Dogbowl - A cyclops in a pop submarine

Originally from the Bronx, where he was born roughly sixty-five years ago, painter, novelist and musician Stephen Tunney, aka Dogbowl, was responsible - especially in the early Nineties - for some of the most gripping pages in psychedelic pop, a genre he pushed to sublime heights above all with his masterpiece “Cyclops Nuclear Submarine Captain”. What follows is our interview with the good Stephen, who didn't disappoint us, proving to be remarkably talkative and full of passion for his art.

So, Stephen, tell me a bit about how you got into music and which were the first albums and artists that most struck your imagination.

I've always loved music and the different worlds that musicians create simply by recording songs, and for as long as I can remember, I've always wanted to make music, even though as a kid I had no idea how to go about it. Since I'm getting on in years, I remember how in the Sixties music took on such an important role in the cultural movements of the time: I always had the radio on, and while listening to the grim daily news about the war in Vietnam, the presence of music only amplified the cultural intensity of a world that was changing. As a kid, I remember seeing “A Hard Day's Night” and “Help” at the local drive-in with my parents and siblings in an old Chevrolet station wagon. What struck me then, and still strikes me now, wasn't just the sound of the recorded music, but also the spectacle of live performance, or the coming together of visual art, theatre, film and fashion whenever musicians performed. Back then, I loved the Monkees a lot, because they had a way of presenting music that also leaned on visual impact, following the lesson taught by the Marx Brothers, who used comic depictions of music-making as key parts of their films (Harpo and the harp, Chico and the piano, Groucho as a singer - as far as I'm concerned, the Marx Brothers were real punk rockers!).

As I got older, I had trouble finding a musical instrument that suited me - at my elementary school on Long Island (a New York suburb) there was a good music programme - so I tried playing the trumpet, but failed. I couldn't read music. Then I tried playing the saxophone, and that was also a big failure. Strangely, my school didn't offer guitar lessons, which was what I really wanted to learn to play. Besides, my older brother was already taking private guitar lessons, and I figured the family already had its guitarist. In any case, I was becoming more and more focused on visual art, and learning guitar seemed too difficult; I didn't have the confidence to take lessons to learn that instrument, because I was afraid the teacher would force me to play things I didn't like. Still, things changed when I turned 17: punk rock exploded in 1977, and I realised that all I needed to know were a few basic chords. My older brother had stopped playing electric guitar, so he let me use his old Univox guitar that looked like a Mosrite, while my younger brother Chris (who later played on my records) was already an excellent musician and showed me how to play a few open chords.

Before punk rock, I was obsessed with the Beatles, particularly John Lennon, but I also liked Elton John, Kiss, Neil Young, the Kinks, the Who - basically a lot of the popular musicians and artists that people all over the world loved. My tastes back then weren't exactly cutting-edge... but when I discovered punk rock, I realised it was possible to invent melodies over simple chord progressions and write songs that were both offensive and funny. I immediately became obsessed with the Sex Pistols, the Ramones, Devo, Richard Hell, Johnny Thunders and others. Around the time of my punk rock infatuation, I found out that two of my close friends were going through similar musical experiences: my friend Mark wanted to learn bass, and my friend Steve was already an excellent drummer, so we formed a band and called it The Flys. We played just one show, at my high school, but the Long Island students didn't fully appreciate punk rock, so there was a mini-riot: the students threw garbage at us, and we got thrown off the stage after just two songs! Still, it was a wonderful experience!

This first band's journey came to an end when all the members went off to college, while I started attending an art school in New York. At the time, I was living at home with my mother and father and working weekends at a department store; with a few of my co-workers from that store, I put together a new band, The Skitzocrats: these guys had different musical tastes from mine, and since I was already growing less satisfied with the chordal limitations of punk rock, working with them gave me the chance to expand beyond the world of three open chords. That's when my brother joined the band on keyboards and clarinet. I clearly remember the moment I realised I needed to learn barre chords - going back to the Beatles for a second, there's a scene where they're playing “If I Fell” and George Harrison is clearly playing barre chords - I knew I'd have to learn that kind of chord if I wanted to improve the melodies in the songs I was writing; at that moment, watching that scene, I realised I might never become a great lead guitarist, but I could at least become a decent rhythm guitarist. It was during this period of post-punk musical development that I discovered Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground, with whom I became and remained absolutely obsessed. In particular, their moody, heavily distorted songs, like “White Light / White Heat”, sounded like they'd been recorded with such care, and the results were perfect. As if the idea of being able to do it yourself wasn't just easier, but also more faithful to your artistic vision: if you set technical perfection aside, you can reach the perfection you want, the one that shows up in your fleeting imagination.

Besides music, what else has influenced your music?

Cinema, painting and literature. As far as cinema goes, I obviously love directors like Tarkovsky, Kubrick, Fellini, Godard, Truffaut, Antonioni, De Sica, David Lynch, Woody Allen and so on. My favorite painters tend to belong to the Renaissance or pre-Renaissance period, with Hieronymus Bosch obviously being a central influence; these days, though, I'm more interested in certain mysteries of Renaissance painting - recently I've become fixated on some of Raphael's achievements in color saturation. As far as visual art goes, I'm stuck in the past! In literature, I tend to favor classics like Joyce, Dostoevsky and Cervantes.

Why did you choose Dogbowl as your stage name?

It all happened by chance. I was assigning ridiculous names to the members of one of my early bands, and one of the musicians asked me: "Okay, and what will your ridiculous name be?". I remember there was a dog bowl on the rehearsal room floor, so I said: "Dogbowl, my name will be Dogbowl!". For better or worse, it stuck. People remembered that name.

Between 1986 and 1988, with King Missile, you recorded two albums ("Fluting On The Hump" and "They") that mixed, with a surreal touch, indie-rock, anti-folk, psychedelia, garage-rock and more. Why did you leave the band at a certain point?

King Missile were becoming more and more popular, but I was spending a lot of time in France (my late wife was French), and staying with them would have meant losing the chance to spend more time in Europe. Plus, I was writing a lot. By focusing on my solo career, I could keep living in France with my wife. Anyway, all the guitar parts on those records are very simple, and I figured they'd find a replacement right away, which they did: Dave Rick became the new guitarist and they went on to achieve much greater fame! Luckily, I stayed friends with them, and over the years I've come back to play with them at a few occasional shows. John Hall and I recently got the original King Missile lineup back together and played in New York in September, so hopefully we'll have more chances to play together again.

King Missile (Dog Fly Religion)

With Kramer's support, in 1989 you recorded "Tit! (An Opera)". What do you remember about that experience and that record?

"Tit! (An Opera)" came out of some demos I was making at the time with a small 4-track cassette recorder. Kramer asked me if I wanted to make a solo record, so I gave him a copy of my demos and he liked them a lot. It was also a chance to work with some friends I'd played with occasionally, like cellist Charles Curtis, Lee Ming Tah on lap steel, and my brother Chris on clarinet. We recorded that record more or less like it was a home demo, except Kramer had some fantastic microphones. Besides recording it, Kramer played bass, guitar and percussion. It's funny that the title was added long after the record was recorded: there was no intention at all of making an "opera"... we just thought it would be funny to add it!

Then came "Cyclops Nuclear Submarine Captain". Why that particular title?

I've always loved cases where Greek mythology collides with pop culture, and I've always liked the figure of the Cyclops, as a kind of clumsy and terrifying character. I've always been a huge fan of both Jules Verne's Nautilus and the Beatles' "Yellow Submarine", and I liked the idea of exploring a similar theme on a record. But it's also fun to give a record a long, absurd title.

"Cyclops..." is a true masterpiece of kaleidoscopic psychedelic pop. Can you tell us how the idea for the record came about? What had changed in the meantime compared to "Tit! (An Opera)", aside from some of the musicians in your band?

For my first record, I put together a group of musicians and then we started working on new songs. I knew my second record had to have a grand, almost mythological scope, and I think the songs, in the order they're in, convey that idea. We brought in Race Age, a wonderful drummer - "Tit! (An Opera)" had no drums! Some drum machine, but no drums - while Lee Ming Tah moved from lap steel guitar to bass. Having a real drummer, the sound expanded substantially. I knew it had to be colorful, and with my brother Chris contributing (clarinet, sax, organ and vocals, ed.) and Michael Schumacher on guitar, I was sure these different sonic viewpoints would either merge or collide. I love the idea that the listener might think they're watching a film while listening to "Cyclops Nuclear Submarine Captain". It remains my favorite among all my albums.

Where was "Cyclops..." recorded, and how long did the recording sessions last?

About a month, if I remember correctly. We recorded it at Noise New York, which was Kramer's recording studio in Manhattan, before he moved his operation to New Jersey.

Do you remember any particular anecdotes tied to the recording of "Cyclops…"?

I was very happy with how "South American Eye" turned out.

We had a lot of fun making it. We'd already rehearsed all the songs, so we could have played them live. I remember Kramer telling me I should sing it like a crooner, like Rudy Vallée, which I did to the best of my ability!

The lineup that recorded "Cyclops Nuclear Submarine Captain"

How was "Cyclops…" received by critics? Do you remember any particular review?

I don't think it sold very well, but the people who bought it loved it! A lot of people told me it was their favorite among all my records. It was my late wife's favorite record! I remember the British press, magazines like NME and Melody Maker, wrote about it very favorably, on several occasions! So the press liked it. I also know that Piero Scaruffi likes it! I've re-read what he writes about my music and I'm flattered and honored by his analysis! I'd already read some of his stuff before, he always writes fantastic things!

What artists and/or albums inspired you while writing the songs that would end up on "Cyclops…"?

It's hard for me to remember what inspired me, but Ray Harryhausen's animation was definitely important! I remember I kept thinking about Ray Harryhausen while making this record!

Tell me more…

As a kid I was always fascinated by the hyperrealistic results of stop-motion animation, especially the cyclopes from the film "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad" (directed in 1958 by Nathan Juran, ed.). These particular cyclops figures seemed to me the most effective representation of the Freudian Id, meaning they acted completely without regard for society or human interaction. They were fiercely determined, since they had only one eye… they were savage creatures and yet they knew how to grab a person and cage them, only to cook them whenever they felt like it. They were terribly frightening and, at the same time, deeply intriguing. I also think it was the jerky movements of stop-action animation that gave a hyperrealistic quality to the scenes with these one-eyed beasts, and I think that's a fascinating quality of all of Ray Harryhausen's work: the animations themselves weren't perfect, and yet they were incredibly compelling to watch, as if, through the imperfect movement of stop-motion animation, they created an alternative visual reality, which interested me a great deal. I think that's one of the main reasons I titled the record "Cyclops Nuclear Submarine Captain"… because the nautical nature of a submarine and the steampunk qualities of a mad cyclops made for a really great combination.

The dominant theme of "Cyclops…" is essentially love. Is it possible to identify an overarching narrative thread running through the album?

I like the idea that the record "suggests" a story rather than "telling" it. And I think a group of songs that share a surreal bent and a common theme creates a sense of dreamlike movement. Many of the songs suggest the idea of flight ("South American Eye", "Float") or a sea voyage (the title track, "Swan", "Beautiful Trailer Park"), or, again, the inner movement of sadness ("Shopping Mall", "So Painful") and the movement associated with love and dreamlike settings ("Flower Garden Bed", "Hit Me Over My Head", "Ferris Wheel"), and I hoped the listener would fill in the blank spaces with their own stories, so as to feel involved in the making of the record.

After "Cyclops…", you released "Flan", which closes out your psychedelic trilogy…

I'm very fond of those three records and I believe they're connected in some way. Many of the same musicians appear on all three, which makes them a kind of "trilogy." I think of "Tit! (An Opera)" as a series of sketches that were later painted over to give coherence to songs that wouldn't normally sit well together. It's funny, but "Tit! (An Opera)" is actually more like two records. The Lp version has fewer songs than the cd version, while the latter contains songs I recorded at Noise in New York after finishing the Lp. Those extra songs are very stripped-down, but I think they added a lot to the overall sound of the record. The reference to "Opera" in the title was added after the record was recorded, because we thought it was funny and it seemed to work, since, thinking about the songs as a whole, I had the impression they hinted at some vague story. "Cyclops…" was more of a direct application of a suggested plot, simply leaving a few hints of sea voyages, cyclopes and flight. In that case, I think the listener is able to build their own surreal world, working off the clues scattered through the record. As for "Flan", finally, it was a reworking of my own 1992 novel of the same name, which was very blunt and deliberate in its narrative structure.

On that note, can you also tell us about your experience as a novelist? What themes interest you most, and which novelists have inspired you the most?

Since I love working across three media, I often like to think of them as a sort of three primary colors: painting, writing and music are, to me, three primary colors. I'm happiest when I manage to combine them and somehow build bridges between these different modes of expression. "Flan" exists because I had already written the novel of the same name, and it was accepted for publication before I recorded the record, so I thought it was the ideal opportunity to explore, and even break down, the barriers between writing and making music, keeping in mind the album's artwork, the visual representation and the different zones of expression. As for the theme of "Flan", it really is both a post-apocalyptic novel and a post-apocalyptic record. As a child, I was always very interested in the concept of "post-apocalypse", because I grew up in the paranoid worldview of the Cold War. My elementary school constantly held nuclear bomb drills, and that struck me deeply; as a young kid I came to believe there was no future, because the future would blow up before I ever reached adulthood, and I had a lot of nightmares about it. In fact, those fears of a destroyed world that I lived through as a child turned into many of the tools I use when making art. Thankfully, there was never a nuclear war.

Since "Flan" contains a lot of surreal and psychedelic elements, it's more than just a post-apocalyptic story: it's more focused on the nightmares induced by post-apocalyptic fear, so I suppose I was very frightened by the concept of the post-apocalypse, and at the same time fascinated by it. The concept of the post-apocalypse can take many forms. It doesn't necessarily have to mean the destruction of the world, but can refer to the destruction of one's own world. For instance, I'm a widower — I was with my French wife for 30 years, and honestly she was my main inspiration for a lot of the artistic things I've done. She died of brain cancer in 2017, and my life has had a certain post-apocalyptic atmosphere ever since. Even when my wife was extremely ill, I had trouble imagining what life would be like if she died. When she finally passed away, it was as if my entire world had collapsed, and even though I feel better now than in those first dark days as a widower, that post-apocalyptic feeling hasn't entirely gone away, because my wife no longer exists, and that's a situation that still troubles me. Still, the advantage of writing a novel is that you can go very deep into a subject in a way you can't with visual art or music. I think that when you write a novel, you live through something like a lucid dream, as if you were dreaming and creating an entire world all by yourself… You can do that because you're simply using words, and the descriptive power of words can create a visual sensation in the reader that can't be achieved through painting or music. Writing novels allows for that, especially once you stop paying attention to the rules about how novels are supposed to be built. All artists, whether visual artists, composers or writers, should invent their own rules when creating. As for my favorite novels, I tend to favor classics like Melville's "Moby Dick", Dostoevsky's "Crime and Punishment" or Cervantes's "Don Quixote". I also like the work of Charles Bukowski, Celine, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Amos Tutuola and, of course, Edgar Allan Poe.

Since you're an all-round artist, tell us something about your painting too. I know you graduated from Parsons School of Design in 1982.

Yes, I graduated from Parsons in 1982 and then earned a master's degree in painting at City College of New York in 1991. At Parsons I studied illustration, and at City College I studied painting, where I was drawn to the classic painters of the Italian and Dutch Renaissance. In particular, I became obsessed with many of the Renaissance painters' techniques, or their use of line, or the layering of glazes of color. For instance, what I love most about Botticelli is his use of line, the almost cartoon-like application of line when he renders his figures and facial features. I also obsessively studied Raphael's layering of color, because Raphael is my all-time favorite colorist. I'm also very inspired by Hans Memling's portraits, or the almost photorealistic results of Hans Holbein's portraits — it's funny that I say "photorealistic", but I think "hyperrealistic" is a more accurate description, and that brings me back to why I was drawn to the hyperrealistic results of Ray Harryhausen's stop-motion animation. I like things that are realistic and, at the same time, a bit out of place, a bit unrealistic, so that the eye keeps trying to figure out whether something is real or not. That's a zone I feel very comfortable in, and one that fascinates me.

After "Project Success" (1993), you collaborated with Kramer on a couple of records, "Hot Day In Waco" and "Gunsmoke". What's Kramer like? What's it like working with him?

The great thing about Kramer is that he did things right. He has excellent ears and hears a lot of things that many artists don't pick up on right away, which makes him a great producer. It's also impressive that while you're finishing a record, he's already thinking about the next one. I remember that while I was in the middle of finishing a record with him, Kramer would suddenly turn to me and say, "I hope you've already written the songs for the next one!". In that sense, it was fun working with him, and it was fun touring too — I did a lot of tours with him in the 90s, and I also played rhythm guitar with Bongwater on their first European tour, I believe in 1991. I think his production on "Cyclops…" is wonderful.

Your last three albums, "Fantastic Carburetor Man" (2001), "Songs For Narcisse" (2005) and "Zone Of Blue" (2015), came out on your own label, Eyeball Planet. What happened: was there no more interest in your music, or did you freely choose to work independently?

After the two duo records with Kramer ("Hot Day In Waco" and "Gunsmoke"), I recorded two albums with the French label Lithium Records in Paris, so for a while I worked and toured a lot in France. I got in touch with Lithium Records through my friendship with Michel Cloup of Diabologum and Peter Parker Experience; in fact, before making a full album with Lithium, Michel Cloup and I put out a double single on Lithium called "Nuage Nuage" under the names Dogbowl and Peter Parker. In France, I recorded, for Lithium, "Live On WFMU (Cigars, Guitars And Topless Bars)", which was the recording of a live concert at the WFMU radio station in New Jersey, with a trio made up of me on guitar, Lee Ming Tah on bass and Race Age on drums. I've always loved working with a guitar-bass-drums trio, and I'm glad "Live on WFMU" documents that sound. Afterwards, I recorded a studio album called "The Zeppelin Record", also for Lithium Records. For that project, I ended up working with some excellent French musicians at Studio de la Seine in Paris. After "The Zeppelin Record" came two records for my own small self-run label, Eyeball Planet: "Fantastic Carburetor Man" and "Songs For Narcisse". The latter grew out of a theatrical production of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's "Narcisse", directed by my wife Anne Deneys-Tunney. It was staged at Theater For The New City in 2006. I composed and recorded the music for the shows, as well as designing the set. As for those two releases, I don't know what kind of record label I could have convinced to take them on if I'd shopped the recordings around, but at that point I didn't have an actual record label, and I wanted to see what would happen if I put the records out myself. It turned out to be trickier when it came to producing the cds, so I started burning and packaging them myself. It was fun, but I think it's better to have a label's support. "Zone Of Blue" later came out on the Belgian label 62 TV. They had already put out the "Best Of Dogbowl" in 2000, so I knew them well and was friends with all the musicians. I recorded my parts in New York and sent the files to Belgium, where the Belgian musicians who play on that record contributed their tracks, recorded at the excellent Swimming House Studio in Brussels.

What are the ten most important albums in your life, and why?

It's almost impossible to answer, because more records will come to mind in a moment, but here goes, off the top of my head…

1. Sex Pistols – Never Mind The Bollocks, Here's The Sex Pistols (1977): because it made me aware of the possibility of making my own music, and because punk rock really spoke to me at the time.

2. Ramones – Rocket To Russia (1977): because that's where I learned the beauty of using just three chords when writing songs.

3. Beatles – White Album (1968): because it contains the song "Julia", which is my favorite song of all time.

4. Velvet Underground – White Light / White Heat (1968): for how free the production sounds and for its glorious mess.

5. Velvet Underground – 1969 Velvet Underground Live With Lou Reed (1974): because it contains the most beautiful version of "Sweet Jane" ever recorded,

– I believe they must have written it that very afternoon it was recorded live.

6. Buzzcocks – Singles Going Steady (1979): because it proves punk rock can produce great, great, great pop songs.

7. Kiss – Alive! (1975): because I still like playing air guitar when I'm home alone, and "Rock And Roll All Night" is, for me, the ultimate air guitar song.

8. Rolling Stones – Some Girls (1978): because when I listen to it, it's 1978 again and I'm 18 again.

9. Public Image Ltd – Metal Box: simply one of the most fantastic things ever: "Albatross", "Poptones" and "No Birds" are among my favorite songs.

10. Devo – Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo! (1978): this record is an absolute masterpiece and, in many ways, represents the true American answer to the Sex Pistols.

11. All the recordings of the great Robert Johnson. The true inventor of rock and roll!

What are you up to these days? Do you still have musical projects in mind, or are you focused on other things?

Honestly, I've got a lot going on these days! I just had an exhibition of my paintings in New York, and I have a project for 12 (or maybe even 20) new electric guitars painted in oil that I'd like to complete this year (or in 2025, if I procrastinate!). I'd also like to do more portraits and revive my portraiture career, which I've been neglecting! I'm also working on the two sequels to my latest novel, "One Hundred Percent Lunar Boy": there have been some setbacks due to certain contractual issues, but I keep pushing forward, hoping everything works out for the best. Musically, I'm working on two albums that I'm recording at home. The first will be called "Muse" and is a collection of songs about the death of Anne, my French wife, who also sang a track on "The Zeppelin Record", titled "Peggietta". The other record is called "Exile On Planet Brooklyn" and contains a lot of songs about isolation and sadness and... of course about love, because even widowers can fall in love again, and this new album has songs about that too. I'm not sure there's a label interested in releasing these two records. If not, I'll put them out myself. In the meantime, a label from Nashville is reissuing not only my early psychedelic albums but also the first two King Missile albums, the ones I played on as well. The label is called Needlejuice Records. They'll be reissuing "Cyclops Nuclear Submarine Captain", "Tit! (An Opera)" and "Flan", along with the King Missile records! Needlejuice Records has also made my previously out-of-print albums available again for digital download or streaming.

That really is great news, Stephen! In the meantime, I'll say goodbye and thank you for your time!

Thank you!

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