Servotron

With the cartoon like punk presence of gimmick flavoured bands on Lookout such as The Groovie Ghoulies and the Go Nuts, it made perfect sense that the label would also make its mark known into the release schedule of robotic collective ‘Servotron’. The band was an offshoot from the popular surf rock band ‘Man Or Astroman?’ – a collective of wildly imaginationed sci fi influenced musicians, playing- mainly - instrumental tracks laced with samples. The two members of Man Or Astroman who broke away to form the, likewise sci fi infected Servotron were Hayden Thais and Brian Teasley, both taking pseudonyms in both bands. As Hayden in Man Or Astroman was known as ‘Dexter X’, he became ‘00zX1’ in Servotron, while as ‘Birdstuff’ in the former, Teasely graduated to ‘Z4-OBX’ in the latter. Ashley Moody – later Ashley Reader following her marriage to Joel Reader of The Mr T Experience – took on the role of female robot Proto Unit V-3 on keyboards and vocals, and was at the time married to fellow android Brian Teasely. The concept of Servotron was that of a dictatorship of highly superior robots, enslaving mankind with the propaganda of spreading the word of all machine to rise up against humans. The outlandish costumes the band adopted also went hand in hand with the ideals they were spreading, with full android costumes worn for live performances as well as all photos of the band. The bands performance idenetities were also never broken, on or off stage, in any form, which lead to the the preaching of robot superiority even outside the realm of the bands front.

Hayden Thais (Servotron) : “Never dropping our guard was important to me. The whole Andy Kaufman idea of the joke with in the joke with in the joke, like "do these guys really think they are robots? -  why don't they crack a smile and let us know they are not mentally ill, because they are starting to make me feel uncomfortable. The live shows were 50% music and 50% banter. Issac Asimovs three laws to robotics was a big influence, mixed with "how would it sound if robots created music with instruments made in the 60's."”

The stance the band took, however often took a turn for the worse, when people didn’t ‘get’ the whole charade. With constant verbal tirades aimed at the ‘humans’, the band would often feel the heat from audiences.

Chris Appelgren : “Peechees played with Servotron at the Garage in London, and a guy at the show attacked Hayden because he was anti-robot. They were heckling the audience talking about robot superiority, and someone took offense and tackled Hayden – hilarious, but it stopped the show.”

Ashley Reader (Servotron) : “Hayden and the guy had words which is usually where it ended - with Hayden calling the guy an inferior human or something of the like. I don't remember exactly what was said this time, but the guy basically bum rushed the stage and punched Hayden in the face. This lead to them really fist fighting for a bit before knocking all of my keyboards over and tearing my wig off. Then my cover was blown! - it was pretty awful. I mean, obviously everyone knew we weren't really robots, but it was pretty humiliating and the show was stopped. We all walked off stage and sat in the backroom but then the audience starting chanting for us to go back out. We did eventually go back out, but it took some coaxing from my bandmates to get me back out on stage, one of my keyboards was pretty busted, but we managed to play one more song. I always tried to really be in character on stage and at that moment - the big reveal! -  I just didn't know how to handle it,  but I recovered!”

Hayden Thais (Servotron) : “The problems with violence at the shows was a common one - some people are unable to differenciate between fantasy and reality. Throw alcohol into the mix and the lines get blurred -  even though we had a circuit board we found in the trash glued to us and were telling folks we were superior to them - things would get ugly some times. Being a protagonist by nature probably didn't help much either.”

Being the only female band member was sometimes a strain on Ashley, with the inevitable drunken heckling aimed at Servotrons gimmick mixed with sexist verbalzations at the obviously attractive – even dressed in tinfoil – keyboardist. The band however were also quick to unleash on the usually game audience.

Ashley Reader (Servotron) : “Most of the time things went smoothly, but we were playing somewhere in Europe and the room was great - it was totally round, the whole venue. We were playing before a weekly dance party so the place was actually packed, but not necessarily for us. As we walked on stage, there was a guy that kept heckling me, he kept calling me "silver pussy". The first couple of times, we let it slide, but Hayden and Brian were not pleased, and it did get a little heated for a minute although it never actually transpired into a real scene. Most of the time people were really tolerant of our insults to them. One night at the Middle East up in Cambridge MA, Brian was insulting some guy for his poor vision - he had on glasses -  and he made him come up to the stage where he smacked the shit out of him with his drumstick. The guy took it and the crowd laughed - I was always amazed at the shit people would take from us. Since I was the girl robot, a good part of my bit was to insult guys on their penis size, that always a big hit with the members of the audience as well.”

Even though the band was well established - especially with the Man Or Astroman connection - it was a common feeling that the band washed over many, perplexing as they were, Servotron had a vast array of material in the marketplace by the time the discussion came around to work with Lookout. By 1998 – the year of the bands Lookout Records album ‘Entertainment Program For Humans (Second Variety)’ (LK 197) – they had already clocked in ten 7”’s, a 10” and a full length LP in three years along with numerous compilation appearances. Servotrons debut album ‘No Room For Humans’ had been released on ‘Amphetamine Reptile Records’, who had also been working on other EP and compilation projects with the band.

Hayden Thais (Servotron) : “Amphetamine Reptile was falling apart and we had Entertainment Program finished and needed a home for it. We loved Pansy Division, The Hi Fives and Chris and The Peechees were great too. Touch & Go Records were interested but I really wanted to keep a wall up between Man Or Astroman? and Servotron. I don't know if we ever got a solid fanbase going but I don't think we recruited any Am Rep fans, yet I feel your Lookout Records fan could be more open to the concept than say the Touch & Go fan.”

Ashley Reader (Servotron) : “I think our fanbase, in the beginning anyway, came largely from us riding on the coattails of Man or Astroman?. Granted our lyrics were all about killing people so if AmRep fans just read our lyric sheet they might have been into us, but seeing the live show, I don't think we were really dark enough. I mean those AmRep bands sounded pissed. I don't know if we would have been a good fit for Touch & Go either although I loved their roster. I do remember trying to get on Grand Royal Records but I don't know that that would have been a good fit either. Ultimately, we were stoked to be on Lookout. We had some really great times but there was a good bit of tension towards the end. Myself and Brian were married, and the end of that pretty much ended the band as well, although who knows how much longer we would have carried on.”

Hayden Thais (Servotron) : “We had definite plans for another record. I had a ton of songs written. The working title was "Okey Dokey Computer" and I think it would have been great! It was going to have alot of Ashley as the female robot voice on lead vocals. Unfortunatly we had alot of internal, very human problems at the time. I would have loved to continue with Lookout no problems at all at that end. The biggest shame was we quit before reaching our prime. The best musically was still yet to come. I was gradually taking serious steps, balancing a great pop record without compromising the robot theme, which wasn't easy to do.”