No Longer In My World

Another brilliant minimalist Blackbean and Placenta Tape Club packaging job on this one, with a couple of glossy mag photos pasted to the front-- each sleeve had different photos, from what I've seen-- and barely a handwritten "45" or "33" on the label to differentiate between the two sides (each side plays at a different speed, naturally). The sleeve on my copy got a little messed up from being stapled to the wall at Brass City Records, but when you're an international pop star like Jim Rao, that's what happens: your records go right up on the wall next to the butcher cover and the collectible Venom shaped pic discs.

Tricycle Popstar is a Japanese guy living in Australia, if I remember correctly from the Four Letter Words comp, and if you own that comp then you can trust me that the song I'm posting here is even better than "No Skin Off My Ass". Really, no higher praise exists.




Orange Cake Mix -

"Sunday Kind of Girl"

Tricycle Popstar -

"Peach Boys Bed Sounds"

(these files are now listen-only)

If That's A Police Song Then It's Fucked Up Anyway

If you haven't heard the self-titled Cheveu LP that came out last year, you should track it down because it's a hoot. This track here is nothing like it (not really), so that'll give you another side of Cheveu to explore.

As for Tyvek (that's a locked groove, by the way), Paul Bruno says it's time for the backlash anyway, so I'll have nothing good to say about them.




Tyvek -

"Future Junk"

Cheveu -

"El Tortuga"

(these files are now listen-only)

I Can't Imagine What Goes Through Your Head

Last Sunday's Delay/Swear Jar show in Windsor had probably the biggest crowd of any house show I've ever been to. No doubt it was because of the headliners (whose name I'll remember in just a second), but jeez, the number of people standing around both inside and outside for this thing was massive. For instance, when I first pulled up around 8:30 and parked on the street behind the first row of cars that I saw, I figured I was only one or two doors down from where I had to go; I had no idea how far I actually was from the house. Turned out it was only about a quarter-mile walk or so, but it felt like I was walking to the Big E or something. Hey, sometimes I'm lazy, what do you want from me.

This show was on time like a motherfucker, too, which means I pretty much missed the first two bands but got there just in time for Swear Jar and Delay, who were awesome. Both Swear Jar and Delay play the sort of rough-around-the-edges pop-punk that almost woulda passed for "indie rock" back in the day, but as long as bands wanna lug their amps around and play anthemic rock tunes, I'll show up no matter what it's called. I guess this was Delay's first show in CT, even though they've got a bunch of records and CDs out; I love their stuff on the split 7" with Monikers, plus they were selling copies of a new tape-only album ("Plain Language") which is going to be released on vinyl soon by Salinas, and on CD by someone else. It's all really good Middle American pop/rock type stuff, much like a new school slant on Hüsker Dü/early Replacements-- sorta similar to Modern Machines in that sense-- with maybe a little bit of The Embarrassment, although I'm not sure if Delay are old enough to have ever listened to The Embarrassment or not. Anyway, Delay tore it up big time, and they were really funny guys, too.




Swear Jar's set seemed a bit more ragged than the one I saw at Whitney House a couple of weeks earlier, or maybe it was how the layout of the Whitney basement helps push the sound straight forward and makes just about any band sound better. The garage we were in was humid as hell, making it hard for the bands to stay in tune, and I think I lost a pound or two just standing there. In any case, it was still a good set and everyone who was there was getting into it, plus the Swear Jar tape is finally out so everyone else can hear some of these songs now, too (I don't think Swear Jar have a MySpace or anything like that). Once the word gets around in pop-punk circles about these guys, they are gonna kick some serious butt. Big thanks to Chris for sending me the mp3 files and saving me from having to rip them, since my cassette rips are generally pretty crappy anyway.


Swear Jar -

"You Bet It Does"

Delay -

"Bad Habits, Good Company"

(these files are now listen-only)

Count The Things That I've Done Wrong

Henry over at Chunklet put up a post recently, pointing out the scarcity of good-to-great 10" records (which quickly de-evolved into a "name every 10-inch record you've ever heard of" competition in the comment string, but that's alright), and that prompted me to dig out and post one of my favorite 10"-ers of all time: "Some Girls Like Cigarettes", by the Karl Hendricks Trio.

I'm pretty sure that the Karl Hendricks Trio are one of the most seriously undervalued outfits to take shape in the 90's, which you can judge for yourself by listening to the tracks I've posted here (and by seeking out their stuff through Merge, which is mostly all still available digitally and why I won't be keeping these tracks up for very long). When Karl Hendricks goes for The Big Rock, it sounds like Thee Speaking Canaries trying to swallow My Dad Is Dead whole; when he takes it back a bit, you're still left with a bleeding mess of comic despair. I mean, "The Last Thing You'll Ever Do For Me", with a guy asking his girlfriend to kill him off after she dumps him, is just funny ("Hold me down, kiss me, cut my throat... you can always change the sheets after I'm dead"). And who else would you say writes songs more beautiful yet-still rocking than "It Could Be A Miracle" or "If This Song Was A Cigarette"? The fucking Pixies? Give up.




Karl Hendricks Trio -

"Some Girls Like Cigarettes"

"It Could Be A Miracle"

"If This Song Was A Cigarette"

"Ducky"

"The Last Thing You'll Ever Do For Me"

(these files are now listen-only)

A Countdown To What I Don't Know

Tuesday night (geez, over a flippin' week ago) was another night spent at the Whitney House, though I only hung around long enough to catch the two openers-- locals Swear Jar and Dead Uncles-- and then split before the touring bands hit the stage (something Red Scare something-or-other, you can google it if you want). Swear Jar were good, very good; in fact, they might be my second-favorite new Ct. band I've seen so far this year, after Wonderlust. Hearing their recordings will correct me on this, I'm sure, but Swear Jar have a sorta Dylan Bredeau screamy pop punk thing going on, though a bit more ironed out, and their melodies were smooooth. I'm looking forward to their first demo tape, which is supposed to be out this weekend when they host a house show with Delay and (yïk) Andrew Jackson Jihad.

Dead Uncles had a bit of a sound problem for their first couple of songs-- turns out Swear Jar had turned all the knobs down but didn't tell anyone about it-- but their rest of their short set (6 or 7 songs, maybe?) was sweet. Dead Uncles were supposed to have a 7" out by now, or at least in time for their tour in August, but the test pressing got rejected, thus the wait. The band did release "Wayward Nowhere" from the record as a preview track a couple of months ago, and I like it a lot-- especially the rifle shot snare hits at the beginning, and the breakdown in the middle-- so here it is.





Dead Uncles -

(this file is now listen-only)

"Wayward Nowhere"

Boredom Won't Starve As Long As I Feed It

This has long been my favorite Homestead 7-inch, which I think says something when you consider all the great 45's that came out on Homestead back in the mid-to-late 80's (most of which I've posted here already): Big Black, Squirrel Bait, Honor Role, Phantom Tollbooth, Volcano Suns, and so forth. If you were anything like me-- a hardcore punk kid, raised on 70's metal, who had openly admired his dad's Neil Young and Crazy Horse albums and was beginning to see the end of hardcore's reign as the underground's great white art hope-- the emergence of a band like Dinosaur was a flippin' godsend.

I saw Dinosaur's original line-up a bunch of times (even before the Jr. was added), including one show at Wesleyan's Eclectic House that was cut short when the fire alarm went off during Dinosaur's set, only it took them finishing the song they were playing before anyone could hear the alarm-- that's how punishingly loud they were. The strangest Dinosaur show I ever saw, though, was at the Night Shift Cafe in Naugatuck, which must've been around '88 or so. Lou and J. got into a fight onstage and actually started hitting each other, including one of them (I forget now if it was Lou or J.) swinging his guitar, still strapped around his neck, at the other one like a baseball bat. The two pictures you see below (scanned from an old issue of Brushback) are from that show, although I stopped taking pictures once the fight broke out; it was so uncomfortable that I put my camera down, not wanting to turn anyone's meltdown into a National Enquirer moment. There's been times since then when I've kinda wished I had gone ahead and taken a photo or two, though.

Supposedly the on-stage fight was mentioned in the book Our Band Could Be Your Life; unfortunately, when I flipped through the book trying to find it, the writing was so boring that I had to stop reading after a couple of pages.




Dinosaur -

"Repulsion"

(this file is now listen-only)

They Told Me I Was Everything

If Estrogen Highs come anywhere near your area on their current tour, then jesus christ go see them-- especially since they've got this one new song, "Logical Doctor", which is just about the greatest song ever written. Plus to correspond with the tour they've released a killer new 7", which I've been itching to rip ever since I bought it three weeks ago. (These will be listen-only files, though; I don't wanna be giving away all of their new goods for free, and risk getting a punch in the face at the Birth Control show in a couple of weeks.)

"Echo" is the standard Estrogen Highs rocker that you've come to expect, though it's still pretty great, and it even has this cool theremin-like part running all the way through it (I guess it's called a Stylophone). The b-side, "They Told Me I Was Everything", is the real find here, sounding like some sort of nasty spawn between Syd Barrett Pink Floyd, The Fall, and Modern Lovers. One of the finest bands Ct. has to offer, and they've recently put together a new CD-R of their first two singles and the Telephone Explosion tape (all out of print), so now's your chance to get caught up.





Estrogen Highs -

"They Told Me I Was Everything"

"Echo"

(these files are listen-only)