Hold the phones. Stop the presses. Alert the appropriate personnel.

The Commander is out of weed.

“I’m scraping my pipe out as we speak!” cackles George Frayne a.k.a Commander Cody from his home in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. “You know, when you’ve smoked up all your stash and you have to scrape it out – ‘smoking the pipe,’ we call it.”

Weed or not, Frayne’s got a lot to feel high about. Even at 60 years old, the motor-mouthed master artist, conspiracy theorist and cult rock ’n’ roll icon can still party with the best of them. When he’s not out of his stash, that is. “Just keep this part of the interview a secret,” he confides. “Don’t let the world know the old Commander’s outta weed. My reputation will be shot!”

Frayne’s words are trying fruitlessly to keep pace with his thoughts, darting off on some graphic tour story or wacked-out conspiracy theory (“I think the government is out to get us and they’ll stop at nothing,” he says). But he always strangely manages to bring the conversation full circle. “Don’t forget,” he continues after a lengthy discourse in hospital horror stories, “I was a High Times centerfold. Twice. And not just my hands holding a bunch of stuff. No – me in my ‘Save the Whales’ T-shirt for every Fed in the world [to see]. Otherwise, I’d be growing it myself and I wouldn’t be out of the stuff!”

In the late ’60s/early ’70s, Frayne left his job as an art professor at Wisconsin State University to front the boogie-woogie rock and roll outfit Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen, landing a dedicated, ahem, grassroots following, a short string of novelty hits and one hell of a list of stories along the way. The original lineup, of course, disbanded in 1976, but Frayne has toured and recorded with a rotating cast of players known as the Commander Cody Band ever since, the most recent combination having performed together for the past seven years. Currently, Frayne’s backing band consists of rock and roll vets Mark Emerick on lead guitar, Rick Mullen on bass, Steve Barbuto on skins and Chris Olsen on pedal steel.

Fresh off the release of the All the Way Live From Turkey Trot combination CD/DVD (a mix of classic Commander Cody tunes and some new material recorded live), the Commander Cody Band is pulling in approximately 100 days of road duty a year, slightly down from the 300 Frayne muscled out in years past, but more than even some of the youngest rock and roll whippersnappers out there. In recent years, Frayne and company have shared stints with Dickey Betts, Charlie Daniels and the Marshall Tucker band and performed at virtually every large blues festival in North America.

Now, one might assume the Commander’s goals have shifted after 40 years of some of the most wild road tales in rock and roll history (see also: mescaline, see also: the Berkeley Riots). Not so. “I’ve always had the same goals, just to rock out, have fun and stay high,” he giggles. “Yeah, baby! I’ll probably fall over and collapse on stage some place. And that’s what it’s gonna take, you know? Other gigs may pay more, but there’s nothing quite as much fun as playing rock and roll music.”

For more info on the Commander, head over to www.commandercody.com.