Urgh! A Music War: Alternative Music as Product

This was actually something of a trial to wade through.

Urgh! A Music War isn’t a proper snapshot of underground music dating from the last portion of the seventies and into the eighties. In fact, probably the only performance ‘punks’ would consider punk, would be the Dead Kennedy’s song included here.

Sure, Joan Jett cranks out an anthem, but even at the tender age of twenty, she’d already moved a bit away from whatever the Runaways were and further into a hard rock scene, that the singer admittedly enervated with some excitement. Spiky haired punkers, though, probably weren’t moved too much by her track.

Devo’s always good. But again, a bit too weird for straight laced punkers (that makes sense if you think about it). More bizarre than the band itself was the stage show that accompanied it’s performance. Sure, they were probably all rich by the point that Urgh! was filmed. But those giant pillars of flashing lights were a bit outrageous. And not in a good way.

The other Ohio based group on show for the film, Pere Ubu, worked up a track not from one of its first two albums – the strongest in its canon – but instead chose “Birdies” from 1980’s The Art of Walking. Not a sub-par effort, there’s a funky instrumental break about halfway through, but not the band’s crowning achievement.

With the inclusion of some much more visible acts on the roster, the film becomes a curious study in what people at the time perceived to be weird. All the aforementioned bands had at least some tangential tie to the punk world, even if it was only the dates. The same might be said for the Police. But watching the band and it’s ancient guitarist made the ensemble look like it was shoved up there for posterity.

Sting was sporting an English Beat shirt – but he was still clearly a good looking guy who was hooked up with extraordinarily talented players in order to mine his cult of personality. In mentioning the Beat, though, a few JA related acts showed up. The white people ska stuff wasn’t too notable. But Steel Pulse turned in a performance that was at least passable. It still reeked of being post-1975. That’s just how reggae music goes.

Anyway, Urgh! has apparently been difficult to track down since the eighties. No longer, my friends. No longer. I just don’t know if it’s worth splaying out the dollars to see.

Nick Tosches: An Annotated Bibliography (Part Three)

Country: The Twisted Roots of Rock 'n' Roll. Da Capo Press. New York. 1996.

In contrast to his other long form books on music, in Tosches’ dissection of country music, the writer takes a view based more upon discography than anything else.

While describing the impetus for unique variants on American music, there’s usually a detailed account of specific labels, who ran the company as well as what studios were most frequently associated with them. At times, the approach becomes tedious and reads like an enormous list while not amply displaying Tosches’ skills as a writer. The form, more than the subject matter, can be figured as the reason why.

There are brief moments when Tosches’ prose takes over and gifts the reader with some flowery descriptions. Instances like these usually occur when the book attempts to relate a single players biography instead of making broad overviews of a time. One section, focused on an almost forgotten performer named Emmett Miller, eventually formed the basis for Where Dead Voices Gather, an investigation into the man’s disappearance.   

 

Transformer by Lou Reed. 2007.

            http://www.rollingstone.com/music/reviews/album/2747/21119

(accessed September 18, 2010).

Humor doesn’t always lend itself to the written word. But if one can open an album review and get and audible chuckle, it probably means the writer’s doing something write.

Beyond that, staying the game and writing on roughly the same topic through a number of different decades might afford a writer the chance to comment upon the same individual more than once. In this case, upon the reissue  Reed’s second solo album, Tosches was able to land a write up of roughly the same length on exactly the same album in the same outlet.

Unfortunately, the two reviews are basically the same save for some editing and a different opening paragraph. It’s difficult to tell if Tosches is the culpable party or if Rolling Stone, who obviously owns the content, simply saw fit to solder a few bits and pieces together and pretend they’d retained Tosches’ services for thirty four years. Either way, it’s a let down. I was already disappointed with RS, so it really shouldn’t be a big deal.

 

 “Do You Feel Lucky, Monk?” Vanity Fair. 2008.

            http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2008/12/eastwood200812

(accessed September 18, 2010).

There’s generally a point to an article. With this piece, it seems Tosches is more interested in discussing the fact that Clint Eastwood plays piano well more than anything else. Since it winds up being a short, engaging piece, it’s a success.

Eastwood doesn’t have any heavy questions levied on him, just some simple biographical lobs and a few about what players he enjoyed while growing up in San Francisco. But the informality of the banter, disguised by Tosches’ prose makes it appear that the two have an easy going relationship. That might not be the case, but for a writer to interact with a personality of this level and have it wind up being a breezy affair is a remarkable achievement. Of course, if there was something substantive present, it would have been more memorable, but reading about a big screen, tough guy figure Chopin as a profound influence makes up for any perceived shortcomings in the article.

 

A Minute with Johnny Witmer from the Stitches (Part One)

PM: Do you still skate?

Johnny Witmer: Yes I still skate. I try to do it as much as possible. I can still do pivot to fakie on any ramp.

PM: You gotta day job – how ‘bout the rest of the folks you play music with?

JW: No. Most of the guys are professional drug addicts. We all hustle, though. 2 of the Stitches guys are professional sober guys now.

PM: What prompted you to start The Crazy Squeeze?

JW: Johnny Sleeper (original Stitches drummer) and I had another band, about 2 years ago, called the 10ors. We had Jimmy Greco (pro skater) and Francois from Motorcycle Boy in the band. We did some recordings and played some gigs, but then it fizzled out. Sleeper & I had a bunch of rehearsal time booked for the 10ors, so we just started writing new songs. We got a bass player, and second guitar player & called it The Crazy Squeeze.

PM: Is this the first tour with that band?

JW: Yeah. We had some tour stuff booked for last November, but we had to cancel. We ended up getting rid of the 2nd guitar player at that time, and we had to find a new one. That's when we got Frankie from The Teenage Frames.

PM: I really like some of the Teenage Frames releases – how’d you meet Frankie Delmane? And why/when’d he leave Chicago?

JW: I’ve known Frankie for about 10 years. I met him through a mutual friend. The Frames played a show in Hollywood, and the door guy left his seat open. I jumped into his seat and started charging people money. We were able to buy tons of drinks with the cash. This cracked Frankie up, and we’ve been friends ever since. Frankie had to leave Chicago, because he got the reputation as being a sexual predator. Plus he hates cold weather

PM: Describe the musical differences between the Stitches and the Crazy Squeeze (apart from the fact that your new group is more Dollsy)?

JW: The Crazy Squeeze can actually play their instruments.

PM: What label’s the new single on, when’s it out and how’d you settle on the two tracks that are gonna be on there (how many songs you guys got at this point/what’s your set like)?

JW: We’ve had a few offers from labels to put out the 7”, but they all fell through do to everyone being broke/ bad economy. We’re gonna put the 7” out on the Stitches label Vinyl Dog records.  We’ve had the 2 songs recorded since last year, and it should be out this summer. We have about 15-02 songs (including a few covers). We usually do about 10-12 song live set. [CON’T]

The Bizarros - "Lady Doubonette" (Video)

The Bizarros weren't the biggest band in Akron. And actually seemed to have impacted latter, localized scenes less than almost any of its contemporaries. That being said, the band had a few recorded moments that count as some of the better Velvet impersonations from Ohio.

TWOFR: The Locust x Soccer Team

The Locust

Safety Second, Body Last

(Ipecac Recordings, 2005)

This compact disc holds just over ten, that’s correct, ten minutes of music.  Yet some how, Mike Patton and his team of savvy indie-music biz moneygrubbers have deemed this slab worthy of a ten, that’s correct, ten-dollar price tag.  Now, whether or not I’m a fan of Patton and his various projects, I refuse to allow such a blatantly ridiculous occurrence to go uncommented upon.  So, let’s take time out here so that I may begin a dialogue with said label boss.  Ahem.  Sir.  I am part of the record buying populace and find the pricing of your labels latest single to be exorbitant.  Firstly, the pretension of squeezing eight (or whatever the number maybe) songs onto two tracks is blindingly repulsive.  Secondly, when I purchase a record by a group such as The Locust, I am not looking for minimalist electronic music (which occurs sometime during the first track), I’m solely looking for some (retardedly) short blasts of HC violence.  Furthermore, Mr. Patton, while I appreciate the space noises and what occasionally sounds like Devo playing HC, I simply loose myself in the space of a seven minute screed of noise that is the first track.  I can tell, sir, that the band meticulously planned out this recording, replete with videogame and cricket noises, but I simply want more for my money.  You see, I have a job that pays seven dollars an hour.  So I have to work 1.428 hours just to buy this record.  I don’t find that quite acceptable.  Please get back to me when you get a chance.  Thanks again.

Soccer Team

“Volunteered” Civility & Professionalism

(Dischord Records, 2006)

Despite the general media consensus that the new Dischord sound is edgy, arty and a fresh look at indy pop, middle of the road releases have brought down labels as well established and respected.  Soccer Team comes to the roster sporting a former label employee and Ryan Nelson (former Beauty Pill/Most Secret Method).  This duo is able to create interesting and moody pop songs rooted in spacey ramblings.  The noise and ambiance from this album is commendable, but not cohesive or admirable. The ability of a musician to create sounds that are pleasing is not the greatest task of all.  The ability of a musician to create these sounds and organize them in some manner is the concept that all must strive for.  The album begins with an eighties sounding subdued track which leads into something a bit more sad.  The one element that this group has not as of yet figured is that the more variety in each song there is, or emotion and sound, the more gripping the listen will be. “Lobster Season” sounds like The Cramps if they didn’t have any drugs and were a bit tired.  It really doesn’t get any better or worse from there. “Platonic, Unrequited, Tragic” almost reaches a point where critics may summon the word art.  But swirling guitars won’t get you over forever.  With a bit more sonic variation Soccer Team can and will be more interesting.  But, if you want some duo style pop to pass out to, here ya go.

 

The Reatards: Up in the Bedroom, Disasters

Punk’s a weird animal. And the Reatards were the three-legged horse of the punk scene during the late nineties and into the augties. But, ya know what? That’s good.

Disbanding the group, though, served as entrance into high visibility for Jay Reatard. Unfortunately, he didn’t make it to the other side, instead petering out in an excess of attention. At least the man enjoyed a good deal of (underground) success during his final years.

Bed Room Disasters, though, is a compilation of singles and tracks recorded in various bedrooms across Memphis with nary a real studio in sight. Most likely some of these songs shouldn’t have made it on to any cd: the unlistenable “Fashion Victim”, the ridiculous, “Puke on You,” (a rip off of the Boys?) or the Germs-esque “Loretta.”  That’s punk though and the losers are the winners.

Apart from the stuff that’s a bit difficult to get through on Bed Room Disasters, there are a number of covers (Ramones, Saints, Angry Samoans), including “Running Free,” which isn’t exactly a Dead Boys track but lifts the riff and the vocal delivery.  It’s a befitting homage, purposefully or not.

A number of the originals are really stunning, however.  Some great choruses see the light of day like, brought up from the basement or wherever these tracks were birthed - “I gotta rock n roll/Before I loose my mind,” being quant and apropos all at once.

While not every track can be quality, there are a number of sonically competent guitar riffs (“No Turning Back”, “Chuck Taylor’s AllStar Blues”, “Bummer Bitch”).  Now that I’ve praised ‘em, I do have to say that Jay Reatard went on to form The Lost Sounds, whom no one in good conscience vouch for. Surely, the market for weird robot punk hit a peak with the genre becoming engorged during the very early aughties – still though, not that great. But, for some reason the mid to late nineties produced some really passionate punk rock. The Reatards are one of those bands with substandard musicianship, a howling vocalist and that really just means good punk. Today there’s not a band that can churn out the punk like these guys, The Showcase Showdown or The Prostitutes and that’s Americas’ loss.  It seems like keyboards and new wavey drumbeats and fey lead singers are more popular today than authentic anger and drunken teenagers. Oh well, at least we still have reissues and compilations like this one.

Los Saicos - "Demolicion" (Video)

This is one of the most evil sounding garage tracks dating back to the sixties that I've ever heard. There's a bit of that "Surfin' Bird" vibe moving throughout the whole thing, but Los Saicos remain a tremendous and under-appreciated force in garage from it's initial era.

Nick Tosches: An Annotated Bibliography (Part Two)

“A Baby Wolf with Neon Bones.” Penthouse. April 1976.

            http://www.oceanstar.com/patti/intervus/760400ph.htm

            (accessed September 18, 2010).

Fixating on a single artist or player often times serves some weird personal motivation. And after taking in a few of the opening questions in this interview, which focus on Patti Smith’s sexuality, the reader might start to get the wrong idea. Apart from the fact that Smith’s music deals with the subject, the interview, which appeared in a ‘men’s magazine’ probably needed to be slanted in that direction.

Even with those opening salvos (and a few other vacuous prompts, “When did it first occur to you to blend rock 'n' roll with poetry?”), the interview is overwhelmingly taken over by Smith reminiscing about her childhood, how she didn’t fit in with the boys or girls in her school and how the wound up impacting her work.

It’s all rather candid, but that’s in part due to Smith’s personality. Tosches being able to edit her responses and weave it all into a cohesive experience, wrapping it in high mindedness masquerading as banality - “I believe in the Rolling Stones but not in the Dave Clark Five. There's nothing philosophic about it.” – and including a patch about how rock stars (Dylan, Morrison, Hendrix) aren’t really that engaging one on one makes for a good read even if Smith isn’t a figure that’s of interest.

 

Easter: the Patti Smith Group. 1978.

            http://www.oceanstar.com/patti/crit/tosches.htm

            (accessed September 18, 2010).

 

Beginning with a mention of poet Charles Olson, whose work was rendered in song by the Fugs in 1966, sets Tosches in a literary tradition removed from non-fiction and reportorial works and gets off the line, “The real poets have had the least poetic natures.”  What’s meant to be an album review carries on in this strain for just about a quarter of the piece’s length.

Smith’s set in this tradition as Tosches recalls a reading she gave a few years prior to the review being written. The entirety of this thing isn’t narrative, but it seems as if that’s the way it’s going to be for most of the review. What winds up happening, though, is Tosches focuses on a few lyric passages and almost totally recoils from defining the music by someone he terms “the greatest broad poet that ever was.” Of course, considering Smith came to rock and roll through her writing, Tosches’ summation of her work jives with its intent; fooling the fey-hip crowd into listening to a female poet.

Giant Sand: Hard to Muster the Energy

I first read the name Giant Sand a few years back. It was the middle of the summer and without too much at all to do, I’d been running through a few books per week in an effort to stave off complete and utter boredom.

In the middle of some forgettable book detailing independent musics during the eighties and nineties, there was a bit about Giant Sand. The thing was, the brief mention of the group was accompanied by any description of its music or the background of the ensemble. But seeing as I’d be hard pressed to properly recall the name of that book at this point it might mean those pages weren’t soldered together with too much more than binding.

Beyond that, the description of Giant Sand must not have been so overpowering as to necessitate my searching the band out. Certainly, there was some mention of folk music and probably at least some passing mention of Dylan or Waits. It doesn’t really matter anymore. But all of that came back to me after seeing an ad for Blurry Blue Mountain, an album Giant Sand released twenty five years after its first disc. But even that can’t really properly explain the career trajectory of the band.

Howe Gelb moved to Tucson, Arizona after growing up a bit in Pennsylvania. He’s been in that latter locale a longer time at this point, but his music doesn’t read as if it was spawned from the dessert. Instead, it’s some amalgam of folkisms and a sense of country music clearly figured out second hand through reissues and a slew of compilations.

What makes it so comical is the flat nature of Blurry Blue Mountain. I’ve not been sitting around with other work from the group – and this is clearly not the best point of entry. So, despite the seemingly endless slew of praise detailing Gelb’s ability to genre hop across American music, there’s not a real musical hook here.

“The Last One” gets jazzy, but jazzy in the way that Bob Wills would have approved. There’s no swing here, but Gelb orchestrates a lilting country track that comes off morose regardless of how one might want to read the whole thing.

Extending the updated hillbilly concept, “Brand New Swamp Thing” attempts to turn on listeners with a theatrically slinky rock thing, but comes up short. The patch of noise in the middle doesn’t hurt, though.

It’d be completely unfair to write off a group with such a long history based on this one late career album. But it’s pretty hard to muster the energy to dig anything else up after sitting through Blurry Blue Mountain.

Toxin III: Not as Racist as Skrewdriver, but at least it's American

The most incredible thing about Toxin III and how some folks from the backwoods of Louisiana found punk in the waning moments of the seventies is that a piece written by Nick Tosches for Rolling Stone on Patti Smith interested band members.

That’s a tremendously powerful perspective on journalism. But totally appropriate in some instances.

Most noticeable about Toxin III is the logo it used on the cover of its one single. Combining the confederate flag and a swastika in addition to hailing from the deep south probably makes folks believe Toxin III to be a fascist band. Maybe they are, but an admitted love of the Clash might dispute that fact. Regardless of the group’s political leanings – which might be obfuscated by “Seig Heil Rock ‘n Roll” after a cursory listen – its recorded legacy seems as strong as just about any unknown group hailing from the first wave of punk.

Finding itself anthologized on one of the Killed By Death compilations, Toxin III eventually got itself a proper release of the collected works it recorded. And oddly enough, there’s been some international attention for the group. Let’s just hope that there’s no reunion gig. We all know how hillbillies age. It’s not always pretty.

Anyway, lumped together on I Rock I Ran (Again) are some studio works and demos. There’s nothing present that completely changes the way one might look at punk. But between the title track, which opens the album, and the aforementioned “Seig Heil Rock ‘n Roll” there’s really no reason to miss this one.

What’s impressive here, though, is that the band is able to work within the most stringent guidelines of the punk genre and then push it’s limits. Again, these guys don’t get all jazzy or improvise a tremendous amount, but a pair of songs at the heart of this album amply portray an ensemble that could have done more than it did.

“Is It Really Dead ?” all of a sudden gets extraordinarily funk and seems as if it might have come from the Gang of Four back catalog. After one takes in the funky drumming and heavy bass-line, the discordant guitar is just about shocking.

Continuing on in a minimal vein the following “Middle Class” almost sounds like the Jam’s rhythm section working out with some NYC minimal guitarist. The vocals even come off as a nascent rap. It’s all things at once.

Less fascism here than one would expect, but some ferociously persistent punk.

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