On May the 5th, the hot weather season will be kicked off with an explosive burst of musical energy. Temperatures will rise and feet will jump, as the Fleshtones and Disturbance take the stage at Toad's, each to bring the crowd to boiling point with their respective brands of frenzy and fun. Both bands have been exciting their hometown fans for about five years, the Fleshtones in New York, and the Disturbance here in New Haven.

The Fleshtones' first musical effort came in 1976, soon after Marek Pakulski moved from his home state in Maine to live in New York with his life-long friend Keith Streng. The two started playing bass and guitar, joined by Keith's high-school friends Peter Zaremba and Brian and Gordon Spaeth on Harmonica, tenor and alto saxophone respectively. The band played at parties and small New York clubs, steadily building up a following of excited fans, who dubbed them 'The Kings of Garage Rock.' Later, in March of 1979, their popularity was to be attested to by their victory in the first N. Y .C. Battle of the Bands. New York club owners and press were soon to notice the talented Fleshtones, and by 1978 Marty Thau had signed them to his Red Star label. Red Star released the band's first single in summer 1979. Entitled American Beat, the record captured perfectly the wall of fuzzy reverb and Yardbird-like harmonica that are the backbone of the Fleshtones' American beat sound. Around the same time, the Fleshtones recorded an album, Blast Off, but Red Star went bankrupt and was never able to release it on vinyl. (Recently, however, it has been released on cassette by ROIR cassettes).

In September 1980 the band performed in the feature film Urgh! A Music War along with many other well established new music bands - the Police, the Go Go's, XTC, Gang of Four, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, the Au Pairs, Magazine, Echo & the Bunnymen, John Otway, etc. etc. After a later performance at Irving Plaza, for Marty Thau and Jimmy Destri's '2x5' album/concert, Tim Sommer of Trouser Press was to rave: "The Fleshtones played one of the strongest and most exciting sets I've seen by an American band this year. Their pounding snarl-rock is in the tradition of the greatest American Primitives; they are logical successors to the Stooges, Raiders, and the Dolls, bashing around the stage with a conviction and adrenalin level rare on this side of the Atlantic."

Almost immediately after this the troup signed with Miles Copeland to the International Record Syndicate (I.R.S. to most) and toured on the West Coast. Late in 1980, a 5-song EP, Up Front, was released, and the following June their single "All Around the World" b/w "The World has Changed" hit the stores. The culmination of these events was to be their first album on vinyl, Roman Gods. Released early in February this year, the album jumped right into the charts to reach no.17. Tom Carson, writing for Rolling Stone Magazine, calls this "simple, unaffected LP the best rock & roll to come out of New York in the past year. And you can dance to every blessed minute of it." One can't fail to agree. Every cut reverberates with passion, Streng's guitar and Zaremba's vocals yelping and leaping over Bill Milhizer's throbbing drums. Every angle of the history of American rock & roll - Motown, pop, rockabilly, psychedelia, etc. etc. is splashed into the album with instinctive command, and yet is played with such panache and boyish adventure that the music can be no one's but the Fleshtones'.

If you are more than ready for the shedding of clothes that comes with hot weather and dancing, then head for Toad's on May 5th. Be prepared - it will be hot!

Of course, a great deal of the excitement that night, especially for the locals, will be generated by the opening act, Disturbance. By now, Disturbance are veterans of the New Haven and area new music scene, having played at all the area's clubs over a span of four years or so. Their music has never been so refreshing and inventive as with the current line-up of Marc Puttock and Tom Hosier, each both guitar and vocals, Bud Lyon on bass, and Mark Becker on drums. Varied influences have helped to shape Disturbance's sound, particularly instrumental and surf music such as the Ventures, the Shadows and the Surfaris, and also Motown and psychedelic music of the '60s. So far, Disturbance's only recordings have been demo tapes, but the band has recently started to record again, hoping eventually to put out a single, which has been delayed partly by lack of funds and partly by determination to come up with the right sound before wasting what money they do have. Their sound is certainly riveting. Puttock's distinctive guitar sound, spiced with echo and reverb, has a clean, treble bite that hovers impressively over Hosier's tight-spun chords and riffs and Lyon's elastic, funky bass. Beneath it all, Becker's drums thrash relentlessly on, carrying their music along in the tradition of all the great surf bands. Their songs run a gamut of subjects, from apocalyptic visions of war and confusion ("Sirens in the Night"), and collapsed civilization ("Tomorrow's Dance"), to working at nights ("Graveyard Shift"), to visions of faraway exoticism ("Postcard of the Great Wall"). Some lyrics are written as abstract and surreal interjections to the music's rhythm, and some are long and cleverly worked out poems of thoughtful complication. All Disturbance songs are played with energy and joyful abandon. The result of this striving force is both harmonically cerebral and rhythmically physical. Disturbance's fans are magnetically drawn to their music from all walks of life. Waterbury factory workers, cooks and waitresses, students, and admiring area musicians invariably flock to their gigs and dance as though there were no tomorrow. They proved their support when Disturbance collected the most ballot votes for Best New Wave Band in the Connecticut Music Awards and received their award at the Party for the Bands held in December. For Disturbance there must be a bigger and better tomorrow's dance. See if you agree.