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Dead Schembechlers: Where Are They Now?

By Chip Midnight

Going into Michigan week last year, things couldn't have been better for the Dead Schembechlers, the notorious garage-punk band with a hatred for all things from the state up north. After years of staging Hate Michigan rallies around the campus area, the Dead Schembechlers followed the Buckeyes’ lead and took things to the big time by scheduling a headlining gig at the Newport Music Hall the night before the big game.

Lead singer Bo Biafra worked the press in the weeks leading up to the gig, appearing as a regular guest on CD101's morning show and helping land the band some positive press not only locally (including a UWeekly cover story) but nationally as well.

And then the bubble burst.

With a sold-out show scheduled to go off later that night, news broke that the band's namesake, former Michigan coach Bo Schembechler, had passed away earlier in the day, leading to an impromptu press conference by the Dead Schembechlers, where they announced that the 2006 Hate Michigan show would be the last under their current name. All the bands involved that night (Dead Schembechlers, Watershed, and B.A. Baracus) agreed to donate the profits from the show, over $6,000, to the Heart of a Champion fund as designated by Schembechler's family.

We all know how the Michigan game, and the rest of the season, played out, but what has become of media darlings, the Dead Schembechlers?

In the weeks between the 2006 Michigan game and the BCS title game, the band revealed that they would go forward under the name The Bastard Sons of Woody. But after the Buckeyes’ embarrassing loss to the Florida Gators, Biafra snapped and was sent away to the Athens Lunatic Asylum, thus leaving the band's future in doubt.

To further complicate matters, bassist Bo Vicious moved to Seattle to open a German breakfast food restaurant (Luftwaffle) and drummer Bo Scabies reportedly returned to his Christian Wolverine hatecore band, Cross of Woody. Only guitarist Bo Thunders has remained true to the band and says on the band's website, "I would have to say that we have no future and that for the first time since our formation, there will be no show for this year."

While the future of the band may be in doubt, the former Dead Schembechlers continue to spread the word about the International Wolverine Conspiracy as they are prominently featured in "Saturday Rules: A Season with Trojans and Domers (and Gators and Buckeyes and Wolverines)," the new book by Sports Illustrated writer Austin Murphy and in the HBO documentary, "Michigan Vs Ohio State: The Rivalry." Filmed around the time of the Hate Michigan rally last year, Biafra and Scabies both get face time on the documentary, which is in heavy rotation on the HBO schedule through the end of the year.

"We're bigger now than ever in history," Scabies says on the band's website. "Figures that we would finally blow up as the wheels fall off."

Don't count The Bastard Sons of Woody out just yet. While time is running precariously thin, a potential surprise show this weekend in Ann Arbor isn't completely out of the question, according to Biafra, who may or may not still be holed up in the Athens Lunatic Asylum.

In an e-mail correspondence earlier this week with Biafra, through the band's MySpace page, the singer said, "As for this coming weekend, if people outside Michigan stadium see a flat bed truck wreathed in tear gas smoke and rioting Michigan fans with rude songs coming from it, they will know the band is there."

It's anybody's guess whether or not The Bastard Sons of Woody will actually be daring enough to pull off a Hate Michigan gig while in Michigan this weekend, but given the band's propensity for spreading the Buckeye gospel across the land, it wouldn't be surprising to watch the band refuel and come back in 2008 bigger, better, and angrier than ever.

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Catch "Michigan vs Ohio State: The Rivalry," featuring an appearance by the Dead Schembechlers, on HBO on Thursday night at 7 p.m., Friday at 6 p.m., or Saturday at 10 a.m.

Originally Published: November 14, 2007

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