The Cheifs

In November of 1979, Bob Glassley and a few friends piled into his car for a road trip down the West Coast. It was a retired police cruiser from the Dorris California Police Department, an all-white Plymouth with a souped-up engine. At the time, Glassley sang for a young punk band from Portland called the Rubbers. They were on a mission that day, to make some alliances in the Los Angeles music scene, and to line up some shows for a touring caravan of Portland bands. “We set out for L.A., and the motor blew somewhere outside of Stockton,” Glassley says. “When we got back on the road we found out it was the day they were taping the Hollywood Christmas parade. All of the freeway exits were closed, so we just kept driving around the city, looking for an off-ramp.”

Eventually they made it into the city and crashed at the Holly-West in Hollywood. The space was a former MGM studio and office building on the corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Western, housing everything from a porno studio and a church led by a gay preacher to rehearsal spaces where musicians lived, practiced and spent most of their time hanging out.

One day, Glassley was listening to a group making noise in a nearby room when a young man with bright blue hair — George Walker — poked his head around the doorway and asked if anyone played bass. “I said I did, although that was a serious stretch,” Glassley says. “I owned a cheap bass back in Portland, so I felt qualified.”

Walker was a gay black man in the late ’70s L.A. punk scene at a time when there were few out gay or black punk musicians.

The two became friends, and after sticking around and playing music for a few days, Glassley was invited to join the group and play bass alongside Walker on guitar with singer Jerry Koskie and drummer Kenneth “Rabit” Bragger. Soon they would come to be known as Cheifs.

Glassley returned to Portland to play the final shows the Rubbers had booked and was L.A.-bound soon after. The Rubbers’ Bruce Loose went on to sing and play bass with San Francisco’s legendary punk outfit, Flipper. Back in L.A., Glassley experienced a thrilling new beginning, building friendships with the now-legendary denizens of the local punk scene, including Darby Crash and Lorna Doom of the Germs, Keith Morris of Black Flag and the Circle Jerks, and Jack Grisham of T.S.O.L.


A. Official Releases (7″ vinyl)

1a. The Cheifs ‎– The Cheifs
Label: Playgems Records
Catalog Number: PG 001
Format: Vinyl, 7″, 45 RPM, EP
Released: 1980

Notes: Darby Crash credited on sleeve as “Creative Consultant”; recorded September 1980 in North Hollywood.

Tracklist
A ‎– Blues
B1 ‎– (At The Beach At) Tower 18
B2 ‎– Knocked Out

1b. The Cheifs ‎– The Cheifs
Label: Spontaneous Combustion Records
Catalog Number: SCR-006
Format: Vinyl, 7″, 45 RPM, EP, Reissue
Released: August 2004

Second pressing reissue

 


B. Unofficial Releases (7″ vinyl)

1. Cheifs / Black Flag ‎– Career In Bootlegging
Label: Bootleg Institute Of Bakersfield
Catalog Number: BIB – 3001
Format: Vinyl, 2 x 7″, 33 ⅓ RPM, EP, Unofficial Release
Released: 1995

Tracks A1 to C2 are April 1982 demo tracks.
Tracks D1 and D2 are 1981 demo tracks.
No track list provided for Cheifs songs on the release itself.

Tracklist
A1 – Cheifs – Cheifin’
A2 – Cheifs – Liberty
B1 – Cheifs – Hollywest Crisis
B2 – Cheifs – Karen Walach
C1 – Cheifs – Drowning
C2 – Cheifs – Eddie’s Revenge
D1 – Black Flag – Spray Paint
D2 – Black Flag – American Waste


Online Resources

Cheifin Out – band history