Severe Tire Damage (band)
Encyclopedia
Rock and roll
Rock and roll is a genre of popular music that originated and evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily from a combination of African American blues, country, jazz, and gospel music...
"garage" band from Palo Alto, California
Palo Alto, California
Palo Alto is a California charter city located in the northwest corner of Santa Clara County, in the San Francisco Bay Area of California, United States. The city shares its borders with East Palo Alto, Mountain View, Los Altos, Los Altos Hills, Stanford, Portola Valley, and Menlo Park. It is...
.
Uniqueness
Severe Tire Damage was the first band to perform live on the Internet. On June 24, 1993, the band was playing a gig at Xerox PARCXerox PARC
PARC , formerly Xerox PARC, is a research and co-development company in Palo Alto, California, with a distinguished reputation for its contributions to information technology and hardware systems....
while elsewhere in the building, scientists were discussing new technology (the MBone
Mbone
Mbone was an experimental backbone for IP multicast traffic across the Internet developed in the early 1990s. It required specialized hardware and software...
) for broadcasting on the Internet using multicast
Multicast
In computer networking, multicast is the delivery of a message or information to a group of destination computers simultaneously in a single transmission from the source creating copies automatically in other network elements, such as routers, only when the topology of the network requires...
ing.
As proof of their technology, the band was broadcast and could be seen live in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
and elsewhere.
On November 19, 1994, the Rolling Stones decided to broadcast one of their concert tours on the Internet.
Before their broadcast, Severe Tire Damage returned to the Internet, this time becoming the "opening act" for the Stones.
Instead of an obscure Australian researcher, the entire world press was watching this time,
and Severe Tire Damage was elevated from obscurity to Warholian
Andy Warhol
Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...
fame.
Newsweek
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...
magazine described Severe Tire Damage as being "a lesser known rock band."
The Rolling Stones told The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
:
"the surprise opening act by Severe Tire Damage was a good reminder of the democratic nature of the Internet."
Band members
- Russ Haines played guitar, and worked at Digital Equipment CorporationDigital Equipment CorporationDigital Equipment Corporation was a major American company in the computer industry and a leading vendor of computer systems, software and peripherals from the 1960s to the 1990s...
. - Mark Manasse played bass, and worked at Digital Equipment CorporationDigital Equipment CorporationDigital Equipment Corporation was a major American company in the computer industry and a leading vendor of computer systems, software and peripherals from the 1960s to the 1990s...
. - Steven Rubin was the singer, and worked at Apple ComputerApple ComputerApple Inc. is an American multinational corporation that designs and markets consumer electronics, computer software, and personal computers. The company's best-known hardware products include the Macintosh line of computers, the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad...
. - Mark WeiserMark WeiserMark D. Weiser was a chief scientist at Xerox PARC in the United States. Weiser is widely considered to be the father of ubiquitous computing, a term he coined in 1988.-Biography:...
was the drummer, and was Chief Technologist at Xerox PARCXerox PARCPARC , formerly Xerox PARC, is a research and co-development company in Palo Alto, California, with a distinguished reputation for its contributions to information technology and hardware systems....
.
Music
Besides performing rock and roll standards, the band wrote a number of original songs that run the range from rock to punk.These songs appears on their two albums: "Who Cares" (a full CD album) and "Trial Starter Kit" (a mini-CD with only 4 songs). Both albums are out of print but are available on their collection CD "The Best We Can Do."
A Funny Name for a Band
Bands with the name Severe Tire Damage appear in the literature many times:- 1988: Vice Academy. In one scene two guys listen to a tape of their favorite rock band: Severe Tire Damage.
- 1990: Give Me LibertyGive Me LibertyGive Me Liberty is a four-issue comic book mini-series published by Dark Horse Comics in 1990. It was created and written by Frank Miller and drawn by Dave Gibbons...
by Frank MillerFrank Miller (comics)Frank Miller is an American comic book artist, writer and film director best known for his dark, film noir-style comic book stories and graphic novels Ronin, Daredevil: Born Again, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Sin City and 300...
and Dave GibbonsDave GibbonsDave Gibbons is an English comic book artist, writer and sometime letterer. He is best known for his collaborations with writer Alan Moore, which include the miniseries Watchmen and the Superman story "For the Man Who Has Everything"...
. A panel in volume 3 states: ". . . condemning the growing popularity of the mutant musical group Severe Tire Damage." - 1992: Real Men Don't Eat QuicheReal Men Don't Eat QuicheReal Men Don't Eat Quiche, by American Bruce Feirstein, is a bestselling tongue-in-cheek book satirizing stereotypes of masculinity, published in 1982...
by Bruce FeirsteinBruce FeirsteinBruce Feirstein is an American screenwriter and humorist, best known for his contributions to the James Bond series and his best-selling humor books, including Real Men Don't Eat Quiche and Nice Guys Sleep Alone. Real Men Don't Eat Quiche was on the New York Times best seller list for 53...
. One example of "real men" is that they "...still keep waiting for a band to be named either Republican Guard or Severe Tire Damage." - 1993: Mrs. DoubtfireMrs. DoubtfireMrs. Doubtfire is a 1993 American comedy film starring Robin Williams and Sally Field and based on the novel Madame Doubtfire by Anne Fine. It was directed by Chris Columbus and distributed by 20th Century Fox. It won the Academy Award for Best Makeup...
. In one scene, Robin WilliamsRobin WilliamsRobin McLaurin Williams is an American actor and comedian. Rising to fame with his role as the alien Mork in the TV series Mork and Mindy, and later stand-up comedy work, Williams has performed in many feature films since 1980. He won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance...
' character pretends to be a former vocalist for Severe Tire Damage. - 1998: Zits (comic strip)Zits (comic strip)Zits is a comic strip written by cartoonist Jerry Scott and illustrated by Jim Borgman about the life of Jeremy Duncan, a 16-year-old high school sophomore . The comic debuted in July 1997 in over 200 newspapers and has since become popular worldwide and received multiple awards...
, appeared August 5. While trying to choose a name for their band, they suggest "Severe Tire Damage, Blown Lunch, and Bite-size Yak". In the end, they reject these for "Goat Cheese Pizza". - 2006: Monk (TV series)Monk (TV series)Monk is an American comedy-drama detective mystery television series created by Andy Breckman and starring Tony Shalhoub as the titular character, Adrian Monk. It originally ran from 2002 to 2009 and is primarily a mystery series, although it has dark and comic touches.The series debuted on July...
, season 4, episode 15, "Mr. Monk Goes to the Dentist", aired March 10. Lieutenant Randy DisherLieutenant Randy DisherLieutenant Randall "Randy" Disher is a fictional character portrayed by Jason Gray-Stanford on the television series Monk.-Personality:Disher is Captain Leland Stottlemeyer's second-in-command and employed at the San Francisco Police Department...
temporarily quits the force and devotes himself full time to his high school garage band "The Randy Disher Project". The other band members disagree about the name of the band. One band member suggests Severe Tire Damage as a better name for the band.
Downfall
On April 27, 1999, Weiser died,and the band never fully recovered.
For Rubin, this was the second band in which the drummer had died, making his life into a
Spinal Tap
Spinal Tap (band)
Spinal Tap is a parody heavy metal band that first appeared on a failed 1979 ABC TV sketch comedy pilot called "The T.V. Show", starring Rob Reiner...
-like experience. For a brief time afterward silicon valley drummer Joel Jewitt practiced with the band and played some local gigs; as of March 2010 Jewitt was believed to be alive.