Nostalgia is especially wistful when channeled through the sentimentality of musicians, aching to achieve an irrecoverable condition. It's been the ruin of many a poor band, but The Alarm Clocks are not one.
In the spring of 1966, three Parma High School students, Mike Pierce, Bruce Boehm and Bill Schwark headed into a Cleveland mom-and-pop storefront with a recording room. With Pierce on bass and vocals, Boehm on guitar and Schwark on drums, the trio had dubbed themselves the Alarm Clocks. Like many local teenagers playing in bands, their tour circuit took them to school gymnasiums, where they belted out cover songs. They listened to the Kinks, Yardbirds and Rolling Stones – the raw end of the British Invasion.
"Boehm's dad was in a polka group, an 'old-man' band, and he encouraged them to make a record of some sort, but they didn't have any original material," says local musician Tom Fallon."'No Reason to Complain' they wrote ahead of time, but when they got to the studio, they realized they needed a b-side, so they wrote 'Yeah!' on the spot." It was all done live, in one take, vocals and instrumentation. The resulting self-released 45 featured both tracks, fewer than 300 were pressed, and by 1967, the band – and its sole recording – had faded into obscurity.
"My friend George Gell was the one who actually uncovered the [Alarm Clocks] original record in the late-70s or so," says Fallon. "We collected these odd garage bands' records back then, when nobody cared about them." Fallon and Gell invited Crypt Records owner Tim Warren to hear the Alarm Clocks single 45, and "he flipped out," according to Fallon. It ended up being on the first volume of Crypt's compilation called Back From the Grave; it came out on vinyl in 1983. Suddenly, the little 45 became a coveted collector's item. Garage rock legends the Lyres covered "No Reason to Complain" in 1986 and Mojo magazine named the song "one of the top 20 garage rock songs of all-time."
Norton Records in New York City issued a reproduction of the single in the 1990s, followed in 2000 by a full-length LP/CD called Yeah!, which included additional Alarm Clocks material recorded in 1966 by Boehm. In 2005, during a reunion with old high school classmates, Pierce was playfully razzed by his 60s cohorts as the "big rockstar," according to Fallon. "He didn't know that Norton had reissued any of the Alarm Clocks old recordings." In 2004, comedian Patton Oswalt named his Comedy Central special “No Reason To Complain,” and featured the Alarm Clocks recording as the musical introduction.
Boehm and Pierce reconnected in 2005, with the help of Fallon and Gell. Less than a year later, Fallon got a call from Norton Records co-founder, former Cramps drummer and friend, Miriam Linna. "She called me, and said: 'You got to get these guys back together to play. It'll be 2006, 40 years since the record.' I thought, okay, I'll try." Schwark was living in Houston, Pierce hadn't played bass or sang in 40 years. Nobody was sold on the idea. Pierce insisted that Fallon join the band to help them get their footing. They did, and Fallon stayed on board. "The amazing thing is [Pierce] started writing songs immediately, which he'd never really done in the '60s." Story continued and Live From Bad Racket video on page two...
