Hasil Adkins
"Haze's House Party" 4-song 7" EP
Norton Records 001, 1986

Winter must be coming cuz the motherfuckers in this building turned on the friggin' heat. So, some biddies get a chill in their bones and now I'm walking around in my drawers sweating on the leather furniture. Opening windows doesn't help, it only makes it worse.

It's no help that I'm listening to this horndog either. Haze Adkins writes about one thing in this EP and that is screwing girls, preferably in hot pants. Three original songs: "Dottie Dottie", "Sex Crazy Baby" and "Do the Hot Pants With Me" and one, uh, traditional tune "She'll be comin' round the Mountain" that Adkins takes for his own, if you know what I mean (hint he lives 'round the mountain).

If you don't know, Haze is one of those iconclastic types that dot the indie landscape (Danny Johnston, Legendary Stardust Cowboy, Tom Waits, Polly J. and, um, John Cale to name a few) -- in this case being the debut record for Kicks' fanzine's Norton Records (see also Flamin' Groovies, ? and the Mysterians, The Sonics). Adkins lives in Madison, West Va., so far out in the country that his landlord no longer bothers to come collect his rent. He eats meat, meat and meat and drinks lots of coffee. He's popular with the ladies -- even went to New York City to buy hot pants for one of his girls (they had no hot pants, so he thinks NYC is kinda behind the times). He plays all his instruments -- at the same time -- and taught himself this way because he thought that's how everyone did it. He can often be found playing in roadhouses in West Va. where they aint' interested in his originals but like it when he plays Hank Williams.

Some of the songs here are, well, just a guy playing three-chord blues guitar and thumping a drum, recorded very poorly. Others, such as the one sampled for y'all below, show the transcendent genuis of Mr. A. Listen to the lone dog whine, the not so subtle smashing of the "rules of blues" to capture his emotional state, doing the human beat box thing at times, a rambling fuck-it-all that can only come from a madman sitting alone in the woods... If this comes on in your random play, remember that you have to do The Hunch...

"Sex Crazy Baby" - Hasil Adkins (163 kbps VBR)

Program Notes:

• You may have thought everything was going to shit in Bush's America but, hey, Norton Records is still going strong and has this single still available at the very fine price of $3.50. If you don't have any Adkins in your life, you should.
• Two great interviews here from Haze HQ -- one with Billy and Miriam of Norton (the Andy Warhol soup can incident is hilarious and the hot pants story is here) and one with Haze himself.
• Read bout The Hunch here (plus semi-recent pictures).

OFFTOPIC:

This kicks off a week or two of just 7"s as I recently found a box full of 'em and spent the afternoon giving them a washing. Here's an article that throws cold water on people who think they might have gold in their vinyl. Bottom line: never open your records or listen to them and you might have something.