Thomas O'Keefe (born January 22, 1964) is a
North Carolina musician and author, best known for his work with
Antiseen,
Whiskeytown and
Train.
Early years
O'Keefe was born in
New Haven, Connecticut, and lived in Connecticut until the age of 14. His family moved to
Mooresville, NC (Metro Charlotte) in 1978.
Thomas O'Keefe attended
South Iredell High School
South Iredell High School is a public school located near Troutman, North Carolina and is part of the Iredell-Statesville school system. South Iredell High is designated an Expected Growth School of Distinction by the North Carolina ABCs Accountab ...
,
finishing in 1982.
After discovering
punk rock, O'Keefe joined and started a number of bands.
Judas Bullethead and Antiseen
O'Keefe and Jeff Clayton started
Jeff Leopard in 1983 and released ''Jeff Leopard Live at the Yellow Rose'' in 1984. Jeff Leopard's first show was in
Boone, North Carolina
Boone is a town in and the county seat of Watauga County, North Carolina, United States. Located in the Blue Ridge Mountains of western North Carolina, Boone is the home of Appalachian State University and the headquarters for the disaster and ...
, on October 1, 1983.
Other North Carolina bands on that bill were N.R.G,
Antiseen and
Fetchin Bones.
O'Keefe tried out for the lead guitar player of Antiseen in 1984, but it never came to be. "I was too broke to afford an amp", O'Keefe stated in a mid-1990s Antiseen interview.
Judas Bullethead
Judas Iscariot (; grc-x-biblical, Ἰούδας Ἰσκαριώτης; syc, ܝܗܘܕܐ ܣܟܪܝܘܛܐ; died AD) was a disciple and one of the original Twelve Apostles of Jesus Christ. According to all four canonical gospels, Judas betraye ...
was the spinoff of Jeff Leopard. O'Keefe recorded it as
Judas Leopard, his Jeff Leopard stage name. Clayton recorded as "Bullethead" an old nickname given to him by Joe Young.
"If they Itch, Scratch Em" was released in 1987 and reviewed in ''Spin'' in 1987. All instruments were played by Clayton and O'Keefe, even though neither was a drummer. The follow-up "Honest, It's just a Cold Sore", was released in 1988. "Honest" was recorded with a lot of studio musicians, including members of the band
Black Acid Disco
Black is a color which results from the absence or complete Absorption (electromagnetic radiation), absorption of visible spectrum, visible light. It is an achromatic color, without hue, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or fi ...
. After Judas Bullethead played a few shows, the band released "The King is Dead / Oh Baby" in 1989 and went on hiatus. A long talked about "Greatest Hits" CD is still a possibility.
O'Keefe officially joined Antiseen in 1988 and recorded the ''
Blood of Freaks'' EP. Antiseen recorded over 20 records during the early 1990s. The band toured Europe three times and played concerts all over the US, including a cancelled show in Los Angeles on the day of the
LA Riots
The 1992 Los Angeles riots, sometimes called the 1992 Los Angeles uprising and the Los Angeles Race Riots, were a series of riots and civil disturbances that occurred in Los Angeles County, California, Los Angeles County, California, in April ...
.
After a very short stint as the band's manager, he stopped playing in Antiseen in the fall of 1995.
Tour manager
O'Keefe first worked as a tour manager with
Lustre
Lustre or Luster may refer to:
Places
* Luster, Norway, a municipality in Vestlandet, Norway
** Luster (village), a village in the municipality of Luster
* Lustre, Montana, an unincorporated community in the United States
Entertainment
* '' ...
in 1996. (
Antiseen drummer
Greg Clayton Greg is a masculine given name, and often a shortened form of the given name Gregory (given name), Gregory. Greg (more commonly spelled "Gregg (surname), Gregg") is also a surname.
People with the name
*Greg Abbott (disambiguation), multiple peopl ...
was the drummer of Lustre.) After Lustre was dropped by
A&M Records, O'Keefe worked with
D Generation,
, Stir,
Mandy Moore and
Tonic.
O'Keefe started tour-managing
Train as their debut CD ''Train'' was just hitting. Since 1999, Train has played hundred of concerts in the US, Canada, South America, Europe and Australia.
He also toured with Rockstar Supernova in 2007 with
Johnny Colt,
Lucas Rossi,
Gilby Clarke
Gilbert J. "Gilby" Clarke (born August 17, 1962) is an American musician, singer, songwriter and record producer. He had a 3-year tenure as the rhythm guitarist of Guns N' Roses, replacing Izzy Stradlin in 1991 during the Use Your Illusion Tour ...
and
Tommy Lee.
Train finished its 2.5-year-long tour for the ''
Save Me, San Francisco'' CD in December 2011. On that tour, Train performed 350 concerts in 30 countries, ending with a show in
Guangzhou, China on December 10, 2011.
After 13 years, O'Keefe quit working with Train in September 2012 and moved to
Nashville, Tennessee, where he worked at
Crush Management
Crush Music is a New York City and Los Angeles-based musician management company that manages Sia, Green Day, Panic! at the Disco, Lorde, Train (band), Train, Weezer, and Fall Out Boy amongst others. The company was founded by Jonathan Daniel, fo ...
Nashville Office. He worked with
Ashley Monroe and
Striking Matches
Striking Matches is an American duo consisting of guitarists/songwriters Sarah Zimmermann and Justin Davis.
History
Meeting in a guitar seminar class at Nashville's Belmont University in 2007, Zimmermann and Davis combined their talents and began ...
. In 2014, as the Crush Nashville office closed, O'Keefe went back to tour managing, working with
Sia,
Dashboard Confessional and
Third Eye Blind.
O'Keefe is currently the tour manager for
Weezer.
Other projects
O'Keefe played with ANTISEEN for their 20th, 25th and 30th anniversary shows in Charlotte. They recorded a live album called ''LIVE POSSUM'' in 2013 with the classic Antiseen lineup of Clayton, Young, O'Keefe, and Clayton.
O'Keefe and Jeff Clayton reunited Judas Bullethead for the first time in 25 years and performed at the Antiseen 30th anniversary show in October 2013. They played two shows in North Carolina in 2019 and are planning re-releasing the three EPs that are long out of print in 2020.
O'Keefe was an adjunct Professor at Segue 61, a local music college in Nashville which is affiliated with
Catawba College in Salisbury, North Carolina.
O'Keefe's first book, "Waiting to Derail, Ryan Adams and Whiskeytown - Alt Country's Brillant Wreck"" was released by Skyhorse Publishing on June 26, 2018.
Personal life
O'Keefe married his longtime girlfriend Stephanie Marriott on October 2, 1999, in
Blowing Rock, North Carolina, and they live in
Green Hills in Nashville, Tennessee. Their daughter, Sophia, was born in Raleigh in October 2007.
Discography with Antiseen
LPs
* ''HONOUR AMONG THIEVES''
* ''RAW SHIT''
* ''NOISE FOR THE SAKE OF NOISE''
* ''DESTRUCTO BLITZKRIEG''
* ''GG ALLIN & ANTiSEEN: MURDER JUNKIES''
* ''SOUTHERN HOSTILITY''
* ''EAT MORE POSSUM''
* TPOS release
10-inch records
* ''Hell''
CDs
* ''GG ALLIN & ANTiSEEN:MURDER JUNKIES''
* ''SOUTHERN HOSTILITY''
* ''NOISE FOR THE SAKE OF NOISE'' (ALSO RELEASED IN EUROPE ON ZUMA LABEL)
* ''THE DESTRUCTO YEARS''
* ''GG ALLIN & ANTiSEEN:MURDER JUNKIES''
* ''EAT MORE POSSUM''
ZUMA/SAFEHOUSE
* ''HELL''
* ''SOUTHERN HOSTILITY/EAT MORE POSSUM''
Cassettes
* LIVE AT THE PARK ELEVATOR
* GG ALLIN AND ANTISEEN
* THE DESTRUCTO YEARS
* SOUTHERN HOSTILITY
* EAT MORE POSSUM
8-track tapes
* ''ANTiSEEN CONQUERS THE NORTH'' (INCLUDES WXCI RADIO BROADCAST 7" AS WELL AS 6 EXTRA TRACKS)
7-inch singles and EPs
* ''BLOOD OF FREAKS''
* ''WXCI RADIO BROADCAST''
* ''TWO HEADED DOG/CAUSE I LOVE YOU''
* ''KILL THE BUSINESS'' (SPLIT w/RANCID VAT)
* ''WALKING DEAD/HAUNTED HOUSE''
* ''MY GOD CAN BEAT UP YOUR GOD''
* ''PSYCHO KILLER/HEAVY MUD''
* ''TODAY YOUR LOVE/THE WITCH''
* ''IT LOOKS GOOD FOR THEM TO CARE/FUCK ALL Y'ALL''
* ''DATE RAPE'' (SPLIT w/RANCID VAT)
* ''FORNICATION/I CAN'T CONTROL MYSELF''
* ''THE EVIL ONES''
* ''GG ALLIN & ANTiSEEN''
* ''BARBECUED BRAINS'' (BOOTLEG)
* ''THE VAULT OF ANTiSEEN''
* ''WE GOT THIS FAR (WITHOUT YOU)/(WE WILL NOT) REMEMBER YOU'' (SUB POP)
* ''RAID OVER EUROPE'' /TEAR IT UP
* ''LIVE IN THE FATHERLAND''
* ''I'VE AGED TWENTY YEARS IN FIVE''
* ''MASTERS OF THE SKY/1969''
* '' DEEDS OF THE DAMNED'' (SPLIT w/RANCID VAT)
* ''CACTUS JACK'' (SPLIT w/SEDUCER)
* '' 1+2'' (JAPANESE 7")
* ''BLOOD OF FREAKS'' (reissue)
References
External links
Thomas O'Keefe Facebook
{{DEFAULTSORT:Okeefe, Thomas
Musicians from Raleigh, North Carolina
American punk rock bass guitarists
American male bass guitarists
1964 births
Living people
Guitarists from North Carolina
20th-century American bass guitarists
People from Green Hills, Tennessee
Musicians from Nashville, Tennessee
20th-century American male musicians