Caps for Slats (Image: CHS)

The Caps for Slats mural hangs today on the Comet ceiling

March marked the 15th anniversary of the death of Chris “Slats” Harvey—an inimitable, charismatic, punk-rock presence who could be spotted at Capitol Hill’s bars, live music venues, and rehearsal studios, often wearing his signature, all-black “uniform” of a New York Dolls t-shirt, leather jacket, skinny jeans, and a wide bolero hat. Slats was a living reminder of what Seattle and Capitol Hill used to be.

A co-founder and lead guitarist of the early 1980s Seattle punk band the Silly Killers, he achieved some level of local celebrity in later years just for being, well, Slats. CHS included Slats among those who should appear on a fictional “Capitol Hill Seattle $1 Bill.” WIRED magazine’s feature article about urban eccentrics included an interview with Slats. T-shirts with Slats’ image were sold at the Capitol Hill Block Party. When he died on March 13, 2010, just one day before his 47th birthday, The Stranger announced, “A part of Seattle won’t look the same without him.”

Last year, I took a deep dive into Slats’ life to learn more about who he was beyond the iconoclastic neighborhood character. I tracked down and interviewed the Silly Killers’ co-founder; now 70 years old and living a quiet life in Colorado, he shared with me a rare, unreleased, 40-year-old Silly Killers demo recorded in the basement of a house shared by members of a seminal Seattle punk band with a future Rock ‘N’ Roll Hall of Famer filling in on drums. I interviewed his Canadian half-siblings, who recalled Slats’ summertime visits to their family’s DIY farm in rural Canada as a youth. I also interviewed his former music peers and childhood friends, and gathered photographs, show posters, and other Silly Killers-related ephemera.

My article, which offers a trip back through Seattle’s early punk-rock history and presents a nuanced portrait of Slats, is online here.

To mark the occasion of his passing, here are a few insights I learned about Slats during my reporting:

1) “The Silly Killers were certainly a big part of my music history.” — When asked to recall some of the earliest and most influential shows he attended, Pearl Jam lead guitarist Mike McCready listed Van Halen and KISS at Seattle Center, Motörhead at the Paramount, and the Silly Killers at the Laurelhurst Fieldhouse (McCready, 15 years old at the time, recalled watching the show through a window with a friend while standing outside in the dark). During its short existence (1981-1983), the Silly Killers opened for Black Flag, D.O.A., Hüsker Dü, and Social Distortion.

The Silly Killers recorded a four-song, self-titled EP in 1982 that includes future Guns N’ Roses bassist and Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Duff McKagan on backing vocals (McKagan was 18 years old). “[The Silly Killers] were certainly a big part of my music history in the early 1980s,” Fastbacks guitarist Kurt Bloch told me. More than 40 years ago, Bloch’s No Threes Records label released the Silly Killers’ eponymous EP, fetching several hundred dollars from collectors today. “I understand why people are looking for that [EP],” Bloch explained. “It hasn’t been re-issued and it’s a cool part of Seattle music history. I wish I still had a box full of them.”

A small memorial formed under the Caps for Slats bottlecap mural on the Capitol Hill Station construction wall after Harvey passed away in 2010

2) “We were like invading aliens from another dimension.” — Slats showed a puerile, rebellious, and punk rock streak as early as middle school. Nick Scott met Chris Harvey in the third of fourth grade at the Bush School, when he was known as “Harv” among friends. “We were like invading aliens from another dimension,” Scott told me. “We were completely at odds with the rest of the class. The other kids were just, like, ‘Oh, man. Not that bunch.’ Harv was this weird, quippy, sarcastic guy who would mock the French teacher.” The pair hung out on the Ave, took music lessons at Village Music, and caroused on weekends, drinking cheap liquor looted from their parents’ stashes and spinning on the merry-go-round to ramp up the alcohol’s dizzying effects. One night, a group of drunken teens were out late and wandering the Montlake neighborhood when a homeowner called the cops. Squad cars arrived, red and blue lights scattering the teens. According to Scott, officers nabbed all of them except for Slats, who ran down an unfinished portion of the State Route 520 floating bridge and dived into Lake Washington. “It was insane,” Scott recalled. “He could have gotten hypothermia! He could have snapped his neck on the way down! It was like nothing could kill him.”

One of Slats’ high-school friends credits Scott with creating the nickname Slats. “Slats was calling Nick ‘Fats,’ and Nick turned it around and started calling him ‘Slats’ because he was tall and skinny,” this friend told me. “Somehow, that name stuck. That’s the story Slats told me when we were teenagers.”

“I have not thought about this in a million years, but I totally remember,” Nick marveled when I shared this story with him. “He was as skinny as a rail. He would say, ‘Whatever you say, Fats.’ I would say, ‘OK, Slats.’ It was a tit-for-tat thing.”

3) “People would trash the place, and I would lose my damage deposit.” — Silly Killers co-founder and bassist Gary Clukey signed the leases and paid the deposits to rent community centers and halls for the band to perform in. That also meant Clukey lost money or was banished when punk bands and their fans destroyed the rooms, events documented in the band’s song “Who Your Friends Are,” which Clukey wrote. “This [song] is about me renting halls, making posters, and putting on shows,” Clukey told me. “People would come, trash the place, and I would lose my damage deposit.”

Independence Day in 1982 marked one of the most raucous Silly Killers shows. Held at the Norway Center, the lineup included Vancouver’s Subhumans and Los Angeles hardcore bands Nig-Heist, Saccharine Trust, and Black Flag (with frontman Henry Rollins). The audience included future Mudhoney frontman Mark Arm, who reviewed the show for the music zine Attack and included this show as one of his favorites that year. That evening, two folding chairs hurled from the crowd nailed Black Flag’s Greg Ginn in the head, according to Arm’s reporting, and three “weenie punkers” set upon one of Arm’s friends during Saccharine Trust’s set, bashing him in the face.

4) “Slats just always sounded really loud and tough.” — Slats wasn’t the most technically skilled guitarist—he had a Gibson SG, a Fender amp, and a few years of Village Music guitar lessons to his credit—but he still managed to make an impression and develop his sound, which was heavily influenced by the UK Subs.

“The most noteworthy thing about Slats’ playing was that he always sounded good,” Bloch recalled. “Slats just always sounded really loud and tough, with a tight rhythm, not that sort of washy sound where a lot of punk guitar players just washed over everything. It all sounded cool. Slats rocked on guitar.”

Former POPDeFECT drummer and Slats’ Bush School classmate Nick Scott told me he would wait out the Silly Killers’ set to hear one song live—“Not That Time Again.” “Slats had moments of brilliance, and that song is one of them, for me,” he said. “Slats wasn’t some amazing virtuoso or anything. But that doesn’t mean he wasn’t good enough for the job. He made up for what he lacked in musicianship with oodles of charisma. People loved him.”

Slats isn’t entirely gone. If you visit Capitol Hill’s Comet Tavern, settle into the southeast corner booth and look up: the pattern of Slats’ sublime and smiling face looks down on you in the form of a ceiling-mounted, 64-square-foot mosaic mural comprised of roughly 7,000 multicolored bottle caps. Rock on, Slats!

Time has not been kind to the mural

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