The Mythic Signifier

Magnetic Fields rarities

2011-08-27T16:42:00.010-04:00

Like many, I have been eagerly anticipating the release of Stephin Merritt: Obscurities, which came out on Merge last week. Though, probably also like many, I approach this album with mixed feelings. On one hand, I am of course excited to have a compiled and remastered selection of rarities from the Merritt vaults; at the same time, it makes all those 7"s I bought 15 years ago seem a little less precious. Or perhaps more precious as objects, but less precious for the music they contain, which is now available to all. As it should be (this blog is evidence of my feelings in that regard) - but like I said, these feelings are mixed.

Also complicating my reaction to the new compilation is the fact that it contains several old songs that have never (or hardly ever) seen the light of day - but also that there is a whole slew of obscure songs left off. A number of people have suggested that there should be a second volume released, but from the sound of this interview, that seems pretty unlikely. And so, I've put together this mix as an addendum to the Merge album. I've cheated a bit, because this contains a number of songs outside the timeframe of the Obscurities album, which only goes up to 1999. And there are still some other songs that I didn't put on - the content of all the Future Bible Heroes singles, for instance, or the dance remix of "I Thought You Were My Boyfriend," or the iTunes bonus track from Realism, or a few others. But this mix does feature all of Stephin Merritt's covers (the Numan and Bowie are particularly good), as well as many of more fabulous other tracks from compilations and smaller releases. It's a good listen!

Stephin Merritt
Obscurities (Addendum), compiled 2011

1. Stephin Merritt, "Get Carter" (0:30; Human League cover, 2000)
2. The Magnetic Fields, "I Die: You Die" (3:10; Gary Numan cover, 1997)
3. The Magnetic Fields, "'Heroes'" (5:56; David Bowie cover, 1996)
4. Stephin Merritt, "Beauty" (3:29; Tall Dwarfs cover, 1988)
5. The Magnetic Fields, "The Man Amplifier" (2:25; Young Marble Giants cover, 1995)
6. The Magnetic Fields, "Le Tourbillion" (2:17; Jeanne Moreau cover, 1999)
7. The 6ths (feat. Lloyd Cole), "Human" (3:20; Human League cover, 2000)
8. Stephin Merritt, "Not One of Us" (3:58; Peter Gabriel cover, 2010)
9. Stephin Merritt, "Dream Again" (4:11; Franz Ferdinand cover, 2011)
10. Future Bible Heroes, "Don't You Want Me" (3:50; Human League cover, 2000)
11. The Magnetic Fields, "If I Were a Rich Man" (5:08; Fiddler on the Roof cover, 1999)
12. The Magnetic Fields, "Plant White Roses (Susan Anway vocal)" (4:45; 1995)
13. The Magnetic Fields, "Crowd of Drifters (Susan Anway vocal)" (3:33; 1990)
14. The Gothic Archies, "City of the Damned (original mix)" (1:43; 1996)
15. The Gothic Archies, "The Dead Only Quickly" (1:10; 1996)
16. The Magnetic Fields, "Plant White Roses (Stephin Merritt vocal)" (4:06; 1994)
17. The Magnetic Fields, "The Nun's Litany (Stephin Merritt vocal)" (2:58; 2008)
18. Stephin Merritt, "A Man of a Million Faces" (4:18; 2008)
19. Stephin Merritt, "I'm in a Lonely Way" (2:19; 2007)
20. Stephin Merritt, "The Meaning of Lice" (3:02; 2006)
21. Future Bible Heroes, "Mr. Punch" (3:05; 2007)
22. Future Bible Heroes, "O! What a Dream It Was" (3:22; 1996)

Get it all here. Enjoy!

Treepeople + Archers of Loaf

2011-08-16T16:10:00.009-04:00

In the spirit of all those Teriyaki Asthma singles and my long-running desire to showcase bands from my home state of North Carolina, I thought it would make sense to build a post around this great double 7" release by Treepeople and Archers of Loaf. To boot, I recently saw the Archers on their reunion tour, although due to a scheduling snafu by one of my friends and the fact that the show started exactly on schedule, I missed almost their entire set, which was a bummer. By the way, what's up with bands actually starting on time these days? Is everyone getting old? Or are clubs starting to be all professional and shit? I'm not really complaining, as it is nice to get out of a club having seen three acts by midnight, but it feels a bit odd somehow.

Anyway, for those who don't know, Archers of Loaf were, alongside Superchunk and Polvo, one of the early-90s indie rock bands from Chapel Hill to "make it" on a national scale. They formed in 1991 and released their first album Icky Mettle in 1993. This classic has recently been reissued by Merge and the new version contains much of the material that I am posting here. As always, I encourage you to go pick that up if you'd like a clean copy of these songs. The band consists of Eric Johnson, Matt Gentling, Mark Price, and Eric Bachmann (later of Barry Black and Crooked Fingers). Treepeople were from the opposite side of country, having formed in Seattle after its various members left Boise, Idaho: Scott Schmaljohn, Wayne Rhino Flower, Pat Brown, and Doug Martsch (later of Built to Spill). They didn't take off in quite the way that the Archers did, but they definitely established a place for themselves in the PNW scene. (See their previously-posted appearance on Teriyaki Asthma VIII.) Their line-up changed over the years, most notably when Martsch left to form Built to Spill around 1993/94.

That was right around the moment that this single was recorded. The idea here was that each of the two bands would contribute one new song and one cover of a song by the other band. This leads us to the alluring prospect of hearing Doug Marsch sing "Web in Front" but sadly I believe he had already left the band at this point. At least it doesn't sound like his voice, and the single doesn't include line-ups for the bands - does anyone know whether its him or Schmaljohn singing? Regardless, this is a powerful selection of four songs by two great bands, and well worth a listen.

Treepeople + Archers of Loaf double 7", 1994
Sonic Bubblegum, no. 16

A. Treepeople, "Meet at the End" (4:04)
B. Treepeople, "Web in Front" (2:24)
C. Archers of Loaf, "Quinnbeast" (3:38)
D. Archers of Loaf, "Funnelhead" (2:51)

To give a bit of context for that single, I thought it would be nice to also share Treepeople's first single, from 1989. This one does feature Martsch and the rest of the band in full glory. They sound just slightly ahead of their time, considering this is from the (late) 80s - unlike, say, Nirvana's early output, this could easily be mistaken as having been written after indie/grunge/whatever became so much more mainstream a few years later.

Treepeople 7", 1989
Silence, no. 2

A. "Important Things" (4:24)
B1. "Handcuffs" (3:51)
B2. "In My Head" (2:10)

Sadly I don't have Archers of Loaf's first single (the stunning Wrong/South Carolina), but I do have their second one, which fittingly includes "Web in Front" to compare with Treepeople's version. This was the band's first big hit, and it still sounds great today.

Archers of Loaf, The Loaf's Revenge 7", 1993
Alias, no. 41

A1. "Web in Front" (2:05)
A2. "Bathroom" (1:45)
B. "Tatyana" (4:37)

Finally, since the Archers songs above have all been released on their Speed of Cattle comp or otherwise reissued on the new Icky Mettle release, I thought you might like to hear this single from a few years later, featuring "Harnessed in Slums" off their second LP, Vee Vee, plus a pretty great flipside that to my knowledge has not been otherwise released (yet).

Archers of Loaf, Harnessed in Slums 7", 1995
Alias, no. 72

A. "Harnessed in Slums" (3:12)
B. "Telepathic Traffic" (2:59)

Get all four singles here. Enjoy!

Bonus round: Teriyaki Asthma & Load

2011-08-03T22:58:00.005-04:00

So, no sooner had I finished my last post than did I find myself at a record store in Williamsburg, sifting through old 7"s, and lo and behold what should I find but another volume of Teriyaki Asthma! For a dollar no less. (They had Level Records's Squirrel and Hamster records for cheap too, incidentally.) I thought about adding this to the post below but then a week passed, and then some more, so I figure better now to make this its own little mini-post.

Teriyaki Asthma IX feels a little bit like the series is going out on a whimper. After the downright badassness of Volume VIII - especially that Ween track - the four bands featured here seem pretty innocuous. At least at first. Then I did some digging and discovered that the first featured act, Superconductor, was the first band led by Carl Newman (of the New Pornographers) and that, to boot, it featured six (!) guitars, two basses, plus drums. That must have made for a pretty amazing live act, and you can just get a glimpse of that here, in their cover of an excellent song by the La's. Stymie, the second band featured, should not be confused with the more recent band with the same name - this is the grunge band that never seemed to get it together and make many official recordings during its actual lifespan (their first single was called "Debut Posthumous Single"). On side two, Crackerbash would have been near the end of their run by the time they recorded this - not much info to be found about them. And finally, regarding Trash Can School: as an art guy, I have to give them props for referencing the Ashcan School in their band name, though I'm not sure what meaning we're supposed to derive from that. Maybe it's better just to settle in with their song, as we round out the run of the Teriyaki Asthma singles series.

Teriyaki Asthma IX, 1993
C/Z, no. 70

A1. Superconductor, "There She Goes" (2:27)
A2. Stymie, "One Proud Stout" (2:00)
B1. Crackerbash, "Head Lika Weedeater" (2:42)
B2. Trash Can School, "Hobgoblins" (1:56)

Get the single here.

And you know, while I'm in the bonus mood, I think I'll throw in that last demo by Load, which jamdkoff had requested a little while back. This is quite the epic endeavor - a 10+ minute operatic rock masterpiece. Or perhaps failure. Either way, all that spoken-word poetic diatribe-y stuff on the Load demo tape gets played out here to the fore. See what you think: Get it here.

More soon!

Teriyaki Asthma

2011-07-23T17:53:00.016-04:00

Having focused aplenty on Washington DC, let's move now across the country to Washington state, where we find Seattle's C/Z Records, a small label founded in 1985. C/Z may be overshadowed by its city's other indie label, Sub Pop, but it can in fact lay claim to some serious milestones in the development of indie rock in the Pacific Northwest. According to the label's website, C/Z released the first recordings by such heavy-hitters as Soundgarden, the Melvins, and Built to Spill - not bad. Perhaps more historically, they were the first label to put out a song by Nirvana - namely the track "Mexican Seafood," which appeared as the first song on the first volume of the label's singles series, Teriyaki Asthma, in 1989.

That's a pretty momentous way to start out a singles series, and over the next four years the label did well to keep up, including songs by Babes in Toyland, L7, Helios Creed, and others, as you will soon see. The majority of the Teriyaki Asthma tracks fit squarely within the grunge aesthetic of late-80s/early-90s Seattle, but there are some pleasant surprises, and overall I have to say there is a very high level of sonic quality here. I am not fortunate enough to own all the whole series (the first volume goes for over $100 these days), but I have amassed four of them, which I am presenting here. These and the rest of the singles, including the never-released Teriyaki Asthma X, have been released on CD by the label and seem to still be available here - as always I encourage you to go get those clean and pristine digital versions. In the meantime, have a gander at volumes five through eight below.

I may already have to eat my words about these records featuring mostly PNW bands, as Teriyaki Asthma V opens with a rager by Jonestown who were, from what I can tell, actually from Philadelphia. There's not much information out there about them other than that they featured Tom Greenwood, who went on to co-found Jackie-O Motherfucker in Portland. Gas Huffer actually was from Seattle, as was Daddy Hate Box, which was a side group formed by the singer from Coffin Break and the drummer from Tad. (Their band name is a play on Mother Love Bone, get it?) Porn Orchard hail from Athens, GA and for this single turn in a similarly raucous track, making this single a fine introduction to what Teriyaki Asthma has to offer.

Teriyaki Asthma V, 1991
C/Z, no. 25

A1. Jonestown, "Fuck Your High and Get You Up" (2:24)
A2. Gas Huffer, "Hijacked" (2:11)
B1. Porn Orchard, "What Kills" (3:57)
B2. Daddy Hate Box, "Look Like Hell" (1:56)

Things get interesting on Teriyaki Asthma VI. The first track is by The Thrown Ups, a band by this point in decline thanks to two of its three members devoting themselves to their more well-known act, Mudhoney. They turn in what is apparently a typically manic performance here, on what must have been one of their last recordings. Olivelawn is a bit more obscure, but came from San Diego and, as their song title suggests, clearly have some aggression to work out. Pain Teens are described on Wikipedia as "an experimental noise rock band from Houston, Texas" which I suppose sums up their song here, which sound great - but not as great as the single's last track. That one comes to us by none other than Unrest, who here turn in an instrumental noise groove that foreshadows some of their Imperial ffrr tracks. I'm always excited to post a rare Unrest track!

Teriyaki Asthma VI, 1991
C/Z, no. 36

A1. The Thrown Ups, "Walrus Head" (3:48)
A2. Olivelawn, "You're a Dick & I'm Gonna Kill You" (1:24)
B1. Pain Teens, "Come Up & See Me Sometime" (3:14)
B2. Unrest, "Caitlin Bums" (3:13)

Teriyaki Asthma VII continues with some of my fave indie heavy-hitters, including, on side B, Superchunk and Tsunami, who have been posted here numerous times already. Both these bands' tracks have been anthologized on their own singles comps. Side A features Poster Children, an Illinois trio (sometimes quartet) that has a surprisingly complete website covering every detail of their long history, so I don't feel much need to go on at length here, and C/Z standard-bearer Hammerbox. All these bands, I'm happy to report, prominently feature female members, making this record a nice antidote to the all-guy indie/grunge trend.

Teriyaki Asthma VII, 1992
C/Z, no. 41

A1. Poster Children, "It's True" (2:50)
A2. Hammerbox, "Promise to Never" (1:51)
B1. Superchunk, "Sister" (2:45)
B2. Tsunami, "Punk Means Cuddle" (2:28)

Our last entry from the Teriyaki Asthma series features another great selection. Starting us off is Treepeople, the band that spawned Doug Martsch of Built to Spill - though I am not sure he was playing with them this late in their career. I can't find any information whatsoever about Dose (anyone have any clues?) though MX-80 seems to be better documented, though largely in their later incarnation as MX-80 Sound. But wait, I skipped the most important track - Ween! What the fuck are they doing here? Making a holy racket and sounding like they don't give a shit and/or are as high as kites, surprise. Anyway, this is classic Ween circa Pure Guava and I believe not otherwise compiled. Good stuff!

Teriyaki Asthma VIII, 1992
C/Z, no. 49

A1. Treepeople, "Drawing Lessons" (1:37)
A2. Dose, "Eyesore" (3:30)
B1. Ween, "Long Legged Sally Was a No Necked Whore" (2:47)
B2. MX-80, "Surfin' Pope-X" (2:06)

Phew - get all four singles here. Enjoy!

Machines (two of them)

2011-07-06T21:48:00.006-04:00

Following on the heels of my Level Records posts, here are two absolutely stunning singles from the "Machines" series put out by Simple Machines records back in the day. This series comprised the first six releases on the label, one for each of the eponymous devices: wedge, wheel, pulley, screw, lever, and inclined plane. These were later compiled on CD, so if you want a cleaner copy, you should go get that. In the meantime, I'm posting the two entries from the series that are in my collection, with all the snaps, crackles, and pops like you're sitting listening to your own copies.

First up is Lever, which opens with a great rager by Severin, followed by Scrawl's cover of "Reuters" by Wire, which if not an improvement on the original (how could it be?) is an interesting and worthy entry into the legions of Wire acolyte-ism. Autoclave, who showed up here on the Teenbeat 50 comp a while back, reappear with another hit, and finally the disc wraps up with the real wonder of the bunch, Circus Lupus, whose song "Pacifier" I first heard on a mixtape in 1994 and is still blowing my mind all these years later. Who'd have thunk that you'd hear the influence of Steve Albini and Alain Jourgensen on a Simple Machines release? Listen and learn, my friends.

Lever split 7", 1991
Simple Machines, no. 5

A1. Severin, "Me & You" (4:10)
A2. Scrawl, "Reuters" (2:17)
B1. Autoclave, "Summer" (2:20)
B2. Circus Lupus, "Pacifier" (3:58)

For the final single in the Machines series, those Simple Machines folks really pulled out all the stops, squeezing four of the heaviest hitters of the early 90s indie scene into one amazing single. Inclined Plane boasts a cover of Flower's "Beauty pt. II" by Tsunami (featuring the label's stalwart leaders Jenny Toomey and Kristin Thomson), followed by (yet another) great Superchunk track. On the flip side is a tremendous instrumental by Louisville's Rodan, and finally, fantastically, Unrest's reworking of the Family Fodder hit "Debbie Harry", which is updated to become "Winona Ryder". Anyone who reads this blog knows how I love Unrest, so this is a very happy finale indeed.

Inclined Plane split 7", 1993
Simple Machines, no. 6

A1. Tsunami, "Beauty pt. II" (3:04)
A2. Superchunk, "Baxter" (4:04)
B1. Rodan, "Darjeeling" (4:16)
B2. Unrest, "Winona Ryder" (2:30)

Get both singles here. Enjoy!

Commemorative Rodent Series

2011-07-02T09:15:00.012-04:00

Blame this one on completism. After I got the Load cassette from my grandmother and started corresponding with Damian at Level Records, I got their first 7", a compilation called Hamster that featured one of the Load tracks and was intended as the first in the Commemorative Rodent singles series. Turns out the series never really took, and there was just one more entry before Level closed and Damian et al moved on to bigger and better things. A few years ago I found Squirrel and was pleasantly surprised to find that it had an otherwise-unavailable track by one of my favorite Teenbeat groups, Tuscadero. That song, along with the Chisel song on the same record, is the true highlight here - with all apologies to readers who may feel otherwise, I'm afraid that most of the recordings here, especially on Hamster, simply aren't that good. So consider this post more of an anthropological study - you've heard the hits of the indie rock scene, now remember what it's like when things don't quite gel the way you wish they would.

With that said, a few words about the bands on Hamster: The back of the record lists both Worlds Collide and Ashes as animal rights activist bands ("hence Hamsters: don't kill 'em!") and sure enough I find a listing of Worlds Collide on a Krishnacore website. Apparently WC's singer Ken Olden also fronted such DC bands as Battery and Damnation AD, hardcore/emo bands that I am not at all familiar with, being more interested in the pop-side of the indie equation than the pure punk side. This might explain why I'm not crazy about "Effect of the Age". The Ashes track, on the other hand, is pretty good - and apparently band members Brian McTernan and Matt Squire have gone on to make names for themselves as producers and whatnot (check the wiki links). Load you know about from the last post. Finally, I Spy was (surprisingly) from Winnipeg of all places and were another hardcore/emo band (the singer went on to play in Propagandhi), represented here with a reggae-tinged song that predisposes me not to like the band, because I've never heard a reggae song I liked.

Hamster split 7", 1993
Level, no. 1

A1. Worlds Collide, "Effect of the Age" (3:20)
A2. Ashes, "Tainted Skies" (5:16)
B1. Load, "The Strike" (4:25)
B2. I spy, "Everything" (3:18)

Things improve considerably on Squirrel. For starters there is a very good - if not great - track by Tuscadero. This song sounds like it could have been their first release, though I believe they had already had a few singles out on Teenbeat by the time this came out. While they don't quite have their bubble-gum/girl-group/Joan Jett nostalgia-trip thing down yet here, they are clearly having a good time. Following their song is a great track by Ted Leo's early band Chisel, which beautifully marries a punk-pop vibe with white guitar noise - turn it up loud! On side B we have a track by Frodus, who it seems have recently reformed and who are here evidenced with a pretty good, mathy discordant number. The final track is one-off collaboration between the hardcore bands Bloodlet and Damnation, which brings us full circle back to Worlds Collide. But enough with the chatter, check out the tunes!

Squirrel split 7", 1995
Level, no. 5

A1. Tuscadero, "Island Girls" (4:04)
A2. Chisel, "Out for Kicks" (2:37)
B1. Frodus, "22-D10" (3:02)
B2. Bloodnation, "Flesh of Another" (4:17)

Get both records here. Enjoy!

Load

2011-06-22T21:34:00.010-04:00

Hello again! It's good to be back. Thanks to those who left comments of support for the blog. I hope you like the new posts. To get us started back again, I am posting this cassette classic from my high school years. I grew up in the middle of nowhere in the pre-internet era, so for many years my only points of access into interesting music were when distant friends would send me mixtapes or zines. This cassette was the odd exception. It was given to me by, of all people, my grandmother, who worked in the dean's office at a private boys school in Washington DC. On rare occasions she would discover that some of the "boys" at her school had bands and introduce me to their music. Thus was I exposed to Load. (Several years later I would be similar introduced to Jonathan Fire*Eater in this way.)

Load released just this one cassette, the first song of which also appears on a split 7" that I will probably post soon. Both were put out on Level Records, which was run by Load's singer Damian. He and I actually corresponded (by letter!) after I got this tape and he sent me one other demo that I may also post at some point. This tape became a major part of the soundtrack for my junior and senior years of high school, and I still can't hear it clearly for all the associated nostalgia.

The funny thing is, just recently when I was thinking about putting this on the blog, I tried doing some research into the band. As you can see, the liner notes only list first names and, as noted, the band predated the web, so it's difficult to track down much information. But based on my searching I am now fairly certain that the singer is actually Damian Kulash, now the front man for OK Go, they of the manic viral youtube videos. It looks like a couple other members of Load were also part of the band early on. Crazy!

Anyway, Mr. Kulash et al are probably embarrassed by this music now, and admittedly it is a bit over-dramatic in places, but I still like it. Hope you do too.

Load, Load EP, 1993
Level, no. 1.5

A1. The Strike (4:13)
A2. Dive (4:11)
B1. All (3:56)
B2. Mirror (3:15)
B3. Cupid's Shotgun (4:05)

Get it here. Enjoy!

poll

2011-06-19T16:17:00.008-04:00

hello there. as you have probably noticed this blog has gone a bit defunct, owing mainly to the fact that it is a pain in the ass to keep up with. but my links are still live, and this week i've gotten a couple of comments, and they got me to thinking that just maybe i might want to start posting again. i got started with this thing mostly because it provides a organized and attractive platform where i can geek out about my 7" collection. i don't consider myself particularly exhibitionistic, but when no one you know gets quite as excited as you do about the records you spend hours hunting for nearly every weekend, you find yourself wanting to reach out. so over time i've realized that i do, in fact, care whether there's an audience for this blog out there. thus, as i consider starting up again, i gotta wonder, would anyone notice?

Gossip, Erase Errata, and friends

2010-05-08T11:05:00.013-04:00

Here is a group of split singles that spiral out of a great four-song 7" put out by Kill Rock Stars in 2002. "Get into the Underground Groove Night School" was curated by The Gossip and shows several of the many ways that the Riot Grrrl ethos transformed and transmogrified in the early part of this century. As you'll see, I've used it as a starting point for pulling together a few other singles featuring some of the same artists - but also pointing off in lots of other directions.

But first, a bit about The Gossip and the other bands on the "Night School" single. The Gossip formed in 1999 in Olympia, Washington, where the band members--Beth Ditto (vocals), Brace Paine (guitar), and Kathy Mendonca (drums)--had moved to from their native Arkansas. They're now based in Portland, Oregon, and have become massively well-known, at least for a queer-punk Pacific Northwest indie band, thanks to their 2006 album Standing in the Way of Control. Ditto's outspoken body image and support of LGBT causes has lent the band some notoriety within the landscape of mainstream music. Their success is showing in their website design, check it out here.

Erase Errata also formed in 1999, though in Oakland, CA. Similar to The Gossip, their sound bridges early 90s riot grrrl/indie rock and the revival of post-punk in the early 2000s, though they are less interested in Arthur Russell dance grooves than in Wire/Fall-style angular improvisation. The band members at the time of this release were Sara Jaffe, Bianca Sparta, Ellie Erikson, and Jenny Hoyston. They have a website here.

There's not a lot to report about the other bands featured here: The Supreme Indifference is, as far as I can tell, a one-off project comprising Kim Gordon (Sonic Youth, Free Kitten), Alan Licht (Run On, Blue Humans), and Jim O'Rourke (Gatr Del Sol, Loose Fur, Sonic Youth, etc). This is their only recorded output. Sleetmute/Nightmute, who released one single beyond the song here, was a noise quartet whose members were named Lanie, Tan Preston (aka Nate Preston), Colde, and Charli. From perusing the web it appears that they were beloved and played around a lot, but that they broke up in late 2003. Any other info on them would be welcome.

Get Into the Underground Groove Night School 7", 2002
Kill Rock Stars, no. 393

A1. The Gossip, "Snake Appeal" (1:43)
A2. The Supreme Indifference, "A Lick in Time" (2:41)
B1. Erase Errata, "O.M.S.F.N." (1:58)
B2. Sleetmute Nightmute, "The V&V Girls" (1:23)

Jumping ahead a few years, The Gossip put out this split single with Tracy and the Plastics, which is an art-music project by "lesbian-feminist video artist" (thanks wikipedia) Wynne Greenwood. When performing, the band consisted of Greenwood (as Tracy) alongside two pre-recorded versions of herself (the Plastics--Nikki and Cola). A fabulous idea, which you can read all about at the T+TP website.

The Gossip/Tracy and the Plastics, Real Damage 7", 2005
Dim Mak, no. 75

A1. The Gossip, "Left Out Now" (2:48)
A2. The Gossip, "Sleepers" (2:57)
B1. Tracy and the Plastics, "Dawn Feather" (2:58)
B2. Tracy and the Plastics, "Save Me Claude" (0:49)

Next up are a couple of split singles featuring Erase Errata. The first actually predates the KRS comp by a year, containing one of the song's from the band's first album Other Animals as well as a more exclusive track. On the flip side is an instrumental by Black Dice, a Brooklyn-based experimental noise-rock band consisting of Bjorn Copeland, Aaron Watson, Eric Copeland, and Hisham Bharoosha. Read more about them at their website.

Black Dice/Erase Errata split 7", 2001
Troubleman Unlimited, no. 80

A. Black Dice, "Untitled #5.5" (4:55)
B1. Erase Errata, "The Shade" (1:53)
B2. Erase Errata, "French Canadia" (1:47)

And finally, the Erase Errata/Sonic Youth split single. I don't really think Sonic Youth needs any introduction, but it is notable that their song on this single is an alternate version of a song from their album Sonic Nurse (with the glorious Richard Prince paintings), re-written to fit into this single's Mariah Carey theme. Gotta love the Mariah Carey theme. Oh, and also this is Buddy Series Vol. 1 on Narnack Records, but no further volumes ever came out.

Sonic Youth/Erase Errata split 7", 2003
Narnack, no. 2

A. Sonic Youth, "Mariah Carey and the Arthur Doyle Handcream" (5:01)
B. Erase Errata, "Glitter" (2:32)

Get all four singles here.

Squatweiler

2010-05-02T22:23:00.005-04:00

Continuing with the "women in rock" theme:

Squatweiler was based out of Winston-Salem, NC. I believe at least singer Haydee Thompson and perhaps other members as well attended the School of the Arts there. They must have gotten started around 1992 and put this album out the following year, on what I think was their own label. In 1995 their second album All Tempo Hot Pants was released on the same label. Around this time I saw them play at the Lizard & Snake in Chapel Hill. Unless my memory is all backwards, Cherry Poppin' Daddies (at that point a punk/ska band) actually opened for them! Squatweiler was unbelievable live. Thompson was totally bombastic and had incredible charisma. Apparently she was so good she needed to blow the joint, and left the band in 1996 or so. After that the band went sharply downhill, but released two more albums, New Motherstamper (1997) and Horsepower (1999).

Nothing touches Full Bladder, though. Female-fronted indie punk rock that still sounds remarkably original and fresh, if certainly of its time--never as programmatic as some of the riot grrrl bands (great as they were) tended to be. The standout tracks are "Willie Fight" which despite its chorus "My willie is bigger than your willie, yeah" concerns a protagonist (Willie) who, much to the chagrin of his girl, decides he is the Lord of Atlantis and wades into the sea never to return; also "4th of July," which is about getting stood up on a national holiday; and of course "Art Fag," which is self-explanatory, and, to this denizen of the art world, still remarkably relevant. Also the Sabbath cover's not bad. And who doesn't love a Sabbath cover?

Squatweiler, Full Bladder, 1993
Huel, no. 001

1. Twofold (3:59)
2. Should I (3:28)
3. Willie Fight (3:12)
4. Full Bladder (3:27)
5. Satan Got Two Thang (3:21)
6. 4th of July (3:58)
7. Art Fag (1:32)
8. Hand of Doom (6:17)

Get it here. Enjoy.

Bikini Kill

2010-05-02T21:21:00.005-04:00

As a footnote to the previous post, I feel it is absolutely essential that anyone out there who doesn't know Bikini Kill learn about the band immediately. To rectify the possibility of such an unfortunate lack of exposure post haste, I am adding here the second of Bikini Kill's mid-90s singles. Simply put, this is the greatest 7" released in the 90s. It is out of print, but has been released on CD along with the two other almost-equally awesome singles the band put out in 1995-96. Buy that disc here. But now, get ready to be rocked.

Bikini Kill, The Anti-Pleasure Dissertation 7", 1995
Kill Rock Stars, no. 250

A1. In Accordance to Natural Law (0:28)
A2. Strawberry Julius (2:17)
B1. Anti-Pleasure Dissertation (2:29)
B2. Rah! Rah! Replica (0:58)

Get it here. Enjoy.

PS. Full disclosure: Although I own this single, I cheated and didn't re-rip it for this post. This is the CD version. Don't worry, there are more scratches and clicks soon to come!

Bratmobile, Cold Cold Hearts, and Frumpies

2010-05-02T16:04:00.024-04:00

Over the past weeks, though I haven't been posting, I have been thinking about posting, and considering various options for what to do next on this blog. I can be a bit of a logic freak, so the idea of constructing an overarching organization for future posts holds a certain appeal. The problem is that it also builds up my expectations to an almost unattainable level, where an entire thesis on the history of indie rock springs forth from my fingertips in one fail swoop. So rather than having to get just one post up (already something I have trouble doing), I'll have to conceive of a whole string of posts and actually follow through with the idea. This conundrum explains my silence of late, but I am working hard now to overcome this roadblock. Hopefully what follows will be the first of a group of thematically interconnected posts, which will in turn usher in a new way of approaching this blog, with a bit more order and concept, for your reading and listening pleasure.

I've been knocking around several ideas to base this series of posts around, and since my most recent entries up to this point were focusing on Teenbeat records, I thought I'd start from one of the bands featured on Teenbeat 100: Bratmobile. There's an excellent write-up of their story on Wikipedia, but in short, the band got its start as a duo, comprising Allison Wolfe (guitar) and Molly Neuman (drums), in Olympia in 1991, but almost immediately thereafter moved to Washington D.C., where they met Erin Smith (guitar; also of Teenage Gang Debs) and became a trio. They were one of the fundamental acts associated with the Riot Grrrl movement, along with Bikini Kill, Huggy Bear, Team Dresch and others; but like all indie bands in the early 90s, they operated as part of a larger scene, that in their case included Calvin Johnson, Beat Happening, and K records; Mark Robinson and Teenbeat; and Dischord artists like Fugazi and Nation of Ulysses. This heady mix of politics, punk, and pop yielded some great music that was never too ideologically overdetermined, unlike some of their Riot Grrrl peers. Bratmobile put out one album and slew of singles before breaking up in 1994 (they would reform five years later and put out another album in 2000). This is their first 7".

Bratmobile, Kiss and Ride 7", 1992
Homestead, no. 178

A. Kiss and Ride (1:32)
B1. No You Don't (1:44)
B2. Queenie (1:21)

After Bratmobile broke up in 1994, Molly Neuman moved to the Bay Area and began working at Lookout! Records (which she now co-owns), while Allison Wolfe and Erin Smith remained in D.C. and formed Cold Cold Hearts, at first with Lora McFarlane (drums) and later with Nattles (future member of Flin Flon) and Katherine Brown (bass and drums, respectively). They put out one single and one album, both produced by Mark Robinson. This is the single.

Cold Cold Hearts, self-titled 7", 1995
Kill Rock Stars, no. 258

A1. Yer So Sweet (Baby Donut) (1:50)
A2. Broken Teeth (2:51)
B. Any Resemblance to Persons Living or Dead is Purely Coincidental (3:03)

While all this was happening, Tobi Vail, Kathi Wilcox, and Billy Karren - when taking a break from their more well-known band Bikini Kill - were playing as Frumpies, all singing and playing guitars, with drums helmed by none other than Molly Neuman. They actually formed the band in 1992, not longer after Bikini Kill's and Bratmobile's first records were released, and continued off and on til 2000, around the time of Bratmobile's reunion. This is their last single, aptly titled "Frumpies Forever" - there's a long description of its recording and content at the Kill Rock Stars site, so I recommend you head over there and check it out.

Frumpies, Frumpies Forever 7", 2000
Kill Rock Stars, no. 366

A1. Frumpies Forever (2:24)
A2. We Don't Wanna Go Home (2:40)
B1. Turn Off the Faucet (2:36)
B2. Tell Me (3:19)

Get all three singles here. Enjoy.

Teenbeat

2010-03-27T13:59:00.010-04:00

While we're on the topic of Mark Robinson, here are a couple of early compilations put out on his Teenbeat label. Mark founded Teenbeat in 1984 with Andrew Beaujon, Phil Krauth, Tim Moran, and Ian Zack, who all attended Wakefield High School together in Arlington VA. They modeled the label after Factory Records, numbering all their releases starting with the "Extemism in Defense of Liberty is No Vice" compilation tape, which was released on February 23, 1985. The interest in numbering has been tied up with a strong archival impulse, marking special numbers with special releases and often releasing updated "books of numbers" that catalogue all the Teenbeat releases to date.

Teenbeat 50 is the first major retrospective comp the label put out. Originally it was going to come out in 1990, but around the same time Teenbeat signed a distribution deal with Matador, and the comp wasn't issued until 1993. I find it interesting that even though the label had only existed for 8 years at that point, the folks at Teenbeat already felt an impulse to self-historicize by adding the "epilogue" on the earlier version of the release. This historical/archival desire has continued over the past 20+ years as they released first a tenth anniversary box set, and then annual compilation CDs chock full of hidden bonus tracks from the archives, and most recently the Teenbeat Originals releases. I feel like this impulse can sometimes border on self-mythologization, but it's definitely one of the things that make Teenbeat unique--so many other labels have been content to let their back catalogue slide into obscurity, but these guys have kept one eye firmly on the past even as they look forward to new things.

Speaking of the past, it's worth noting that Teenbeat 50 features a lot of early and side projects by folks you may know from other bands: Scaley Andrew is Andrew Beaujon from Eggs and Mark Nelson from Labradford; Bastro features John McEntire of Tortoise and The Sea and Cake; Autoclave features Mary Timony of Helium and Christina Billotte of Slant 6; Teenage Gang Debs features Erin Smith of Bratmobile and Cold Cold Hearts; Superconductor features Carl Newman of The New Pornographers; Helter Skillet is Calvin Johnson of Beat Happening and Kathleen Hanna of Bikini Kill and Le Tigre; Clarence is Phil Krauth from Unrest. There are probably more connections that I'm missing - but still, this is a pretty illustrious group.

Various Artists, Teenbeat 50, 1991/93
Teenbeat, no. 50/Matador, no. 25

1. Teenbeat Theme 1991 (1:21)
2. Scaley Andrew, "Earle Hotel" (2:50)
3. Bastro, "Sketch for Sleepy" (2:51)
4. Circus Lupus, "Marbles" (2:53)
5. Vomit Launch, "Block of Wood" (2:37)
6. Bells Of..., "Strange Pair" (3:39)
7. Unrest, "Capitalist Joyride" (3:49)
8. Autoclave, "Dr. Suess?" (2:32)
9. Jonny Cohen, "Time Loop" (1:58)
10. Teenage Gang Debs, "On Tape" (2:36)
11. Sexual Milkshake, "California" (2:26)
12. Superconductor, "I'm Going to Blow Your Fucking Head Off" (3:22)
13. Velocity Girl, "Not at All" (1:54)
14. Eggs, "It's Hard to be an Egg" (2:56)
15. Courtney Love "Shaniko" (1:52)
16. Teenbeat Theme 1985 (1:59)

17. Krokodiloes, "Sweet Georgia Brown" (1:07)
18. Helter Skillet, "The Look Out" (3:02)
19. Naomi Wolff, "Teenage Suicide" (2:52)
20. Clarence, "Love Affair is Over" (3:47)
21. Coral, "Merry Go Round" (3:03)
22. Jungle George, "The Equator of Her Navel" (3:14)
23. Mark E Superstar, "Holiday New England "(2:16)
24. S.C.U.D., "You Fucking English Bastard" (1:51)
25. Butch Willis, "The 23rd Rocker" (3:23)
26. Wall Drug, "Peace" (4:22)

Get it here.

Around the same time that Matador finally issued the above album, Teenbeat catalogue number 100 rolled around. To mark the occasion, they released a 7" compilation featuring ten new one-minute songs by the lead bands on the label's roster. This is one of the greatest indie-rock 7"s ever released.

Various Artists, Teenbeat 100, 1993
Teenbeat, no. 100

A1. Blast Off Country Style, "Weiner Dude Attitude" (0:57)
A2. Eggs, "Baked Alaska" (1:04)
A3. Tsunami, "Brickbook Building" (0:57)
A4. Butch Willis, "Falling in Love" (0:38)
A5. Unrest, "International Nautical Miles" (1:04)
B1. The Shoetrees, "Collisions" (1:13)
B2. Bratmobile, "There's No Other Way" (0:57)
B3. Sexual Milkshake, "The United States of Arousal" (1:05)
B4. Cobalt, "Saturday" (1:17)
B5. Los Marauders, "Slicker Than Snot" (1:02)

Get this one here. Enjoy!

Mark Robinson et al.

2010-03-23T22:08:00.013-04:00

Here's a new idea (and by "new" I mean really not new at all): blog as release and diversion from work rather than as burden on top of work. Let's try it out!

"Matthew" requested more rare Unrest material. Sadly I don't have much beyond what's already been posted - certainly not Twister, though I have the Cath Carroll single in 7" and CD versions if anyone is interested. What might be more fun to listen to are the following singles from a few of Mark Robinson's other projects.

Grenadine was a sort of Arlington, VA supergroup comprising Mark R., Jenny Toomey of Tsunami and Simple Machines Records, and Rob Christiansen of Eggs and Sisterhood of Convoluted Thinkers. Here's two of their three singles - I have the songs from the other single on old Teenbeat comps but it seems like cheating to post them without having the real thing.

Grenadine, Triology 7", 1992
Teenbeat, no. 88/Simple Machines, no. 8

A. Gillian (4:11)
B. Fillings (3:32)

Grenadine, Christiansen 7", 1994
Teenbeat, no. 166/Simple Machines, no. 31
A. The Barnacle (4:21)
B1. Snuck (3:49)
B2. Srew (2:05)

The Project was another sort-of supergroup, in which Mark R. joined half of Tuscadero (what a great band!), namely Melissa Farris and Phil Satlof. The only released this single and could have only played live a few times, but I was lucky enough to see one of those performances at a Teenbeat showcase at the Black Cat in DC in 1998. For "In the Drink" Melissa played drums and Mark and Phil did a great little dance while they played guitar and bass, respectively. It was a fun time, and so is the single.

The Project, self-titled 7", 1997
Teenbeat, no. 226

A. Celluloid Dreams of Superman (4:15)
B. In the Drink (4:24)

Mark Robinson formed Flin Flon in 1998, as the "real" follow-up to Unrest and Air Miami. They're still putting out records, which means that actually Flin Flon is probably the longest-running project Mark R. has participated in to date. Besides Mark, the band consists of Nattles (formerly of Cold Cold Hearts) and Mark Datesman (also of True Love Always). They're consistently awesome, and a great outlet for Mark R.'s longstanding obsession with Factory Records-style postpunk. This is their first release.

Flin Flon, Swift Current 7", 1998
Teenbeat, no. 241

A. Swift Current (4:16)
B1. Flintabetty Flonatin (2:21)
B2. Flintabetty Flonatin (Version) (1:27)

Get the whole mess here. Enjoy.

Albatross Note

2010-03-22T22:07:00.007-04:00

In keeping with the scattershot, semi-impromptu, d.i.y. aesthetic of the Karyo Tengoku record, I thought you might be interested in hearing this record by Albatross Note. Bizarrely enough it is a 9" record, the only one I've ever seen or heard of in this format. The vinyl is a beautiful, marblized green, and the cover art is by the awesome artist Marcel Dzama, who is also the lead singer. There's some info about the band at evilevil, which I am excerpting here:

"Albatross Note is situated in the centre of Canada, in the city of Winnipeg. It is a city of extreme cold, where the temperature can plummet to as low as minus 55 degrees for weeks at a time. The group began as a Yoko Ono and Lee Hazelwood cover band with Marcel's 10-year-old sister, Hollie Dzama, on vocals. This influence can still be heard in the music, which is a mix of honesty and unpretentiousness."

Albatross Note, The Dracula EP, 2005
Trillium Press Record Series, no. 1

A1. Dracula (1:05)
A2. In the Morning (2:52)
A3. Last Winter (3:06)
A4. Stole Your Parents (1:41)
B1. Are You On? (3:18)
B2. Mother (2:31)
B3. The New Crime (2:53)
B4. Please Go (1:55)

Get it here. Enjoy.

Karyo Tengoku

2010-03-09T21:47:00.010-05:00

By popular demand, here is the "other" side (ie, the non-Unrest side) of the soundtrack to Jon Moritsugu's film Mod Fuck Explosion. There is virtually no information available about this band beyond what is listed on the album cover. Someone said that the band may actually be Unrest in disguise. Listening to the record again, I am not sure which is better--the possibility that this is an authentic Japanese noise band, or the possibility that Unrest was capable of this kind of misbehavior. As far as I'm concerned, either way it's a win-win situation: 8 songs in 17 minutes; lyrics about the atomic bomb, James Dean, and smoking American heroin; all recorded on pristine white vinyl. It makes for a very happy Tuesday evening.

Note that according to the album cover the members of the band are named HonEE-comb, LaidEE, and TEEna.

Karyo Tengoku, Mod Fuck Explosion original soundtrack, 1993
Ball Peen, no. 10

1. Hiroshima (1:46)
2. Chuin Gammu (0:56)
3. Freaky Chick (2:26)
4. James Dean (3:23)
5. Soul Brother (2:18)
6. Moto-Cancer (1:33)
7. Dragonfly (1:38)
8. Here We Come (2:44)

Get it here. Enjoy.

Workday/Schoolnight

2010-02-26T22:49:00.008-05:00

Since I seem to be breaking out of my habit (if you can call it that, after just 15 posts) of only putting up old seven inches, I thought I would take a moment to direct you guys toward Workday/Schoolnight, a solo outfit out of Greensboro, NC, home of the now-defunct Rebar and Raymond Brake, who have enjoyed previous posts here. Unlike those bands' mid-90s math rock, W/S creates a solid Krautrock-meets-Synthpop amalgam infused with a healthy dose of found sounds, which arrive courtesy hundreds of audio cassettes discovered while combing through thrift stores and pawn shops throughout the South. Lots of answering machine messages and old self-help tapes. It's good stuff.

Read more at Experimentallmusic, and check out the latest album, Plastic Ocean, below.

Workday/Schoolnight, Plastic Ocean, 2010
Self-released

1. Tapes on Tapes 1 (5:03)

2. Be Positive (Subliminal Series) (1:27)

3. People Crusher (4:54)

4. Family Security (1:34)

5. Survivalist's Advice (6:15)

6. Reset (1:12)

7. Health Slave (5:58)

8. Shopping for Poison (7:27)

9. The Talker (2:55)

10. Dead Doctors Don't Lie (3:22)

11. Affordable Living (3:56)

12. Nervous Illnesses (featuring Rhythm 1001) (2:52)

13. Humans and Computers (3:04)

14. My Creation (3:06)

15. In My Voice, It Sounds Like This (1:35)

16. Trash Machine (2:57)

17. Affirmations (3:09)

18. Major Metropolitan Low Ambition (4:13)

19. Plastic Ocean (5:15)

20. Tapes on Tapes 2 (1:22)

21. Words Control (2:05)

Get it here. Enjoy.

The Zinnias

2010-02-23T08:47:00.006-05:00

Hi all. As you can see, I've been rather inactive on this blog for the past months, due to an extremely overloaded work schedule. When you spend all day in front of a computer it just isn't always that exciting to come home and spend all night in front of a computer. So as much as I love sharing music, I've been losing the desire to do so via the blog.

However, thanks to the good efforts of Michael Williamson over at Aging Spinsters, I have been inspired to upload this gem from Magnetic Fields mastermind Stephin Merritt and company. In fact, it's already posted at Michael's site, and I thought I might as well make it into a post here as well. Maybe I will get The Mythic Signifier rolling again...

At any rate, The Zinnias were an early version of The Magnetic Fields, formed with Stephin Merritt and Claudia Gonson were in high school. They self-released a cassette titled Sand Dollar in 1986, then broke up when Claudia went to college. Stephin then remixed their recordings and released another cassette (with the same track list) as Compost. There's more info and somewhat of a discussion at Aging Spinsters.

I obtained these recordings on a bit torrent site some time ago. Since then they seem to have fallen out of circulation there, and mysteriously have not popped up on the blogosphere. I'll admit I have committed the cardinal sin of the torrent community (of which I am not a member, and about which I have mixed feelings) and compressed the original flac to 320kbps mp3. To remediate this situation somewhat, I am uploading both the mp3 and flac versions so you can take what you want. All thanks go to the kind soul who originally put these up as a torrent.

The Zinnias, Sand Dollar and Compost

1. Leeches (1:57)
2. Bed (1:13)
3. Country (1:55)
4. Otters (1:28)
5. Helium (1:07)
6. Barley (3:05)
7. Kings (2:24)
8. Screech (1:25)
9. Paul Bunyan (3:53)
10. Mindnight Slows (Weekend cover) (1:22)
11. Faberge (3:13)

UPDATE: links have been removed by request of the band.

Magnetic Fields - miscellaneous live

2009-07-19T23:51:00.004-04:00

Hell, while I'm at it, I figure I might as well post some more Magnetic Fields for you guys. This is a bit of a mish-mash of tracks that I downloaded mostly in 1999-2001, during the waning days of Napster and the heyday of Kazaa and especially Audiogalaxy. Those systems promoted file-by-file downloading, and so I got all this stuff without really having any idea where it was recorded. The best thing about this collection is that it mostly covers the period immediately before 69 Love Songs came out - which showed the band moving towards more acoustic arrangements live, while still using mostly electronics in studio - shifting slightly away from the vibe of the mid-90s concerts like the one I posted earlier. During this period they were also debuting a number of songs that would appear on the 6ths's second album, here recorded with Stephin Merritt singing and a much more pared-down accompaniment. To me, the versions of "As You Turn to Go" and "Kissing Things" here will always trump the CD versions, lovely as they are in and of themselves.

Because of their random origins, the recording quality in these files does vary dramatically - though I've left off a lot of really crappy-sounding tracks that I also have. All these songs should have itunes tag information that lines them up in the order below, though I'm never clear on how well the tags translate from computer to computer - and if you're not using itunes I suppose you've got some re-tagging to do. Or you can just listen to them in whatever order you want. Regardless, I hope you like it. I'll have more Magnetic Fields up in the weeks (months?) to come.

The Magnetic Fields, miscellaneous live collection, dates unknown:

1. I Don't Want to Get Over You (live on the BBC, 11 November 2000) (2:13)
2. Grand Canyon (2:54)
3. Just Like a Movie Star (2:47)
4. He Didn't (2:23)
5. The Saddest Story Ever Told (2:03)
6. I Don't Believe You (live on KVRX) (3:01)
7. Smoke and Mirrors (live on KVRX) (3:09)
8. All the Umbrellas in London (live on KVRX) (3:17)
9. Aging Spinsters (live on KVRX) (2:47)
10. 100,000 Fireflies (3:13)
11. Amnesia (2:10)
12. Ever Falls the Twilight/Your Long White Fingers (3:14)
13. Come Back From San Francisco (3:16)
14. Candy (2:28)
15. Jeremy (2:39)
16. Summer Lies (2:55)
17. Looking for Love in the Hall of Mirrors (3:02)
18. As You Turn to Go (1:50)
19. Kissing Things (2:10)
20. Young and Insane (2:06)
21. Alien Being (2:15)
22. When You Where My Baby (2:30)
23. Pillow Fight (2:31)
24. I've Got New York (2:18)
25. Lindy Lou (2:03)
26. Old Orchard Beach (2:49)
27. Winter in July (2:28)
28. I Have the Moon (2:21)
29. Famous (3:00)
30. The Desperate Things You Made Me Do (2:57)

Get the whole disorderly mess here. Enjoy.

Andrew Beaujon singles

2009-07-19T23:26:00.003-04:00

Hello again. Earlier I posted some Eggs singles, which led the band's singer, Andrew Beaujon, to visit the site. Ever since I have been meaning to post these singles Andrew put out under his own name and with his short-lived (or at least not prolific) band Women in Rock. It seems it's about time I actually completed the post. Hopefully this time I'll get all the recording speeds right. Without further ado:

Andrew Beaujon, Marylebone Station 7", 1997
Happy Go Lucky, no. 7

A: Marylebone Station (2:45)
B: Feeling Relatively Good (3:52)

Andrew Beaujon and Women in Rock, Throw the Apes 7", 1998
555 Recordings, no. 14

A: Throw the Apes (3:29)
B: Click and Drag (3:10)

Also, breaking out of my pretty-much-vinyl-only regimen, I'm adding this CD EP. It was released on vinyl too, but I have the CD, which I guess has one fewer song. What I don't have is an image of the cover art - there's no scanner chez Mythic Signifier and I just don't feel much like photographing the CD cover, photoshopping it to a decent size, and uploading it right now. Hopefully sometime soon I will do that. For now, you just get the music.

Andrew Beaujon, Morning, 1997
Neptune, no. 23

1: Snowglobe Hearts (4:15)
2. Little Wings (3:35)
3. Initials K.K. (3:39)
4. Horse Girl in the Passing Lane (5:48)

Get all three singles here. Enjoy.

The Magnetic Fields

2009-07-01T21:52:00.005-04:00

It's actually pretty surprising that I haven't posted any Magnetic Fields yet, considering they are probably my favoritest of bands. If you don't know them, I don't even know where to begin describing their brilliance, so I won't even try. You can gather more information on them via their website.

I will, however, recount the somewhat oddball way I came to discover them and enter the wonderful world of Stephin Merritt: It was the summer of 1997 and I was in NYC interning. I tagged along with a number of fellow interns to see Combustible Edison play. (Remember them?) There were two opening bands--the first consisted of 4, yes 4, theremin players, who made an unholy racket as a rhythym guitarist tried to provide some structure; the second was Future Bible Heroes, which is Merritt's synthpop side project/alter ego band. One song and I was hooked--I went to Kim's and bought their album the next day and the rest is history. What's funny is that I don't even think that Future Bible Heroes were touring, and a few years later when I saw the Magnetic Fields in DC, I asked their drummer Claudia Gonson, who was manning the merch table, when Future Bible Heroes would be playing again. Her typically laconic answer: "When we stop sucking."

Sadly I don't have any document of Future Bible Heroes's shows (though I'd especially love to hear a recording of their more recent--2002?--show at Mercury Lounge in NYC), but what I do have is this great recording from the first Merge Fest at the Cat's Cradle in Carrboro, NC in 1994. I kick myself continually that I lived in Chapel Hill at that time and didn't have the good sense to go to the Cradle that night and discover the band a few years earlier than I did. What was particularly great about them at this stage in this pre-69 Love Songs stage of their career was that while the albums were all really synthy and full of studio wizardry, they transcribed all the songs to a more classic indie-rock format when they played live. Also, Stephin Merritt generally sang all the songs, regardless of who sang them on the album (Susan Anway for the first couple records, and then a whole variety of people in the 6ths--another side project). All this made the concert experience very unique and special. Recently, with their latest album Distortion, they've moved back to this distinction between albums and concerts, but in a much more quiet, contemplative manner. Back in '94, they were all indie rock (or as you can hear Claudia pronounce in the recording, tacky indie rock).

Count on seeing more Magnetic Fields concerts and rarities as I fitfully progress with my posting. For now, enjoy this particular concert here.

The Magnetic Fields live at the Cat's Cradle, Carrboro, NC
Mergefest, July 29, 1994

1. When I'm Out of Town (3:26)
2. Either You Don't Love Me or I Don't Love You (2:14)
3. Born on a Train (3:48)
4. 100,000 Fireflies (3:36)
5. Strange Powers (2:55)
6. Lonely Highway (4:08)
7. Deep Sea Diving Suit (2:00)
8. Love Goes Home to Paris in the Spring (3:08)
9. Dream Hat (feat. Mac McCaughan) (2:53)
10. Candy (3:53)
11. San Diego Zoo (4:30)
12. Rot in the Sun (3:36)
13. Desert Island (3:53)
14. Summer Lies (3:47)
15. Young and Insane (1:58)

The Make-Up split singles

2009-06-11T22:14:00.015-04:00

The first time I saw the Make-Up perform was opening for Sonic Youth on the Washing Machine tour in Raleigh in 1995. I had never heard of the band, or of Nation of Ulysses, and was totally unprepared for the experience. I had never seen anyone be so outrageously glam and so punk rock at the same time. Towering bouffants, matching purple satin outfits, and Ian Svenonius flailing about on the floor of the stage like a maniac. It took me a few years to realize that he was possessed with that gospel yeh-yeh sound, and to become a convert myself. Once I did, though, I got my hands on whatever Make-Up releases I could find, including all their singles, none of which appeared on any album.

A few years later the band released the singles as a compilation entitled I Want Some (buy it here). This was, undeniably, a huge service to the public, and the CD makes for an astoundingly good listen, but as with so many such compilations, it loses a certain something that you get from listening to the actual records--not least of which is the fact that a number of these were split singles. Split singles are an interesting phenomenon when you're a huge fan of just one of the featured bands--the flipside is like opening a window onto an unexpected landscape, sometimes beautiful, sometimes not, but always a refreshing alternative to the music you bought the single to hear. And so, in this post I will do my small part to rescue these flipsides from oblivion:

The Make-Up/The Meta-Matics split 7", 1995
Black Gemini Records, no. 2

A: The Make-Up, "Trans-Pleasant Express" (2:19)
B: The Meta-Matics, "Absence of Rhythm" (2:39)

OK, so this Meta-Matics track has apparently already been rescued, courtesy Troubleman Unlimited's complete discography of the band (buy it here). According to Troubleman's website: "META-MATICS formed in Washington, DC during the summer of 1994 with the intention of cultivating their own musical language. Influenced by ethnic folk music, jazz, classical, and no-wave; they solidified their unique sound quickly, impressing upon bands such as BIKINI KILL and FUGAZI to take them along on tour. The raw energy and the joy of the music was the heartbeat of META-MATICS. They lived up to their name, destroying themselves after 1 1/2 years. The music continues to influence those coming from the punk idiom who want to break free of the self-imposed constraints. A truly groundbreaking band, and historical artifact. Members: Aaron Brenner: Guitar; Franke Vogl: Bass; Malcolm McDuffie: Drums; Chuck Bettis: Vocals. Aaron went on to AIRPORT BAR. Franke went on to RARAFRE+AM, ET AT IT, and HETH. Malcolm went on to CROM-TECH and HOLLOW MOUNTAIN. Chuck went on to ALL SCARS, TRANCE AND THE ARCADE, and founded Mass Particles Records. "

Slant 6/The Make-Up split 7", 1995
Time Bomb, no. 128

A1: Slant 6, "I Love You a Lot" (1:52)
A2: Slant 6, "Rebel, Rebel, Bat Cat" (3:14)
B1: The Make-Up, "We're Having a Baby" (1:55)
B2: The Make-Up, "This Is... Young Vulgarians" (2:01)

These Slant 6 songs, on the other hand, do not appear to have been compiled, and apparently form the band's final output before breaking up in 1995. There's info about them on the Southern Records website: "SLANT 6 played their first show in the Summer of 1992 with Myra Power (Lucky 13) on bass, Christina Billotte (Autoclave, QUIX*O*TIC) on guitar and voice and Marge Marshall debuting on drums. Three songs were recorded at Inner Ear Studios with Don Zientara and Ian MacKaye, and released as a single on Dischord in June of 1993. They did many small tours of the US, stretching from their Washington DC home all the way to the West Coast. For their debut album, the trio returned to the successful recording formula at Inner Ear with Don and Ian. Slant 6 took their name from an in-line six cylinder engine produced in the 1960's and 70's by Dodge for the Chrysler Motor Company. Originally produced with 170 cubic inch displacement, it was later enlarged to 225 Cl and finally 240 Cl for maximum power. It was noted for it's reliability and distinctive angle, banked at 30 degrees from vertical."

The Make-Up/The Crainium split 7", 1998
Slowdime Records, no. 16

A: The Make-Up, "I Want Some (Gimme Some)" (2:48)
B1: The Crainium, "Hatch as Hatch Can-and I Can-But Won't" (2:15)
B2: The Crainium, "The Mechanical Breast" (1:52)

I'm having trouble finding out very much about The Crainium--or maybe this post is just going on awfully long and I'm getting tired. I do know this - they were based in DC, opened for The Make-Up on tour, and after dissolving two of the members went on to form the much-acclaimed Gang Gang Dance. They also released an album, which should still be available for download at Ongakubaka.

The Make-Up/Lung-Leg split 7", 1998
Southern Records, unnumbered

A: The Make-Up, "Pow! to the People" (3:07)
B: Lung-Leg, "Krayola" (3:38)

Lung-Leg was a Scottish foursome, named after Richard Kern's starlet (and cover star of the Sonic Youth album Evol). This was their next-to-last single; most of the info about them on the web deals with their frequent line-up changes - read more about all that here. Besides that, there is a good little text on their myspace page: "Lung Leg began around late 93 with 4 girls; Mo, Jane, Annie and Jade. They were pretty scrappy wee punks and had an ear for a good tune. Everything at the time was kinda crappy versions of Slint or really earnest hardcore so they got together.They liked to look glamourous just like Roxy Music and liked to have a good tune you could whistle like the Fall. Jade left around 95 or so, the usual story... They got a foxy boy drummer, todd, who could do a good Spector beat. They did a couple of Peel sessions which was an honour. They respected the RIOT gIRL THING but were more interested in writing a good tune. At times it seemed we were always classed as a 'girlband'. We hung around with The Yummy Fur, (Jane's brother is John) and made an album. Alex (now Franz Ferdinand) plays keyboards on a couple of tracks. MoMo left to have a little boy (and fell out with most of the band for a while) and Phillipa joined around mid 1997.The little boy remains a dedicated Bowie (in Berlin) fan. The band went to America and made an EP with the Makeup before splitting in 1999. However, it is believed that eyeliner is still applied badly in parts of Lanarkshire and Glasgow to this day."

Get all these singles here. Enjoy.

Pitchblende

2009-05-30T21:15:00.012-04:00

I have no memory of how I came to possess this cassette by Pitchblende, a DC-area band that formed in 1991 and broke up in 1995. I think maybe it was sent to me by Damian from the contemporaneous but even shorter-lived DC band Load, with whom I corresponded a little bit around the time this came out, and whose own cassette I will post at some point in the future. Oddly I never wound up acquiring any further releases by Pitchblende other than the split single with Eggs that I posted earlier, so they're not a band I know really well, but listening to this tape again while digitizing reminded me how much I like it. Luckily for me (and you), the rest of their discography is posted over at Crumbs of Affection, so I should be able to find out what I've been missing all these years pretty easily.

The band also entered the digital age a few years back by creating a MySpace page, which details the group's formation and the circumstances surrounding the creation of this cassette. So I don't see much reason to go on and on about those details here. It is worth noting, however, that the description there does not reference the experimental and interesting hidden tracks that appear at the end of each side of the tape - the latter of which consists largely of an extended telephone conversation in Russian or Polish or some other Eastern European language. Also the MySpace entry lists the songs in a different order than the tape cover does - I've followed the tape here (including the mispelling of "Sum" as "Sump"), so someone let me know if it is incorrect. Finally, I really like the fact that one of the members of Pitchblende actually played as part of Unrest on the Yes She is My Skinhead Girl single, which I have also posted here. It makes me feel like I might be recreating just a little bit of the original community, which is nice.

One last thing: while I normally don't do much to alter the direct recording of my vinyl, I did remove the tape hiss from these mp3s. If I had better (OK, any) command of the EQ functions in Audacity I might have been able to keep this from sounding like it came from an 18-year-old tape altogether, but no such luck. At any rate, I hope it pleases some ears out there. Enjoy.

Pitchblende cassette, 1991
Self-released, #254 of a limited edition

A1: Redcap (3:26)
A2: Tuffet (3:12)
A3: Sump (4:06)
A4: Comatose Snail Punchout (4:48)
A5: Pilot Light (3:56)
A6: [Untitled hidden track] (2:17)
B1: Lacquer Box (5:42)
B2: Drop in the Big Drink (3:07)
B3: Infinite Mouse (3:03)
B4: Sawed Off City (3:12)
B5: Cars (4:20)
B6: [Untitled hidden track] (6:17)

Get it here.

Eggs

2009-05-28T22:41:00.009-04:00

Second to Unrest, Eggs are, in my humble opinion, the greatest of the Teenbeat bands. Like Mark Robinson, the force behind Unrest, Andrew Beaujon of Eggs was with the label from the beginning, working under various monikers such as Scaley Andrew. Eggs was a sort of supergroup that featured Beaujon as well as Rob Christiansen, also of Grenadine and Viva Satellite. Their album Exploder is tremendous, as is their singles compilation How Do You Like Your Lobster. I highly recommend that you visit the Teenbeat site and pick those up.

The first two songs of the first single I'm posting here are included on How Do You Like Your Lobster, but for some reason (a rights issue, perhaps?) the cover of Peggy Lee's Fever is not on the CD. Neither is the great instrumental track from the second single here, which is a split release with Pitchblende - a band that I will post more from in due course. You can get both singles here. Enjoy.

PS. As anyone reading the comments will see, I heard from Andrew Beaujon, who kindly pointed out that I had recorded "Song With Contemporary Influences" at the wrong speed. I am a bad blogger! Or perhaps a bad indie-rock fan? At any rate, what I thought was a zippy instrumental romp is in fact a much mathier, dirge-like ditty. It's still a good song. I've reposted the corrected version via the link above - and just for kicks I've thrown in a little non-vinyl Eggs rarity: their cover of The Cure's "Catch" from the compilation Give Me The Cure, which featured many DC-area bands doing Cure covers, and which I sadly do not own...

Anyway, thanks to Andrew for visiting the site and checking up on his legacy, and thanks to you all as I continue working out the kinks of blogging.

Jade Tree EP, 1993
Jade Tree, no. 1010

A: Sexual Tension (5:23)
B1: In State (2:46)
B2: Fever (3:34)

Eggs/Pitchblende, Balls! Balls! EP, 1994
Jade Tree, no. 1016

A: Pitchblende, "Windshield Kiss" (2:47)
B: Eggs, "Song with Contemporary Influences" (5:03)

Stereolab & Soi-Disant

2009-05-28T22:09:00.007-04:00

Here's a split single by Stereolab and Soi-Disant that to my knowledge has not yet found its way onto CD. Stereolab must be gearing up for another Switched On compilation, on which their song here would presumably appear, but for now this is a pretty hard-to-find entry in their extremely extensive canon. Around my house this song is affectionately known as "The Windshield Wiper Song." The Soi-Disant song is good, too, though I don't know a thing about them as a band. Anyway, I thought this would be a nice follow-up to the Stereolab/Cat's Miaow single. Enjoy.

Stereolab/Soi-Disant split 7", 1998
Lukewarm Music, no. 1

A: Stereolab, "Symbolic Logic of Now!" (4:09)
B: Soi-Disant, "Glitterati (Cruise(r))" (4:12)

Get it here.

Stereolab & The Cat's Miaow

2009-05-21T23:24:00.007-04:00

As a little afterthought to my Unrest post, here's a split flexi-single by Stereolab and The Cat's Miaow. Stereolab also put out a single with Unrest, and Unrest covered a song by Miaow (see below), who is surely the reference point for The Cat's Miaow, don't you think? So this seemed like an appropriate followup. The two Stereolab songs on this disc have not been included on the band's various "Switched On" compilations--though "Yes Sir I Can Moogie" also manifested itself as "Moogie Wonderland," a b-side on their "Ping Pong" single. They're really just sketches here, The Cat's Miaow song being the only fully-formed track on the single. Still, if you're as big a Stereolab fan as I am, this is a nice little nugget from one of the prime moments of their catalogue. Enjoy.

Stereolab/The Cat's Miaow split 7", 1995
Wurlitzer Jukebox, no. 3

A1: Stereolab, "The Eclipse" (0:59)
A2: The Cat's Miaow, "Shoot the Moon" (2:55)
A3: Stereolab, "Yes, Sir! I Can Moogie" (1:02)

Get it here.

Comments, and a return (Unrest).

2009-05-21T19:59:00.019-04:00

So. It's been a long time since I've posted anything here, or even looked at this site. I suppose I lost interest there for a while. But just a little while ago I happened to come back here and discovered, to my delight, that I had gotten quite a few comments on my postings in last six months. As a frequenter of music blogs, I have often seen people write how much comments mean to them, but until now I had not truly understood how blog-affirming they are. So thank you, Billy Sugarfix, Mookieproof, Rye, Andrea Kulpas, Mr. Snrub, JonMcP, Joe, Ned, and yes, even you, Anonymous. (Not so much you, Sexy, who I can only assume is a Chinese spammonger of some sort.) Suddenly I have the desire to post again!

With that said, I thought that posting more Unrest singles would be a nice way to get back in the swing of things:

Yes She Is My Skinhead Girl 7", 1991
Teenbeat no. 42/IPU no. 17

A1: Yes She Is My Skinhead Girl (4:26)
B1: Hydroplane (3:01)
B2: Feeling Good Fixation (0:59)

This is (I think) the band's third single, and certainly the first one to have a large pressing. It's also a co-release with K Records, part of the label's International Pop Underground series. (Or were all of K's releases part of the IPU series?) At any rate, it's a great single, with a lovely Sammy Davis Jr. cover, and a different version of the title track than the one that later came out on the Isabel EP, plus two great b-sides, the latter of which is part of the long-standing tradition of 1-minute Unrest songs.

A Factory Record 7", 1991
Teenbeat no. 63/Sub-Pop no. 103

A1: Deaf (3:14)
A2: UFO (2:05)
B1: Sex Machine (1:27)
B2: When It All Comes Down (3:52)

Anyone who knows anything about the Teenbeat label knows that Mark Robinson (leader of the label and of Unrest) is a Factory Records fanatic. Thus it is only fitting that he would release a single comprising covers of great tunes from the Factory discography. On this co-release with Sub-Pop (part of its single-of-the-month series), we get covers of songs by Crispy Ambulance, ESG, Crawling Chaos, and Miaow (in that order). The Miaow cover was later released on the BPM compilation, which is stil available from Teenbeat.

ModFuck Explosion original soundtrack LP, 1993
Ballpeen no. 10

A1: ModFuck Explosion Theme (2:58)
A2: Zim-Zum (3:22)
A3: London's Theme (2:18)
A4: Northwest Territory (1:28)
A5: In the Garden (3:11)
A6: Unrest Incidental Piece (3:52)

This soundtrack catches Unrest at their prime, right between the release of Imperial FFRR and Perfect Teeth, and it shows. Six beautiful songs that were, incidentally, the first Unrest songs I ever heard, thanks to a great mid-college mixtape by my friend Kelly's roommate Rebecca (wherever you are, thank you). The other half of the soundtrack is by Karyo Tengoku, a brilliant Japanese noise-punk band - I haven't digitized that side of the album yet, but plan on seeing it here at some point. The ModFuck Explosion film came out on DVD a few years back, but I never mustered up the willpower to watch it. I wonder if it lives up to its soundtrack.

Animal Park 7", 1994
Teenbeat no. 133

A1: Afternoon Train (2:24)
A2: Hey Hey Halifax (1:43)
B1: Light Command (4:23)

And finally, the last Unrest single, once the band was rapidly underway to becoming Air Miami (more on which at another time). "Light Command" appears, in slightly different form (I think), on the Perfect Teeth album, while "Afternoon Train" was refashioned (slightly) to appear on the Air Miami album. Bridget Cross sings on both songs.

Get all this stuff in one handy file here. Enjoy!

Evil Wiener, Spatula, and Tinsel

2008-09-13T17:02:00.010-04:00

And just like that! Another post. This one features the sonic stylings of three Chapel Hill-area bands that strike pretty different positions within the indie rock scene: nerdy pop songs (Evil Wiener), edging-toward-experimental rock (Spatula), and, for lack of a better word, classic post-grunge indie rock (Tinsel).

Evil Wiener self-titled 7", 1994
Amish Records, no. 2
A1: We're Both Crazy (2:42)
A2: High School Rock'n'Roll Story (2:11)
B1: Get Well Soon, Maria (2:52)
B2: Mexico (3:00)

Evil Wiener has been playing in the Chapel Hill/Carrboro music scene for nearly 20 years, yet there is a surprising dearth of info on the web about them. This record is, I believe, their first recording. [Correction: This is their third release; it was preceded by the split single with Spatula (see below) and their 7" of Xmas songs, now available digitally at thinking about the needle. Thanks to Billy S. for the info!] The band consists of Bill McCormick (aka Billy Sugarfix), who writes the songs, sings, and plays guitar; Groves Willer, who plays bass; and Chuck Garrison, who drums (and who played in the initial Superchunk lineup). For many years McCormick split his duties in the band with his day job as a school teacher. He also runs the website Custom Serenade, through which you can order your very own Billy Sugarfix song for just $100. Crazy, huh? The band has a website, and while it doesn't have a lot of info, it does have a particularly glorious selection of concert posters from the past 15 years, which offer a really nice snapshot of the Chapel Hill indie scene: see Evil Wiener World.

Evil Wiener/Spatula split 7", 1994
Stay Free! Records, no. 2
A: Evil Wiener - The Truth About Mary Poppins (4:51)
B1: Spatula - Break (2:41)
B2: Spatula - Your Heart's Cold (2:04)

Apparently this record came for free with an issue of the legendary Stay Free! magazine, though I bought it (used) in a record store like anything else. It features another great song by Evil Wiener, but is especially notable for being the debut of another wonderful Chapel Hill/Carrboro band, Spatula. Spatula started out as a twosome - Chuck Johnson singing and playing guitar, and Matt Gocke drumming. Later (after these records) they added Chris Eubanks on cello and veered toward more experimental territory, with almost entirely instrumental songs. At this point, though, they were pretty firmly in the indie rock territory, and sound remarkably full for a two-person band (I am happy to say this was true for their live shows at the time, too). Allegedly they got their band name because Gocke didn't have any drum sticks starting out and played using spatulas... Anyway, they put out several albums and I believe broke up sometime around 2006.

Spatula/Tinsel split 7", 1994
Over the Counter Records, no. 4
A: Spatula - Pachinko (4:46)
B: Tinsel - The Mole (4:52)

I can't actually find any information about Tinsel at all, other than that Rob Munk sang and played guitar. And I remember that they played a show at the Cat's Cradle with Spatula celebrating the release of both bands' records on Jesus Christ Records, now defunct. If anyone knows more, let me know!

OK, enough from me. Get all three singles here.

Portastatic

2008-09-13T16:21:00.010-04:00

And I bet you all thought I had abandoned this blog. Nope. I wish I could say that I had spent the majority of the past six weeks relaxing on vacation somewhere, but in fact things have been incredibly busy, and one of the first things to go was posting here. But I've been working on several posts, so hopefully this will be the first in a rapid succession of new music posted for your delectation.

I suppose I shouldn't be posting this one at all, really--as I was ripping these singles I did some scouting and learned that just this past Tuesday Merge released a compilation of Portastatic's singles and compilation tracks, which includes all the songs featured here. I prefer not to post records that are still readily available, but I'm making an exception on this one, since these are so good. Please take this post as a teaser and go right out and buy the double-CD release of Some Small History here.

Portastatic is the solo project of Mac MacCaughan, of Superchunk, who also founded and still co-runs the magnificent Merge Records. The three records I am posting here exhibit the range of styles typical of Portastatic in the mid-1990s: low-fi home recordings, many acoustic (but not all) with some interesting effects thrown in for good measure. I'll admit I am particularly partial to this selection because of the two Magnetic Fields covers included - both from the Distant Plastic Trees album which I think was not yet generally available at the time of these releases. I'll have more from the wonderful world of Stephen Merritt later, but for now enjoy this foray into MacCaughan country.

Portastatic, Naked Pilseners 7", 1994
Matador Records no. 76
A: Naked Pilseners (5:22)
B1: Feel Better (2:23)
B2: Josephine (3:54)

Portastatic, Spying on the Spys 7", 1996
Merge Records no. 117
A: Spying on the Spys (3:59)
B: Do You Want to Buy a Bridge? (3:25)

After Hours Issue #3, 1997?
A1: You Love to Fail (3:34)

This last one is from a Japanese split single with pratically no informaion on its label. The other bands on the single are The Ladybug Transistor and Land of the Loops--the Ladybug Transistor song is from their first album Beverley Atonale, which came out in 1997, so I assume that's around the time this was released. Maybe there's more info inside the aforementioned Portastatic compilation...

Get all three singles here. More to come very soon.

The Raymond Brake & Rebar

2008-08-01T09:10:00.015-04:00

Today, after a delay longer than what I would have liked, I bring you three singles by two of the greatest bands to come out of the early-90s scene in Greensboro, NC: The Raymond Brake and Rebar. My brother Bart is currently a musician in G'boro (see this site) and when I was first telling him about these bands I was surprised to hear how forgotten they seem to be there... even though it sounds like the houses that these records were produced out of (208 Wilson and 908 Spring Garden) are still rocking on. So this post goes out to Bart and to all the young musicians still playing in Greensboro. Hope you dig it.

The Raymond Brake, 7", 1994
A1: Shallow (4:17)
A2: Healthy As You Feel (3:02)
B: Kilo (6:21)

This self-titled single is I believe the first release by The Raymond Brake, on D-Tox records (number 17), recorded December 1993 and released early in 1994. D-Tox also put out the great Pyloric Waves CD compilation, which I may post at some point. The Raymond Brake were part of the same "Math Rock" movement that spawned Polvo, Trans Am, etc. (though I prefer them to either of those better-known bands), meaning that there are lots of discordant guitars, sudden angular shifts of direction, and so on. After releasing this single, the band went on to sign to Arlington, VA's Simple Machines Records, which put out a CD and a single in 1995 (still available here) and toured the country with Archers of Loaf, Karate, and Liquorice in 1996. What would ultimately be their last release, an EP titled Never Work Ever, came out on Hep-Cat Records the next year. The band split in 1998. It consisted of:

Andy Cabic: guitar, vocals
Joel Darden: drums
Peder Hollinghurst: bass (replaced by Matt Houston in 1997)
Ryan Stewart: guitar, vocals

According to a post last year by Darden at Used Bin Forever (here), after the band split, Cabic moved to San Francsico and formed the band Vetiver, Hollinghurst is in NYC, Houston's in Austin doing music and design work, and Stewart is a chef in Durham. Darden himself still lives in Greensboro, where he teaches high school US History.

Rebar, 7", 1995
A1: The Burn That Is On Me (3:36)
A2: Blanch (3:19)
B: Acquaintances (3:58)

Rebar's history seems to have been marred by mishaps that prevented them from releasing anything beyond the singles posted here, plus one compilation track. This, their first single, was released on Crunchy Record Stuff (number 001) in 1995. Most of the information I have about the band comes from this half-functioning semi-defunct website. Since you can explore that on your own, I'll just say this is a great single--great sounding, great looking (transparent yellow vinyl, ooh la la)--along the lines of The Raymond Brake but much heavier and intense. The band when this was recorded consisted of:

Brent Dunn: bass
Greg Sigmon: guitar (later replaced by Masa Koyama)
Jae Skaggs: drums
Sanders Trippe: vocals, guitars

Trippe and Dunn went on to form Vetiver with Andy Cabic from The Raymond Brake. Skaggs later played in the bands Ch'rora, Sclix, and Great Harvest Murder Company. Not sure what happened to Sigmon or Koyama, other than that Koyama apparently had to move back to Japan, presumably bringing Rebar's run to an end.

Rebar/The Raymond Brake split 7", 1995
A: The Raymond Brake - Davliks (3:17)
B: Rebar - Transparent (7:02)

Nothing much more to say about this, other than that it is a split single between the two bands, put out on Crunchy Record Stuff (002) in 1995 on glorious transparent red vinyl. Kudos to Rebar for using the maximum space available on a 7" by recording their side at 33rpm and playing until they literally ran out of room--the song really does end that way, it's not a ripping malfunction.

OK, enough from me. Get all three singles here. Enjoy, and hopefully I'll have more for you soon.

June

2008-07-18T14:26:00.009-04:00

The Mythic Signifier has been a bit quiet lately due to a frantic week at work, but now we return with the first entry in what will likely be a constant thread here: singles from the early/mid-90s Chapel Hill music scene. Today I give you the (to my knowledge, only) three singles released by June. I saw this band I think only once, opening for Squirrel Nut Zippers on Halloween at the Cat's Cradle, must have been 1995. I remember they played a great cover of Bela Lugosi's Dead. Early the following year they released their one and only album on Beggar's Banquet records (titled, like their first single, I Am Beautiful, it is now out of print), and promptly disbanded shortly thereafter. The album includes most of the songs on these singles, but in different recordings--I think the 7" versions are superior in all cases. I hope you think so too.

I am Beautiful 7", Friction Media, 1993
A: I am Beautiful (3:17)
B: The Theme of the Anti-Hero (5:29)

Stripteaser 7", Friction Media, 1993
A: Stripteaser (3:30)
B: The Long Dance (3:29)

Genius 7", Squealer Records, 1994
A: Genius (3:32)
B: All of Me (4:31)

Unfortunately, my copy of the Genius single has not weathered as well as I'd like, so you will notice a single unavoidable little skip in each side of the single. Sorry about that - but luckily for you, the record appears to still be available from Squealer, so you should just go out and buy it yourself here. (Also note that "All of Me," one of the greatest of June's songs, is not available anywhere else.)

At the time of these three recordings, June consisted of:
Kat Cook, vocals
Mathew Gross, drums and vocals
Andy Magowan, bass and violin
John Price, guitar
Tricia Tuttle, guitar and vocals

Download the singles here.

Cupid Car Club, M.P.

2008-07-08T23:04:00.006-04:00

For my second post I give you another exemplary, if very different, single from the early 90's D.C. scene. Cupid Car Club's self-titled single is a paean to, of all things, teenage hipster suicide cults. The cover recounts the suicide of each of the band's members in image and text in the form of an easy do-it-yourself guide, so you too can "join their club." The back cover, which I unfortunately do not have a decent picture of, offers fragments of obituaries for each of the members. That of singer Ian Svenonius is worth excerpting:

"...apparently slashing his wrists in a friends bathroom. Suspected of being a werewolf, Svenonius was best known for his preacher style sermonizing with various affiliated 'social clubs'; The M.P. Skulkers, Carbonas, and the especially notorious Cupid the 'Car Club'. The wrist slashing punctuated an obsession with a late night underworld peopled entirely by drinamyl fueled boys and girls who would, he claimed, 'Dig a grave big enough to dump the wretched legacy of a life squandered on the idiotic principles of the living world and climb into the car club coffin'. Svenonius advocated young, romantic suicide marketed as a sort of new teen craze, for the purpose of 'empowerment' and claimed his 'car club ephemeral...eternally'."

Obviously this whole thing is a bit tongue-in-cheek--a tendency that would be picked up in force two years after this single, when three of the four band members (Svenonius, James Canty, and Steve Gamboa) would go on to form The Make-Up. The fourth member of Cupid Car Club, Kim Thompson, would join Delta '72. More on both these bands in a later post. For now, have a listen to Cupid Car Club's assaultive stylings--especially the standout final track, Grape Juice Plus. The single was originally released on Kill Rock Stars (#215) in September 1993 and has never been issued on CD. You can also find more info on the band here.

Tracklist:
A1-Edge of the Envelope (2:15)
A2-Vapor Rub Out (2:47)
B1-Child Custody Commandos (1:54)
B2-Grape Juice Plus (3:55)

Download it here.

First post: Bavarian Mods

2008-07-06T23:05:00.005-04:00

To start things off here at The Mythic Signifier, I am posting one of my favorite 7" singles by Unrest, the "flagship band" (quoth AMG) of Arlington VA's Teenbeat Records. I'm including all four tracks from Bavarian Mods and Other Hits, including "She Is Today," even though it only consists of the sound of the record player needle being jostled and then about three minutes of silence. Still, to really appreciate the final track "Nova Scotia" you need to weather your way through that silence--on my turntable at least the last track is beyond the point where the auto-return function kicks in, so you really do have to listen to the silence to get to the last song.

Bavarian Mods and Other Hits was released in 1992 on Teenbeat and Homestead Records, and is Teenbeat #84 and Homestead #184. The band at that point consisted of Mark Robinson, Phil Krauth, and Bridget Cross. The song "Bavarian Mods"--one of the gems of the Unrest discography--was later remastered and reissued on the CD compilation BPM [1991-1994], which I strongly recommend purchasing. The rest of the single, including the band's epic rendition of Argent's "God Gave Rock'n'Roll To You" (which was subsequently covered by Kiss as "God Gave Rock'n'Roll To You II," thus the suffix "III" on this version), has never been issued on CD. [Correction: The Argent cover actually did come out on the Dutch East India Company comp Buy This Used Compact Disc. Thanks to Ned for the info!] Enjoy.

Tracklist:
A1-God Gave Rock'n'Roll to You III (4:46)
B1-Bavarian Mods (1:17)
B2-She Is Today (3:09)
B3-Nova Scotia (1:16)

Download link in comments.