Power Pop Legends 20/20 Go Back to California: The 2025 Interview

Power Pop Legends 20/20 Go Back to California: The 2025 Interview

20/20 are power pop legends for the late 70’s/early 80’s, best known for their iconic KROQ singles such as Yellow Pills and Nuclear Boy.  Based out of the legendary Hollywood music scene at the time of their inception, the band played all the mandatory Sunset Strip venues such as The Whisky and The Roxy, and would very nearly find themselves approaching the stratosphere of success.

Founding members Ron Flynt and Steve Allen would be the mainstays – friends since sixth grade – and bandmates for the entire duration.  Their major label debut 20/20 would be unveiled in 1979 followed their Look Out sophomore endeavor in 1981.  Their next album Sex Trap would have two incarnations – the 1982 version on Mainway Records and then the 1983 edition on Enigma.   The band would go silent in 1984, releasing solo albums and working at their various recording studios.  Oglio Records would rediscover 20/20 in the 90’s, re-releasing their first two albums on one disc – and then presenting brand new recordings – 4 Day Tornado in 1995 and Interstate in 1998.

Flash way forward to the year 2020, right before the great pandemic, when Steve and Ron would discuss making a comeback.  The state of the world and their own busy lives would bring delays.  But now in 2025, 20/20 presents Back To California – a brand-new album – now available via SpyderPop Records.  All this, and 20/20 will be playing a live show at the Zebulon on April 12th!  It was a honor to interview Steve and Ron of 20/20 via the magic of Zoom to discuss their power pop legacy as well as a return Back To California!  Read on…

What made you guys decide that 2025 was a great time to release another 20/20 album?
Ron Flynt: Actually, we started working towards making a record in 2020. We had some dates booked before the pandemic. Earlier that summer, we played a show with our buddy Dwight Twilley in California. Steve played me a couple of things that he had. Then I eventually came up with a little bit here and there. Before you know it, we had momentum towards making a record. Then we spent, I don’t know, I think you could say we spent a year, not every day, but off and on working on it. Then it took us a while to find a deal, find a label to put it out. So that’s how it wound up being 2025.

The cover shot is of the iconic Whisky A Go-Go on the Sunset Strip, a place I still go to a lot. What are your memories of the Whisky? Or I should say, when was the first time you guys played the Whisky?
Steve Allen: I think I remember that. Check me if I’m right, Ron, but we played on a Bomp Night. Bomp Records had a special night. I can’t remember if they put out our single already. They might have, but we got up and did like, I think three or four songs was all on somebody else’s equipment. We also had, God, I’m going to have a tough time remembering his name, Ian from England that had this hit. What was the name of that song, Ron?

Ron: Kind of a novelty thing.

Steve: Novelty hit, but it was so cool.  But we love the Whisky. We used to go see Tom Petty and Blondie and Elvis Costello when we moved there in 77. Then to actually be on that stage, it’s, it’s something very special.

Ron: I might be able to add just a wee bit to what Steve just said. My recollection is, is that we were a last-minute addition to the show with no guarantee of getting to play. So the night’s going by and as those kinds of things do, they’re running long. I don’t think we were going to get to play, but then Bun E. Carlos was talking to Greg Shaw. For some reason, maybe Mike Gallo knew him, but for some reason he really wanted us to play. So not only did we get to play, we got to play on the headliner’s gear. We were excited and we, we did pretty good. We lit it up. I think it was Hippy Hippy Shake, Going Up With My Girl. Beyond that, I don’t remember.

Steve: Maybe Drive. We had a song called Drive on Bomp.

Ron: There you go.

Steve: That song was You Turn Me On by Ian somebody. (Ian Whitcomb?)  That was part of the deal was we backed him up. So, we learned that song just in case. Anyway, it was a beautiful night.

Let’s go to 2025. Back to California is the name of the new album. Is there any overall story or concept behind that title and that song?
Ron: I wouldn’t say it’s an overarching concept for the whole record, but the record did start to take on a California West Coast vibe about it a little bit. It’s kind of jangly with lots of harmonies. The song Back to California came about when we were getting ready to go play those shows. It seemed like a fitting subject matter. It doesn’t have to be about a band going back to California. It could be about two people meeting again, trying to rekindle something that had happened in the past. Does that sound about right, Steve?

Steve: I think you mainly wrote that, so I’m going to go with your answer. I had to come up with a lot of solos and things.

Let’s talk about Laurel Canyon, which I think is a Steve song. Tell me about that one and the inspiration behind it.
Steve: I remember distinctly it was really hot. It was like COVID had hit. We weren’t playing. We were kind of like everybody. I remember walking in the hot sun where I live in Nashville, just going for a walk. A I just started to hear that lick. It did remind me of California. At first, I was thinking maybe the Bay Area. I didn’t really know. Then it just quickly morphed into Laurel Canyon. That was where we aspired to live. But the feeling from that place and the freedom of LA and all the great music that came from there just made it like that’s where the story of how the band got together. We were really more in Hollywood, but it all works the same way. I still can’t even believe Laurel Canyon exists. It’s just kind of an unreal place to me that we love.

What are you guys looking forward to the most about your upcoming show here in Los Angeles?
Ron: I think we’re going to get to see a whole bunch of old friends, maybe a bunch of fans from back in the day. I’m really looking forward to us playing live again. One reason that I am very much looking forward is that my son Ray Flynt plays drums, and he played all the drums on the new record, and he’s great. It’ll be a good thing for us to do together. Then, of course, to do it with Steve. I’ve have known Steve since the sixth grade, so we’ll all be together and hopefully just having a whole lot of fun.

Anything to add to that, Steve?
Steve: I think it’s going to be amazing. Like Ron says, so many friends from our past that we just haven’t seen in so long. Then like new fans and have a son on drums. We played LA once before at a place called Spaceland, I think, or Dreamland. So it’s going to be kind of like a dream-like situation. We’ve practiced and we know our set and we’re going to be tight and we’re going to play the songs, four songs from the new album and a lot of the other songs that everybody who knows our music will know. I just think it’s going to be a one-of-a-kind unique night.

I found a video of your performance on American Bandstand performing Remember the Lightning and Yellow Pills. What was that experience like performing on American Bandstand and hanging out with Dick Clark?
Ron: It was pretty doggone exciting; I’ll tell you that. Steve alluded to earlier, we lived in Hollywood, so we just drove over the hill to the Burbank studios. We parked our car, our beat-up cars, right next to Dick Clark’s Rolls-Royce. We go in and they treat you great. It’s a little bit like a factory show – they’ve done it a thousand times. You go through makeup and in our case, Dick Clark came in and talked to us a little bit during the makeup process. Then all of a sudden, the show’s going, he invites you out, you play, you do the interview. For me, my heart was beating so fast, I didn’t know if I was going to survive it. I was nervous and excited. Then a couple months later, we got to see it. We got to see the performance…

Steve: When we were driving to a gig in California, there was no video decks in those days, it was 1980. We had a gig, so we drove on the 5 Freeway, I think up towards Bakersfield, and we were like, okay, at 11:30 we better pull off and see this. We ended up not being able to know where to go. So, we ended up in a hospital. We knew they had TVs. We went into the waiting room. Ron flipped the channel on the TV, which was way up high, and he could reach it. There was his face singing Remember the Lightning. So that was pretty wonderful.

Sex Trap was an amazing album. What was the state of the band at the time during the making of Sex Trap?
Steve: Probably worn out. First off, a lot of people kind of know very few people like you say, “I really like that album.” So, thank you. That is a rare compliment that it’s kind of one of our least known albums – or the first two are really the well-known albums. What did you like about it? If I can ask you.

What did I like about it? I like that it was super dark. I remember going to the shows and you premiering some of the songs from Sex Trap for the first time. I just remember all these cool songs like Haunted People, Overload. I thought, whoa, you guys are going in a great direction.
Steve: Maybe it was. I think I had broken up or wanted to break up with someone at that time. There was a lot of turmoil and changes going on, but yet we were still happy to be playing and putting out our own record at that point.

Since I want to ask you different questions from every other interviewer in the world, I’m going to ask you about a few songs from Sex Trap. So, let’s talk about Howard. What was the inspiration behind Howard and who is Howard?
Ron: Howard was a combination of a couple of people. I had just read a pretty exhaustive interview/biography of Howard Hughes. Then, I had an Uncle Howard, my mother’s brother. So, I kind of put the two of them together. My uncle Howard was a Baptist minister and a rodeo rider. So, he had the devil in one hand and the Lord in the other. Then of course, Howard Hughes, he had all these contradictions in his life.  I’m pretty sure that’s where most of that came from, but Steve might know better.

Steve: I think you wrote that. Even if my name’s on it, you are the creator of Howard.

Steve, Overload. Did you have a case of Overload back when you wrote that song? Tell me about that song.
Steve: I think I was living in Eagle Rock at that point by myself in a little place. I just got the lick and I was like, “I like this“. The song is just kind of a go. It was a good moment for me to keep going. So, I just stayed with it for a long time. I really liked the climbing cord thing – that maybe The Police helped me come up with that, but we all borrow from each other. So, I thought maybe this is this is worthy of being recorded in on the album.  I’m glad you like it.

Ron: We had our buddy Steve Ripley, working with us. He was great engineer, studio guy, had a lot of ideas and had a big influence on that record, I think.

When the record was re-released, there was a brand-new song on it called Jack’s Got a Problem. Tell me about that song and the inspiration behind it. Who is Jack?
Steve: Jack was a combination of different people. We were seeing other sides of LA that didn’t necessarily affect us. But there was one friend in particular that I won’t mention, but he was kind of heading in a direction, let’s say, that we were like, unsure about. Is that vague enough? Suitably vague.

Ron: I think we could say something else about that song is that we had finished the record and had released it. Then we got an offer to re-release it on Enigma, the label that had Berlin and Mötley Crüe. They wanted us to add a song that was a little bit more a single.  They said, “I don’t hear a single, guys.” So, we came up with that tune. Then we also dressed up some of the other songs with some more modern sounds, hoping to make everybody happy with that. I don’t know really what I think about it. When I listen to the first album, the first version of Sex Trap, I really dig it. Then when I listen to the second, there are things about the second version that I dig too. So there you go.

Steve: Let me add this real fast. We did make a video. The video was only seen a couple times. We actually have the video. Ron kind of helped re-digitize it and clean it up. Have you ever seen that video?

Ken: I have never seen that video.
Steve: We made a real, and it got played on MTV a little bit.

Ron: It got played on Richard Blade.

Steve: It got played at Mark Goodman, MTV. I used to have a video of him at the end of it going “I’ve had some weird times just like that!”  We went a little surreal.  We will put that out eventually. If you say you’d like to see it, we probably will.

I would definitely like to see it. I would love to see it. Let’s go 30 years ago. Four Day Tornado is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year. When you look back on that album and the fact that it’s been 30 years, what do you think of it now in retrospect?
Steve: I haven’t heard it in a while, but we recorded it in Tulsa, Oklahoma with our really good friend, engineer drummer Bill Belknap, who had a studio there called Long Branch. Really great studio in Tulsa, and Ron would come from, I think you were in Dallas or maybe Austin. Then I would come from Nashville and we didn’t have a lot of time. So we made it, we worked on the songs quite a bit and then we went in and recorded it in like three or four days. We called it Four Day Tornado.

Ron: I think that’s right. It seemed like everything happened fairly quickly, especially when Oglio Records put out our first two records together on one CD. That kind of got that label and Carl Capriohlio, who’s a great guy, got them interested in us doing a new record. I think that was the thing that got us moving in that direction.

Tell me about the current solo endeavors you guys are doing outside of 20/20. What are you both working on?
Ron: I own a recording studio. It’s a commercial studio and I’m doing; the studio is very busy. I do a lot of recording of acts here in the Austin area. We’re working on a record for a fellow from Memphis. Next month we start on a record from an act from the Netherlands.  I do that as a day job. Then I’m hoping that Steve and I have some starts on some songs that maybe we could push on down the road some.

Steve: I put out two solo records. I think Ron might have put out three. I think from any original songs I have now, if they can remotely fit into 20/20, that’s where I’ll put them. I would like to do some more recordings. Who knows? I mean, we didn’t know we’d do this one. So, let’s do another one, Ron!

Ron: Let’s get to it!

You kind of killed my next question, but I’m going to ask anyway. The last song on Back to California is called Farewell. Would this be a final farewell to 20/20? Or would you like to continue on with the band? Will we have to wait another 30 years for the next album?
Steve: We’re of a certain age, as they say, that we’ve lost a lot of really good friends. I think most people do as soon as they hit a certain age. Not only just family members, but just like friends. You’re like, “Wow.” So it had more to do with that element of farewell. But it did seem like a good farewell. The album’s over. It seemed to fit there. But no, that doesn’t mean we wouldn’t like to release some more music. As soon as we start playing, we’ll probably get more inspired, which is, as you know, coming up.

Ron: We have a show in Los Angeles on the 12th at Zebulon.

That’s pretty exciting. I haven’t seen you guys, I think, since the 80s, since the Sex Trap era. So, this is going to be great.
Ron: I can’t wait to meet you.

I met you guys several times when I was a teenager. I think I even had you all sign the Lookout album. I still have that here somewhere.
Steve: Man, that’s so sweet.

Do you still keep in touch with any of the older members, Chris Silagyi, Mike Gallo, Joel Turrisi, or Dean Korth?
Ron: I saw Chris a few years ago here during South By. I haven’t seen Joel since I moved back to Broken Arrow. Mike Gallo, no, I haven’t had any contact with him at all. I think Steve has had some contact with Dean.

Steve: Dean became a winemaker in Northern California for a winery, and he was the main winemaker guy. I did talk to him recently. I think Mike is in Buffalo and Chris is somewhere in California, and Joel, I don’t know, really.

Ron: I think Joel is still in Los Angeles. I see Facebook things from him periodically.

Do you guys have any messages for your fans who will be attending your show here in the Los Angeles area?
Steve: Man, thanks for coming out. We’re going to put on the best 20/20 show we can. I think we’re all going to relive some of those – I know we will – some of those early shows that you got to see. I think we’re doing the same material with some new stuff, but I think it’s going to have that same excitement, I hope, a magic to it.

Ron: The only thing I would add is to tell everybody who’s bought the record, and it’s sold quite well, and we’re very excited about that – but to say thank you for buying the record. I hope everyone is digging it. It’s got a really good response, it seems. We’ll play a song or two from it and then play a bunch of stuff from the first three records.

(Interview and 2o/20 photos from 1981 by Ken Morton)

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