Rocker crashed but didn't burn

Commander Cody and his band will play Sunday at Rock 'N Rods on Route 66 at the Interstate Center, Bloomington.

Thursday, July 19, 2007 11:25 AM CDT

BLOOMINGTON -- The irony of '70s rockabilly legend Commander Cody fronting a concert at a custom car festival can't be lost on anyone, least of all the Commander.

Over the course of his 63 years (a birthday celebrated today, in fact), the Commander estimates he has piloted himself through no less than 50 vehicular crashes.

So when the Commander takes to the stage of the third annual Rock 'N Rods on Route 66 festival stage at 4 p.m. Sunday, both he and we can thank someone's lucky stars that he made the trip from his home in New York intact.

Actually, he confesses, he's flying most of the way, with only the trek from the Central Illinois Regional Airport to the festival's Interstate Center site occurring on hard pavement.

With seatbelts buckled, we trust.

The Commander, whose real name is George Frayne and whose '70s band was The Lost Planet Airmen, laughs off all this vehicular catastrophe, despite some real tragedy at the root of it.

"It's been a life of violence," he says, as he begins counting off the dozens of mishaps, including "three '55 Fords that blew up" and the time "my little brother blew up a '59 Chevy station wagon on the way to Ann Arbor, Mich., in 1965" and the time "I flipped over and was launched into the Pacific Ocean" and "the other time I hit a moose on the Massachusetts Turnpike, and the officer looked at me like I was crazy when I told him that."

Of the latter episode, he admits "I was living in shame behind a dead moose until two years later someone found a mass grave on the turnpike where they'd dumped 14,000 deer and moose carcasses."

Avenged.

Through all these mishaps and worse, "I was never dead, just a little bashed up."

But then there was the authentically horrific head-on collision with a drunken driver that left everyone involved except himself dead.

It's a miracle, then, that Frayne has maintained a positive relationship with vehicular transportation, willingly playing the custom rod festival circuit and, for that matter, still driving.

These days, he says, "The Commander drives a minivan. I call it my Stealth Lincoln."

Frayne's lengthy dissertation on his benighted traffic record was a way of describing his current physical condition, which involves torments like torn rotator cuffs and, in general, "being older and in pain a lot."

Still, the Commander of the Lost Planet Airmen is in better shape than some of his old band-mates, who are either "dead, dying or really old."

The master of the boogie-woogie keyboard is still out there with his current four-man lineup, now known as The Commander Cody Band, though promoters still tend to cash in his '70s reputation by appending the "Lost Planet Airmen." ("I don't like it, but people do it because it sounds better and it looks better on the poster ...")

Frayne began his new era in earnest about 10 years ago when he vacated L.A., transplanted himself to New York and formed his new band.

The legend of Commander Cody began in 1967, when he and His Lost Planet Airmen forged a bar band in Ann Arbor.

That early incarnation, he says, was your basic "frat rock band." And they played easy-to-grasp frat rock covers like "Louie, Louie."

"As you probably know, it's not manly to practice, so we'd get a bottle of whiskey and get in our '49 Cadillac hearse with a surf board on top, and listen to songs on 45-rpm records on the way to the gigs. That was how we learned them."

Somewhere between whiskey gulps and "Louie, Louie" we started stealing licks from Buck Owens and other country-western singers because they were easy.

By 1971, Commander Cody & His Lost Planet Airmen had honed their sound -- a hip fusion of country, rock, western swing, boogie-woogie and blues -- to perfection, moved to San Francisco, landed a Paramount Records contract and produced their classic work, "Lost in the Ozone," source of the band's trademark anthem, "Hot Rod Lincoln," which reached the Billboard Top Ten ranking.

An equally successful live album followed, 1974's "Live from Deep in the Heart of Texas," along with several more efforts before Frayne disbanded the group in 1976, per a dispute with the band's management, centered on "greed and most of us being ripped off."

Though his solo career has never reached the heights of his Lost Planet Airmen glory of the '70s, Frayne thinks his keyboard playing has improved even as his body has deteriorated over the course of those 50 accidents.

He uses a cane to get around, and he marvels at the stamina of those who can still sit down at a piano and give a show.

"Marian McPartland, how the (expletive deleted) she does that at 89 years old, I don't know. She sits down at her Steinway and plays things hard. (Expletive deleted), I sat down to play the other day, and my arm nearly fell off!"

What Frayne can manage at top performance level is playing his keyboard standing up, with ne'er a walking stick in sight.

"I just throw the cane away, knock back a couple of tequilas ... and the Commander's ready to go!"

At a glance

What: Third Annual Rock 'N Rods on Route 66 Festival

When: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and Sunday

Where: Interstate Center grounds, 2301 W. Market St., Bloomington

Cost: Single-day, $13; two-day, $20

Ticket locations: Festival gate and all Bloomington-Normal Steak 'n Shake Restaurants

Information: (815) 458-2514 and www.rocknrodson66.com

Rock, rods & route

Following are the attractions for this year's third annual Rock 'N Rods on Route 66 Festival:

Rock

• The Blasters, 5 p.m. Saturday: Famed California roots rockers whose rockabilly sounds have been featured on the soundtracks of such movie hits as "Bull Durham."

• Commander Cody Band, 4 p.m. Sunday

• The Hellrods, 1 p.m. Saturday: An Illinois-based rockabilly-blues trio

• The Hillbilly Jones, 2 p.m. Sunday: Another Illinois-spawned rockabilly band

• Rosie Flores, 3 p.m. Saturday: Billed as "The Rockabilly Filly," Flores' honky-tonk guitar riffs have been heard everywhere from "Late Night with Conan O'Brien" to PBS' "Austin City Limits"

Rods

• The Astrosled: Dave "Spaceman" Shuten's futuristic Ed "Big Daddy" Roth tribute car, recently featured in the June issue of Rod & Custom magazine

• Johnny Cash's Psychobilly Caddy: Inspired by Cash's "One Piece at a Time" hit and built with pieces from six Cadillacs (1949-54 models)

• Gene Winfield's Maybelline: Legendary designer-builder Winfield will be at the show in person with his custom-designed Caddy

• Route 66 Cruise-In Car Show & Shine: Show of area car enthusiasts' vehicles, with $200 prizes in 10 classes and $500 best of show award

• Route Ratz Panel Jam: A gathering of the elite among pin-stripers and airbrush artists (Shane Syx, Bobbo, El Vego, Bob Bonds)

• Exhibit Hall: A tribute to car culture legend Von Dutch and a display from Mad Maxx Customs of their trucks inspired by the movie "The Terminator"

• Other stuff: More custom cars, vendors, concessions, artist exhibitions