I've Been Against It

House of Large Sizes-- named after a big-and-tall shop, I think-- weren't really a band that I paid a lot of attention to, though their take on math-y, non-traditional rock could be good at times (namely, there's a split with Treepeople that I wouldn't mind having, if anyone's got a copy). As for this particular single, the a-side sounds a bit like Breadwinner, but at nearly 5-1/2 minutes long doesn't know when to quit; bands need to be making their songs shorter, that's all I'm sayin'. On the b-side, though, HoSL ramp up the "Too Fast For Love" and come up with something that's way more rocking. You could learn to like it, just like I did.





House of Large Sizes -

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"Two-Liter Man"

The World Is Big Enough To Look After Itself

I've held off posting this record for a while because, honestly, I've forgotten most of the tiny details about it. I know that Aargh! Records was Piewackit's label (I might even have a Piewackit single laying around here, if I could ever find it), and I know I ran into the guy who put this record out at Brass City Records a couple of times, but that's about it. I'm a little bit fuzzy on L-R Duo, too; they're accordian and koto (koto being a traditional Japanese stringed instrument), meaning don't expect to hear the kind of stuff that I normally post here, and I know that one of them went to Wesleyan so I'm tagging them as a Ct. band even though it might not be completely true.

These are facts: White is from Madison, Wisconsin, and if you're a fan of noise-rock stuff like Twin Stumps or whatever, "Eat The World" is some of the most fucked-up shit you'll ever hear.




White -

"Eat The World"

L-R Duo -

"Arbutus Dog"

"Indian Hill"

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Wait, I Don't Know

It felt weird leaving the house before 7:00 last night for a show in New Haven, but The Space is an all-ages spot so it actually matters if you get there before 8 o'clock. Even though The Space has been around for 7 years or so I'd never been there before, so I took some time to walk around the place, trying to stay out of other people's way (one girl pointed to a chair I was standing next to and said "Are you sitting here?", to which I replied "No, I'm standing over here").

Titles went on first, and since they hadn't played in about six months they eased through a really short set of all new songs, during which Brad (the singer) tried to stretch things out a bit by telling really dry stories in-between each song while the rest of the guys in the band laughed at him ("go on, you're doing a great job"). If you're thinking this sounds like my kind of entertainment, you're probably right. "Up With The Sun" was my favorite Ct. release of '08, and the next Titles album ("Dirt Bell") is already sounding like it's going to have even more great material; "Bottom of the Lake" and "Who to Hold", the last two songs of last night's set, were particularly stunning. A Titles song won't always have a rousing chorus, or a telegraphed crescendo, or even seem like a fully finished idea some of the time-- in fact, their slower songs seem to be getting even shorter-- but there always seem to be a point in their best songs where I start to marvel at what's going on, and then go back and try to figure out how it arrived at that point in the first place.




I like the King Tuff record alright, and the Happy Birthday song ("Girls FM") on the Sub Pop web site that everyone seems to have heard also, but two songs into his set last night and I started wandering off-- it was just ridiculously dumb. I was actually on the stairs on my way out the door, only the next song sounded friggin' great (I think it was "I Wanna Stay"), so I went back in. This time I stood at the back of the room, where the sound was fuller, and that seemed to solve the problem for a while. A part of me is willing to go to the mat for anything that resembles Rasperries-styled '70s pop-rock in a world full of Passion Pits, but not at the expense of putting up with someone else's lazy bullshit. Eventually I wandered off back to the stairs, and wouldn't you know the band started sounding great again, so I guess the whole point was that Happy Birthday sound really nice if there's stairs around.


Titles -

"Piano Girl"

Happy Birthday -

"Girls FM"

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One Of These Days I'll Find The Edge Of Town

Dunno if anyone remembers me talking about the playing card-like set of CosmoSingles that I bought at the Hygienic Arts festival in New London last year-- 16 bands, 16 two-song CDs-- but anyway, Cosmodemonic Telegraph is releasing another set again this year, to coincide with another Hygienic Arts festival at the end of this month. Like with the previous two sets, you'll also be able to buy the set as a single CD, except that this year it's a double CD, called "Powers", featuring 28 tracks in all. That's twenty-eight bands, nearly all of them from New London, with all of them almost completely different from each other. Really, there hasn't been a town with the ability to throw that kind of hand on the table since the heyday of the '90s Danbury scene, but that's what New London has been doing for a while now.

My favorite track on the compilation is definitely the one from Rich Martin's band, Brazen Hussy, whom I saw about 4 years ago (at the Manchester VFW with The Chuck Hestons, who were awesome that night) but haven't really stayed on top of since. "Broke Into Your Facebook" has a really cool Bratmobile/Slant 6 thing going on, so I guess that means there's some catching up I need to do.

I've picked out a few of my favorite tracks from the compilation to post here, although they'll be listen-only files; some of the other bands on the compilation include Brava Spectre, The Can Kickers, Low-Beam, Bedroom Rehab Corporation, and The Weird Beards, and you can stream all of the tracks individually at the "Powers" Bandcamp site, powers.bandcamp.com (where you can also buy the whole thing as a download now), or just buy the set when it comes out on Jan. 30th.


Get Haunted -

"Cedar Grove"

Brazen Hussy -

"Broke Into Your Facebook"

Fatal Film -

"Remember When You Were Fun"

The Suicide Dolls -

"Senses"

Total Phone -

"Alone"

(these files are all listen-only)

Let It Up

I don't know all that much about SuperSnazz, only that Nørb mentioned them once in one of his zines, so the next time I saw one of their records I bought it. I guess now they sound like the Go Go's or something, but this early single is completely trashy and pretty fucking choice. The b-side instrumental, "Let It Up" (The Sharks, maybe?), sounds like it was recorded on a boom box, and the a-side sounds like the singer was in the next room, which actually isn't a bad idea.




SuperSnazz -

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"Uncle Wiggly"

"Let It Up"

Would You Lose If They Ask You

I don't really have an excuse for not paying more attention to Edsel back in the '90s; maybe there was so much similar-sounding stuff back then that after giving their records one or two spins I just filed them away. Still, after ripping the Edsel track on the "Vehicle" 7-inch a couple of weeks ago, I finally started thinking that they could be a pretty decent band, and so I dug out the one other Edsel vinyl that I own-- their "No. 5 Recitative" single on Jade Tree-- and, well, it has its moments. Sorta striding the middle between Jawbox/Fugazi D.C.-type stuff (obviously) and maybe some Touch and Go indie rock stuff like Seam (at least on the b-side, "Laugh Him to Scorn"), I'd say. You can't go wrong with the top-notch control of dynamics and the solid playing here, especially the snappy rhythm section, so I can dig this.




Edsel -

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"No. 5 Recitative"

"Laugh Him to Scorn"

I've Got A Busy Schedule Of Annihilating Myself

Women's Basketball is a (fake) band in which Tyler Trudeau is the only member. Women's Basketball (the band) has nothing to do with the act of women playing basketball. --Tweefort Records press release

Fake band are a great idea, especially when they're actually not even real (remember Sioux Savage? didn't think so), except that Women's Basketball are a sort-of-real band and it's really the guy in the band who's made up (if you're not following me here then don't worry about it). Anyway, the Women's Basketball album is one of the first things CT's Tweefort Records has released since becoming a full-fledged digital-only label, and on the whole, "An Octopus, But Like, An Octopus" is a pretty fun thing to check out if you're into home-recorded stuff that's way catchy and more than a little bit clever. I like these hand-crafted demos even better than Tyler’s main project, The Tyler Trudeau Attempt, though your own enjoyment might depend on your tolerance for Tyler's singing voice; myself, I think hearing lines like "I need to act fucking dignified" being sung by a voice that sounds like a poodle that's getting run over by a dump truck is pretty hilarious, if not a huge part of the overall charm. On top of that, there's also an ancient drum machine that sounds straight out of a M.O.T.O. cassette from the '80s, which goes even better with the songs that have a more punkish tempo, like "Hold Me, Fuckers". Stephen Fievet has nothing to worry about, I'm sure, but in any case this definitely one of the more amusing things I've heard in the first two weeks of this year.


Women's Basketball -

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"Evan, Don't Touch My Stuff"


You can download the entire 10-song album by going to tweefort.com/releases, and while you're there, check out some of the other Tweefort Records stuff as well (there've been five releases so far).

Let's Go Bonin' On The Condo Lawn

The Injections were practically the one and only Weaselcore band in CT back in the '90s; I think their 1997 demo, "Won't Grow Up" (which I posted a while ago) is even better than this 7", but "The Kids Aren't Right" has their best song-- "25 Perry Ave."-- so I guess it evens out. "25 Perry Ave." is about the Anthrax, of course, and if you've read Chris Daily's book then you might know what the line in the song about "condo lawns" is referring to... if not, then you can always scan down a bit here to read Jeff Spazz' rejection letter from "The Real World", which actually has the balls to reference e.e. cummings. Man, those MTV people are so literary. Reality shows must be serious business!




The Injections -

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"25 Perry Ave"

"Brainkill"

I Understand About Indecision

This is the compilation that proved once and for all that "Smells Like Teen Spirit" is a rip-off of "More Than a Feeling" (actually, I may end up siding with John Beers on this one). "Bostonot" is nine different Northwest bands deconstructing all nine songs from the first Boston album, spread out over two 7"-ers, and while half of this is just plain goofy, a couple of tracks are pretty choice. I think Cog came up with something good with their version of "Smokin'", and Treepeople's take on "More Than a Feeling" might be my second-favorite Treepeople 7" side of all time, after "Important Things".

In a nice touch, the center label on each of the four sides features a different hand-drawn portrait of one of the original guys in Boston; you can pick your own favorite, though the blownout poodle doo's on the Brad and Sib ones make them the front-runners, I think.




Treepeople -

"More Than a Feeling"

Karp -

"Let Me Take You Home Tonight"

Cog -

"Smokin'"

Fitz of Depression -

"Rock & Roll Band"

(these files are now all listen-only)








L to R: Sib Hashian, Tom Scholz, Brad Delp, the two guys nobody remembers

I Thought You Were Different

Here's one that I can guarantee almost none of you have ever heard of before. I never would've heard of Spunk Davis either, except that Spunk Davis guitarist Henry Donahue also ran the Really Fast Racecar record label that put out the Special Pillow 7" in '95, which I posted a while ago. I liked the Special Pillow record enough back then that I mail-ordered a few more things from the label, and this single was one of the records that I ended up with.

Well, it turns out that "High Tide" is a really good punkish/power-pop number, sorta like The Who's "Pictures of Lily" sped up with an MC5/Halo of Flies riff, although it doesn't sound quite that dirty. Or maybe I'm just grasping at straws here. Click on it, and then you tell me. Then put this one on your next '90s mix tape and stump your friends.




Spunk Davis -

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"High Tide"

Practicing To Be A Doctor

I was wandering through the archives of Last Days of Man on Earth the other day, refamiliarizing myself with all the great old St. Louis stuff that Joe's posted over the years-- stuff like White Suburban Youth, the Laffinstock demo (you definitely have to go grab "Fucked Up For Days", it's friggin' classic), and-- best of all-- the first Drunks With Guns 7". All of the early Drunks With Guns stuff is in so many ways superior to everything else; take songs like "Zombie", "Leprosy", and "Wonderful Subdivision", where just the locked-in rhythym section alone will snap your neck back after about two seconds. If you wanna talk about the immediate post-hardcore era (say '85-'89), aside from maybe M.O.T.O. there was no other band whose records were more of a blast to listen to than Drunks With Guns.

Strangulated Beatoffs (an offshoot that featured DWG guitarist Stan Seitrich), on the other hand, not so much. Sure, on "Doctor", a lot of the same elements are still there: the lumbering bassline, the repetitive song title as verse and/or chorus, throw in some hiss and some manufactured tape glitches... good enough in a pinch, I guess, though not quite as hairy-knuckled as the real thing. Still, I'm betting if you used a different name and snuck this out on Parts Unknown today, it would do pretty well. Don't ask me about this Forced Exposure shit, though, that's some lab' I've never even heard of.




Strangulated Beatoffs -

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"Practicing to be a Doctor"