Pat Smear Joins Nirvana/First Arena Tour | Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend

at this point Pat smear had joined the. band too that was a huge like from the. release of the album he was touring with. you guys this was it was big because we. had made the album and Kurt had talked. about you know at one point there was a. second guitarist in Nirvana before I. joined the band and he wanted to get. another guitarist at this point and he. says um he goes down to Los Angeles he. comes back he says I found our second. guitar player and he said really who's. that he said Pat smear from the germs M.

and if anybody knows the germs they were. very early on the punk rock band in Los. Angeles perhaps the most dangerous and. um so I just thought like oh my God I. can't believe that guy's still. alive because he was in the germs and. also and and a side a sad side note is. side note is like Darby Darby Crash yeah. he committed suicide yeah the singer of. the. germs um anyway so Pat comes up and I'm. just expecting this big disgusting fat.

junkie and he's the most. wonderful. energetic brilliant beautiful put. together he he he really breathed this. whole new life into the band the great. thing too is I there's a great anecdote. that. defines his contribution to the band In. addition to being a great musician and. and and I think what I've always read is. that Kurt wanted someone who could also. help handle some of the you know. technical parts so that he could focus. more on the performance and the and and.

singing and so obviously P can do that. but the other thing that was a great is. that he had this uh great attitude and. there was a story of you guys playing a. show and then there's a not a nice. review about the show and it says you. know the show was off and someone's. reading the. review people are getting pissed that. was the first sorry to interrupt the. first night of the the opening night of. the tour the inudo tour was at the. Arizona State Fair and it's the first. night.

and so you know it takes a couple shows. to get roll in and so it was Edna. Gunderson from USA Today Shez. Louise a name that will. live she gave us a mediocre review like. why didn't she go like three or four. shows into the tour then she would have. caught us and that's what you get on. this um box set you get the band is at. full what happens is this review comes. out and the story I heard uh is that the.

the review comes out and everyone on the. bus is like God damn it why did USA. Today write this about us and Pat said. oh come on we sucked and everybody. laughed meaning just sort. of taking taking the piss out of the. whole thing come on we were off well you. know well also I love that who do you. call to take over the technical side of. things in a guitar band the guy. from the germs yeah I can't think of a I. can't think of a band that is a a a. closer parallel to the kind of like. uneasy feeling that you got from the.

weirdest moments of Nirvana than the. germs like their their their whole thing. had that same sort of yeah like familiar. but slightly Sleazy and slightly. uncomfortable quality and and it was a. Sonic thing like the sound of Pat sme's. guitar it sounded a little sour and a. little you know a little creepy and it. seemed like a like it was a natural as. soon as I heard about it I thought oh. yeah that's a natural it was it was. great so when we came out to do these. shows I mean they were bigger shows and.

I mean really it was our first Arena. tour you know when did you like was did. you like playing the Arenas it it felt. strange at first I think I mean I. towards the end of 1991 we did an arena. Tour opening up for the Red Hot Chili. Peppers and um you know I I was always. afraid that that what we did that energy. wouldn't translate in a in a bigger room. y you know cuz we were used to playing. places this big and put us in the corner.

there and the place explodes and it's. amazing to try to you know move that. yeah to a bigger room would be hard so. um it felt weird all of a sudden there. was like Caterers yeah we had a caterer. on tour and then the catering fired them. because they made the wrong mac and. cheese well no because they did because. they had really good food I thought it. was really good and Kurt like corn dogs. and macaroni and cheese and our baloney. sandwiches so they were making actual. Macar.

with actual cheese and he had never had. that before and that was the last. straw you know so it was just. like you know was one of those things. like ah and well we did a show we had a. show it was a 90-minute show we had a. stage set up we would do our acoustic. breakdown part yeah we did the same show. every. night um and we would play it was like. $20 tickets tickets were like 20 bucks. because you could sell CDs and make. money and then we had like working.

family prices but then also the best. part was we're like oh okay we're in. Arena band now right cool the opening. band is going to be the boredoms from. Japan or the opening band is going to be. the Butthole Surfers so You' got. all these kids that like just bought. their Nirvana T-shirt and they come to. The Rock Show to see their favorite band. and they've got like Bobcat gwe is the. MC and then the Butthole Surfers. like what the is going on how did. Bobcat gold weight become the opener for. you guys were real fans we were fans.

Kurt had meet Bob that record and then. we just so happened to be it was like in. 1990 and I we were in like Michigan or. Wisconsin at a college radio station and. Bobcat was there and we like hey we know. you he didn't know who we were we nobody. knew who we were like hey we you're. you're on Police Academy like we're. like and he he tells the story he goes. say yeah I met them and I said good luck. with your little. band as we said goodbye.

and then we just yeah I don't know we. just got he was sort of on our side like. as as as a comedian sure he was like. kind of a cynical subversive. weirdo yeah yeah and so we liked him and. he got a bad riew Rex Reed gave him a. bad review and he goes he was my f. favorite judge on The Gong. [Laughter]. Show.