Saturday, February 28, 2009

Let Dick Clark Work Out All The Details

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Now that Mr. HCI has painted me as a know-nothing about Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments, here's the classic Great Plains LP, "Naked at the Buy, Sell, and Trade". Part Embarrassment "Death Travels West", part Replacements "Let It Be", and part how-the-hell-did-that-get-in-there, I'm guessing that most people who already knew about this record back then were too busy complaining about Ron House's vocals to notice how good Great Plains' songs really were. Of course, if you missed this record (and the 80's) entirely, you'll probably never fully understand how dead-perfect the oft-mentioned "Letter To A Fanzine" really is. It's just one of those things that can't be recreated by hindsight, not to mention that it's way more clever to have picked on The Offense Newsletter than it is to talk shit in the comments section of freakin' Brooklyn Vegan.


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Great Plains -

"Dick Clark"

"Last Chance To Be Free"

"Letter To A Fanzine"

"Origin Of My Silly Grin"

"Time To Name The Dog"

(these files are now listen-only)


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12 comments:

Jersey Beat Podcast said...

I just played a track by St. Paul & His Coalition of the Willing, which - I discovered belatedly - is Paul Nini of Great Plains, Log, and TJSA.

And hey, whoever this HCI is, it can't be as bad as what Coley and Cosloy used to say about me.

Brushback said...

"HCI" is Mr. Horribly Charred Infant from Happy Flowers! (And also The Landlords... and Castoff blog)

I was just kidding about Mr. HCI, also; it's in reference to the comments on the New Bomb Turks "Bottle Island" post.

Anonymous said...

You beat me to the Great Plains punch! I suppose now I'll have to find the link to the photos from the reunion show with Big Dipper and Antietam from last year, where they closed with "Letter To A Fanzine". Furthering my opinion that oddly, Ohio never fails (TJSA, Gaunt, New Bomb Turks, Brainiac, Devo, Dead Boys, Pagans, Rubber City Rebels)..the almost-palindrome state strikes again!

Brushback said...

Yeah, Ohio's always had tons of great shit. They practically invented punk, along with The Ramones, even.

Anonymous said...

hey sean, i haven't even seen those photos!!

PB said...

Ron House is my punk rock hero.

Kudos to you for posting this.

However, jeers for not including my favorite cut from this LP, "Hall of Shame."

Brushback said...

Aw, man - I can't include EVERY track! Gotta cut stuff out somewhere...

Sometimes I think when I pick the 5 songs that I think are the best, that somebody somewhere else likes a completely different set of songs from the record.

Anonymous said...

I had a chance to see these guys back in the day. I even had a conversation with one of their members where he told me they were the worst selling band on Homestead.

Brushback said...

I'd heard the Green River LP on Homestead sold only 300 copies the year it was released.

Brushback said...

Actually, it's unbelievable now when you look back at the records that Homestead put out, that those records weren't the big world-beaters right off the bat that they should've been. I mean, NOBODY liked Dinosaur, NOBODY liked Sonic Youth, outside of a handful of people, and if you followed those bands back then it was like being a part of a secret club. Sure, a lot of people pretend now that they were into those records and those bands from the beginning, but I know firsthand that they're full of shit. The fanzines all hated Big Black, nobody gave Homestead the time of day.

Brushback said...

The mp3 files on this post are now listen-only (non-downloadable) files. For those of you who missed the boat, I will do my best to respond to any e-mailed requests for the original files.

Paul Nini said...

Someone just pointed me to this entry, a good time after the fact. Anyhow, thanks for posting this. Those of you wanting to download Great Plains releases should see --
http://www.emusic.com/album/10602/10602996.html

Thanks much.
Paul Nini
www.old3c.com