Archival Buffalo News feature articles

  First appearance here by Pat Benatar and she’s the opening act. Nov. 5, 1979  Werner Wears Out His Welcome After Benatar's Boogieing          Terry Sullivan of the Jumpers recognizes him as he walks in with David Werner's band – Thom Mooney, who used to play drums with another whiz kid, Todd Rundgren, in Nazz 10 years ago.          Now Mooney's drumming for a guy whose first album five years ago was called "Whizz Kid." There are a couple things that are definitely right-on about David Werner Sunday night in Harvey and Corky's Stage One and one of those things is the drumming.          Another is the guitar work. Sassy and sinuous, these guitars will deliver Werner anywhere he wants to go. Red-shirted guitarist Mark Doyle seems born to play Mick Ronson to Werner's David Bowie.          Werner bears more tha...

  A forgotten British band that deserved better. Oct. 27, 1979  Opening Act Rivals Local Headline Band          The Sinceros were not at all pleased. Here they were, a British recording group, and essentially they were opening for a local rock band at a Halloween beer blast at the University at Buffalo.          Nevertheless, the Sinceros swallowed their pride Friday night for this – their second U.S. gig – and delivered a blockbuster for a partially costumed crowd in the Fillmore Room of Squire Hall.          For the Sinceros, there were a couple important advantages to playing first. They got the crowd before the beer set in, and they got a sound check. As a result, they sounded great.          The Sinceros are a song-oriented pop quartet, one of the many that have sprung up in the wake of the Knack. They ...

  Bonnie Raitt, back in the days when it wasn't so damn hard to get tickets for her shows. Oct. 25, 1979 Bonnie, Fans Rate Each Other Highly            Bonnie Raitt always has a good time in Buffalo. Wednesday night was no exception.          "You make me feel like rockin' and rollin'," she said with a grin to the near sell-out crowd in Shea's Buffalo. The fans rocked right along with her all the way through a four-song double encore.          "Gee whiz," she remarked near the end. "Why don't you come with us to Syracuse tomorrow?"          Looking chic in black pants and a black sparkly blouse, red-haired Raitt was in fine form as she belted out her recent remakes of Motown and R&B classics from the '60s and her blues and rock favorites from the '70s.          H...

  Once it finally got underway, another glorious night 45 years ago. Oct. 12, 1979  The B-52s’ Impact Is Raucous, Weird No doubt about it, the B-52s and the Jumpers add up to a punk-rock happening in the Fillmore Room of the University at Buffalo’s Squire Hall Thursday night. Furthermore, it’s sold out, all 600 tickets. Lined up outside the door is a garish legion in funny sunglasses, skinny ties, tight pants and weird makeup. And how about that bunch over there with their hair colored a tacky maroon. Like most university rock concerts, this one moves with a highly independent sense of time. That’s why there is this long line waiting to get in at the scheduled 8 p.m. start. The sound checks finish about 8:30. The Jumpers go on about 9:30 and the B-52s finally appear at 11. When the punk-rock fans aren’t making the floor bounce with their jumpy, twitchy, free-form dances, they stand – there are no chairs – and they sweat – there is little ventilation – and they wonder...

Oct. 6, 1979  Revved Up Cars Run Fine – Except for Mid-Set Stall Behind those bug-eyed sunglasses and that angular black hair, Ric Ocasek stands coldly at his microphone Friday night in Memorial Auditorium, looking like a grand vizier in some comic strip set in the 21st century. Ocasek's image is high-modern, a combination of carefully cultivated and immaculately controlled effects. And so is the band, since the Cars are pretty much his brainchild. Visually, they limit the spectrum to three colors – red, white and black – with a bit of green lighting or wavy spotlight projections on their backdrop for contrast. Musically, they're just as minimal. They knock the extraneous stuff out of rock 'n roll, building most of their material off the super-crisp drums of David Robinson and the abrupt chunks of Ocasek's rhythm guitar. It takes a certain kind of intensity to make this kind of music rock, but rock they do. They heighten it with synthesized vocals and Greg Hawkes...