Despite the low-key packaging (plain black center-hole sleeve with no other info or inserts), Starvation Army's self-released "Ticket to Oblivion" 12-inch is a pretty good dose of solid late-'80s Cleveland rock, even if some of the quirky touches that made their two earlier 7"-ers on St. Valentine so great are missing. The few attempts at curveballs here end up wide of the mark-- the jazzy "Wildly Mispent", for instance-- but the rest is straight-ahead punk rock. Plus, one of Starvation Army's strong points was always Fraser Sims' vocal style, and here it's as hard to pin down as ever; try figuring out who he's trying to sound like, or if there's anyone else who sounds like him, and you'll just be left scratching your head. One of my favorite overlooked bands from the '80s, if you haven't already noticed.
Starvation Army -
(these files are now listen-only)
"I'm a Saint"
"Tarantula"
"Gunfighter"
"Disconnected Boy"
8 comments:
this reminds me that I have old issues of NEGATIVE PRINT somewhere.
Ooooh, Negative Print was great!! OOPS, too. Cleveland had some great zines.
It certainly did. Do you remember Vince Rancid, the artist from Kent, OH? his stuff was featured in a lot of them...I'm surprised he's not more known today.
Now there's a name that I'd pretty much forgotten. I Vince Rancid did the Raw Power records, and the ads for Toxic Shock and stuff?
The zine-artist guy that I remember the most from back then (besides Pushead) was Jim Blanchard. He had a punk zine back then called "Blatch" which was pretty cool...
I forgot he did the Raw Power stuff. Met and stayed with him in Kent... watched him slaughter a rabbit for dinner, (I declined)!
who was the guy that did all the Poison Idea flyers?
I did meet Pushead's mom too. (she didn't slaughter anything).
Do you have that Children's Crusade 7"?
I believe it's SA's Fraser Sims and Doug Gillard of Death of Samantha/Cobra Verde/GBV/a million other bands.
If not, I'll have to digitize it and put it on my blog.
I only know about the Children's Crusade record because it came out on Scat (I think there's a whole cassette of the stuff), but I've never heard it. I've got one Children's Crusade track that was on the "They Pelted Us With Rocks and Garbage" Negative Print compilation, it's pretty interesting...
The mp3 files on this post are now listen-only (non-downloadable) files. TOUGH LUCK, WIZZNUTS! No, actually, for those of you who missed the boat, I will do my best to respond to any e-mailed requests for the original files.
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