COLIN MELOY @ the IOTA, Arlington VA

SRO in this small bar to see this indie superstar. I ran into local Bob, guitarist from DT and The Shakes, a defunct DC-based garage band that opened for just about everyone back in the day. IOTA is literally a half-bar / half-restaurant living in the spaces vacated years ago by Billy "Bardo R.I.P." Stewart and his Roratonga Rodeo. You go to dinner on the right side and then pay an admission fee to go over to the other side. The nice thing about this deal is that its first come, first serve. No having to buy scalped tix on Craigs List - downside is you have to arrive early for big acts. There are two bars - the middle bar serving both the restaurant and the gig area. Ambiance is sort of grungey neighborhood bar. Bob described it as his other living room. Upcoming shows include Kings of Convenience, Earlimart and Tommy Stinson.

There was no opening act so a little after 930, the performer ambled onto the stage and opened his set. Having suffered through enough open mike nights, I can attest that Colin Meloy IS a fine acoustic guitarist - switching off between a 12 and 6-string throughout. He is an engaging performer with his faux-shy persona and his sharing of Decemberist trivia (he likes how his keyboardist sometimes says "whooo" quietly to herself between songs and tunes his guitar while standing on his tiptoes) and other stories. Although I couldn't help but contrast him with Sufjan Stevens whom I saw a few months ago. Where Sufjan's songs and stories are deeply rooted in his past and his home, Colin doesn't seem to have existed until he picked up a guitar. All his songs and stories date back only a few years or are imaginary reincarnations of past lives.

He started out with some of his band's songs (including the story behind "Apology Song") which loosened up the somewhat sedate shoulder-to-shoulder crowd a bit, then a few of his Morrissey songs followed by a couple "Side D" songs from his bands' new album (out in March, east coast tour in May) and one or two that WILL be on the album ("Dec 2" & "Bachelor and Bride"). He explained "Side D" as songs that will appear on an expanded follow-up to Picaresque from the Jealous Butcher label. If I understood him correctly, this will be a two CD or two LP release. He then came back for an encore with some of the more well-known Decemberists songs.

Several times during the show, I kinda got a Don MacLean vibe from Colin even, perhaps especially, when singing the Morrissey songs. His voice is very similar when framed with just an acoustic guitar. Close your eyes during "I Know Very Well How I Got My Name" and you swear the next song is going to start "Starry, starry night..."

Not immediately smitten with the Morrissey CD that he's selling exclusively through this tour but I picked up a few copies. Not sure if that's because I don't care much for Morrissey or what. Still, "Sister I'm a Poet" is already growing on me as is "I've Changed My Plea To Guilty" so I'm willing to give it a few more chances. Update: I'm also grooving on "Pregnant for the Last Time"... Plead your case and I may part with one of the EPs.

Four more shows on this tour including a Tsunami benefit in Portland with the Dandy Warhols - he was a little concerned about getting up to NYC today what with the SNOW but I suppose if they get an early start, there shouldn't be a problem.

What do you think?

"Sister I'm a Poet" - Colin Meloy sings Morrissey

This weeks guest disclaimer from Bob Mould: MP3 files are posted for evaluation purposes only. Through this site, I'm trying to share and promote good music with others, who will also hopefully continue to support these artists. Everyone is encouraged to purchase music and concert tickets for the artists you feel merit your hard earned dollars. If you hold copyright to one of these songs and would like the file removed, please let me know. Availability is limited.

... in the case this is read by him, my apologies also to the performer for taking the flash picture .... I know that this is a horrible breach of gig etiquette and for practical purposes has to be banned... I tried to set it to low light without the flash but misread the settings. In my defense, I didn't do it during a song but during the between song patter. Anyway, the bar's gig referee called me on it. This has been a week of fouls for me so why shouldn't it extend to Friday night?

And as if on cue, the snow has just started at 9:01 in downtown DC.

UPDATE: My extra CDs are gone. Colin on Flickr. Next stop for him: Teen Beat.

PS: Matt from 5500.org points out in previous thread that Brooklyn Vegan has posted the entire SF show

Colin Meloy show tonight

Well, I'm off to the Colin Meloy showm the hipster equivalent of going to church or Sabbath or whatever -- three hours early because I'm afeart that with Iota's first come first server policy and the popularity of what is essentially a guy with an acoustic guitar doing Morrissey covers that I might not get in. So, I'm not so much a big Decemberist fan but more interested in supporting someone traveling the country with slightly illegal vinyl (an EP of Morrissey covers) for sale.

I've put together a list of links from blogs that recently reviewed him at my clip shack, which I set up a few days ago to handle all my non-MP3 posts. Here's the main URL...

There's not alot of legal stuff online of The Decemberists, although the Kill Rock Stars label has two songs up that everyone in the world has alread linked to. In terms of Meloy, the dormant Phonophila (which was an excellent idea to capture sound and publish it) has a 2002 Portland show by Meloy here.

My favorite cut there is his acoustic version of "Sunshine", the 3rd most downloaded song at iTunes and while I like the song, I'm still not totally convinced this show is going to be that wild but hey others disagree. But they say we'll be snowed in tomorrow and I'm supposed to meet a gig buddy there anyway... cheers!

Post Show Update:

Pretty much what he said...

Inauguration week in DC has me about ready to go find a corner and start cringing. IT's not just the myriad of street and Metro closings, wacko pro and anti protesters, assorted nuts that shut down everything with phony bomb threats, pointy-haired project sponsors who insist on meeting - across town - at 11 AM today and of course the ill-timed snow and ice yesterday afternoon. There's just so much (mostly bad) music that if you throw a rock you'll probably hit some blue-jeaned country-"rock" singer or a dread-locked punky protest band member.

The Post summarizes. Can you imagine the look on Peter Wolf's face when he sees DC's worst bar band opening for J. Geils? And can someone PLEASE get 3 Doors Down out of our town - now!? It's like there's this vacuum cleaner just sucking all life out everything so long as they're within a 10-mile radius. Here's our Vinyl Mine guest commentator, George W. on the anti-Doors: "How about 3 Doors Down? Pretty cool guys, right? Seem cool to me." Well, not cool enough for your daughters who avoided getting on stage with any of the lame-o bands that showed up (methinks they are a bit miffed that their pal, Kid Rock got disinvited).

As we wait breathlessly to find out what Dick Cheney thinks about Jojo, what struck me, what with all the anti-skank-ness against Kid Rock, were how Mr. Greengenes got through the prudery filter.

In the later hours, the Next Generation of Republican Leaders sponsored a "Late Night in the Green Room" at the Wyndham Washington Hotel. Musical guests included this aptly-named group for this party( again, for the record, that's Mr. Greengenes, get it hahah?).

Here's a sample lyric from one of their songs, "Shotglass" where the timeless question that vexed our previous President is asked once again:

Put the quarter in the cup -- C'mon and hurry up

Things are moving 'long y'all and I can't miss

(Off with the bra!) You better do what he says Miss

Damn! I thought your shirt was too tight

Hey, are those things real? Let's hope the rest ain't cellulite

For real! And let's step to the wall.

Man, those Next Generation of Republican Leaders (think Republicans as Mayflies) listen to some pretty edgey stuff! If you're brave, you can listen to the song here (WMA) or just go to their website and feel, y'know, dirty and skanky and all. Anyone got Don Wildmon's phone number? I think these Next Generation of Republican Leaders need to spend some time in the stocks.

But, there's the other end of the spectrum and its alot less exclusive and, um, dumb. Q AND NOT U are playing a $5 benefit show tonight. Here's the details:

Thursday, January 20th - Washington, D.C. - Sanctuary Theater/Calvary Methodist Church (1459 Columbia Rd. NW, between 14th and 15th Sts. near the Columbia Heights Metro) - w/Anti-Flag, 1905 and Del Cielo - 6pm - $5 - ALL AGES. This show is a benefit for Empower DC and Jan. 20th Protest efforts against the 2005 Presidential Inauguration. For more info, go to www.positiveforcedc.org

I'll probably be too beat up by dealing with the work thing and I don't relish shifting from toe to toe waiting for Anti-Flag to end. It looks better than the Black Cat show - in any case I hope my neo-con t-shirt arrives today since I'm sure it will annoy alot of people if I venture out (personally, I'm a neo-realist).

So, here's "So Many Calls" by Q and Not U which will be on my iPod as I venture with great trepidation into the Metro today - it comes courtesy of Albany-based WakeupPunk Radio where there are lots more where that came from. Visit them, give 'em your love (all they ask is for you to be their Friendster) while I go find a corner to cringe in until its all over and I can go outside without getting frisked and having my camera confiscated.

However, there is hope. The poor man's Jill Scott is playing at DC 9 tonight. For a total non-political bent, chill out with Deborah Bond. Here's her "Giving Up"

For real! And let's step to the wall.

My So-Called Radio Career or Why I Won't Be PodCasting Anytime Soon

This post from 4F: (welcome them to our Blogroll) about that thar' new-fangled trend called Podcasting got me thinking about my short radio career on an obscure college radio station in Baltimore. After all, I imagine if I did do a Podcast, it would probably end up sounding like my old radio show.

So... I had the 2:30-4AM Saturday morning shift which usually meant I came in a few sheets to the wind, (and/or) stoned, full of lots of ideas (usually bad), a box of records & tapes and an occasional pal to keep me company (whom you can sometimes hear snickering in the background). Although friends were banned from the studios, there was usually no one there but the engineer who really didn't care. I probably had about five listeners at that time (it wasn't a big college) and I don't think the broadcast area covered more than a few miles.

Anyway, no one wanted the timeslot and jeebuz, I was barely enrolled in this school & had no illusions about a career... but I loved it .... even if it lasted only a semester. I kept a small box full of my semester's tapes but it got lost in my '98 cross-country Move From Hell. This lone tape survived somehow.

My radio show was called Nihilius Fillilius - get it? Well, it seemed cool back then and I remember looking with pride at the yellow xerox calendar they handed out at the student center. Since blogs are apparently part vanity, part revealing embarassing stuff about yourself, I thought perhaps somebody might get a kick out of my stumbling delivery and my occasional loss for words. The sound is well... its taped off radio and I didn't encode it at a high bit rate. Well, for the one or two of you who do download it, feel free to delete after you've had a good laugh (hello Rhetoricpig).

Here's a ~5Mb excerpt of me going through the second set's playlist and Red Lorry Yellow Lorry's "Talk About the Weather" which I'll have to post for real somtimes - it's still a great song ... It will be up for about two weeks...

For you masochists, here's the entire set from which this came (25 Mb, 35 minutes) via yousendit - it will only be available for a week. Woo-hoo. Again, my apologies for the sound quality but its... y'know... college radio. I think its a great playlist for late 1986 if I say so myself (although I'd drop the Hitchhiker's Guide crap). I remember the hippie-ish engineer getting a bit testy when the Happy Flowers song rounded into minute 3. What was his name? Scuz? Spaz? Schizz? something like that...

Playlist, 6 Dec 1986 (2nd set) Nihilius Fililius:

Poison Idea - Didn’t See the Picture - Kings of Punk
Execute - Nasty Nasty Nasty
Scratch Acid - Crazy Dan - Keep on Eating
Butthole Surfers - Unknown cut - Soundboard tape, Live at Staches, Columbus Ohio 1985
Flipper - There’s No Place As Bad As Southern California - Flipper, Live
Sonic Youth - Now I Wanna Be Your Dog - Confusion is Sex
Big Black - Every Man For Himself - God's Favorite Dog
Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy - BBC Radio show excerpt that goes on for too long
Happy Flowers - All I Got For Christmas Was Clothes - God’s Favorite Dog

Red Lorry Yellow Lorry - Talk About the Weather
Yoko Kill John - Mistress for All Seasons (short clip into commercials)

The 1st set had a full "women of punk" theme that included Nina Hagen singing "White Punks on Dope in German" (which hasn't aged well), Wendy O'Williams' "Sex Junkie (live)", The Avengers ("Cheap Tragedies"), Pussy Galore and the Dils (live). There's also a short rant on Pere Ubu after which I play one of my favorite songs of theirs: "Humor Me"... but its even too embarassing for a blog.

Oh, the closing track for this show was "I Want Everything" by The Godfathers...

"Dire Straits? Throw it!"

ForksLoveTofu of Tofuhut interviewed me back in December and has recently posted it. In it, I reveal my sordid fanzine past, my Halloween song mix and my Fleetwood Mac guilty pleasure. One minor update: since that interview, I have signed up for a peer-to-peer file sharing service (Soulseek) but I have used only for researching bands that I post about at this blog. When I'm active, I share some OOP hardcore and my own twisted music.

In honor of Forks and all vinyl lovers, I present the famous record-throwing scene (11 Mb) from Shaun of the Dead in which the vital question of all record collectors is externalized once and for all in widescreen cinema. To wit, which LPs from your collection would you choose to throw at flesh-eating zombies if your life depended on it?

Here are Shaun's picks... I'll have to think about mine but please feel free to leave your candidates in the comments section:

• Streetsounds Electro, the 2nd Album Shaun ever bought ("it's not hip-hop, it's Electro")
• New Order's Blue Monday - thrown by mistake ("an original pressing!")
  
• Prince's Batman soundtrack (they kept Sign o' The Times and Purple Rain)
• Dire Straits
• Sade (it's Shaun's ex-girlfriend's record)

Get the Shaun of the Dead DVD - there's some real great extras -- such as what happened to Diane after she left the Winchester and how Shaun escaped the hordes of zed-word people. There's also the full Coldplay ZOMBAID interview. More clips from the movie (including the action prior to my clip) can be found here.

Update:
My top five records to throw at slow-moving zombies:

1. Caribou - Elton John
2. Works, Volume 2 - Emerson, Lake & Palmer
3. Flag - James Taylor
4. Brothers in Arms - Dire Straits (yeh)
5. A - Jethro Tull

See A Small Victory where Michele picks up on this thread

Coffee and Cigarettes MP3 Mix #8: Pre-Inauguration Living in DC Blues

Get Out of Town - Kate McGarry
America, Sort of - A Drunken Swedish Guy Disappointed About American Election
Extended Tongue - New Wet Kojak
A Thousand Kisses Deep - Leonard Cohen (referring page)*
Something New - Lorbi

* Found object = probably not "legal"

King Face

Self-titled EP
King Face, 1987

Another of the incredible 2nd-gen Dischord bands - except they never recorded an original record for the label. Still, Mark Sullivan played in one or two of the high school Ian-Jeff bands, MacKaye produced this, at (where else?) Inner Ear, their lyrics of self-reliance/soul-baring fit with the others and they certainly played a bunch of local shows with the other Dischordians at that time. This record aptly captures their live show energy, a good thing and a bad thing. Good because, well, their live shows were pretty memorable. Bad because they occasionally over-reached - a sin that is forgivable live but all to obvious when listening to a recording. This is most present in the opening and closing cuts of this six song EP. Can't recall ever liking the bluesy harmonica-laced "Crawl Into Tomorrow" - the 1st song on the a-side - but I kinda have to respect 'em for trying to break out of the mold. They just don't have it to do the blues-rock thing, though, whatever "it" is. And that last cut, "Like A King" is about two minutes too long and bloated with jamming, that like I said, over-reaches beyond their talent.

Where they hit is in their simpler, tighter cuts. "I Don't Want To Be Anything" was their big crowd-pleaser at their memorable live shows - in a flash this song would turn the front of the stage into a manic, crazy mosh-scene with Mark Sullivan seemingly whipping his dreadlocks into the crowd.

"Anyone" has an opening guitar riff that sounds like a Dead song that is subversively laid on a thrashpop bass-drum bed. I love the paradoxical lyrics sung without irony by the distinctive voice of Mark Sullivan:

If anyone starts talking to you about human nature
Ignore them, it means they're as dumb as their parents were
Our nature is to change our nature

"Lick the Moon" and "Lull-A-Bye" are also stand-outs on this out of print record, the latter featuring some fine guitar work by Pat Bobst. The band broke up after about three years (1989, I believe) and then reunited in the late '90s. I believe Dischord put out a CD anthology but that too is sadly out of print - someone should do something about that sad fact.

Record sleeve and insert was designed by Cynthia Connolley with a lovely Leslie Clague set of band photos.



Band line-up (in order of pictures):

Pat Bobst - Guitar
Larry Colbert - Drums
Andy Rapoport - Bass
Mark Sullivan - Vocals

Listen to some King Face songs and tell me what you think (limited time availability):

• "I Don't Want to be Anything"
• "Anyone"

Links/Where Are They Now?:

• Flex's King Face discography was helpful - KF also have a cut on the Dischord State of the Union compilation)
• Mark Sullivan has gone on to greatness in the publishing world with his thriving NYC-based Akashic books. They publish everything from Krist Novoselic's Of Grunge and Government to edgy Cuban crime fiction.
• Per Dag House, Bassist Andy Rapaport showed up to play with the one-off Looters DC show at the Black Cat anniversary last year. And there was a 2000 Joe Talbott indie movie Eat Me! that includes King Face music and Andy acting (he's also had a bit part in John Waters' Pecker) - haven't seen Eat Me! but it got played at a side-festival at Cannes.
  

Johnny Ramones' gravesite statue attended by the statuesque Linda... Courtesy The Globe and Mail

Obit.

Jimmy Griffin, the guitarist of Bread died this week.

Bread, of course, was known for pioneering the soft rock sound and responsible for some of the most awful, annoying commercial songs of that time such as "Baby I'ma Want You" and "If" - most of these songs were written by David Gates, of which we will say no more.

... but if you go deeper in their catalog, there were a few era gems of Soft Rock -- most of them written by Griffin and life long friend Robb Royer. Royer was also in Bread and collaborated with Griffin on their biggest hit, The Carpenter's "For All We Know."

Contemporary touchpoints for Bread can be found in the indie "wimp rock" scene --although for the most part, this music is less commercial and alot more interesting -- see for instance, the latest Postal Service song recently posted at Scenestars ...



(almost all of Bread's music is available on iTunes)

This cut is a Griffin/Royer song from their second album - also available on their Anthology CD.

"Look What You've Done" (128 kbps, 3 Mb - limited availability)

Swamp voodoo 2-chord punk blues lovers rejoice...Fat Possum records released a tribute album, Sunday Nights: The Songs of Junior Kimbrough last Tuesday.

The artist line-up is tres cool.

Here's the track listing:

1. You Better Run (version #1) Iggy and the Stooges
2. Sad Days Lonely Nights Spiritualized
3. Meet Me In the City Blues Explosion
4. Done Got Old Heartless Bastards
5. My Mind is Rambling The Black Keys
6. I�m Leaving The Fiery Furnaces
7. I Feel Good Again Pete Yorn
8. Do the Romp Cat Power & Entrance
9. All Night Long Mark Lanegan
10. Release Me Thee Shams
11. Done Got Old Jim White
12. Lord Have Mercy On Me Outrageous Cherry
13. Pull Your Clothes Off Whitey Kirst
14. I�m In Love With You Jack Oblivion
15. Burn In Hell The Ponys
14. You Better Run (version #2) Iggy and the Stooges

Although Fat Possum is only offering short samples from some of these songs (including the Stooges and Furnaces cut), they do have a generous offering of free MP3s from previous Junior albums. Just click here and then click on the individual records to check them out.

My quick pick for y'all

"I'm Leaving You Baby" - Junior Kimbrough (from Most Things Haven't Worked Out)

and an extra bonus rap remix from a previous Fat Possum record, Fat Beats from the Delta, of "I'm Leaving You Baby"


Check out this piece from Patrick Donovan in Australia's Age (bugmenot login/passwd: obfuscator/whome) for some more background on Junior.

Choice quotage:

The crowd would bump and grind away to the psychedelic, trance-like music as the charismatic guitarist grooved on and around two chords, the music stopping only when he needed a drink or fell asleep on stage.

Junior's Place was originally his house, where he jammed with friends on Sunday afternoons. Soon word got out and people started turning up, so Kimbrough charged admission. He may have played on the day of the Lord, but this was the Devil's music: songs about sex, mortality, good times and bad, best experienced in a juke joint or while dancing barefoot in the dirt.

He claimed the songs came to him in dreams, and he wrote music people could dance to on a Sunday night and forget the hardships of the week.

Matt Johnson, founder of the Fat Possum label, for which Kimbrough recorded his four albums, speaks of the bluesman as of a lovable, flawed uncle. He recalls the time Kimbrough threw a car battery into a batch of moonshine.

"It was like he was on The Muppet Show. Junior would kick all the shit out of his house and stick it in the front yard - he didn't care if it was pouring down rain," says Johnson, from Fat Possum's headquarters, a trailer in the nearby town of Greenville, Mississippi. "He would charge people a dollar for a beer - but he would get up to fetch it because he didn't trust anybody. He would get so drunk, he would sit on his amplifier and moan and drool. It was like a tinder box, and they would stoke the fire until it was red-hot in winter - it could have gone up just like that. He was a law unto himself. He wouldn't even play songs, he would just play this sludge stuff - it was like sonic diarrhoea."

And...

Another highlight is the Blues Explosion's version of Meet Me in the City, featuring one of the last performances by the late Elliott Smith.

"Everything Smith recorded, he took to another level. He killed himself pretty much after he did that, which really sucks. Once I got past the labels and managers, everyone else I contacted really wanted to do it."

Cheers from Omaha where the weather forecast is -4 below zero tonight.

I don't normally like this type of shit but...

1) Shivaree has a new album out. Eh. Liked 'em a way back but Ambrosia seems so 1999 now. Then again, they got onto the Kill Bill 2 soundtrack (during the credits).

Stupidly, their website only offers samples off the new one - and in the dreaded WMA/Real format. Get a clue, Zoe. Here's a cut (probably not "legal," bitches) I found on a defunct blog from her previous...... well, I liked it, think Tom Waits rides Lucinda Williams semi-hard and leaves her wet....1999 album is called I Oughta Give You A Shot In The Head:

"Bossa nova"


2) On another note, I'm sitting in Reagan Nat Airport waiting for my flight and put the iPod on random play. Somehow it came up with this AGK cut I downloaded (legal, bitches) that I had forgotten about but it strangely seemed just perfect to watch planes take off and taxi around, girls look up from their books at me suspiciously, watch some grunge 1993 idiot talking on his earphone cell and make the minutes go by. Eno got it half right - Music for Airports should have been about wirelessly pumping music out and handing out earphones so you can blank out the sound and watch the world anxiously go by.

"Short Romance" - AGK remix ( from Ambi-sonic - there's more there for you electronic snobs)

I'm out here in Omaha NE this week on business (like, why else would one go to Omaha?).

Did you know that there actually IS a WOODMEN building - if you saw the movie About Schmidt, you'll understand. I thought the building name was CGIed - it seemed a perfect a parallel to Jack Nicholson's character (who retires from this building at the beginning of the flick). I took a picture of it from the Joseyln museum (everything is closed on Monday) but forgot my cabling to connect my camera to my laptop. C'est la Vie.

Here's a picture I found on the Interweb until I post mine.

So, while I'm out here, I'm going to try to check out a show at the Sokol Auditorium, Omaha's premiere underground spot - this is where Bright Eyes and the Faint, two bands I know virtually nothing about but are supposedly hot, got their first boost. Bright Eyes is playing there on Friday kicking off their double album release on the 25th - but my flight is outta here on Friday morning and quite frankly its pretty damn cold and I don't know the band well enough to know whether I like them or not (supposedly its not really a band but a one-man dealio).

Anyway, there is a show on Wednesday with a handful of bands I've never heard of but for only $5, how much can you lose? One is called Intergalactic Fax Machine - they appear to be the headliners. The name sounds familiar but a google on it turns up little.

Speaking of shows, January in DC is pretty lame what with Arcade Fire selling out in what? 5 seconds? Theivery Corporation are doing a 930 Club DJ set as a benefit for the Tsunami relief (28 Jan) - not really psyched about a DJ show but hey its a benefit so you don't feel real bad about leaving early - and Andy Zipf has a show the day before on the 27th at the Black Cat backstage. Thurston Moore, Kim Gordon, Don Flemming, Andrew W.K., Tom Smith (ex-Peach of Immortality) and many more are doing a Noise Against Fascism Inauguration night gig at the Black Cat (details halfway down this page) but I imagine it will be packed and hard to get into, if it isn't already sold out (but there's always the other stage, pussy! - ed). I was just considering getting out of town that day because security is going to be real tight. They're even banning boats on the Potomac starting this weekend! Or maybe I'll stay and take pictures of all the protesters which is always fun. If anyone is going to these shows, drop me a line - I'll be the guy with the black T-shirt, uh-huh.

Anyway, Andy Zipf - so I downloaded some of his tunes a few weeks ago at the recommendation of a local music blog (which seems to have gone defunct). I find it kinda hard to describe - the song below is sort of a swamp country power pop thing.... great voice - the other blog compares him to "Jeff Buckley, Radiohead or even Moby" - artists that I wouldn't normally recommend but there it is.

here's my favorite download of the bunch:

"Are We Going Down" (referring page with additional downloads) - Andy Zipf

CHEERS!

Of Note: Alice Bags' Blog

While researching last night's The Bags (Boston) post, I came across Alice Bags' (lead singer of the LA Bags) blog (Diary of a Bad Housewife) and website. She posts Bags / Dangerhouse record label memorabilia, the occasional odd MP3, writes about her life and plugs her upcoming gigs with her current bands.

She is currently playing with the all-female Stay At Home Bomb and the all-Chicana Las Tres. Her main website is worth exploring - including an interview with Dinah Cancer of 45 Grave. Her media page includes some classic Bags downloads and a cut from her all-Chicana Las Tres coffeehouse band. Here's my favorite:

"Survive" - Bags (96 kbps) (go to media page for the rest)

Bonus link: Rockin' Rina's Women of Punk

Not So Quiet on the Western Front

Various Artists
Compiled by Tim Yohannan, Jeff Bale and Jello Biafra (Maximum Rock 'n' Roll)
Alternative Tentacles Records (double LP), 1982

Most notable for the Flipper cut and about 89% of the reason I bought it, this compilation claims to be one of the first regional compilations of a punk band scene; and like a tsunami wave, many similar efforts followed. We'll get to the best songs but first I gotta get on my soapbox and attack a beloved punk icon.

This record claims to "document" the scene, but it spends too much time elevating the people that compiled the songs and plugging their radio show. Maybe the original 48 page booklet had more information on the bands but either I lost my copy or just chucked it in disgust (I seem to remember it just being crammed with black and white Winston Smith collages). There is a rote call-to-arms essay by Jeff Bale that was on one of the record sleeves that suggests "the youth of America may not be rioting in the streets yet, but in greater numbers than ever they're flaunting ossified social conventions and starting to embrace alternative values, a necessary first step in America's peculiarly sterile cultural and political context." Damn those "ossified social conventions" that are only present in America's "peculiarly sterile cultural and political context"... I mean, really?

So instead of saying anything meaningful about the bands themselves and using precious space for their lame screeds, all we get are their names and their cities of origin. Not alot to help someone trying to get more info on such and such band. Other later regional comps would include band member names, addresses and so on. Eh, maybe I'm just being a crank.

Still, Maximum Rock 'n' Roll bills itself as a fanzine but music takes secondary status to lengthy political diatribes and conspiracy theories in tiny font, bloviating "columns" about "the scene" and band "interviews" (usually sent in by the band in question). The "fanzine" rarely takes a stand on music except in requiring that most bands it features hew to some sort of anarcho-leftist political kant. It favors quantity over quality - most reviews are about two sentences long and rarely provide much information beyond a pat on the back. Music is a "hook" in MRR, not its reason for its being. It should be called Maximum Youth Indoctrination. That said, let's give them props for 924 Gilman, a great and wonderful venue (once you get past the pamphlet tables) in downtown San Francisco. And I enjoy the occasional 50,000 word Noam Chomsky reprint as much as the next guy. Cheers, MRR!

So alot of the cuts here are pretty forgettable but there's about 25% worth saving and, about 15% is worth noting. Here are my top selections followed by some notes on each song:

"Dead Men Tell No Lies" - No Alternative
"Worker Bee" - Angst
"Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition" - Impatient Youth
"Dan With The Mellow Hair" - Naked Lady Wrestlers
"No More Riots" - Bent Nails
"Turmoil" - The Frigidettes
"Sacrifice" - Flipper

SONG NOTES/LINKS:

No Alternative was one of the original '77 Bands who along with The Dils and The Avengers were a big part of the early San Francisco punk scene. By 1982, when this comp was put together, they were about the only surviving band. They've got a pretty good cut here called "Dead Men Tell No Lies." Here's a page (from IRS Corner) with some biographical information (more than what's provided on Western Front's liner notes). Some of their music has been reissued but hard to find - look for their classic song: "Johnny Got His Gun" if you do the file sharing networks. (IRS Corner is trying to document every band ever released or distributed via IRS Records - I'd mention Sisyphus but then look at what I'm doing)

Angst were an unknown when they appeared here. By the end of the decade, the Pope Bros. made a name for themselves by putting out a series of incredible eclectic (pop/punk/folk/dance) albums on SST - part of the "second generation" of SST bands. Here's their minute-long pogo dance unknown classic - based on that surreal slogan from Auschwitzz - "Worker Bee". See Angst's Trouser Press review.

Impatient Youth's "Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition" has become a sort of punk folk song and is a satirical take on the World War II song -- it is one of those obscure songs that gets covered by other bands, the most notable being the folky (Young) Pioneers. Some Impatient Youth background from IRS Corner. Here's the story behind the original song (which is not the same as this one) inspired by an incident during the Pearl Harbor attack.

Naked Lady Wrestlers kind of remind me of the New Jersey/Phillie jokeband scene. They used to play shows with Free Beer (another band on this comp) during Fleet Week in San Francisco just to see the look on the sailor's faces when they realized there were in fact no naked lady wrestlers or free beer (link to story). Cruel but kind of funny. Their cut "Dan With The Mellow Hair" utilizes a recognizable Scottish highland melody and has some stupid patter before and after the cut. Here's IRS Corner's page on them.

Bent Nails "No More Riots" is distinguished by the offbeat twangy guitar lead on top of an otherwise decent punk pose anthem. Members of the band went onto the Mister T. Experience (aka MTX).

The Frigidettes have a SF/Brit female punk sound. Their antiwar cut, "Turmoil", has some off-tune singing, a snakey guitar riff and cool sound effects that I accentuated by setting the iTunes equalizer to Loudness (one of my favorite settings). Here's a page with some bio information on the band.

Flipper was the major draw for me to buy this compilation - at one point I was a record collector scum when it came to Flipper. This cut is "free and legal" from the Alternative Tentacles website where they are selling this entire thing on CD. There are links to other cuts - most of which I rejected. You can check them out if and see if you disagree with my assessment. "Sacrifice" is a sonic treat for Flipper fans and like most of their best stuff it appears to be live. It, like some of the tracks above is like nothing else on the rest of the album. Highly recommended for noise rock fans. This cut also appears on Sex Bomb Baby, a 1988 release that compiled their singles and comp tracks. A Flipper fan page with appropriately blurry photos.

Some other notable cuts are Fang's drugged-out "Fun With Acid", Rebel Truth's speed-noise "All I Know", Risby's "Collapse" - sorry, don't have enough webspace to include them.


SAVED ROUNDS:

• Dance of Days, a history of DC 80's - 90's punk by Mark Anderson and Mark Jenkins. It's a shame nothing similar was included with the reissue of this compilation.
  
• Maximum Rock 'n' Roll
• Alternative Tentacles
• Winston Smith's art has gotten better even if it is still one-note Johnny when it comes to subject matter
  
• Buy the CD reissue here
• Gilman photo by Gwen (hosted by Flickr)
  

BORING SAUSAGE MAKING NOTES:
I encoded all of these cuts using RazorLame 1.1.5, an open source WAV-to-MP3 encoder, which is appropriate for single cuts that you are trying to digitize that don't need any noise reduction. You can convert all the cuts in a single batch. I'm not sure I had the settings correct (I used the default settings) so if you have any comments on the sound or your own experiences with this software, please chime in. I did some post-processing in iTunes by setting the volume level up, setting song endings in case I picked up some of the next cut during the recording, and using their equalizer algorithms (everything has been set to Loudness). As you can see I also added the album cover art.

The Bags (Boston)
self-titled LP
Stanton Park Records, 1990

This is an album that doesn't work too well in the cold sober sunlight of the day but turns into a totally different beast once the moon comes up and the party materials come out (and no, the Vinyl Mine only tolerates legal party materials- like those conical party hats and noisemakers).

The Bags were a mid-80s / early-90s Boston 3-piece that mostly played music as if stuck in a pre-Sex Pistols rock'n'roll timewarp. At times, they were sort of an MC-5/Stooges version of Spinal Tap (not to say that both bands didn't have their Spinal Tap moments). Foghat and Kiss also spring to mind when listening to some of their songs. At other times, pretty thoughtful and original and even somewhat eclectic (one of the cuts, "Superpower" would have been right at home on a Boston hardcore compilation). I once saw them play in DC and they were the type of band where both the bassist and guitarist wore their guitars down at crotch level and had the same type of hair as Slash that they shook around as they played. They almost looked like a Peter Bagge (forgive the coincidence of their names) comic strip if it wasn't for the non-heroin chic babyfat and acne (well, maybe the acne).

Side 1 is what I would call The Stupid Side. With songs like "Atomic Coconuts" (because electronic coconuts just don't cut it) and "The Beauty of the Bud" (a tribute to the devil weed), you can't help but getting good and stupid. This is a great side for preparing to go out. And it's just not for single hipsters. The Ohio Playersish "Atomic Coconuts" is stupid enough for the kids, too and I dare you not to dance to it.

The second side is perhaps more thoughtful. The afore-mentioned "Superpower", their take on foreign policy that makes as much sense as, say, Noam Chomsky or Bill Kristol (which is to say, it makes no sense) and the almost wistful "Closer Then," a nostalgic recollection of an old friendship that might bring a tear to yer bloodshot eyes. This is the side you put on when you get back home. While the only "chilling out" I do is when I sleep, this does kind of set the stage for it.

The Songs:

"The Beauty of The Bud"
"Atomic Coconuts"
"Closer Then"


Band Members:
Crispin Wood, guitar, vocals
Jim Janota, drums, vocals
Jon Hardy, bass, vocals

Links/Factoids:

• The Boston Rock and Roll Museum's The Bags page with biography and discography
• Guitarist/Singer Crispin Wood's hilarious Rock School website (Jim Janota and Jon Hardy provide voices to his animations)
  
• Trouser Press's review (and yes, I made the Spinal Tap and MC5 connection before reading this_
  
• The Bags reformed in a limited manner last year and put out a two-song live record on their old label, Stanton Park Records (who provided this promo, lo so many years ago). This record appears to be out of print (although I'm willing to be corrected) although Stanton Park offers some Bags rarities.
  
• Aram Heller is the executive producer. Here's my previous review of his World of Distortion single.
• Boston sound genius Lou Giordano shares engineering and producing duties with Carl Plaster (an unsung sound guy from Boston - worked with Come and Juliana Hatfield)
  
• The photograph details used above are from the album and credited to Mim Michelove
• Not to be confused upon penalty of a Jay Hinman takedown with the L.A. Bags
• A Peter Bagge band drawing (although its rather smallish)
  

The fine print: All MP3 tracks are provided to stimulate discussion and further research and education into the arcane world of (mostly) independent music. Mp3 files are removed after roughly two weeks or at the request of the artist/copyright holder.

Black Helicopter

I once wrote a song using the often psychotic dialogue that came from a phone "action line' that a newspaper had set up (I think I even posted it here several weeks ago). Black Helicopter takes it one step further:

Black Helicopter take their lyrics almost verbatim from the twisted ramblings of a sociopath who used to loiter at the "Clerks" style convenience store owned by the father of drummer M. Nicholas. Secretly recorded on a boom box, tapes of this warped, misogynistic, unemployed Teamsters' ranting serve as the inspiration for Black Helicopter’s lyrics. The subject matter is loathsome, yet steeped in a realism that cannot be manufactured.

The so-called sociopath (I think they've misdiagnosed him but whatever) says a lot of offensive things such as in "Good Times" where he rants about the ignomy of someone supposedly naming a boat after that "negro" TV show or in "Bitch Move" where he fantasizes about taking out a female newscaster. By doing this, the band can take a step away from responsibility and yet still shock the audience (and perhaps get people to talk about them). They also can't be blamed if their songs don't make a lot of sense or go anywhere although for the most part they do - at least the ones I've selected below. Still, its a concept that might work best as a side-project and not the focus of fulltime band. Another ethical question arises - should they compensate their lyricist or tell him that they've used his words or is it just a found object?

The music is not at all shocking, though, a bit of sludgey, sober Flipper crossed with a looser Mission of Burma. Since their members came from Kudgel and Green Magnet School, respectively, I guess that's no surprise. There's also a lot that reminds me of Killdozer and Big Black. They often use repetition and layering of noise and this can be mesmerizing - for instance in the latter half of "King of Wormtown" - this supports the delusional patter of the lyrics quite appropriately. At other times, the lack of a real lyrical structure forces the music to be built around the words rather than vice versa and this leads to some interesting song decision such as in "Mousemeat" - sometimes it works and other times ("Little Davey Bowditch") it doesn't.

If you're in the area, they are opening for Mission of Burma next Thursday (Jan 13) in Northhampton, MA. Their record label should be commended for putting up a generous amount of MP3s. A few of them are worth a spin if this is your type of music and I've ranked them from my favorite to least (there are more at the website below). If your not into this type of music and just curious about how the concept works, I'd download "Mousemeat" and if you like that check out the others:

Mousemeat
King of Wormtown
The Good Times
Bootstraps

Links:
- Black Helicopter Website (the photo above came from this website although its rehosted via Hello)
- You can download all the Black Helicopter MP3s that are offered by the Traktor 7 Record Label

Throw Rag

In this age of lo-fi and joycore, it's nice to know that some indie bands can still be dangerous, scary and offensive (or at least purposely obnoxious and annoying)! From Shauna Farnell's Vail Daily News review of a Rev. Horton Heat show in which they opened:

Throw Rag, which defines its sound as "sailor rock," unleashed screeching, yet oddly harmonious vocals reminiscent of the Joykiller and punchy, power-chord laden guitar choruses not unlike The Sex Pistols. The singer, who was a deadringer for that old man with the toothless underbite and wide-eyed stare you see on postcards, wailed under his yachting cap and strutted across the edge of the stage like a lounge singer throughout the show. It was less scary to have him amble across the stage than his half-naked back-up vocalist, whose bare gut wobbled threateningly along with every King-Kong-like thump he delivered onto the instrument hanging around his neck. That instrument, ironically, was a washboard that he played with a spoon, complete with a cowbell attached for that well-timed clank between riffs.

Early on, when the guy - who had clearly gotten into glue or some other significantly mind-altering substance before the show - grabbed some girl in the front row and shoved her head into his crotch, I decided it was time to take a couple steps away from the stage. After the microphone disappeared inside his pants, I hoped, for the Rev's sake, that all the equipment would be changed out if not disinfected before Reverend Horton Heat took the stage. Regardless of this nastiness, Throw Rag put on a great show.

• The Throw Rags website (above photo is courtesy of this website)
• Download their Dickies vs. Sex Pistols (via BYO Records) cut entitled "Hang Up"

Blog Off: The Lounge Lizard Edition

Blog Off is a semi-regular round-up of downloads and postings that I found interesting...


We're all inspired this week by Rev Purvis's Vinyl Orphanage's Talent Show featuring the The Glickmans that we've invited them to the Vinyl Mine lounge to play a few. The Rev describes them thusly:

If you have ever seen the recurring Saturday Night Live Skit with Will Ferrell and Ana Gasteyer as a couple of elementary school music teachers who moonlight as lounge singers, you will have a pretty good idea of what is represented in this recording.

Check out the vocal stylings and the synthesized oboe in "Send In the Clowns." I'm tapping my toes to "Fame" and is that an art-lounge version of "The Gambler"I hear?! Go ahead, put something in the tip jar and make a request for "Feelings" at your own peril. Whew, glad that's over, you know what I mean.

But now the lights have gone dark and man in black shambles onto the stage. Is that... Johnny... no wait, it's that Trent dude. Here's "Hurt (Take 1)". Sorry, Trent, Johnny Cash ate your breakfast a few years ago. Mr. K of Totally Fuzzy productions booked him (check there for link to main site).

Now the lights are back up and that Silence is a Rhythm guy is putting coins in the jukebox. Is that a remix of Scissor Sister's supposed cover of "Comfortably Numb" blasting on the jukebox. Hmmm... so that's what all the fuss is about. Doesn't sound at all like Pink Floyd. I think I'll go to the men's room.

Now that other guy with a faint deluded smile is selecting Bridget Bardot doing her classy hit, "Je danse donc je sui" - whoa, what's next, Dusty Springfield?

A word of warning, watch out for those ladies sitting alone at the bar who ask whether they can go up to your room and "use your phone".

And what lounge night would be complete without a version of "Begin the Beguine" courtesy of that guy from Locust Street. Hell, let's hear the original and drink a martini to the late band leader.

And while we're at it, let's drink a round of Scotch for the guy in the corner with the mask.

Green River: Rehab Doll

Subpop, 1988

Not really punk, not really metal, perhaps the closest touchpoints is a less blues-heavy update of Alvin Lee's Ten Years After merged with the minor chord devil boogie of Blue Oyster Cult. This was their swansong LP, the long-awaited record that was recorded through the latter part of 1987 and released after they had broken up. Its a good, though not great, record and probably would have worked better as an EP. I always thought Green River had some of the greatest song beginnings - as in fact almost all of these songs do - they just didn't always deliver the song. I would have consigned "Rehab Doll", "Together We'll Never", "Smiling and Dyin" and even "One More Stitch" to the eventual CD w/unreleased tracks and called this release the Swallow My Pride EP (after the best song on the record). It would have stood proudly with Dry as a Bone as a fine example of pre-grunge Seattle misericore.

There aren't that many reviews on the Interweb that I could find but one was All Music Guide (AMG)'s site in which they complained about the recording. I don't understand All Music Guide's problems with the sound. Departing from their previous, ah, production values to Bruce Calder's sonic embrace was in retrospect a good idea. I found the sound to be one of the great things about the record, in fact. Maybe the CD version was remastered poorly, I dunno, but the LP version is fine.

AMG also complains that Mark Arm's vocals sound "like he's singing from across the room." Um, that's the idea of reverb vocals, dooshbags and I think it was very intentional - Arm's vocals, in this manner, work but (there's always a but) I think Arm "sells" his pain and misery a bit too much and it sounds a bit contrived, almost amateurish, at times. That's only made more painfully obvious when he moans in full room reverb. As for the other players: Gossard, Ament and Fairweather do a great job - for a pretty youngish band, they inherently understand each other's limitations and complement into a coherent whole - yielding some mighty decent riffage. They also contribute (via Calder's engineering) some pretty wild background vox which you notice after several listens.

The lyrics and the whole gist of this LP is pretty miserable - not bad miserable but truly utterly despairing miserable. Their subject matter being stuff like girlfriend with AIDS, mutual suicide pacts, self-destruction, you get the idea. Some of it is pulled off with aplomb but unlike Kurt Cobains' obtuse but deeply felt puh-ain, I'm not so sure that Mark Arm really has this badness in his life -- it just doesn't always ring true - ok, I'll say it: poser, dude, yer a poser.

And while there are some very worthy poetic passages in the songs, there are also some lines that sound like they were ripped out of his 8th Grade notebook (you know right next to the pix of pentagrams and big boobs) - I mean "the river in the city gets pumped with sewage/the river in the city runs brown" and "my love she's a party in Hell... only you make the gray sky black" (from "Rehab Doll" and "Smiling & Dyin'", respectively). I think what's missing is a sense of humor -- maybe he just didn't like his bandmates and the direction they wanted to go with the band (his pal Steve Turner having already left the group to "go to school") Whatever the tension that was in this band is reflected in these songs, I think. Mark Arm is not a depressed or depressing guy if Mudhoney and his other projects are evidence. And early Green River had its happy happy moments - the first EP was rollicking party longhair music for serial killers and demongirls. I say this because "Swallow My Pride," which is included here (and was on Come on Down EP), was one of the first songs they wrote. If you listen and read the lyrics, its a hilarious song about falling for a Reaganite chick and going through all sorts of 20-something liberal angst over it and then concluding that, well, "I wouldn't mind / if you swallowed my pride / make me feel alright." It ends with a seemingly spontaneous prolonged sendup of BOC's "This Ain't The Summer of Love" which I don't remember being on the demo version or Come on Down (confirmed!). Although the Summer of Love thing is done somewhat in jest, its probably indicative of my notion that Rehab Doll couldn't even take a funny (albeit self-hating) song without adding some downer elements into it.

There's also "Porkfist" which sounds pretty much influenced by Big Black about the guy who swings the big hammer in the slaughterpen and the alpha-pig that's about to go up against him. hmmm... sounds like every rocker promising that if they sell out, they'll somehow survive the carnage. Instead, I'm thinking that the alpha-pig got a boot to the head and a big hammer to the skull. Incidentally, I can imagine it was a song like this that inspired Chuck Eddy to (derisively) come up with the term Pigfuck for describing this genre (Killdozer being the kings of Pigfuck) and while Green River is constantly being touted as the progentors of grunge (I'm not totally sold on that but I will take Mudhoney for $1000, Alex), maybe they and Albini are really the fathers of Pigfuck, eh? (note: GR toured with Big Black in '85).

Finally, I like "Forever Means", the opening cut, even if it is the most overtly metal song here. It just has a riff that doesn't quit and its so good I'm willing to forgive Mark Arm's vocal excesses here and there. Even the downer lyrics are kinda okay since they are a pretty punk snarl about how "their" world (y'know, the squares) has nothing for the singer: "what you get is what you see/lookout, i don't aim to please")

The fact that Gossard and Ament went onto one of the biggest groups in the '90s (Pearl Jam if you didn't already know) has probably kept this record in print. You can buy it in multiple outlets along with the predecessor EP. Check froogle for best prices.


Songs:
When the sad day comes that I hit my 20 Gigs on my iPod, and that day will surely come, some of this Green Riverage will have to go. But these are the three songs that will remain:

"Forever Means" (metal, yes, but truly sonic - dig the background vox)
"Swallow my Pride" (with "sonic moans" by Kim Gordon)
"Porkfist" (a Pigfuck song if there ever was one)

Fine print: All recordings come off of vinyl that I own that is recorded off a cheap turntable. They are offered for research and historical purposes only and are removed within two weeks of the date of this posting. If the copyright holder, blah blah blah... etc. ad nauseum.

Links:

Despite all the hype around the band, there's relatively few fansites of note. Most of the better documentation on the band comes from Mudhoney fans. For some reason Pearl Jam fans take little note of the Green River years.

• An incomplete attempt to put together a Green River tour book with some notes from interviews with band members including this illuminating account (from Jeff Ament) of working for Corey Rusk in Detroit, '85:

And then...and then, went up to get paid afterwards...after, you know, after probably the most humbling experience ever, and, Corey Rusk, who, he was in The Necros at that point, I was really excited to meet him, 'cause I loved The Necros, and runs Touch and Go now. He was the promoter for the show, we were supposed to make like a hundred bucks, which was a huge payday for us at that point. He's paying Danzig like $12,000, or whatever he was making that show. And I put my hand out, and he goes 'Man, I thought you guys sucked, I'm only giving you 25.' I just put my head down, and I'm like, I gotta to back and tell the band that we only made 25 bucks."

• From the same site, a seemingly complete Green River discography
• A faux-academic history of grunge and Green River's relationship to it
• AMG's review of "Rehab Doll"
• Byron Coley's obituary in Trouser Press" (as always, I'm humbled by The Man)
• A Stone Gossard interview from 1998 in which he talks about what Green River & Mother Love Bone were trying to do:

Well, we were trying to be Ten Minute Warning and Tales of Terror and Iggy Pop. Some combination of that and probably, in somebody's mind, SSD Control, and something else...but ah... Yeah, there were a lot of bands around at that time, the U Men and bands that were totally, in our minds, "the rock stars." We just went out there and we had some bad heavy metal riffs and we liked punk rock too, so we put them together and that's kind of what we came up with.

My Jerry Springer parting thoughts:

Green River broke up, reportedly, over the notion of "selling out" - Gossard and Ament wanted to make a good living playing music and put together Pearl Jam with Eddie Vedder. Mark Arm wanted to stay true to the punk ideals and along with former Green Riverite Steve Turner went off to form Mudhoney. They've released about 8 original albums - the most recent being 2002's "since we became tranluscent." Earlier this year, Arm replaced Evan Dando to complete the MC5 reunion tour to great acclaim. Meanwhile, Stone Gossard has released a solo LP, to little acclaim and reviews that will always compare his work in the context of Pearl Jam. Jeff Ament is apparently spending his time doing endorsement deals. And Pearl Jam haven't released a notable record since 1993. Pearl Jam itself went into seclusion after their massive popularity pretty much made every personal thing they did the subject of media gossip and paparazzi snapshots. To some, the old adage, "be careful what you ask for, you just might get it" rings true.

Lou Reed all'italiana!

Welcome and grazie to The Ancient Art of MP3 Blogging, a new Italian music blog who linked to MusicbOOm.it's Lou Reed tribute album, Boomsongs for Velvet (the Google translated link is here). You can download the entire album as a Zip file (192 kbps) or as separate files (they come in two different bit rate formats - 192 and 320 kbps).

There's a lot of good cuts here, only a few clunkers. I like tribute album songs that don't just do a cover but bring a bit of personality and insight into the song.

Some highlights: Check out Zen Circus' psychotic jam version of "The Gift" as a great example of doing a tribute that's out there. For more stoner songs, check out Encode's "All Tomorrow's Parties"... Cantu, Ciappini, Iriondo's "Black Angel's Death Song" is also a notable trippy cut.

Only one song is repeated twice and its a surprise that they're both pretty good: Sebastian's "Caroline Says" (stick with the song, it gets better), Studiodavoli's version of the "Caroline" is better, though...

However, I'll nominate Lorenzo Bianchi's Lorbi w/ Odette di Maio and their empyreal update on Lou and Nico's "I'll Be Your Mirror" as the best of the bunch - one of those rare tribute album cuts that bests the original. Perhaps its Nico's European connection that inspired it.

(All my links are to the 192 kbps versions - the web page has links to all the bands' websites)

Saved Rounds:

• A not so legal download of the original "I'll Be Your Mirror" for comparison purposes.
• A review of a 1984 performance of "The Gift"
• quicklook listing of all bands and songs from the CD back cover

Soundtrack to a New Year's Eve Dream

I found myself running through a decaying building, I think it was a gym, that looked like the set from Alien onto the grungey part of 14th Street (in Washington DC). I was once again being pursued by Prince Olaf and his nameless brother, my reoccuring green and ugly nightmare gnomes, and we all realized that something even worse, a dark giant, was pursuing all of us. The giant shadow thing smashed Prince Olaf's brother into an unrecognizable smear on the macadam... we called a truce and ducked into a bar where an HDTV screen was showing Harry Dean Stanton performing a retrospective of all his greatest characters... Bud the Repo Man, the lonelyheart detective from Wild At Heart, the broken father from Pretty in Pink and that's when I woke up.



Coridda - Lindows (Poland)
Destroy That Boy - Boonaraas (Germany)
Making Enemies - Lied (Malaysia)
Dla Mnie To Cos - Freez (Poland)
Coup de Ska (live) - Beat Soup (USA)
Conspiracy Theory - Steve Earle (USA)
I've Got News - The Murg Masalam Blues Band (Malaysia)
Transducer - Dusk (Malaysia)

Get in the Car - The Giraffes (USA)
Behold the Cucumber - Carrion Dust (Malaysia)
Silent Movie - This Body Broken (Malaysia)
Close Your Eyes - Her Reverie (Malaysia)

Fine print: All tracks deemed "legal"... hi bit-rate... my apologies as many of the songs do not have proper ID3 tags and may need some "repair" after you download...report bad links, please

Links: Harry Dean's IMDB (he also appeared in Alien which I hadn't remembered)

Coffee and Cigarettes: Sinnerman Mix

A 5-act mini-opera about sinnin' and dyin'...

"Taneytown" - Steve Earle - Referring page*
"Big Iron" - Steve Owens
"I'm Not Like Everybody Else" - The Chocolate Watchband - Referring page*
"Sinnerman" - Nina Simone - Referring page*
"Dream" - Damn Dirty Apes

*All songs notated with an asterix are of questionable legality.

Gray Matter
Food for Thought LP
R&B Records, 1985

If you tried to draw a straight line from predeccesor band Iron Cross to Gray Matter's second record, the emo classic Take it Back, you'd be hard pressed to find this album on that line. If I had heard this without knowing their priors -- Guitarist Mark Haggerty and drummer Dante Ferrando played in Cross, suburban DC contemporaries of Minor Threat and Void -- I'd have signed them up to Bomp! instead of Dischord.* With the exception of the more forgettable tunes "Oscar's Eye" and "Gray Matter", these songs recall '60s-'70's garage punk over the more trad. Dischord straight-edge of that period, that, say Dag Nasty were fronting at the time. I mean, snotty vocals from a "Dischord band"? Voxx-style reverb guitar? Beatles covers??? Perhaps that's why the opening song is called "RETROspect"?

But it kinda makes sense in a way. The intersection of Bomp! and Dischord is teenage alienation and disillusionment and these songs are full of it. But unlike a lot of the suburban NoVa (Northern Virginia) punk music of the time there's a rare sense of humor and some cultural references minus the usual straight-edge snobbiness and prudery. They cover "I Am the Walrus" without their tongues in their cheeks (at least its not noticable). "Phobias" deal with, among other things, the fear of Roger Moore - so that's kinda funny and cultural, right, I mean he was James Bond at the time - can't hear the rest of the lyrics (no lyrics sheet, arrgggh!), are they saying their afraid of discourse and grass? And "Caffeine Blues" deals with the whole straight-edge gateway drug pretty nicely - I got a kick out of hearing the old Coffee Generation commercial (with ELO playing "Hold Onto Your Dreams") playing at the beginning, donchu?

There are three exceptional garage punk songs here that still hold up - "Flash in Time", "Give Me A Clue" and "Retrospect." I'm less enamored with "Fill a Void." The recording itself is kinda disappointing (remembering my previous problems with the Ignition EP), at least in comparison with Take it Back. I'm wondering if they did a remix for the CD release. Another piece of evidence that the Ian and Don Z team improved by leaps and bounds through the Winter of 84-85. Oh, I also think the cover is pretty crappy but in a high school kinda way its oddly appropriate.

I've only heard one song from the band's early 90's reunion album, Thog, and it was a cover of Lennon/McCartney's "I've Just Seen a Face" and, besides the fact that its probably their first and only song about girls, it sounded like they had successfully integrated the g-punk of Food with the emo of Take it Back.

Songs:

"Give Me A Clue"
"I Am The Walrus"
"Caffeine Blues"

Fine Print: Songs are all from the Food for Thought LP (although its kind of a mini-LP), recorded from vinyl and digitized accordingly. These songs are not out of print and retain all the original copyright bullshit intact. They are made available for a short period of time (~two weeks) to faccilitate discussion and research and Fair Use ... but if the artists or one of the copyright holders objects, they will be removed promptly.

*To be accurate, this was not originally a Dischord release, although it was later packaged with their follow-up EP into a single CD available from the Dischord website.

Links/Notes
Gray Matter Dischord home page
Southern.com does "bio & begats" for this band


Alternative Reviews:

• Flex provides a take that suggests they didn't listen to the record: "Wonderful melodic DC style hardcore, a classic."
• Skaters review the CD at Amazon.com: "This cd is one of the sickest cds ive ever heard. If you skate and you need some music to get you amped listen to Gray Matter. Trust me."

The Ever-So Interesting Where Are They Now? Section That Shows on the Screen At The End of the Teen Coming of Age Drama-Comedy

• Steve Niles is now a horror comix writer - one of his stories is being produced into a movie by Sam Raimi. He names his characters after his old bandmates. An interview about his Gray Matter days is up at his website (although it oddly credits Jeff Nelson as being in Gray Matter - he was in Three with Haggerty, Turner and Jeff Nelson, ex-Minor Threat).
• Dante Ferrando runs two of my favorite DC spaces: Black Cat and... Food for Thought where he fights calls from straight-edgers to ban drinking and smoking.
• Jeff Turner (vox, guitar) is aka Geoff Turner. According to Niles' interview he lives in LA, and plays in sleaze-skronk dance band New Wet Kojak - their website is either here or here or both. The latter has a link to two MP3s that would be perfect for a gallery opening as hosted by Dieter of Sprockets. He also ran the WGNS Studios Cassette label (now defunct) and recorded (and played on) some of Dave Grohl's solo songs while he was in Nirvana.
• Mark Haggerty, according to the Steve Niles interview, lives in San Fran and plays in a band called Shanty - I couldn't find any reference to them anywhere. Anyone got info?

Awww.... Mp3 bloggers get some end-of-year love...

Jimmy Aquino writes in SF Bay Area's Metroactive: COMMERCIAL RADIO DJs can't be trusted anymore—ever since they let themselves become the palm-greasing promoter's bitch. So in 2004, the music geek nation turned its lonely eyes to the MP3 bloggers—those self-important desktop DJs who push music snobbery to its geekiest by putting streaming MP3s on their site. As a result, '04 was the year I bought more singles than albums. I love how iTunes gives you the option of buying individual songs rather than the whole kit and caboodle. Good lookin' out, iTunes!

Read the entire piece here - Movie soundtrack fans take note: Jimmy's Fistful of Soundtracks webcast is carried via live365.com (also available via iTunes radio button)

Sam Kinison
Louder Than Hell
WG, 1986

To shake myself out of that certain Christmas sentimentality, I pulled this tape out of the pile.

So to perhaps get you over that Christmas sugar-ridden malaise, here's a dose of political incorrectness from the late Sam Kinison, the most hated and loved comedian of our time.

No topic - Jesus, World Hunger and the Tate-Bianca murders - was beyond Kinison's acid anquish. Although Side 1 is way too personal (and hateful) to be funny, Side 2 is a keeper.

"I'm glad you fuckers can handle your high"...

"Manson" - Sam Kinison