Dr. Tim and the Subliminal Seductress

Dedicated to Deanna Love Burgess.

In 1971 a pirate radio station called WUCK-FM was broadcasting from the top floor of a three-story Victorian-era house located at 2737 Halifax Avenue South that was rented and inhabited by four young men in their early to mid twenties. The radio station was strung together by a long haired, bearded 24-year-old engineering student who called himself "Doctor" Tim Treeman, with a hand-built makeshift transmitter set up in one of the third floor rooms, a studio in an adjacent room that included a hand-built mixing board, microphone, two turntables and a reel-to-reel tape deck all set up on two old wooden desks, all of this wired to a rooftop antenna that could broadcast from a radius of several blocks to a few miles, depending on conditions. The station broadcast on the 107.3 frequency and didn't interfere with any legitimate radio stations, so it stayed under the radar of the Federal Communications Commission.

Programming was mostly progressive album rock. Everything from Mott the Hoople to Frank Zappa to Quicksilver Messenger Service to the Grateful Dead was played. But program director/operations manager/disc jockey Dr. Tim didn't have any real set limits on music, as he also played obscure pop singles and B sides if he liked them, plus a little jazz and blues. Music was supplied by a local store, Karma-Mantra Records, in exchange for frequent mentions on the air. In addition to music, Dr. Tim would do a little psychedelic poetry, much of it jotted down moments before he read it on the air. There was also editorial content about such things as the Vietnam War (against), pot (for), the draft (against), the brotherhood of man (for), the Establishment press (or "pig press") (against), the Underground press (for), plus public service announcements for such services as the free clinic and suicide prevention hotline. All in all, it was a pretty professional-sounding operation.

"This is WUCK-FM, I'm Dr. Tim and I'm here to play phonograph records," he would say in his deep voice, up close to the microphone, before hitting the start button on an already cued-up record on one of the turntables. When that song played through and ended, he'd go straight to another cued-up record on the other turntable, put a different record on the first one and cue it up, and so forth. At least once every half hour came an announcement that would go something like, "Music on WUCK-FM comes courtesy of Karma-Mantra Records, 1605 Roosevelt Avenue. Karma-Mantra is now your eight-track headquarters with the widest selection of eight-track tapes, plus eight-track car stereos. Get an eight-track stereo for your car. It's what's happening, baby!"

Elsewhere in the house on Halifax Avenue, there was usually a party going on. Dr. Tim and his roommates Barry S. Wilson, Kevin Leer and Eric Carlsberg turned it into quite a psychedelic mansion with colorfully mismatched furniture on the hard-wood floors, colored lighting, posters on the walls and a constant supply of beer and booze, and maybe some decent marijuana and other substances to make guests feel at home. And if somebody brought their own stuff and wanted to share it, that was beautiful, man.

There were other voices heard on WUCK-FM besides Dr. Tim. Barry, Kevin or Eric would often go up there and do a show for a couple hours, or a houseguest who was interested in trying it out, or someone who wanted to say something to the community at large. And then there was a mysterious, sultry female voice who would take over the airwaves from time to time, calling herself Renee the Subliminal Seductress. People within listening range of WUCK-FM wondered who she was, and whether she was affecting their subconscious minds broadcasting subliminal messages. Rumors began to spread that she, in fact, was.

The mysterious Subliminal Seductress was actually Renee Swensen, the 21-year-old youngest daughter of well-known local businessman, Larry Swensen. Renee was blonde, blue-eyed and gorgeous, and in case you didn't notice she was gorgeous, she'd tell you so. She enjoyed a comfortable upper-middle class upbringing in a lake front home, although she was sent to public school. Growing up, she was close to her father and coddled by him when he was home, which usually wasn't often enough with all the business trips, conventions and long meetings he had to attend. Meanwhile, her mother was more aloof, and was the one who kept her in line.

Renee was going to college with the goal of becoming a school guidance counselor, mostly at the behest of her parents. But upon getting there and being away from home for the first time, she felt the need to rebel, at least a little bit. Her new friends in the women's dorm, mostly from well-off families, introduced her to such things as alcohol, cigarettes and parties. She was much enamored with 1920s-era art deco fashion and so she liked to wear twenties-style dresses and smoke using a cigarette holder, fancying herself more as a modern-day flapper than a contemporary hippie. She had helped her father campaign for Richard Nixon in 1968 and continued to share his Republican leanings.

It so happened she and her college girlfriends went to a party at the house on Halifax Avenue, where she met Tim Treeman, and she immediately found him alluring. He was so completely different from the kind of guy her parents envisioned for her. He had long hair, a beard and wore dark glasses. His background was blue collar, his education was from trade schools, and yet he was a deep, intelligent thinker. She listened intently as he spoke on a wide range of subjects while most everyone else there was babbling nonsense. When she saw the radio station he built, she was all the more impressed. She quickly became infatuated with him and she was coming over to see him as often as she could. Tim's roommates started referring to her as his groupie.

It didn't take long, however, for her to win them over. When she saw how little food they actually had in the house, she started bringing some over and making them dinner, and if she spent the night, she'd make breakfast. Soon, she talked the guys into letting her host a fondue party at the house, making her very popular with the crowd that hung out there. She was also rather artistic, and so she brought paints over and started painting colorful flowers, hearts and other designs on the walls, putting her feminine touch in the bachelor pad, and giving everyone something fun to look at when they were using recreational substances.

The "Subliminal Seductress" thing came about the first evening Dr. Tim had Renee in the studio with him as he did his radio program. They talked together while the records played, and when Tim put on the headphones and started speaking on the air, she continued to talk in the background and it was picked up by the microphone. In an attempt to go with the flow, Tim told his listeners, "Renee the Subliminal Seductress is here, sending good vibes into your subconscious mind."

"I'm so sorry," Renee said after Tim removed his headphones, as another record was playing.

"No, that's cool, baby," Tim told her. "It adds to the atmosphere." A bit later, he opened the microphone while a record was playing, and had her say in a soft voice at a distance, "Sex, sex, sex, sex, sex." First at an even pace, then slower, then he told her to pick it up and say it faster and faster with more breath. Then he turned off the microphone and they busted out laughing.

Before long, Renee talked him into letting her do her own radio show. Women disc jockeys were fairly uncommon then, and Dr. Tim thought of it as another "revolutionary" thing for his station to do. He advised her to speak slowly and softly to sound a little less like a bubbly teenybopper, and he let her select the music she wanted to play. Her musical tastes leaned more toward Joni Mitchell and Judy Collins than hard rock. She called herself Renee the Subliminal Seductress on the air but refrained from whispering too many messages during the music because, Tim figured, "it might get us into trouble."

"Subliminal Seductress" was intended as a joke, a social satire on allegations being made at the time that marketers were slyly slipping sex-related subliminal messages into advertising to influence the subconscious minds of unsuspecting consumers. But to some people, just the suggestion of anything subliminal was no joke and from there, things started to snowball.

A few WUCK-FM listeners were claiming the broadcasts were having a strange effect on them, causing everything from weird dreams to desires to do things they wouldn't normally do. A man who was arrested in a home invasion just a few blocks from the house on Halifax Avenue blamed it on subliminal messages being sent over the airwaves by the station. Police, who knew the man, chalked it up to his mental illness and drug use, and being unaware of the existence of WUCK-FM, assumed it was part of his hallucinations as well. But the call-letters did appear in the police report.

Then a letter to the editor appeared in the daily newspaper mentioning the call-letters and expressing outrage that an unlicensed broadcaster somewhere within city limits was corrupting the minds of unsuspecting citizens with "subliminal messaging technique," suggesting it was a communist plot.

As city officials and law enforcement slowly became aware of WUCK-FM, they started monitoring broadcasts. The station did not broadcast on a set schedule, only when Dr. Tim felt like turning on the transmitter, and when it was on, the signal could only be heard in certain parts of town, which somewhat confounded attempts by authorities to investigate. When they were able to pick up the signal, officials listened closely for any potential subliminal messaging, as well as to song lyrics and spoken commentaries on the station for any obscenities or promotion of drug use and other illegal activity, such as draft dodging. Every questionable bit of content was jotted down in a log book, along with the date and time.

A complaint was filed with the Federal Communications Commission in Washington, DC, which promised to investigate. But other priorities for the government agency took precedence over some tiny unlicensed radio station run by a bunch of hippies that wasn't causing interference with other stations. So the police, in conjunction with the city council and mayor's office, decided to take things into their own hands.

On November 16, 1971, under the pretenses of complaints of a noisy party, police raided the house on Halifax Avenue. They arrested everyone they could get their hands on, while many others ran out the back door. They made their way up to the third floor of the house and confiscated the broadcasting equipment, as well as drug paraphernalia and other items found elsewhere in the house as "evidence." TV film crews were there and the raid made the top of the local Action News and Eyewitness News broadcasts.

Tim, Barry, Kevin, Eric and Renee were taken downtown, booked and charged with a number of alleged crimes, including disorderly conduct, conspiracy to provoke unrest, conspiracy to promote unlawful activity, possession of drugs and drug paraphernalia, and "broadcasting obscenities in violation of city code, using subliminal messaging technique."

The raid became an even bigger news story when it came out that the daughter of Larry and Lois Swensen had been among those arrested, and that she was, in fact, "Renee the Subliminal Seductress." People who knew the Swensens shook their heads in pity. "And she seemed like such a nice girl, too," they said.

The raid stirred a tremendous amount of controversy locally and on a national scale, as the story got picked up by the Associated Press, and thus made it into newspapers across the country, and film footage from the local affiliates appeared on the ABC Evening News, and on the NBC newsmagazine program "First Tuesday."

Ultimately, most of the charges were dropped, at least those pertaining to the radio station. Tim Treeman got his equipment back, but by that time he had received a warning letter from the Federal Communications Commission threatening fines if the station returned to the air, not because of the content of broadcasts, but because the agency's investigation found that it was an illegal operation, operating without a license and at higher power than would be allotted for such a station.

By 1972 the house on Halifax Avenue was vacated and the guys all went their own ways. Renee returned to a more "normal" life, graduated from college and became a school guidance counselor, until she realized she could make a lot more money with far less stress as a commercial voice talent. Her experience as a disc jockey at the underground radio station paid off quite comfortably in the end.

Going New Wave

When the 1970s gave way to the 1980s, there was a noticeable change in the culture, the way people talked and the way they acted. There was a new phony optimism and shallowness that I didn't have much use for. I might have been living in the eighties but I didn't have to participate in it. Everyone else might have been going new wave, but I was sticking to my good ol’ rock 'n' roll. Or so I thought.

I had some friends who were in a local bar band, originally called the Druggists. They had formed in 1979 doing straightforward rock 'n' roll covers of songs by groups such as Led Zeppelin, Bad Company, Grand Funk Railroad, Bachman-Turner Overdrive and the Knack. They were loud and somewhat good, and they mostly played in the small dives and private parties around the city. The drunker the audience, the better they sounded.

My good friend Dave Wiedemann was the lead vocalist and bassist for the Druggists, with Mike Rupert on lead guitar and vocals, Bob Martin on rhythm guitar and Ed Williston on drums and percussion.

Dave joined in 1980, replacing a couple other guys, and immediately took the band over with some bold new ideas. He wanted to get the band into better venues, get more publicity, and do some original material, so they wouldn't be strictly a "cover" band. I had some artistic ability, a few media connections and was a budding writer with a whole notebook of potential ideas for original rock songs, so Dave asked me to be the "official" publicist and lyricist for the band. If nothing else I was at least affordable, and Dave knew how to stroke my ego.

"We're gonna be big, and you're gonna help us get there, dude," he told me.

My role as "publicist" consisted mostly of hand-drawing posters and leaflets for the band's upcoming appearances (this was before the era of home computers), mass-photocopying them and riding around town on my bike, stapling them to telephone poles and community bulletin boards. I would get the band's appearances listed in the weekly "alternative" newspapers, and I would write up press releases and send them out with press packets that included the band's bio, upcoming appearances and a photo of the guys in the band, with their scraggly hair and beards, standing, arms folded, with pissed-off looks on their faces. The posters and publicity materials included the slogan, "WE ARE THE DRUGGISTS, AND WE ROCK!" Occasionally someone would cross out "rock" and write in "suck" on the posters, but I'd just tear that one down and put up a new one when it happened.

Having the opportunity to write songs for the band was especially thrilling. I didn't write music, but I'd jot down lyrics that I thought would make good, hard rock songs with a particular tune in mind. I'd submit the ideas to Dave, he'd work out something with the other guys and come up with something that was dynamite. Dave would belt out my lyrics with gusto, and I took pride in the fact that I did not write love lyrics or anything conventional, and that’s what Dave and the other guys wanted.

One of the band's favorite songs that I wrote was called "I Just Don't Care No More." They played this at just about every show they did, and Dave cranked it out with aggressive vocals.

Well I'm tired of listening to

Anything that comes from you

From this day there is no way

I'll listen to anything you say

So you say that your life's so bad

I just don't care no more

You tell me that you feel so sad

I just don't care no more

You want someone to tell your troubles to

I just don't care no more

You come to me when you feel blue

Well I JUST DON'T CARE NO MORE!

NO I JUST DON'T CARE NO MORE!

NO I JUST DON'T CARE NO MORE!

I won't be there for you when you cry

I just don't care no more

I'm sure you know the reason why

I just don't care no more

You always depress the shit out of me

I just don't care no more

And from your troubles I want to break free

'Cause I JUST DON'T CARE NO MORE

NO I JUST DON'T CARE NO MORE…

Or there was this classic. Heavy metal lyrics from a parental perspective:

You're not a child, you're a demon from hell

There's not a doctor or cure that could make you well

We've put up with you, now we're drawing the line

You piece of shit, you're no son of mine!

You're ONE SICK BOY!

You're a disgrace to our family name

To your mother and I, you've brought only shame

In our society you'll never advance

We should have aborted you when we had the chance!

You're ONE SICK BOY!

And then there was Dave's personal favorite, and a popular one with the club audiences, the unforgettable, hard rockin' party song, "Beast Man":

There's a creature out there you can't escape

Sometimes he's a man, sometimes he's an ape

BEAST MAN!

Not too many things give him a thrill

But he loves to hunt and he loves to kill

BEAST MAN!

Killing everything is his desire

Looks like evolution has gone haywire

BEAST MAN…

In the first couple of years of the 1980s, hanging out with that band was a blast. The Druggists were getting better gigs, performing as an opening act at the better nightclubs or as a fill-in when a main act couldn't show up, while continuing to perform in bars and at private parties. The audiences were generally receptive. Occasionally there would be some obnoxious drunk causing problems, but there were never any hostile audiences that I saw.

The band was still performing classic rock covers, with my songs thrown in, and it was especially gratifying for me to see people really jamming out to something I had written. Dave was good about crediting me and introducing me to people, but I was quite fine with staying in the background and watching it all from my own comfort zone.

*****

In the spring of 1982, Dave informed me he and the guys were working in a studio and were putting the finishing touches on an album that would have twelve cuts, including six of my songs. He told me I’d be given writer’s credit and would receive a share of the royalties. Finally, my work for these guys would actually pay off.

He asked me for suggestions on what to call the new LP. I thought for a moment and suggested the title “Fuck ‘em.” It was a phrase Dave used a lot, as well as me, and it expressed the attitude of the band.

Dave’s immediate response was “Yeah! Cool!” But then after thinking about it he said, “I don’t know, man. Stores aren’t going to stock anything with ‘fuck’ in the title.” I guess he had a point.

So then I suggested, “Why don’t you call the LP “Nuke ‘em.” On the front cover, show a picture of the band, with a big ass fuckin’ nuclear explosion mushroom cloud in the background!” This was, after all, at the height of the nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union.

Dave loved that idea, had a professional graphic artist work with my sketches to create the album cover, and in June 1982, “THE DRUGGISTS—NUKE ‘EM” came out on vinyl and cassette tape, with “I Just Don’t Care No More” as the opening track. A couple of FM rock stations even played that track and another one I wrote. It was at least a year before I actually saw a royalty check, and it wasn’t much, but I was happy to get it.

The album also included a couple of new tracks I wrote. One was called “Adolescent Therapy Session.” It started out with a distorted guitar riff, followed by slamming drums. Then Dave’s searing vocals came in.

Well you are only seventeen

But you’re the WORST CASE we’ve ever seen!

You’re going out and stealing cars

You’re drinking in cross town bars, good god!

You pick up a police woman decoy

You’re parents say, “You are such a naughty boy!

“We tried to raise you right from the start

“Now you’re breaking our heart!”

And they SCREAM…WHAT THE HELL’S THE MATTER WITH YOU?!

The other one took a different turn, and to everyone’s surprise it became something of a local hit. It was a ballad called “Terrance,” sung by Dave from the perspective of a high school cad.

My name is Terrance

And I’m really chic

I’m so cute you could pinch my cheek

I’m on the honor roll and the football team

When the girls see me, they all scream (backing vocals: Oh, TERRANCE!)

My name is Terrance

And I’m the high school jock

My big, hunk body is solid rock

I’ve got a tall blond cheerleader by my side

I’m gonna take her home and take her for a ride

Oh, I’m the all-American boy

To all the girls I provide such joy

Cause I’m a gorgeous son of a bitch

I’ll never have to work ‘cause I’m good looking and rich…

I was stunned to find out "Terrance" became a favorite at the local clubs, and couples were actually dancing close together to it when it was played. And it did get some radio play as well, but with a couple of words bleeped out. Those came up in the last verse of the song.

And last night I got such a thrill

When I [bleep]-ed some [bleep] by the name of Jill…

You can't accuse me of being incapable of writing about romance!

*****

As the decade progressed, things were changing. Bar audiences and bar owners were looking for something different than simple loud rock 'n' roll performed by four or five guys in long hair, beards, mustaches and shabby clothes. It was now the era of the music video, where looks mattered more. So-called new wave rock and urban contemporary dance music performed by guys and girls in wildly fashionable hairdos and slick, colorful outfits was becoming the big thing that people were looking for. New bands were popping up and snatching up gigs that could have been had by the Druggists. And what kind of a name was the Druggists anyway? It sounded too much like a throwback to hippie-era drug culture. We were now in the era of Nancy Reagan's "Just Say No" campaign. People still did drugs, but it was now considered wrong to promote it openly.

In March 1983, Dave threw us all for a loop. He called a meeting at the old warehouse where the band practiced, and told me to be there too. He had some big news, and publicity is going to be more important than ever, he said.

With me, Mike, Bob, Ed and a few others there, Dave made his big announcement. "I hired a keyboardist. His name is Howie Horkelson (that actually wasn’t his real name) and he's great. We're going New Wave, man. We got to get with the Eighties. We got to think about making music videos and getting on MTV. We can't go on being some fucking sixties throwbacks."

The guys were all looking at each other, saying, "What the fuck?"

He turned to me and said, "Dude, I want you to make posters and put them up all over town saying we've gone new wave. I want you to write up press releases and send them everywhere. Newspapers, TV stations, radio stations, everywhere. Oh, and the band's not going to be called the Druggists anymore. From now on we're Illegal Smiles. Not the Illegal Smiles, just Illegal Smiles."

The other guys in the band were not so gung-ho on that idea, least of all me. I said, "What the fuck do you want to do that for? The eighties suck!" The other guys were saying, "Yeah, no shit."

Dave said, "Look, guys, I'm not saying we can't play rock anymore. But we're living in the eighties, and if we're going to get out of playing the dives and get booked at some of the hotter clubs, we've got to get with what's current, what's trendy. People don't want to hear covers of Led Zeppelin and BTO songs all the time anymore."

"So what about the stuff I'm writing for the band," I asked.

"Keep doing what you're doing," he said. "What you write can easily be adapted to new wave."

Dave had a talent for being persuasive as much as any good salesman and the guys all came around to his side of the issue, however reluctantly. And so the Druggists became Illegal Smiles and I drew up some new posters with the group's new name in an eighties pop art style and emphasis on "New Wave." Meanwhile, getting into the spirit, I wrote my first "new wave" song for the band. Dave loved it, and had new keyboardist Howie sing lead on it.

God bless this beautiful day!

God bless the American way!

Well there's a great big smile

On every face I see

Everyone's a-living in harmony

Walkin' down the street you'll havta agree

America is the place to be!

Yes you can tell that America is the place to be

The way the surgeon performs his surgery

The way the drunkard drinks his burgundy

The way the radical speaks subversively…

Howie was actually good at what he did, the band played well with the new sound, and Illegal Smiles did start to draw bigger and more enthusiastic crowds than they did when they were the Druggists. In addition to what I was writing for them, the band was covering tracks from groups such as DEVO, the Clash and the Sex Pistols.

Then in the fall of 1984, Dave decided to make another big change. He brought in an aspiring singer named Tracy Gerwitz. Tracy was an aerobics instructor who wanted to be the next Madonna, and she tried hard to look just like her idol, with big permed hair, big earrings, heavy makeup, and a crucifix around her neck, even though she was Jewish. "It's just a fashion accessory to me," she'd say.

She had the Eighties Attitude big time. She was there because Dave was dating her, and I'm sure the other guys in the band were banging her as well. Not me, though. We tolerated each other, but that was about it.

She was nice to me in a phony sort of way. She'd say, "I want you to write songs for me but it's got to be my style." Or, "If you're going to make posters for the band be sure to mention me. Please? You know how to spell my name, right?"

She wasn't too crazy about the songs I wrote for the band either. She went through my notebooks with the lyrics I had jotted down and said, "Uh, I can't believe some of this stuff you write! Your words are so cynical, so angry at everything. Can't you write a love song?"

"Fuck that," I said. "I don't write puss songs."

"Love songs are not puss songs," she insisted. "Have you never been in love before? Don't you know what it's like?"

"Well, what about 'Terrance'," I suggested.

 

"I hate that song," she said. "That one is so sexist and misogynistic." 

 

 "Oh well," I replied.

She rolled her eyes and sighed exaggeratingly. "What-EVER!" Then she complained to Dave about me. "Why do you hang around with negative people? Do you know how it affects your psyche?"

Dave was hot and cold with Tracy. One day he'd be gushing about what a great lady she was, the next day he'd be calling her a "psycho bitch." But she had her clutches in him and in the entire band, and that was that.

Before long a new group photo was taken with Tracy up front and center, with the guys in the background. Soon Ed left the group (ostensibly to get married), and then Bob left. A couple of new guys came in to replace them, and I actually stuck around out of loyalty to Dave. Finally, in the spring of 1985, when the band started being billed as "Illegal Smiles Featuring Tracy Gerwitz," I knew it was pretty much over, and I too split the scene, moving on to other things. And pretty soon there was no more Illegal Smiles, just "singing sensation Tracy Gerwitz" getting booked at all the hot clubs. Dave finally realized he was just a stepping stone for her.

All these years later, Dave is still a friend of mine. He stops by occasionally for a beer and a chat. We talk about the good old days and he still gripes about how Tracy screwed him over. Then he gets to the point of his visit.

"Dude, you got $100 you can borrow me? I'll pay you back tomorrow, I promise."