The Beach Boys “Cabin Essence” This was a free single from Mojo magazine to promote the “SMiLE Sessions” box set. Funnily enough my copy of the magazine had two copies of the record inserted in it! A boon when it already goes for twenty plus on ebay. Sadly, it isn’t the best material that I have heard from the SMiLE sessions; and not the best tune either. But it is good enough not to sell one of the copies.
Geister “Night Terrors” EP and “Nostalgia” EP. My band recently played a show with the Canadian band, and I was very impressed. I acquired both of their releases. The “Night Terrors” release is a little rough at times, but with “Nostalgia” the band really tapped into the early 80’s hard punk vibe. Sometimes it is a bit Avengersish, and other times a bit more in the early English crust style. Live it was straight cross-over sounding.
Oasis “I’m Outta Time” the Liam penned song from their last album points to a sound that Beedy Eye would rip further into; Beatles worship. It is cliché to say with the Manchurian, but now more than ever it is true. Good a-side, with a crap remix of “To Be Where There’s Life.” Liam’s voice doesn’t mesh with dub-step twitches and drop outs too well. Really a miss fire. Bands like Oasis should steer clear of 90% of all Remixes.
John Lee Hooker “It Serves Me Right/Flowers on the Hour” I have been scooping up a lot of blues records lately and couldn’t pass up this Vee Jay single.
Jackie Wilson and LaVern Baker “Think Twice/Please Don’t Hurt Me” A great floor filer with “Think Twice” is really one of the gems of Wilson’s career. SOOOOO Good.
BEST NEW REISSUES: Grandaddy “The Sophtware Slump”Originally released at the dawn of the new millennia in Y2K on the now defunct V2 records, Grandaddy’s second full length “The Sophtware Slump” echoed the future-present mood of the early days of the oughts. The record would go on the garner great critical acclaim, and be on many year-end lists. I came to the band through an old friend, who happened to be a cousin of bassist Kevin Garcia. The record, reissued eleven years later on vinyl by the Control Group documents a band that was in control of their sound-that stood out in a busy pack.
Y2K was a busy year for progressive-atmospheric pop with Radiohead’s “Kid A” and Bjork’s Dancer in the Dark Soundtrack album “Selma Songs” among the heavy hitters. It would less than a year later that riff based rock would replace the critical spotlight with bands like the Strokes and White Stripes gaining mainstream attention and overshadowing bands like Grandaddy or even the Beta Band.
Eleven years later “The Sophtware Slump” still feels remarkably fresh. It is a hook heavy record with emotive lush crescendos that never feels, dare I say, emo. It’s production is dense and layered without sounding cold; its organic charm accents the folk-meets-futuristic aesthetic that the album exudes.
Lyrically the album focuses largely on industrial breakdown, an antiquated idea in many ways, but at the dawn of the digital age it seemed like a fresh parable for what we faced as computers and the inorganic replaced the analog and organic world.
Many have pointed to a Radiohead influence, and while I note that this is big change from “Under the Western Freeway”, it still retains the threads of the Modesto sound that made them more uniquely American than simple Anglophiles. The Radiohead comparison is lazy listening, in that they were not the first band to make lush and dense pop arrangements with an overarching concept; just (in Y2K) the most recognized.
Grandaddy’s emotion cuts to the core with sincerity dripped over their songs. If it were not for a sea-awash in bands competing for your attention in Y2K, many of these songs would have been indie classics. While this record is not on par with “OK Computer”, of which it is often compared to; it is just as sincere and interesting the Flaming Lips' “The Soft Bulletin” released around the same time even eleven years on it still sits comfortably amid the pack.
SPLURGE PURCHASE: Unrest "Yes She is my Skinhead Girl" IPU XVII
Unrest's "Yes She Is My Skinhead Girl" seven inch (released as part of K Records International Pop Underground series) is one of my favorite IPU singles, up there with the Teenage Fanclub single and the Headcoats single for sure! I haven't heard it in years, and saw it and made splurge purchase to buy it for sentimental reasons.
"Yes She Is My Skinhead Girl" hints at the more refined pop sound that would infuse Unrest's pre "Bridget Cross" era work on records like "Perfect Teeth."
When I think of fun, dirty lyrics in a time before "the Teaches of Peaches" the line, "Fucking fucking on sandy beaches" always comes to mind delivered in a rather straight manner, rather than the ridiculousness that it is to read them. In all seriousness, this song is a silly lyrically as Mystikal's "Shake Yo Ass." But lyrics aside, the song is better than a giggle, it is a good song with a great hook.
LATE PASS: Dum Dum Girls “He Gets Me High”It is not too often that I find myself buying 12” EP’s these days. But with three short, sweet originals and one take on an old classic I find myself glad that I picked up this EP. The follow up to their debut lp “I Will Be” steps up “Dee Dee”’s game with a more robust and lush sound. With “He Gets Me High” the Dum Dum Girls musical vocabulary extends further than girl groups, lofi and reverb helping distinguish themselves from their contemporaries.
Co-produced by Ravonettes’ Sune Rose Wagner and Richard Gottchrer (producer of “My Boyfriend’s Back” and “I Want Candy”) “He Gets Me High,” while rooted in the lush pop-melodies that the production team would imply can be at times dour, and dripped with distortion creating a tension that their last record sorely lacked.
I didn’t come readily to this platter when it was released, because I feared it would be too similar to their first disc “I Will Be. With”I Will Be”, the “critic/blogger” talking points seemed to be the bands raw, lo-fi sound; a combination of girl-group troupes and Jesus and Mary Chain worship. A combination that can be getting old by this point… However, I should say, that rarely do any of the bands touted of borrowing from Jesus and Mary Chain actually sound like they listened to their records beyond having fuzzed out guitars but Dum Dum Girls strike me as different, and “He Gets Me High” points to the melancholic pop-laziness that made Jesus and Mary Chain work. Exhibited on these three originals is a songwriter who is not afraid to bury her influences, and knows how to show off just how well she gets it.
And then there's the cover of the Smiths' "There Is a Light That Never Goes Out", you couldn't pick a more obvious choice from the Smiths catalog for them to cover, personally I would have preferred a cover of a Smiths song that I don’t hear often; but that is a minor gripe for a great set of songs.
STILL BUYING THEIR RECORDS: Guitar Wolf “Space
Battleship Love”This is the first LP released in America since Billy “Bass Wolf” died nearly six years ago. This isn’t to say that this is the first release since then, 2007 saw the release of both “Dead Rock” and “Mars Twist.” “Space Battleship Love” is the second release with the new “Bass Wolf:” UG; and while I am dismayed that they haven’t released “Dead Rock” on vinyl; I am sad to say that I could of lived without “Space Battleship Love.”
While the same tropes of sci-fi, horror, and pure rock-n-roll exist in “Space Battleship Love” the production feels like they are pulling back from their pure sonic assault, and perhaps the most refined they have been. I still maintain that “Jet Generation” was their zen-finding just the right balance of pure ear bleeding insanity and actual song craft.
This record feels like, “More of the same.” And while I typically can’t say that is bad with Guitar Wolf; there is something different about this release that makes me feel like maybe I should have passed on this release… Which would be the first time I didn’t buy one of their records since I first bought “Kung Fu Ramone” in the 1990’s…
REPURCHASED: Radiohead “Ok Computer”I had originally purchased an import version of “Ok Computer” when it came out; and for some silly reason sold it. I don’t find myself coming back to a lot of the band’s catalog; but am quite fond of the first four albums, and really only listen to “The Bends” and “Ok Computer” on a more regular level.
The question that begs to be asked, is how do you even talk about a record like “Ok Computer” almost a decade and a half since it was released. It is a landmark record, and like any landmark record it is held in a glass case with the likes of “Nevermind.” But, unlike, dare I say, “Nevermind,” “Ok Computer” doesn’t sound dated to the degree that Nirvana’s disc does.
One some levels “Ok Computer” sounds dated in that, for the most part, it is a rock record; and in the years since to make a rock record that is not heavy on the testosterone, and devoid of that irony, is kind of passé. But sonically “Ok Computer” was leaps and bounds ahead of its peers in creating lush soundscapes and an un-flinching sense of continuity, which even almost fifteen years later still sounds fresh.
Along with similarly minded bands that recorded just before and just after them, “Ok Computer” was a push back against a classical rock revival, and in many ways the bands work since continues to do so; but with “Ok Computer” there was still similarity with what they were “against” and what they “wanted to be”; it was a much more subtle step; “Kid A” and “Amnesiac” were bolder f’u’s to the establish rock convention.
“Ok Computer” was a great balance that most music listeners could latch onto, it was done through real tunes and careful songcraft. “Ok Computer,” could have been made quickly and cheaply with the nearly unlimited possibilities that modern recording technology can offer; but it was a painstakingly slow record to make for the band and their attention to detail shows in every aspect of the record; I am more than glad to have purchased it yet again!
BOOTLEG CITY: Slowdive "hide yer eyes"
It seems like these days ever few months a set of nicely packaged, with silk screen covers, bootlegs hit the shelves. This time I picked up the Slowdive "hid yer eyes" boot. The quality is pretty lo-fi at times with some slight shifts in volume; but all in all it is enjoyable and entirely listenable. A lot of the tracks are from the time just before "Soulvaki," making the material some of their most memorable "tunes," in a more raw and driving form.
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