ones. We’re just going to play it. with, you know, next weekend. We’re gonna wait for the right show, with the right moment strategically, strategically. Perfect. You’ve got to book that holiday show in advance. To be quite honest, I don’t like playing in January. No one does. No one does in Chicago, so I think we’ll skip January. Well, that’s the time to woodshed. That’s the time to work on those songs that didn’t make it to Electric Heartbreak. But do you remember, Rudy, the time we were going to Double Door in the snowstorm? I think we were playing in January or something. It’s snowing really bad, and I’m like, man, this weather’s terrible. And Rudy’s like, that’s cool, man. People like going out in the snow. No. That was my answer. I was just trying to hype you up, man. Mark Doyle, the drummer, we mentioned, he may or may not be here. Hold my phones up there. Oh, yeah. I’ll text him, yeah. Sorry. He’s probably on his way. He may. He lives across the street. So what can he add? What do we need to talk to him about? he loves you that’s what you thought you were going to be one of the top of the told by your sandwich marked oil was on one of those rare one album release one album wonders. Like there are so few bands in history that get like one album then they go away. He was on one of them, Mark. I don’t think, Mark is not the biggest talker about Loud Lucy. You know, it’s just not, cause I bring it up all the time because we would go see them. Yeah. You know, like we were kind of like fans, you know. And yeah, he doesn’t really bring it up too much. I think maybe he thought it was kind of teeny-bopper-ish or something, you know, but it really wasn’t. It was cool. Well, what do you remember about that period, that era? I mean, because for those who weren’t in it, even for those who were, there was kind of a mythological, almost Camelot perception of Chicago back then. Well, it was a scene. It was an actual scene, you know? I mean, it was similar to Seattle. Like, there was, you know, you had your waves of bands. You had your pumpkins and your verge overkills fairs and then all of a sudden there’s a huge signing wave and then you get the Pope’s and the triple fast actions etc. and then you know then everyone’s then people like myself were like well I gotta I gotta be in Chicago I’m in college at the time you know so not in Chicago so I’m just like well I gotta move there that’s where stuff is happening you know so I met Mark at an Urge Overkill show at NIU like before they were even signed yeah yeah. That’s cool. Yeah, he remembers, I remember, we were just hanging out before the show. They were not signed yet, but getting, I think they were getting courted by Geffen, and that’s why they were opening for Urge at the show. It’s like 35 years later. Yeah, it was a long time. We were in a band together. So I was privy to the band, and Rudy, you knew the band too, just from being in the city, right? Yeah, I was a fan, and I met Mark at Thurston’s at A Loud Lucy Show, and he lost his hat, and he was looking, I saw him in the back couch that was upstairs looking for his hat, and I was like, hey man, can I help you find your hat? And he was really freaking out because he needed this hat after his show. So I found his hat for him and we became buddies because of that. Maybe the hat gives him his powers. It must, it was like, because he had really curly hair and he needed to put his mat, his hair down after his set. And then I, you know, I would saw them several times after that and then ran into him at the double door at his show when he wasn’t in a band and asked him to join Woolworth and he jumped on it. That’s great. Well, it’s a tight band. Again, the album Electric Heartbreak. It’s streamable, of course. It’s way cooler if you get it on vinyl. The big guy. Ladies and gentlemen, Mark Doyle of the band Woolworthy. At last, at last. Hey, James, how’s it going? Nice to see you. I see you too. Wait, did you kick Dave out? I did. We’re having such a nice time with him. He can flop back in. You guys could have crammed in here. I can ask him. He could sit in my lap. Oh no, oh now he looks sad. Dave, come back! You want to try to squeeze in? He’s on his phone. He’s sad and forlorn. How are you doing Mark? I’m doing good. We’ve already talked at length about the band and the album, so good night. Alright. But what I was saying, I’ve said it now a couple times, my first thought listening to this album is, yeah it sounds like Woolworthy. Yeah. Not missing a beat whatsoever. I think it’s our best record we’ve ever done. Where we were musically then is we couldn’t have put this record out then. You know, this like… Rudy had a lot of these ideas floating around in his head. And the original… I don’t know if you guys talked about this, but the original idea was we weren’t going to get Woolworthy back together. We were just going to record… Just work on some songs. We were just going to record a couple songs with them. And it wasn’t until we started playing that we’re like, God, this really feels like… the old magic yeah I know none of us said anything at the time we just kind of I mean maybe a little bit and then once we got in the studio I think it was Jeff Dean was like dude it was before the studio yeah I talked about it he’s like this is this is what Jeff Dean the mayor of Morton Grove yeah he was like why don’t you just he’s like why don’t you just have dole do all the drums instead of trying to set up you know two or three drum sets and then like a week or two before it just really felt like it was a Woolworthy record. And, uh, and it is, and it is cause these songs were written for Woolworthy in my heart. I love it. All right. The new album is available now. It is streamable. It is electric heartbreak. Don’t look for this band on stage when it’s snowing out. It’s not going to happen, but once the weather clears up in Chicago, we can see you on stage once more. Uh, I am so like, I’m just, I’m jazzed that we’re. doing this again decades later. We’re not in the studio talking about the album, we’re sitting in a car on a side street in Logan Square, but still it feels like old times. It sure does and you were such a big proponent or a supporter of what were they even back on our first record, our first demo is you would put them on key 101 and Thank you for that. You you called my landline for that local 101. I did yeah, you called me up People weren’t on email back then so when I knew that for bands if they were gonna be played on the radio They wanted to hear it and tell their friends and I tried to call everybody I was gonna play in advance of it so that they knew so it wasn’t because once it’s gone It’s gone is it once the broadcast is over. You don’t get to hear it again So I tried to call as many people as I could And then later progressed to being able to email people like, hey, heads up, this is coming. But I always thought that was like the right thing to do. That was awesome. That’s cool. Calling the landline. Loved it. There’s Dave taking a photo. Oh, cool. Action shot. I look so not metal. All right, well, Worthy, thank you. Congratulations. And I’m just glad you’re back. Thank you, James. Much appreciated.
