You're A Dick And I'm Gonna Kill You

Back when I was a little hardcore kid, whenever I'd play a new record I'd always drop the needle on the shorter, louder songs first, because one of the neat things about vinyl is that you can tell which songs are quick and thrashy and which songs are slow and boring just by looking at the grooves. Apply that method to this record and you'd obviously play the Olive Lawn song first, because not only is it three times shorter than the song right next to it (The Thrown Ups' "Walrus Head"), but it also has a goofy song title, which is usually a safe bet that something good might happen.

You'd be a little off in this case, since the Thrown Ups rank as one of our nation's finest purveyors of rock ever, while the Olive Lawn song is your basic paint-by-numbers C/Z grunge rock (elevated a notch or two by the goofy song title, of course). But this isn't even a hardcore record anyway, so I don't even know why I'm bothering to go through all of this, except for the fact that early-80's hardcore was way more exciting than the boring early-90's noise rock that grew from it (of which the "Teriyaki Asthma" series, along with the "Love and Napalm" series and all of the others just like it, dealt up in spades).

The b-side presents a bit of a drop off-- though Pain Teens and Unrest are great, this probably isn't their A-1 material-- but I've ripped that side anyway, because both songs are kind of meditative in a way, especially the Unrest song which is almost pure techno. "Caitlin Bums" is also the only song here where the recording doesn't make it sound like my needle has a big piece of fuzz on it, not that there isn't one, you never know.




The Thrown Ups -

"Walrus Head"

Olive Lawn -

"You're a Dick & I'm Gonna Kill You"

Pain Teens -

"Come Up & See Me Sometime"

Unrest -

"Caitlin Bums"

(these files are now listen-only)

Your Band Sucks

The Throw Ups were the Seattle scene's main saving grace in the 80's, operating along the same territory trod by the likes of Drunks With Guns and Happy Flowers and proving yet again how the shit that takes itself too seriously almost always sucks (U2, Yes, the last six or eight Beatles records) and the stuff that has a sense of humor about itself is almost always great (The Ramones, Ted Nugent, the first two or three Beatles records). The most obvious example of The Thrown Ups single-handedly stemming the tide of Seattle's suckiness came when they threw in the towel in 1991, after which Seattle bands promptly began scribbling "pro-choice" on their arms and shooting themselves in the face.

If you were like me in the 80's-- barely going to school sometimes while hanging around in a record store all day listening to uptight dickheads talk about their Moody Blues collections-- there's nothing funnier than playing a record that screams "Your band sucks!" and then laughing your ass off, which is exactly what one of my friends and I did. Not only were the first three Thrown Ups 7"-ers on Amphetamine Reptile totally classic ("Felch", "Eat My Dump", "Smiling Panties"), but they were the ultimate tonic against musical bullshit. I was always the one guy in the crowd who hated The Beatles the most, for instance, so hearing Ed Fotheringham bellowing "Love me... DOOOOOO!!" in "The Ladies Love Me" was always a sure-fire laff riot.

I don't own any of the Thrown Ups 7"-ers anymore (naturally, you practically couldn't give 'em away back then-- call it the Green River Factor-- but they're worth big bucks now), but "Seven Years Golden" collects them all on one CD, which is almost as good. The CD booklet has a big hole punched through the middle, so the spindle that holds the CD in place shows through to intentionally resemble, um, several body parts, but in the interests of the small children who read this blog regularly I blacked those parts out. When you open up the CD it becomes a bullet hole to the foreheads of John F. Kennedy and John Lennon, and what could be more 80's American punk rock than that? Goddamn nothing, I tell you!





The Thrown Ups -

"Your Band Sucks"

"Eat My Dump"

"My Cock Is The Coin"

"The Ladies Love Me"

"Scabby Like My Love"

(these files are now listen-only)