It's Tuesday night at Smokey Joe's, and 53-year-old Kenn Kweder is ready to rock.
"Hey, you motherfuckers!" he shouts to a mass of Penn students. Around 100 upperclassmen have flanked the graffitied wooden tables of the popular campus bar for drinks and the weekly musical attraction.
Kweder wears all black: black Levi's, black button-down shirt, black shoes, sometimes a crushed velvet jacket.
As the show begins, students are involved in their own conversations, but as the alcohol flows, Kweder's contagious energy, wild gesticulation and screeching voice drive sloppy twentysomethings shrugging off schoolwork to their feet. Even the students sitting in the pleather booths nod their heads in time to the music.
"What goes on at Smokey Joe's is one of my favorite things," Kweder says. "There's some sort of reciprocity that goes on, a visible energy exchange. And people screaming at you.
Known as the "Mayor of South Street" in the 1970s by fans and critics, the southwest Philly native now lives in the Fishtown neighborhood near Center City. He navigates through Reading Terminal on a brisk Friday afternoon, hailing old friends and highlighting favorite stands. Kweder is taking time from a day normally filled by answering phones, booking his own gigs and updating his website. Glancing at his rosy cheeks and cherubic smile, it's difficult to imagine that he is notorious for his foul-mouthed stage persona. After choosing a relatively quiet spot near the bar of the Reading Terminal eatery, Beer Garden, Kweder rolls up the sleeves of his black corduroy shirt and pushes his dark sunglasses back, revealing electric, aquamarine eyes eager to impress a captive audience with tales of hedonism and music.
Kweder has produced six albums over the past two decades, the most recent of which, 2002's Kwederology Volumes I and II, made number 56 on Philadelphia Weekly's list of the "100 Best Philly Albums of All Time." The guitarist, vocalist, producer, manager, bartender and madman has been playing in Philadelphia for over three decades and off and on at Smokes' for 20 years. During his career, he has opened for Blue Oyster Cult, Cheap Trick and Elvis Costello and even headlined with the Ramones. Rolling Stone Senior Editor David Fricke, a Philly native, once praised Kweder's music as "songs of love, wanderlust and fleeting sanity," but to his devout following of Penn students, Kweder is best known for his Tuesday night performances.
Growing up, Kweder wanted to escape his working-class neighborhood, which to him felt uninspired and empty. By the age of 16, he traded childish dreams of the NBA for music.
"As much energy as I put into basketball, I put into guitar. I had a completely irrational desire to become world famous," he says.
Influenced by Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones and his effervescent, musically-inclined mother, Kweder learned to play by watching a PBS series hosted by Laura Weber every Wednesday at 8 p.m. He bought his first guitar with coupons and set out to fulfill his destiny of world domination, or book a gig. While Kweder now plays over 200 shows a year, he didn't know back then how to break into the music industry. He littered Philadelphia with flyers and posters decorated with his name, the word "folk" and a photograph of Jack Ruby assassinating Lee Harvey Oswald. He sold tickets for spaces he'd rented out for $90 a night. He also played at churches and even Alcoholics Anonymous meetings -- ironic considering he himself was drinking heavily at the time.
As a 22-year-old Temple University senior in 1975, Kweder met Philadelphia-based booking agent Bill Ives. Ives initially hired him to drive performers to venues, but the next year, Kweder convinced Ives to book him with his band at the same venues. With only two credits left to graduate, Kweder dropped out of Temple to focus on music. He worked on his on-stage persona, accrued his extravagant wardrobe and nurtured the self-destructive habits that often characterized '70s rock.
"I was coming on to stage with a fucking sword and guns. I had this cane with a sword in it. I would wear satin pants, ballet shoes -- the Mick Jagger thing," he boasts with a grin.
The Center City music scene started to take notice of Kweder in the late '70s, and he soon garnered national attention. Record tycoon Clive Davis once called Kweder "one of the two most exciting first impression artists" he'd ever seen perform live. The other artist was David Bowie.
In 1978, Davis and Kweder entered negotiations for a potential contract with Arista records, and during a nearly six-week process, Davis proposed that Kweder dissolve his band and write more radio-friendly pop hooks. Kweder ultimately refused to sign onto Davis' Arista label, because he wanted to remain on the local circuit. "I can't water it down," recalls Kweder of his meetings with Davis, his fingers rubbing his temples. "I was as pure as possible."
Kweder nonetheless chose to party like a rock star. "Back in the day, I'm coming back from gigs. I'm out of my mind smashed [and I] get on a bus. I'm going up Lombard Street. For some reason, I'm seeing cars pass, and this would be a normal night. I'm like, 'They shouldn't be passing the bus! They should stop their cars and get on the bus!' So I pick the fucking cane up and I'm hanging out the back window. I'm like jabbing at the cars. I won't let them come by with my sword."
Kweder is engrossed in his story much like a hung-over college student recounting a previous night's debauchery.
"They're yelling. And I'm going, 'Get out of the car! Get on the bus!'" he says as he leans across the table, demonstrating how he lunged toward nearby cars. "I kept doing this for about 10 blocks. And all of a sudden, the bus stopped. The bus driver says, 'Alright, you get the fuck off the bus.' I was booted off the bus, but that was a typical night in those days during that rock and roll thing."
Many points in Kweder's career are marked by chronic drug abuse that spanned almost a decade. In the early '80s, Kweder admits to overdosing and attributes his survival solely to luck. "There was a heavy emphasis on coke, it wasn't considered a big deal. I did crack. No big deal... At one point, I said, 'You know what man, I don't like this; it's starting to fuck with my career.' I said, 'Fuck that. Either I'm going to become a crack addict and have a fucking bad ending, or I'm going to stop that.' So I just stopped it."
Drugs are a theme in Kweder's music as well. On any given Tuesday at Smokes', students belt out the lyrics to Kweder's song "Heroin" with the hypnotic chorus, "Heroin, heroin, heroin / It's the only way / It's the only way to get back to you." Incidentally, his trademark song wasn't written about his own use of the addictive opiate. Kweder remembers waking up one morning and stumbling into the kitchen where bold type newspaper headlines reported a recent heroin bust.
Along with the drugs came tough financial times. In the early '80s, Kweder was on welfare and says that he never married because of his unstable, and at times dire, financial situation.
"I always had to have a second job. I've bartended, been a taxi cab driver and parking lot attendant in order to stay alive," he explains.
Kweder says he owes his life and turnaround to Ben Vaughn -- best known for composing theme songs for 3rd Rock From the Sun and That '70s Show -- who told Kweder that he needed to get into the studio.
Today, Kweder professes to have cut back on drugs and has in turn become more of a boozer. He thanks a diet centered on breaking foods into "forward" or "reverse" categories for his surprisingly wrinkle-free face and full head of dark brown hair. Forward foods include raw garlic, wheat grass, nuts and basically anything that came out of the ground, while reverse are processed foods full of trans-fats. Partly based on common sense, his theory is reminiscent of the Caveman Diet.
"We've been living on the planet for millions of years," he reasons. "Your DNA and my DNA anticipate a peanut before potato chips."
Kweder is currently playing with his 22nd band, The Men From Wawa (not the convenience store; their name is an acronym for "We always want alcohol"). Ten years ago, Kweder decided to play other people's music during his performances, and since then, he has been able to cut back on his bartending shifts.
Kweder was even the mentor to country singer Tim McGraw. When McGraw was 16 and trying to break into the music industry, his father, famous New York Mets and Philadelphia Phillies pitcher and Kweder fan Tug McGraw, called Kweder asking if his son could get his feet wet performing with him.
"His fucking voice is unbelievable," Kweder says of McGraw.
Before long, McGraw moved to Nashville because he believed he couldn't make any money in the North. McGraw still calls Kweder up when he's in town to play. The first time McGraw was playing in Philadelphia, he invited Kweder backstage.
"I was dying of a hangover, but I made it out there," Kweder says with his hand over his heart. "I told him, 'It didn't work out for me, but it worked out for you.'"
He recalls McGraw screaming, "Kweder, you fucking asshole!" and the huge bear hug McGraw gave him backstage. McGraw identified Kweder to his wife, country singer Faith Hill, as "the guy who sings Heroin!" (a tour bus favorite) and started singing it at the top of his lungs. According to Kweder, Hill isn't a huge fan.
Nonetheless, Kweder has garnered a broad fanbase. His former Penn groupies continue to adore him, hiring him to play for private parties at the Union League ("a conservative bastion") and places in New York like the Canal Room.
Close friend Becky Scott, whose first Kweder show was in 1975, admires his dedication and honesty.
"He's an inspiration in my life. He doesn't get sidetracked by what people think he should do," she says.
Scott's relationship to Kweder has grown over the past 30 years from groupie and band member to virtual family member. Her 17-year-old son Tom, who plays music and is also a fan, even asked Kweder to be his godfather. He also sees Kweder at the Tin Angel, only missing shows when he can't sneak in.
College junior Mike Stewart also has a unique relationship with Kweder. Stewart played with him at St. Anthony's fraternity fall formal last year after the band's drummer had a conflicting gig downtown and the bassist for Kweder, a Kappa Alpha Society alumnus, suggested Stewart. KA has booked Kweder for their annual Fling Party for the past several years.
"We have familiarity with him. We can sing the songs with him," Stewart says. "We love participating with the band."
Stewart adds that Kweder even stays at KA after the gig's done to play music and hang out with the brothers.
Fricke might have put it best when he said, "For him music was a life, not a career... there's nothing wrong with being a legend in your hometown. He's genuinely unique."
Smokes' owner Paul Ryan, has known Kweder for 31 years and considers him a great friend and gifted songwriter.
"A person is a success if he gets up in the moning and goes to bed at night and enjoys what he does in between." Ryan says, offering a Dylan quote. "Kenny definitely enjoys what he does in between."
* * *
It's last call at Smokes', and it's no surprise that Kweder's grand finale is "Heroin." In honor of exam week, Kweder changes the chorus, alternating between "Ritalin" and "Adderall." The crowd of twentysomethings swarming around the stage hop and spin in pairs and groups, mouthing the well-known lyrics of his trademark ditty, perhaps fitting in Schoolhouse Rock!. "Heroin, heroin, heroin. It's the only way, it's the only way. It's the only way, the only way to get back to you. And you! And you, and you, and you"
