BLANKCRISIS.COM (an mp3 blog)

Over & Out

2007-07-17T10:12:00.001-04:00

Yep, folks. This is it. Time for new posts has slipped due to new projects (and school).

But I will still be around mp3blogville! So we need not say final goodbyes or anything like that. However, the songs you see available now will disappear by the first of August.

Thanks for everything, guys. Two years is about long enough to do anything. And there are about 2 million mp3 blogs popping up every day, so... see you around.

~Neal

3rd side of two exiles

2007-07-03T11:20:00.000-04:00

(not including "Happy")

*Read the story behind this 1971 masterpiece here*

from the original Stones album:

Turd On The Run mp3
Ventilator Blues mp3
I Just Want to See His Face mp3
Let it Loose mp3

from the Pussy Galore cover album/cassette:

Turd On The Run mp3
Ventilator Blues mp3
I Just Want to See His Face mp3
Let it Loose mp3

surfers' "locust"

2007-06-29T11:00:00.000-04:00

(Below is a quick tribute to Bob & his Gimme Tinnitus...)

Q: Who has received the most posts here in the last two years?

A: It's them Texas acid freaks-- way, way up at the top of the pile.

piouhgd got the first bit of props; and then last summer Rembrandt was featured. So it was only a matter of time before their 1987 album would find its way onto the center of your screen and between yr earz.

One of my favorites in the annals of rock folklore is the one about this band moving near Athens to stalk REM. The story is perfect-- reminding me of that Southern duality thing, on the level of the Beatles (angelic) & Stones (demonic), sort of. Another story from that period (as reported in It Crawled From The South had Gibby and some other members burning their van in Stipe's front yard. I speculate that this was simply the Surfers' way of showing their love... and jealousy.

Another interesting story is the one where Gibby jokes to Cobain about jumping the wall at rehab. Combine that one with the long-held rumor that he'd given Daniel Johnston his first tab of LSD (which he denied in the documentary).

But back to Locust... It's full of interesting twists, from a bare bones Sabbath cover/homage to the bizzare "Kuntz" (which includes source material, unknown to most fans, but identified by WFMU earlier this year), to the debut of Gibbytronix...

"an arsenal of effects devices, which redefined the concept of lead vocals. Just like the various musicians and films going on simultaneously during BHS performances, Gibby’s voice was a wordless instrument that entered the dense mix comprising the BHS sound system experience. Without a distinct voice, the album was decidedly non-didactic. It was like jumping punk ship and falling into a hallucinatory dreamscape."
-found here in a much better article on the album than I could ever write

...and who could forget Leary's beautiful Hendrixian lead at the end of "23 Going On 23"? Absolutely brilliant.

NOTE: If any 'a youse out there owns a copy of the 1990 side project The Jackofficers Digital Dump album, please contact me!

Sweat Loaf mp3
Human Cannonball mp3
U.S.S.A. mp3
The O-Men mp3
Kuntz mp3
22 Going On 23 mp3

Marin & Tommy

2007-06-26T10:30:00.000-04:00

Rarely is it the case that this blog pounces on the moment to address the really important issues...

And after a long time wrestling with what to post today, I was saved by our pal and sometime Blank Crisis correspondant, Joel Rowsdower. He sent us this article about a film coming soon, The Purple Brain. (I searched for trailers, but no-could-find.)

The plot is as follows: Sure, the pot you and your 40-something peers once enjoyed may have been innocuous, but that's only because it bears no resemblance to the super-potent weed of today-- strains with such foreboding names as "Train wreck," "AK-47," and "The Purple." As proclaimed by Drug Czar John Walters recently, "We are no longer talking about the drug of the 1960s and 1970s -- this is [in computer parlance] Pot 2.0."

So, enjoy some time today with Marin & Tommy, otherwise known as these guys.

*Watch C&C on YouTube, as well*

Dave's Not Here mp3
Earache My Eye mp3
Let's Make a Dope Deal mp3
Sgt. Standanko mp3
"The Chong Bong"? (may or may not be C&C, found at Audiogalaxy back in the day) mp3
McDoobie's mp3
Gonorrhea mp3
Pedro & Man at the Drive-in mp3
My Scrotum mp3
Sound clip from "Up in Smoke" mp3
Cruising With Pedro mp3
Vietnam mp3

10-B

2007-06-22T10:27:00.000-04:00

This is probably the last podcast for a while. Until August or whenever I can get some other personal crap together.

Remember, you may access previous mixes at any time by clicking labels: podcasts at the bottom. And don't forget to subscribe while yr at it!

Right click/save as: mp3 (53 MB)

Playlist here: (.txt file)

*This episode is archived 24/7/365 at this page*

mixtape 10 side A

2007-06-19T10:05:00.000-04:00

Right click/save as: mp3 (50 MB)

Download playlist here (.txt file)

Archived 'til Doomsday at this page

H E N D R I X

2007-06-15T16:00:00.000-04:00

In honor of this weekend's 40th anniversary of the Monterey Pop Festival-- which effectually broke this American artist in his homeland. I am not posting that legendary performace here today, but if you'd like, YouTube it below:

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

I had originally envisioned today's post in the podcast format, with my friend Andy sharing some of his knowledge. Didn't work out-- we recorded it all drunk & it turned out pretty shitty-sounding. The set remains the same as planned, dig:

Hear My Train A'Comin' (live) mp3 12 MB.

These are my personal favorites, and you'll notice I've skipped the PurpleFoxeyJoe's. That is intentional. If there's one thing I hope to impart on casual fans, it is this: part of the reason why JH was so miserable before he died is because he was just fucking tired of being everyone's "human jukebox". He came to hate those songs (And if you don't believe me, watch Live at Woodstock-- his most spirited performances are the ones outside the expected early material). He wanted to branch out-- but no one was listening. Yes, even in the 1960s, where everything was supposedly open and free, the lowest common denominator still ruled.

I can't think of how times I've requested (or anyone else at a gig) a song to an artist-- they never play 'em! But back in the day, it was important to give the audience exactly what they wanted. In this way, I think we have it better now.

Message to Love mp3

Another crucial part of JH's last year or so on this earth (besides all the business problems) is the utter lack of black patronage of his music. He wanted to be loved by his people (and who wouldn't?), but he was often deemed an Uncle Tom by them, even as he led two white boys (in The Experience)! He formed the awesome Band of Gypsys partly as a response to those saying he wasn't "black" enough.

*Read a great article 'bout the Gypsys here*

The Stars That Play With Laughing Sam's Dice (STP-LSD) mp3

Look out for that door! Don't open that door! Don't open that door! Aw, That's the way it goes...

I want to say briefly how disappointed I am, and continue to be, everytime I see shit like this or this. BC kindly asks that you please do not buy products that exploit dead artists' images and music. Please.

Wanna see something else that is quite bothersome? Go visit his brother's Space.

Voodoo Chile (long version) mp3 21 MB.

I got into JH when I was 12, and when I hear these songs, I'm reminded of sitting in my grandmother's house with the headphones on.

1983 (A Merman I Should Turn to Be)/Moon, Turn the Tides...Gently Gently Away mp3 13 MB.

Machine Gun (live) mp3 17 MB.

FNM "kingforaday...foolforalifetime"

2007-06-12T19:00:00.000-04:00

I'm totally with the Punk Guy on this one. And there are only a handful of bands left I'd kill to see reunite & tour again.

Released a year prior to that which I spotlighted in the last post, FNM returned from their genre-shattering Angel Dust record, sans longtime guitarist, and delivered something a little more accessible, but no less brilliant. It was called... well, you know...

"[Mike] Patton could very well be one of the most versatile and talented singers in rock music."
-AMG critic, Greg Prato.

My sentiments exactly. There are no other vocalists I can think of who can evoke Barry White, Jello Biafra, Sade, and still do that thing that's all Mike-- in the same song.

A major Like, How Cool is They? goes out to all the Australians who put this album in the #1 slot.

Ricochet mp3
Evidence mp3
Ugly in the Morning mp3
Digging The Grave mp3
The Last To Know mp3

*Read Blank Crisis' Angel Dust post from Sept 2005*

*Buy this album at Amazon*

GUILTY PLEASURE POST: STP's "tinymusic" ('96)

2007-06-08T10:00:00.000-04:00

You say you hate this band... and frankly, so do I. But shortly after the release of their third album (left) in 1996, I was won over for a spell. Why? I ask myself. Perhaps because it nods off to the best in '70s glam rock. Maybe because it's so trashy-- fucking slutty, even. Like getting crazy head behind a fast food joint from someone you barely know, right between the dumpster and the grease trap.

Not that I would know what that's like.

Tumble in the Rough mp3
I'm the excuse for the little lies/ But all I got was humble kidney pie...

Grunge is dead and I shed no tears at the funeral. Dirty jeans, Pavement T-shirts, and dreadlocks are boring. Rock stars used to be alluring! We're like magicians, ya know? We get to project love and positive energy. We get to create magic! The thing is, I don't really give a sh*t what's cool and what's not cool, because I've never been regarded as cool. However, it is cool right now. Could you hand me my sweater?
-Scott, vocalist

(YouTube link)

Big Bang Baby mp3
Nothing's for free/take it away, boys...

But this record had other sides to it as well. Often this sort of pre-emptive mourning & regret (some might say self-pity) holds sway-- a recognition of opportunities lost, trying to get one's shit together over a prolonged period. Pissing them away as soon as they arrived.

And So I Know mp3
It will never be this way again...
(The addict might say this within the context of losing it all: "I will get back up, I will change." Alternately, it suits the best of times, too: "I can't maintain; eventually I'll fuck everything up again, and never recover.")

But, as I was saying-- I listened to this record a lot, back in the day. One summer alone in a dirty basement. Chasing uppers with the liquor acquired from my personal contribution to the delinquencies of minors.

At the same time, Scott was running from the law. Someone said he'd been caught with damn near every illegal substance in the book, and was dodging treatment. However, this fugitive story-- I cannot find anywhere on the Web today.

"Man, he'll be dead before they catch him," was the word then.

I believed that Scott wanted his rock & roll immortality very badly-- just as Cobain did two years before. Self-destructoids. But whereas Kurt tossed us his apologies beforehand, Scott wasn't quite so commited. He remained fearful of the hole he was gradually throwing himself into. This album is in a lot of ways a cry for help.

Trippin' On a Hole in a Paper Heart mp3
I'm not dead and I'm not for sale...

(YouTube link)

Art School Girl mp3
We'll never break up/Been together for a month....

We shot drugs the whole time... Most of the time she just walked around in panties. There was never anything that went on between us. ... Dope was the most important thing.

Adhesive mp3
Grab the hate and drown it out/Grab the beat and drum it out...

Here's to Scott W, and BC wishes him a long, healthy life. Stay sober, big guy.

I don't regret drugs at all... the hell I went through made it possible for me to enjoy life the way I enjoy it now.

GEORGIA MUSIC POST: Hiro Noodles

2007-06-05T09:10:00.000-04:00

Not long ago, I closed a podcast with a track by this Athens artist-- a man completely devoid of a Web presence these days, apparently. Oh well.

Some fellow Georgians out there might recall him as the dreaded kat underneath the hat working the register at Low Yo Yo's. He also played for a time (I'm unsure as to whether this is still the case) in self-described "improv-noise freaks" Garbage Island.

Jewel On mp3
M mp3
Rocket Scientist mp3
Beds mp3
yr not real mp3

*Buy this album at CD Baby*

ZIP CLUB: "vampireontitus" (1993)

2007-06-01T09:30:00.000-04:00

Introducing a new feature here on the ol' Crisis-- the ZIP CLUB! I will try to post a classic record in its entirety once a month for as long as I feel like it. The idea is that folks coming in from the Hype will not be privy, unless they do a bit of looking around at the site (i.e. the opposite of grab & go readership). And don't think of it as me punishing those folks; I know they will come around some day. Think of it more as a way I can reward my regulars, who comment and email and link me. I love each and every one of 'em.

So... You & your comrades go on & jump the fence to the deserted daycare this weekend-- y'know, the one stuck dead in the middle of the strip mall with the awesome 4 ft. deep swimming pool (as if 4 ft. and deep put together ain't oxymoronic). If anyone sees you, they won't care. If the cops show, tell 'em you work there. Perks, you know. But be cool about hiding the party favors you brought, and don't forget this 1993 lo-fi beaut of which I'm treating you today. Play it loud. It's gonna be a hot afternoon. See you there!

zip (43 MB)

summer 07 podcast

2007-05-29T10:00:00.000-04:00

Right click/save as: mp3 (55 MB)

OR: Archived here for all eternity.

Downloadable playlist here (.txt file)

2ND ANNIVERSARY! NEW LOOK! & WARRIOR SOUL too!

2007-05-27T15:30:00.000-04:00

This blog has entered Year 3, and with that comes a new design. And feedback is appeciated.

Tried to post this once, and it was a long one, but blogger ate it somehow. So let's try this again...
If you could go back and talk to my 15-year-old self, in 1990, and asked me who my favorite bands were at that moment, I would probably tell you: Jane's, The Cure, and this band, which happens to be our selection for today:

This was obviously right before the Seattle takeover. And WS often receives these sorry little distinctions like Oh, they could've been as big as Nirvana-- and looking back now, I know they held their own, and may have set the stage so to speak. Somewhere musically between Mother Love Bone and Alice in Chains, but more lyrically intelligent, and strikingly political.

The artist is not there to be worshipped or adored. They're there to be enjoyed. The audience is not there to be politely asked to buy the T-shirts, to be patted on the head and to go home. The audience is a part of the artist. They're friends. Allies. A show is a rock'n'roll ritual. The bands are the witchdoctors, the medicine men, the wise men. The band entice, preach, encourage, unite, excite ...
-- vocalist Kory Clarke in Kerrang! magazine, 1991

And does anyone (besides me) remember seeing this video on Headbanger's Ball?

(YouTube link)

I was shocked to learn while creating this post that the original drummer, Mark Evans, was murdered two years ago in London, also that WS have reformed this year and are back on tour Visit theirSpace and beg them to play Atlanta for me!)

I See The Ruins mp3 Don't let the cheesy intro fool you (I got no problems, man!), this album gets better as it goes.

We Cry Out mp3 Rock culture!

The Losers mp3 The chorus to this one is great: the way that guitar just holds down the open-E chord while the bass and drums descend and descend slowly. Almost like the way all motion exists beyond the frame of any given snapshot.

Downtown mp3 You hate your mother/you hate world... Reminiscent of "Welcome to the Jungle" perhaps? By the way, we were all highly anticipating GnR's follow-up to Appetite back then. Thank you, Cobain, for changing my mind.

M-D-M-A... Trippin' On Ecstacy mp3

Superpower Dreamland mp3 If any pigs outside do not hide/we will rumble!

Charlie's Out of Prison mp3 Another side of the war on drugs. I've always wanted to hear this song live.

Blown Away mp3 America was, and still is, the land of greed, violence, and escape.

Lullabye mp3
"Kory sang about fear, apathy, rejection and the size of the (U.S.) national debt, while W.A.S.P. sang about the size of their dicks." - quote from this cool online fanzine

In Conclusion mp3 Governments hide behind religion/...goodbye,freedom

*Buy this album at Amazon*

Skip

2007-05-18T15:15:00.000-04:00

Much has been written about this one, and so I'll just compile what I can from various sources below. I bought it just a few weeks prior to his death in 1999.

A former Moby Grape and Airplane member, Spence suffered from schizophrenia, and during a 1968 recording of Grape's 2nd album, attempted to break down a bandmate's hotel room door with a fire axe while on LSD. He was committed for six months to the criminal ward at New York's Bellevue Hospital. Upon release, he recorded his only solo album (all instruments played by him on a 3-track!), the now-classic psychedelic/folk album Oar.
~mostly from Wikipedia

[Oar] is perhaps the strongest psyched-out legacy of the time -- dark, harrowing and mad, the American answer to Syd Barrett (Pink Floyd's similarly crazed first guitarist). It sank like a stone upon release and became the quintessential cult disc. (from this Salon article)

[Oar] stands alone as a dense and beguiling statement and one as delicate as a moment whose passing is immediately felt and never forgotten…as delicate and rare as a hand-carved snowflake sculpted out of a hollowed-out eggshell as viewed through a back lit strobe projection where outlines are only intimated as shadows flicker into a tiny dance within and without.
~read more of this "Book of Seth" review here

Skip attempted to reach out for a time in the mid-'90s, and spent some time as a derelict alcoholic before finally succumbing to lung cancer. Of course, a tribute album was near completion. (And I can never understand why people feel the need to do such things-- but supposedly Skip heard it moments before he passed away. )

For me, it is pure understated beauty beyond all conception or comprehension. Hold this one close your heart, friends.

Little Hands mp3
Diana mp3
Weighted Down (The Prison Song) mp3
War in Peace mp3
All Come to Meet Her mp3

*Buy it at Amazon*
*This album is also available on 180 gram vinyl.*

Return of the Spill

2007-05-15T10:00:00.000-04:00

Thanks to Joel for reporting to me this wonderful news a couple'a weeks ago. You may recall I wished it upon a post last December...

More again from my fave Spillage:

Time Trap mp3
Else mp3
You Were Right mp3
Temporarily Blind mp3
Broken Chairs mp3

E.C.

2007-05-11T15:40:00.000-04:00

WAIT!... WHERE ARE YOU GOING?!... JUST A JOKE!!!!

'Zat more like it? I hope so.

One thing I like most about this record from 1978, apart from the obvious, is the way the drums sound. And if you didn't already know-- that's one Mr. Pete Thomas bashing the skins all the livelong day.

I should probably tell you that I can do a great (if I say so myself-- and I do) Elvis impersonation, vocally that is... The mannerisms, not so much... See, there are total of 3 great rock vocalists I can do, and, it's sort of like once you master one, the others come easy. These are: EC, Bachmann and Gene. Sounds hard to believe, but it's true.

No Action mp3
This Year's Girl mp3
Little Triggers mp3
Radio, Radio mp3

Crosley Bendix reviews...

2007-05-09T12:30:00.000-04:00

Dance! (mp3)

For: Robert Stitt, 48, mortally wounded in a "battle dance" yesterday.

D-E-V-O!

2007-05-06T18:45:00.000-04:00

I mentioned this group in my last post. And I realized how incredibly reductive I sounded in describing the new oM music. My apologies for that. Please take a bite outta Side Two (below) from their 1978 debut and forget I said anything at all.

Too Much Paranoias mp3. Hold the pickles./ Hold the lettuce./ Special orders don’t upset us./ All we ask is that you let us serve it your way!!! Taken from an old Burger King ad.

Gut Feeling/ Slap Your Mammy mp3. Counting myself as blessed to have watched The Weather Channel's early morning "On The 8's" getting ready to go to class a few times and the long intro to this song was in the background. A good start on my day. And hey, does it sorta remind you of that Outlaws tune, "Green Grass and High Tides Forever"?

Come Back Jonee mp3. The Devos made the best music videos ever. Here's the one for "Come Back Jonee" (YouTube).

Sloppy (I Saw My Baby Gettin') mp3. Nothing really to say about this one. Except: I'm willing to entertain any interpretations you all might have of/on the lyrics...

Shrivel Up mp3. Just since I started putting this post together I have lost something extremely valuable. Time to start prayin'.

GEORGIA MUSIC POST: of Montreal

2007-05-02T12:30:00.000-04:00

If you've got some time to kill, head over to the online baseball comic my pal Ernie & his collaborator, Sean, have created at Friendly Confines. Tell 'em I sent you, too.

Sheesh. It's been a while since I've done one of these-- but alas, another Georgia Music Post. And what other band is more deserving of my love and adoration?

From twinkly townie-folk to global glam through a Devo-ish blender, today's pick are one of the scant few remaining E6'ers left. And many people will tell you-- myself included-- they've just continued to get better and better over the years (Most notably, despite their popularity. You'd think bands get bigger because they get better, but we all know that it's usually the other way around...).

And so today I'm listening to the second side of their third album, released in 1999. It's perfect for sunny days (and Spring cleaning!-- something I've committed myself to actually doing this weekend). With another semester almost out of the way-- this is how we properly summon the Summer fun.

*Buy all the oM recordings at Amazon and/or at emusic*

The Miniature Philospher (mp3)
My Friend Will Be Me (mp3)
My Favorite Boxer (mp3)
Advice From A Divorced Gentlemen To His Bachelor Friend Considering Marriage (mp3)
A Man's Life Flashing Before His Eyes While He And His Wife Drive Off A Cliff (mp3)
Nickee Coco And the Invisible Tree (mp3)
The Gay Parade Outro (mp3)

got Danielson?

2007-04-27T13:35:00.000-04:00

In BC news: For those of you tired of keying in that dash between the Blank and the Crisis-- or can't be bothered with the whole dot-blogspot noize-- your fingers will soon thank me. I registered a sweet spot for us on the Internets yesterday where we continue to do our thang:

blankcrisis.com.

No need to fret about switching up your browser favorites or anything like that, okay. The blogspot address obviously still works. Yes, I am the master of two domains.

Also, as the Crisis approaches its third year this May (and I can't believe it, either!), look out for a few more modest luxuries on this site. First of all, the new template is going to absolutely slay the one you're looking at right now. Something more clean and reader-friendly, too, I hope. File storage is being upgraded as well, and so hopefully the transfers will go down swiftly and smoothly for everyone.

Okay, but on with today's post...

Yes. Christian Rock finally comes to the blog. But when I say that, certainly you're not hoping for this or even that. (No, please, Lord! No!!!) But I'm sure you all know about this marvelous band (below) already and so I won't waste much time with it. They've been around some time now and continue to make great art.

But it's this one from 1998 (below) that we're listening to today. The first time I heard it, it solidified some feelings I had-- that they were going to be so much more than a passing novelty act. (The build-up to bridge/coda of "The Nose..." is superb, however, the "Deeper Than...Government" 3-in-a-row thing I found a little, er, trying. Those are omitted today.)

It's kind of interesting to me-- the implicit political statements made throughout the record. And some of it sounds pretty funky even ("Failing a Test...")...

As with all D'son releases it is highly singable and you should sing this stuff out loud to whomever or whatever you wish.

Idiot Boksen mp3
Fruitful Weekend mp3
Sold! To The Nice Rich Man! mp3
Failing A Test, Falling In Love mp3
The Nose Knows mp3
Thanx To Noah mp3

no.9-b (podcast)

2007-04-24T09:30:00.000-04:00

Right click/save as: mp3 (48 MB)

Playlist available here (.txt file)

This episode should always be available here for your listening & downloading plezzzzzhahhhh.

#9 side A podcast

2007-04-19T13:30:00.000-04:00

Right click/save as: mp3 (52 MB)

For playlist click here. (.txt file)

This episode is archived for all eternity (or so I'm told) at this page.

ENJOY! Will be back for side B on Tuesday or Wednesday...

Special guest post!: Throck on VARSITY DRAG

2007-04-17T10:30:00.000-04:00

Today marks the first time ever I hand over the reigns to someone else for a little rockwrite. It's our friend, Throck (below)-- helping out now as yours truly crunches for End of Semester deadlines.

(above: Throck descending Mount Palomar at 50 mph no-handed in the winter of 2002)

Hello, Crisis fans. Throckmorten Mordecai Wellington coming at ya from exotic Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. I am here to pimp out one of my favourite new bands.

New band with a familiar sound. A sound that has been absent for too long and one that you will all remember. The band I speak of is Ben Deily’s (ex-Lemonheads) Varsity Drag and for an added extra bonus is his 90’s project Pods (Pardon Our Dust).

First let us all give props to Neal for supplying us with a steady diet of great downloads The Crisis has afforded us with since its inception. He has turned me onto a lot of great music and has dazzled me with music from my past that I thought I would never hear again (stuff that is out of print or had on audio cassette and whatnot). He has helped me relive many a good memories with his posts and has also kept me (and you, too) with a smile on my face with his witty and genuine writings.

Second, let me put up my own disclaimer: I am writing this post from an establishment that has both Guinness and Internet on tap. So disregard any errant information and lazy grammar.

Many people wondered where the unique punk sound of Lemonheads went between the albums Lick and Lovey. Well, that unique sound decided to better himself and get an education at the prestigious university called Harvard. And well he did. Cum Laude if memory serves correct. Veritas, Ben.

Where Lick ended, Ben continued his punk poetry through his next project, Pods with his brother Jonno and the then more recently Varsity Drag. Having released The Drag’s first album in Europe on Boss Tuneage Records, then almost immediately followed up (and recently just finished) a successful tour of Europe. (Footnote, Ben and his fellow band mates all have 9-5 jobs, that is like running 2 marathons back to back).

Varsity Drag is made up of Ben Deily (guitar, vocals, piano), Greg Randall (guitar, vocals [http://myspace.com/gregrandall]), Will Anderon (bass guitar, vocals), Ian G. Miller (drums, vocals), Bob Spector (guitar, vocals), and was recorded in a plush metal shipping container in the Bay Area of No-Cal, like all chart-toppers these days.

I became a Lemonheads fan in 1988 when I was 14. I was intrigued with the punk sound meshed with great lyrical content. Sharing song writing duties with Evan Dando, Deily’s songs stood out to me the most. Especially in songs like "Postcard," "Second Chance," "Two Weeks in Another Town" and "Come To The Window." I was disappointed when Lovey came out and Deily’s name was not on it and the patented sound was gone. The sound that produced one of the 77 best Punk records of all time ("Hate Your Friends") was absent. Having indulged in other Punk bands (the usual, Misfits, Suicidal Tendencies, Buzzcocks, Stranglers, Wire, The Dead Milkmen, Dead Kennedys, Stiff Little Fingers, etc etc) from that era, I find it refreshing to hear that he has been making music still with that same gritty, catchy edge and with the same meaningful lyrics.

Posted below are some songs for your judgment and liking. Off of For Crying Out Loud, Varsity Drag’s debut album.

Skinny Ties mp3
Billy Ruane mp3
Look at Me mp3

If that is not enough, you can get a taste of Pods:

Only Living Boy mp3
Promise mp3
Name in Vain mp3 (a scathingly plead to Evan Dando to finally put the Lemonheads name to rest).
End/Begin mp3

If that is not doing it for you, surf over to theirSpace for more songs. Also, Ben Deily has a website full of satire and some rare mp3’s at bendeily.com. "Holla back" at him and let him know what you think of his latest releases. More Pods and Varsity Drag sounds are for sale here. You can also find Varsity Drag on Amazon. I hope you enjoy them all. Varsity Drag is signed to Boss Tuneage Records.

I want to thank Neal for letting me guest post on my favourite mp3 blog. The best on the Inner Nets, by far. He never ceases to amaze me with what he posts.

Until next time friends; Throck out.

Never Postpone Joy. (That’s the Guinness talking).

Frosty

2007-04-12T10:00:00.000-04:00

No, this isn't a post about the unseasonably cool weather we had earlier this week-- here in the Confeds. (Was nice while it lasted...)

Hopefully somebody out there recalls that I included on the very first BC podcast (8a) one gloriously Stooges-esque track from this late '90's Miami band ("Drive-Thru Lover"). Well, I'm doing ya one better today, & presentin' the scorched highlights from their one and only release entitled Liquor Drink.

And I quickly learned while trying to put this together how little information there is on the group at all. So here's what I know, maybe readers can fill in any blanks. Prior to this release, they did a split with fellow Floridian noisemakers, Harry Pussy, and both acts are often linked to noise-rockers To Live and Shave in LA (whom a founding member, Ben Wolcott, left to begin Frosty. These days, Wolcott may or may not still be in post-Frosty outfit Oscillator).

What I like the most about this record is, along with the vocalist's homicidal Waitsian attack (check out "Alice")-- most of these songs are full-on, in-the-red hypnotic. There's something equally tribal & trashy about most of it. The disc closer, "Scoatshine", is probably my favorite. (And maybe you, too, did not know what a scoat is, and needed to seek the Urban Dictionary for explanation.)

"Gutter rock that make(s) Pussy Galore seem downright literary."
-Little Brother Records

Wham-Bam mp3
Hey Whatchoo You Tryin' 2 Say! ?! ? mp3
My Little Gorilla mp3
Alice mp3
Scoatshine mp3

Scientifically Speaking...

2007-04-09T16:40:00.000-04:00

The first night I'd seen her, she seemed miffed at the fact that I'd brought a camcorder to the show.

It was the summer of '99, I think; the place was the Ultramod Compound house in Athens. I had come to see Quintron and arrived very early, per my usual-- sucking down at least four PBRs on the couch while Mr. Q & Miss Pussycat were setting up gear. So I'm one eyeball in the camera viewer, checking to avoid accidental erasure of more important footage 'round the time she came up to me.

Did you ask Mr. Quintron if that was okay... to be taping the show? she asked.

I looked up. Something vaguely reminded me of a school teacher sending me to the principal's office. I didn't know who this was, and frankly, I was more than a little intimidated by her presence. At any rate, I didn't bother to ask. Too much of a weird vibe, and so I simply answered: "No".

You need to clear that with him first. The scowling mystery woman then disappeared to another room.

Well, I'm not interupting anyone's soundcheck, so fuck it. This was the first time I'd ever tried anything like this; didn't think it would be so big a deal. But I thought, obviously there's a problem here, and I'll just put the damn thing back in my stationwagon. After I finish my beer.

A little while later, Q & P are done and they walk outside. Well, maybe this is my chance to get permission, I thought. But by the time I get out there, the two are into some heavy makeout session next to their tour van, which I'm parked beside. I'm not interupting this one either. The camcorder goes in the back seat where it remains.

My new friend turned out to be the evening's opening act, a then-local Athens artist & entomologist.

And while I'm doing this post today to promote her work & art-- my first impressions tell me she wouldn't approve at all. (Even though, the last time she and I exchanged words, at first conversing with a mutual friend after several beers-- she was very pleasant to me then.) I consider myself lucky to have seen at least 3 of her lectures/art performances during my time in Athens.

Side One mp3

Yes, these are lectures on insects, accompanied by repurposed slivers of Welk, etc. And if you think this 10" record originally released in '97 sounds weird, you don't know the half of it. She would present this material with slide shows, and sometimes even (gasp!) live specimens. That was sort of like what everything was building toward, anyway.

I can recall at least one club gig at the Caledonia where she brought cockroaches. When she brought them around all the way from the front of the club to where I was sitting at the bar, I don't think they were even encased in anything. It was just like a tray, I believe. The cockoaches were perfectly calm, save for their little antennae bobbing about. The reactions on most of the girls' (and some dudes') faces that night in the crowd were as much a part of the show as the little critters themselves.

Side Two mp3

On another occasion, she lectured to us on the social/mating rituals of some species or other. And this went on for a while, and people visibly got over their initial discomfort with the subject matter and back to the usual relaxing and drinking and chatting away. Then Moon says, "One of my associates will now bring a live specimen for you to look at." Well, of course people are still just blabbing away. Moon at once chided and tempted the crowd, "We're lucky this evening. They're feeling very social. Yes, they're feeling very social tonight..."

Inside the see-through container being brought around, which was lit by what I remember as being similar to white Christmas lights, there were four or five porcelain or plastic debutantes, sitting by a table, sipping tea. Indeed, many were horrified.

It was a brilliant mixture of performance art and science that I will never forget.

*An interview with today's featured artist here*

*Her most recent release is available on both iTunes and emusic!!!*

(And hopefully the DVD mentioned in that Wiki entry is still forthcoming...)

Huggy Bear

2007-04-05T15:00:00.000-04:00

Greetings! and a firm handshake to all the new visitors comin' from The Hype (but not to forget all the well-aquainted ones... ).

You know, I've been enrolled on Hype for almost as long as this blog's been around, but I've been using the wrong file server the whole time, and so-- nothing would show. Needless to say, since making the necessary changes, I'm very happy with the amount of hits I'm getting these days.

Also, I finally got the whole podcast subscription thing down yesterday. Maybe you noticed in the top left corner? The feed is here and should sync up with iTunes, piece-a-cake.

Now, on with today's post...

HB were feminist rock all the way-- one of the original riot grrrl bands from the early '90s. How many other groups can you name that supposedly announced a retirement date upon inception... and stuck to it! Some Wiki background:

During the course of their existence, they refused to be photographed or interviewed by mainstream press, nor gave their full names once they began releasing records formally. In spite of a major label bidding war, HB stuck with Wiiija, an indie label. Huggy Bear did agree to sign to Nude Records, but only if the label would drop the band Suede from the label's roster. Nude Records refused to drop Suede, its best-selling act and one of the top British bands of the time.

The Amazon entry for today's selection (below) prices used discs between $24 & $80, while emusic has someone else in mind completely. Here we have a band sorely in need of the box set/reissue treatment, complete with a DVD extra.

Dissthentic Penetration mp3
Sizzlemeet mp3
Shaved Pussy Poetry mp3
Pansy Twist mp3
Concrete Life mp3
Pro No from Now mp3
Prayer mp3
Her Jazz mp3
Teen Tighterns mp3
Derwin mp3
No Sleep mp3
Can't Kiss mp3

Tangerine Dream

2007-04-03T14:45:00.000-04:00

Ist nacht musik...

No! Ist kosmische...

The second album by these Krautrock kings, released in 1967, is said to be their transition period, moving more toward the electronic-based soundscapes they are most known and loved for.

Me? I can't say much about it because I have so little to work with in terms of comparisons. But, right now I'm watching/listening to the song "Ricochet" on YouTube and it's unreal! I intend to get all their stuff ASAP.

There are moments on Alpha that seem to foreshadow hundreds of post-rock acts to follow. Especially Sunrise in the Third System (mp3), which totally fucking reminds me of Godspeed's "Sleep".

And I have to give Steve credit for turning me on to this stuff... It's really good for a late night of dark, drunken solitude. When only the headlights of cars are allowed to invade by way of the front window.

Fly and Collision of Coma Sola (mp3/18 MB)

TD news: the band is set to play a 40th anniversary gig in London Astoria on Friday April 20th. And if you have tickets, you're a lucky bastard!

Bonus/rare:
Ultima Thule, pt. 1 (mp3) This one is a vinyl rip & has a little bit of surface noise, but is not to be missed.

The Red Krayola

2007-03-29T15:10:00.000-04:00

Get your freeform freakout right here. Mayo and company deliver an avant proto-punk/psychedelic tour de force on this 1967 debut-- straight from the heart of Texas. I got this thing a long time ago, after only hearing Thompson's magnificent solo effort, Corky's Debt..., and I was pleasantly surprised. (Wish I could say the same for the completely unlistenable Coconut Hotel. Check it: 37 of the 44 tracks are one-second pieces!)

It has a strange personality, this album. The parts not entirely devoid of structure are up there with the best of the late 1960's era, and more like the British stuff, which I like better anyway. And the parts that are devoid of structure are like an added bonus-- and they, too, remind me of the British psych. Evidently, the acid was better over there? Not too many American acts brave enough to skronk out?

You may notice that the track listing is waaayyyy behind in chronology, and I've tried to rectify this problem below. Sorry I didn't just re-tag everything, I simply forgot about the discrepancy. Obviously the folks mastering the version I own had fallen aslepp at the wheel. But in their defense, the noisy segues between make it difficult to differentiate.

Hurricane Fighter Plane -- actually the Side A of the record.
Transparent Radiation -- actually "Pink Stainless Tail"
War Sucks --actually a "freeform freakout"
Pink Stainless Tail -- actually "Parable..."
Parable of Arable Land -- the final "freeform freakout"

Rush week (2 of 2)

2007-03-27T19:00:00.000-04:00

Air drummers of the world unite (and take over).

A Farewell to Kings mp3.

Cygnus X-1 (YouSendIt mp3/14 MB)

Back with the second installment of Rush week. I had thought that these would be more spaced out (har har) in terms of time between, but frankly I'm ready to be done with it. Don't get me wrong, I'm crazy about the comments I've received thus far... Definitely a polarizing band if there ever was one.

Maybe some of you heard about the horrible double-tragedy their drummer endured in the late-'90's, but did you know he wrote a book about it (or rather: how he got through it)? I'd actually like to read that sometime.

He has said about Rand's objectivist influence on his lyrics (he's written almost all of 'em since the band's 2nd album):

There was a remarkable backlash, especially from the English press, this being the late 70's, when collectivism was still in style, especially among journalists... They were calling us 'Junior fascists' and 'Hitler lovers.' It was a total shock to me... For a start, the extent of my influence by the writings of Ayn Rand should not be overestimated. I am no one's disciple.

That's fine. But don't get BC here started on Rand and capital-fascist greed. OK?

Circumstances mp3. This is probably my favorite of their shorter songs-- which are few and far between as it is. (Under 3 minutes? The hell you say!) It actually sounds heavy throughout, save for the twinkly synth & bells bridge sequence.

Broon's Bane/ The Trees/ Xanadu (live) Listen and download on this page/26 MB. Okay, the version we have here (from this album) is highly recommended. After a nice little solo acoustic guitar piece, we get "The Trees"-- which according to its Wiki entry, has nothing to do with civil rights or antiracism. Go figure.

And then there is "Xanadu"-- something of a Stoner National Anthem during my 10th grade year. My friends and I took all the wild triple S-curves on late nights at high speeds. The fog was unbelievable. I saw the overlapping clouds descend upon the damp rural fields one night, like someone closing the blinds from the sky. So interwined are my early experiences with psychedelics and this one song. Coleridge might have even been proud. And Lifeson's closing solo is so well done; not overwrought, or drastically simple-- just fucking great. Alternating between howls, and moans, some chirping. (I guess I can mention here his trouble with the law a few years back... The Devil has Florida.)

So they are apparently putting out a new album in May, but honestly I stopped caring 10 years ago or more. I did see them once play the Omni in Atlanta, and it was one of the worst shows I've ever attended. But it wasn't their fault, it was just shitty seats (the balcony). Every time Neil hit a trigger pad to some sample effect sound, it would saturate everything else! That was one of the last big, big arena concerts for me. But, it was also a fantastic show at the same time, because Cunt-all box opened, and were booed of the stage. And even though that band was cut short, they just had to get through their vomit-inducing shitfest of a hit before leaving. Like they weren't getting paid if they skipped it or something... Fun times.

The final word on what was supposed to be a week-long special: the band's later stuff, I must admit that I still dig "Subdivions" when I hear it on the radio. Possibly a case of the message/topic exceeding the music...? The video (YouTube)) is okay, too.

Hopefully I will be back (with some music I'm actually proud to say I'm a fan of) by the end of the week. Thanks for indulging me, as always.

Rush week (1 of 2)

2007-03-23T13:30:00.000-04:00

I'm back with more music than you can handle. (And if you only knew how much trouble my file server's been givin' me lately...)

Ready to get hazed, kids? Cuz it's Rush week.

The Crisis is currently working with your local tatoo establishment(s) to brand calves, asses, you-name-it-- it's on us (me)!!!

You-- yes, you!-- dear friend, can look like this dedicated fan I found on da Space (pics above & below). Because you know chicks dig Canadian prog-rock on a man.

Not really, though. This week goes out to all the older brothers supplying us back in the day. Did we know any better? And before you answer, please take into consideration-- our main dealer was in training at the time to become an FBI agent.

Truth is, there's nothing cool about the trio. As Ernie said to me, "They're soulless." But that's alright. We can deal with that. Remember to never get too comfortable with daily life, you punk rockers. SXSW? You know I'm paying attention. Just let me get outta yer way....

Bastille Day (mp3)

Just about all these song are long as hell. But you knew that. How many bloggers are going to de-link me after this post, I'm wondering....

Lakeside Park (mp3)

The Necromancer : Into Darkness/ Under the Shadow/ Return of the Prince (YouSendIt mp3/17 MB) Try to get through the narration on this one without laughing. Kind of reminds me of "March to the Witch's Castle", in spots.

The Fountain of Lamneth: In the Valley/ Didacts and Narpets/ No One at the Bridge/ Panacea/ Bacchus Plateau/ The Fountain (Listen & download mp3 at this page/27 MB)

It's rather amazing to me that I can listen to this stuff several years later and feel like I'm in ten places at once.

One last song before I go...

By-Tor and the Snow Dog (YouSendIt mp3/17 MB) And if you play it backwards at the end (or speed it up? I can't remember.), where the low rumble is underneath the guitar solo, there supposedly is a secret message, according to the PMRC. It goes: I want your mind and your body . . . I want you . . . I'm By-Tor!

More where this came from (possibly) by Monday. It's for the sake of all you punks out there.

Spring Break podcast

2007-03-08T15:00:00.000-05:00

Here is the third installment of the Blank Crisis podcast, just as I'm getting ready to take off to ATL & SAV for some rest, relaxation, and... all the trappings involved in such pursuits.

Direct download link at this page (56 MB)
Tracklisting available here (.txt file).

I'll be back sometime soon-- can't really say when. But when I do, I have a couple of major Guilty Pleasure posts to get off my back. So, there's something we can all look forward to, right?

MM

2007-03-08T14:00:00.000-05:00

So... I was at an eating establishment on campus with Joel & Andy, where we're so lucky to get mtvU shoved down our throats during lunch. Some high schoolers were there on a field trip or something, early recruitment/marketing or whatever. The place was packed, but we considered that a good thing-- you couldn't hear the goddamned godawful crap coming from those ten or so mounted idiot boxes in the main eating area. But like a masochist, I happened to look up and this is what I saw (YouTube).

I really should be used to this sort of thing by now.

The first time I heard "Float On", I knew that the Mouse had chosen a well-worn path to commercial suckcess. They'd been around for ten years, had a huge following, and were (like me) quickly approaching 30. And, by the way-- how many songs did Brock write about cars breaking down on him, anyway? The indie rock lifestyle (even though they were one of the biggest of the late 90's acts) was no longer enough. I don't know how you guys took it, but "Float" was, to me, the most trite Assurance Rock ever produced.

(Photo above: The band before they needed a thousand members, including the 80's has-been.)

Assurance Rock = the quickest way to make it. Just write a song about how everything's going to be okay. People like that. And you know, tap into it. Be an entertainer rather than artist. Be a whore.

Shortly after that, The O.C. treatment. "Float" is MM's cultural birth for most folks under the ages of, say-- 26 or 27. And I so pity them. All I can say is that there is a lot of truth to Sickboy's "Unifying Theory of Life" (YouTube).

Correct me if I'm wrong, too: Brock's stuff in the early years seemed to be about a man's struggle with bipolar disorder? It comes up frequently. And that voice, what happened to it? I find myself making excuses for him now. He's getting older, he can't or doesn't want to scream at the drop of a hat anymore. There are long-term implications, in terms of health, after all. Same reasons, I would guess, that Bachmann had to radically tone down.

So, join me in some good old days-ism. It's what I'm best known for in MP3Blogoplis. Most of these tracks come from this comp of early singles (above), many are vinyl rips.

All Nite Diner mp3
Sunspots in the House of the Late Scapegoat mp3
Medication mp3
Whenever I Breathe Out, You Breathe In (positive/negative) mp3
Buttons to Push the Buttons mp3
A Life of Arctic Sounds mp3
Grey Ice Water mp3
Birds vs. Worms mp3

The Princeton Reverbs Colonial

2007-03-05T12:45:00.000-05:00

Today I'm content to share with you all one of my prized possessions. It's a vinyl rip of New Hampshire band Princeton Reverbs Colonial's 1999 LP Christ On The Foreheads of 144,000.

And this was an extremely limited debut-- one that has been woefully out-of-print now for several years. I first heard it on WUOG (of course) one afternoon during their "Lunchbox" program, & scrambled to hit the "record" button on my boombox. It kind of hit me as a cross between GBV's glorious 4-track era and the best of the E6 collective. The hooks on this thing are just fantastic! And I thought to myself, This should be the biggest indie band in the world right now.

Soon after, I got a chance to see PRC rock the Watt with fablefactory opening!!! It was one badazz show, and I'll always remember the Reverbs were wearing like, Sunday school attire-- churning one great tune after the other. I would later discover the connection between these two awesome acts-- PRC frontman Paul Vittum & his label, Red Carpet Ring.

A year passed by, I think. And then they came back to town: they were on the air (WUOG, again!) with those Je Suis France dudes. I called the station and talked with Vittum for a long while, gushing about how awesome they were.

Paul was a gracious man, he gave me his number and sent me a vinyl copy of Christ on the Foreheads, along with fablefactory's American Custard CD.

I can't tell you how much it meant to me, and still does. We spoke to each other on the phone handful of times-- talked music, college, what it was like running a label, the NH climate. I was going through a particularly rough divorce during this time, and Vittum was even cool enough to endure my drama for a spell.

They came back to Athens, in the summer of 2000 I think, playing at the Ultramod Compound-- but this time with the France. I finally met Paul and the 'verbs in person that night. After some wicked guitar destruction courtesy of Ryan ("The Darkness") Martin, PRC rocked the house. I begged them to play the closer to Christ.... ("Laudanum"), but Vittum said he couldn't remember how to play it. I laughed. So I said, how about "Our Red Clarinet" (their latest single then)? And as I was off somewhere drinking in the packed house, they gave me a shout-out & dedicated that one to me. That had never happened before. I would give almost anything for a video of that night.

I kind of fell out of touch with PRC around 2002-2003, though. I heard through the Athens grapevine that they'd broken up, and that Paul V. had quit music altogether. So I was very much elated to discover while surfing the Internets recently a new email address for Paul (the Red Carpet Ring site has been neglected for so long), along with some news on the band. I emailed him, and here's part of the reply:

My wife Faith and I recorded the third PRC disc wtih family and friends in NH in
2005. We mastered it with Jeff Lipton whose done some work with Magnetic
Fields, Pernice Brothers, etc. The disc is titled join the invisible
choir and its the third installment to the story we started to tell
back with ..and the flute to float the soldiers sword. The choir record
hasn't seen a proper release yet. I think many of the songs are
floating around out on the internet, though probably somewhat hard to find.

...I'll always be making music, its the
best thing for my mental health. Talk more soon, sincerely Paul

So look out for Princeton Reverbs, and if they come to your town-- check them out. You won't be disappointed. Until then-- enjoy today's music, and I'll be back here around the end of the week. Cheers. And long live The Princeton Reverbs Colonial.

Side A mp3 (16 MB): Swt. Spts. Nitro/ Miscommunicated words I wrote to Jeff/ Only Veratria Ointment/ Prelude to Christ/ Zoological Examples of personality traits

Side B mp3 (20 MB): Trains we rode/ Falling Forward/ Ammoniaque/ Season of Change/ Laudanum

2-fer 2z-dee: something to tide you over...

2007-02-27T14:15:00.000-05:00

And now that I put it that way... makes me think of this and this (both are YouTube). And by the way, TD's character is how I feel as of late, what with my school workload. Spring Break is coming soon, but I'm hoping to get 2 more posts in before then, plus a special edition of the BC podcast! Yesh yesh.

But for right now, we're going to call the first half of today's post: Songs That Remind Me of High School...

I'll never forget riding 'round in my friend Rich's car-- he'd just inherited that booger-green tank from his grandpa, who played some major league ball back in the day. We spray-painted that mofo all over, with hideous looking flowers, anarchy signs, peace signs. This was the soundtrack to the mayhem we inflicted on our lil' hometown. (And I recently discovered that our old highschool apparently offers a podcast these days. WTF.)

Punk Rock Girl mp3
Bleach Boys mp3
My Many Smells mp3
Smokin' Banana Peels mp3
Born To Love Volcanos mp3

---------------------------------------------

So now, an quintessential album just for the helluvit.

Some Wikipedia love:

Spiderland is the second and final album by the Louisville, KY rock band Slint, released on March 27, 1991, on Touch & Go Records. Shortly after its release, the band broke up due to internal differences, and, supposedly, mental breakdowns brought on by the recording sessions of the album. They apparently did not tour in support of the album.

It is now widely recognized as one of the most influential alternative rock albums of the decade, proving a key influence on numerous post-rock and math rock bands: critic Dean Carlson writes that the album "remains one of the most essential and chilling releases in the mumbling post-rock arena. Even casual listeners will be able to witness an experimental power-base that the American underground has come to treasure."

The cover photograph was taken by Will Oldham in a limestone quarry lake in Utica, Indiana, in summer 1990.

The track "Good Morning, Captain" was later included in the soundtrack album of the 1995 movie Kids.

Some versions of the CD release include the following legend on its back cover: "This recording is meant to be listened to on vinyl." On the back cover of the vinyl release is a message that reads: "interested female vocalists write 1864 douglas blvd. lousville, ky. 40205."

And I used to have this thing on vinyl, but sold it like a fucking dumbass! Anyways...

Get it on zip (52 MBs/YouSendIt-- limited time!)

It's a celebration!

2007-02-20T15:00:00.000-05:00

So what are we celebrating, anyway? I dunno. We'll figure something out.

File this first part of the post right next to other gems: Roderick Parks, Nehemiah Wade (wma file), and that Frogs album I posted last year. For precisely the same reasons. It's a celebration. There's no hate involved whatsoever.

Hey there. What's yer sign say?

Awwwwwww snap!!!... Haha!

Yeyah. uhh. uhh.

CHRIS ROCK "Niggaz vs. Black People" mp3.

We all know this one by heart.

FUN VIDEO BELOW:

*Watch the 2006 Boondocks "Return Of The King" episode on YouTube*

*Watch the "Beat a Snitch" video via YouTube*

--------------------------------------------------------------

Moving right along....

Last summer I posted something by this UK wonder and scored tons of hits across the ocean. Thought, maybe I'll try again with a different number composed of several numbers...

FRANK SIDEBOTTOM "Indie Medley" mp3

--------------------------------------------------------------

Why? Just thought I'd throw this last one in. It has no humorous intentions. Just a good song. Should be played at maximum volume. At work or home.

YOKO ONO & THE PLASTIC ONO BAND- "Why?" mp3

was with a sickness

2007-02-19T17:06:00.000-05:00

Sorry for not posting in a while. I've finally been raised from the dead (or rather: the couch) and will bring more mp3s soon.

Thanks visitors,

Neal

Once wuz lost, but now...

2007-02-13T13:10:00.000-05:00

Know what RAWKS?...?...?...

Ramble Tamble (mp3) rawks!

In a big way. For like, almost seven and half minutes straight. Maybe you wouldn't expect this kind of thing from me... Hell, I'd almost forgotten this song completely. How great thou art, emusic. It goes somethin' like this, sing along with me:

Mud in the water, roach in the cellar, bugs in the sugar,
Mortgage on the home.

Garbage on the sidewalk,
Highways in the back yard,
Police on the corner,
Mortgage on the car.

Okay. Break it down and build it back up, Fogerty boys. I need one stunningly cool bridge. Up & up & up. Higher & higher. Geez. Are those bullets flying from yer geetars? Or richocheted gravel below this dusty transport? A three-note chord on the piano will be new pulse, my ladder to the Cosmo's. A hazy guitar line breezes in, swirling around right to center to left. The Creedence knew what they were doing. Beautiful stuff!

We gather our wits for one last verse and refrain:

They're selling independence,
Actors in the White House,
Acid in digestion,
Mortgage on my life.

----------------------------------------------

Ahem. Very very soon, friends-- BC shall feature a podcast in honor of a truly visionary artist, and some other special treats to go along with. Why now? Cuz. It's almost the 40th anniversary of his triumphant return home.

And our resident JH expert, Andy, has agreed to help me out with this, and I personally can't wait! We'll most certainly air our grievances with the fam, and as for any FoxeyPurpleJoe numbers you're expecting-- well, those will be wholly disregarded from our podcast entirely. Understand, if you don't already: these songs caused the genius immense pain before he left the planet. I personally believe that they contributed to the several other causes of psychic damage which ultimately killed him at age 27.

I Don't Live Today (live in San Diego 1969) mp3. This is the exact version I heard the first time I got high (with a girl named Kris). Comes right off this comp from 1990. At the end, he twists feedback into little animal balloons for the crowd. Like it was nothing.

Existing.
Nothing but existing...

Oh. How you fucked my 15-year-old mind, JH.

----------------------------------------------

And now...

one more for all'a y'alls...

(art above by Snowcrash. From the Escher Blowout 2 contest)

Can't Touch Dis (bizzaro remix/cut-up) mp3. One final piece of nostalgia today. This version you might not have heard before, and it's origins are unknown to me now. I dedicate this song to Kris, wherever she may be.

GEORGIA MUSIC POST: Rock and Roll Summer

2007-02-08T13:40:00.000-05:00

Before I get into today's post, I just wanted to point y'all in the direction of a nice blog I'm really digging as of late: Gimme Tinnitus. Bob R. says that he "reads the mp3 blogs so you don't have to." Well, I dunno about that. But he sure has some excellent taste and I highly suggest you update bookmarks/link lists accordingly. Right alongside Comm Maj/Engl Min and others.

Another thing about blogs (and I swear I'll get on with it)-- we all are mourning the loss of Bret's PPJ, right? I mean, what the hell am I supposed to do without those Monday podcasts?!! Hopefully April will arrive early this year, in time for that new Egg City (if he does decide on that name) grand opening...

----------------------------------------------

I tried very hard to resist this band's infectious twee pop/bubblegum upon several first-listens, in '98 or so. I had my dear post-punk and garage and indie pop that swaggered more than it bounced-- and then holy crap!, Athens begins to go through this real pop revival via the E6-ers, et al. Lots of bands were singing bop bop bodda... bop bop bodda and the message was clear: Let's have fun!

And so it was.

But Wes Whitener and Rock and Roll Summer took it farthest, I think-- without sounding one bit ironic or like an elaborate tribute to any one particular band. The guys embraced the sensibilities rock had enjoyed in the mid-to-late 1950's, when the songs were full of innocence and sincerity-- y'know, taking your true love to the dance, holding hands, etc. Kind of like the Beat Haps without all the use of subtle sexual double entendres.

Some of you might find this stuff corny at first, like I did. But then you realize that these songs might be even more punk rock than all the sporty spit & grime put together, in this day & time-- when it's all about cynicism, ugliness, image, etc. What takes the most guts sometimes is making onesself the most vulnerable. And this goes equally for girls as it does boys today.

Whitener can out-sincere & out-earnest Richman at the top of his game. Gasp! But it's true!

Richard, Tell The Truth mp3
You Never Picked Me Up in a Helicopter mp3 (very recommended!)
Homecoming Court mp3 (very recommended!)
Rock! Roll! Summer mp3

Still don't get it?

Ahhh....

... ssshhhh...

Just tell that DJ "spin that record one more time"!!!

*Listen to lots more Rock and Roll Summer at iputmybooktogether.com*

*Make friends with Wes on YourSpace/HisSpace/ThatSpace*

8tt beside (podcast)

2007-02-06T17:00:00.000-05:00

Having some trouble with the subscription side of the new podcasts. Trying to work that out. I've been told that I need to post these as "mp3 enclosures" or something, whatever that means. The new service I'm using has turned out to be similar to YouSendIt in some ways-- doesn't register as straight-up mp3 files. And biscu is giving me regular hell with these podcasts. But here is the second side of the #8 podcast from last weekend. I'll resume regular track-by-track stuff again soon.

Direct download here (54 MB) and playlist here (.txt file).

UPDATED: Podcast now available!

2007-02-02T14:00:00.000-05:00

Making good on several past threats, Blank Crisis brings the first in a series of ultra-hip podcasts for your listening pleasure. Today is the first side of Mixtape #8.

Everything on the podcast-- never posted here before. Totally worth the download!

Podcast direct download here (57 MB)

Track list here

But I have to admit-- I forgot to use compression on the announcement mic at mixdown, and so it isn't quite the radio-quality that future ones will have. Geez. I sound like a grandmother making excuses on Thanksgiving Day...

Podcast feed link? You'll find in the left sidebar (in case you didn't notice... above the Ad-Free owl)-- for those who are into subscribing: click here. Also, I am working with a new file server to archive each and every BC podcast presented for an unlimited time. This means they will be available to you FOREVER!!! A new "mixtape" will be up at least once a month, possibly more. And guests will be stopping in from time to time to help with. Enjoy!

GEORGIA MUSIC POST: Smoke

2007-01-29T11:30:00.000-05:00

Today marks the eight year anniversary of an enormous loss still felt in the Atlanta music and art scene. Nix that... the world.

His name was Robert Dickerson, but he called himself Benjamin. A number of groups he led in the '80's and '90's: Freedom Puff, The Opal Foxx Quartet, and of course, Smoke. He and the band were immortalized in Jem Cohen's excellent 2000 documentary, Benjamin Smoke.

DVD Trailer: [YouTube it or below:]

Smoke were an incredibly powerful ensemble-- and unmistakably Southern. With Dickerson's heartbreaking poetry over Coleman Lewis' guitar, Bill Taft's trumpet and banjo, and Brian Halloran's cello-- they covered dark terrain, but were coming from somewhere 100% real.

Another YouTube from the movie

The first time I heard Smoke on Album 88 in 1994, I was completely stunned. Here was a guy with a voice so pained and deep of gravel, it would've made Tom Waits sound like he'd just had a slight cold all those years. Benjamin, I imagined to be a heavy set guy, with a hairy chest and wife beater. Man, I couldn't have been more wrong. Soon later I discovered that Dickerson had a penchant for cross-dressing, was legendary in Atlanta, and was living with HIV for several years. He looked emaciated. But his voice was so robust. It still is.

One final YouTube link

After he died, I remember the press in Athens and Atlanta had featured a slew of tributes and memorials to him. There had been a parade in Little 5 the weekend before, lots of fans carrying banners reading The Love That Won't Shut Up. Somehow it had taken us by surprise that he would die. I blew the last opportunity life gave me to see Smoke live at the 40 Watt not long before, stupidly thinking Oh, I'll see 'em next time... Just as he sings on the song "Dream": "It goes away if we don't think about it..."

So this post is dedicated to the life and memory of Benjamin, who left us too soon, but gave so much... (RIP 1960-1999)

From the album Another Reason to Fast:

Trust mp3
Friends mp3
When it Rains mp3
Shadow Box mp3
Dream mp3
Chad mp3

"Atomizer"

2007-01-25T10:49:00.000-05:00

The classic from 1986. But don't take my word for it: Sounds said at the time:

A FRENZIED, sometimes frightening onslaught, Atomizer builds on the legacy of Husker Du with an accuracy and purpose that leaves you drained. In the aftermath of hardcore's golden age, a few American bands are picking up the pieces left by the pack leaders, and Big Black's Chicago-based roar is one of the most distinctive survivors.

The drum machines on this record give their rhythms a brittle, crisped quality: the whole sound is scorched, charred to a black twist of metal. Although, like Husker Du, they know how to sneak pop licks in among this terrible sound. In 'Big Money' or 'Fists Of Love', Big Black's music sings.

They're eaten up with the little crimes of small-time America, and their notebooks are actually more reminiscent of The Minutemen than the Huskers. Where some hardcore is a high, screeching sound that seems to whistle through city blocks, Big Black sound like they're trapped in some subterranean plant, hatching out a furious underground sound.

They already have nowhere else to go, like their predecessors; say this sort of thing once and there's not much reason to say it again. But Atomizer is lacerating proof of the way the American underbelly keeps releasing its dark offspring.

Another fansite noted:

This album marks the debut of Steve Albini's incredible guitar sound. On Kerosene it sounds like he's playing shards of broken glass rather than a musical instrument, and when he's beefed up by Sant and Dave, and driven forward by Roland, the song becomes something more akin to a train derailment than a musical experience. Bad Houses, which immediately follows, is one of the darkest and moodiest songs around--I rank it with Pere Ubu's "Final Solution", just to give you something to compare it with...
Originally to be released in mid to late 1985, this didn't see the light of day until early 1986--possibly due to problems licensing artwork (the cover was originally going to be Marvin the Martian pointing a deathray at Earth). Anywho, it was definitely worth the wait, this is the toughest, nastiest, noisiest Big Black stuff, bar none. Forget Songs About F***ing, this is the sound of Big Black at their peak...

All liner notes reprinted below presumed to be written by Albini:

Passing Complexion mp3. In certain circumstances, a mancould prefer to lose his entire heritage, when another more comfortable one presents itself. Especially if he plays piano. Especially if it's 1926.

Durango said, "I'd really like to be playing this two octaves higher," and Burgess said, "No problem."

Big Money mp3. Greed that manifests itself in laziness. A cop who sleeps in his car. A cop who goes into "bad" neighborhoods for recreation. A cop who uses his position for a bludgeon.

The digital screams are our first moves into the lucrative disco/beatbox genre, where we plan to concentrate our future efforts once we quit our jobs.

Kerosene mp3. In small towns, there are few forms of amusement. Two prominent ones are easy-- sex and arson. When the more simple exercises lose their bang, new combinations develop.

Any similarity between the rhythm patterns used and Led Zeppelin drumbeats is entirely appropriate.

Bad Houses mp3. We do things, bad things, and go places, bad places, even when the thrill is seldom worth the degradation. Maybe we need the degradation. Maybe we associate it with the thrill, and after a while, they become inseperable. Then the thrill becomes secondary.

A toy organ the size of a paperback book through a guitar stack the size of a walk-in freezer. God, how excessive we get sometimes. We like Seventeen Seconds, all of us.

Fists of Love mp3. Take expression of emotion to its physical end, until the expressions take on meanings of their own. They become almost rituals in their own gravity. Fist fucking, wife beating, whatever.

You can hear the change drop out of his pants pockets as he drops them in the toilet stall. Microphone feedback is pretty fucking loud if you're standing in front of the speaker for five minutes.

Bazooka Joe mp3. Joe comes back from the great war very different. He has done nothing but kill and watch death for many long months. He has trouble adjusting until a friend suggest a new line of work, compatible with Joe's new skills.

Part of the track is an M1 carbine being fired in a field exercise. By a guy named Joe.

"This is good radio..." WUOG's Head 2 Head program (cir. 1999)

2007-01-19T19:30:00.000-05:00

Blank Crisis proudly presents an old tape from a call-in show that used to come on every Friday night at 7:30 pm on the University of Georgia's campus station, WUOG. It was called Head 2 Head, and you can read a sort of "mission statement" from 1996 here; while the cast credited is totally different from the dudes who came on when I began listening at the end of the '90's... the vibe comes pretty close.

They called themselves The Strange Gang, and were a group of college DJ friends and/or Athens, GA bandmates (Je Suis France, Wee Turtles, Masters of the Hemisphere, etc.). The exact date of the broadcast is uncertain, but I would place in sometime between late-'98 or early '99.

THE STRANGE GANG was/is: Brian Crews/ The Darkness,/ DJ ("Cougar") Hammond /Rev. Bobby Nuisance/The Apple Farmer/others...

Ev'ry day is a waste 'a day!!!!....

And I don't want to give too much away or build it up a whole lot, because there is a lot of in-joking and so forth; just use your imagination... One episode certainly cannot give Head 2 Head the justice it deserves, but it's the best I can do for now. My closet at home is full of cassettes, and I've so little time left with everything else going on at present. I can tell you that I am not on this particular one, though.

A few references made to: DialAmerica/ Terry "Big Dog" Stephens/ Jim Donnan/Vince Dooley/ Herschel Walker/ Widespread/ The Red and Black.

Download the episode: "Post-NEVER AGAIN"
(Or: "Richard Meets The Shellac Guy") mp3/40 MB

JUST IN FROM DJ : Mesmerization Eclipse will soon be hosting tons of old H2H tapes in podcast form! Look for updates on this... First 365 Days returns-- and now this!!! My birfday ain't till Tuesday, yo...

Bobby ("B.0.B." '66)

2007-01-17T12:48:00.000-05:00

The soundtrack to many'a perfect cold morning-- after breakfast and so forth-- when you've got absolutely nothing to do that day. I am not so lucky at present, but whatever...

And I wish that I'd been more successful in the past with ripping the mono vinyl copy I own of this utter and total masterpiece from '66, cuz it sounds incredible. Each time I tried, the highs turned out to be just too much for digital. And you wouldn't think mono would be all that-- but I assure you that it is. Like an old-time AM radio broadcast.

It has been my companion for oh-- 12 years or so now. In fact, back when I was still married, I would literally get up before the dawn and drive thru the suburbs-- just me & Bobby on the cassette player, and he'd spin his tales. Half of them were lies, but no matter.

His harp work? Well, it's almost a survey of every single great blues that came before it.

Sometimes I have to wonder about these 60's rock icons such as Dylan-- how they are almost like-- not of their own time or something-- and yet were doing something so original. Over the holidays, I bought the "Royal Albert Hall bootleg" and needless to say, I was floored. But what got me the most was how it sounded like it could've been recorded yesterday. No shit. And so you can probably see how I can't be bothered with those "Best Of" lists at the end of each year. Because I mean, really-- who is putting out anything on par with a record like this?

Pledging My Time mp3
Visions of Johanna mp3
One of Us Must Know (Sooner or Later) mp3
Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again mp3
Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands mp3

Polly Jean

2007-01-11T09:44:00.000-05:00

Elvis Costello's by now well-known (at least: earlier) modus operandi of "revenge and guilt" seems to be very much at work here on today's selected artist and her 1993 sophomore effort (above). SPIN hyped the hell out of it, I recall. And the fact that Albini produced it-- well, these are the main reasons why I bought it. In those times, hype could be justified (SPIN still had a shred of credibility, mind you), and for this album-- it certainly was.

At least the first four tracks, anyway... To me, these are sincere expressions of bileful rage and plaintive reassurance, beautiful and ghostly, repudiating and seductive (sometimes all in the same breath!). Orgasmic, but don't turn your back post-coitus-- there' s a knife at the foot of the bed.

Later in the album she covers ol' "Highway 61..." (a hint at the next post I'm doing), and it's damn fine, too. She would of course go on to a more commercial alterno sound with following albums, from what I've heard.

Rid Of Me mp3
Missed mp3
Legs mp3
Rub 'Til It Bleeds mp3

"1990"

2007-01-08T13:48:00.000-05:00

Danny does the blues-folk-hymnal thing like almost no one can on this Shimmydisc release. It's without a doubt my favorite of his in-studio material, and was produced by none other than "radical adult" Steve Shelley. It's surprises me, too-- cuz I don't normally go for the whole religious proselytizing thing, had it come from anywhere else.

DJ of course continues to ride the wave of attention garnered from the 2005 Sundance-winning documentary The Devil and Daniel Johnston, which I still haven't seen. However, I still manage to sustain on whatever I can find on YouTube-- right here.

Noticeably absent below for many Johnston fans is "Some Things Last a Long Time"-- a song that for me, is one of the weakest on the album-- yet I know I'm in the minority here... Jad co-wrote it; BTS covered it. And I still don't dig it very much...? Maybe it's just the sequencing of "Held The Hand" immediately followed by "Lord Give Me Hope", and I'm really knocked the fuck out.

(Read a previous Blank Crisis post on Johnston here)

Devil Town mp3
Spirit World Rising mp3
Held the Hand mp3
Lord Give Me Hope mp3
Tears, Stupid Tears mp3
Don't Play Cards With Satan mp3
Careless Soul mp3
Funeral Home mp3

GEORGIA MUSIC POST: FLAP

2007-01-05T17:00:00.000-05:00

Open 4 Bidness!

Would've made my return as early as yesterday, but my file server was down for upgrades.

So today I share with you one of my most prized posessions: a super lo-fi cassette produced by the Atlanta band FLAP almost twelve years ago, Tits Up For The 9-5. (Many readers weren't there-- but this was the first band ever to be posted here on BC.) I recieved it via snail mail so long ago, after writing a fan letter to them. The subsequent response from Andy Hopkins (now performing as Mr. Rudy Day) accompanied this treasure of mine-- yet was stolen by another rabid FLAP fanatic. Enjoy!

MJ Poison mp3
Enema Band-it mp3
Bob Larsony mp3
Exprexxo mp3
(untitled) mp3
Shi or Gi (live) mp3
Wooky Talky mp3
Nighttime at the Zoo mp3
Lemmy Inn (live) mp3
Pickin' Up Trash mp3
Mutants of This Here Monster mp3
Flying mp3
Glass Knuckles mp3
Dr. Fat Boy (studio) mp3
Bears Against Drugs mp3
(untitled) mp3

Last call for '06 super-post!!!

2006-12-21T16:40:00.000-05:00

Well, here it tis. A little holiday gift basket to warm yourself up with...

One of the best (and unfortunately, only) concerts I caught this year. The Joos (sans Malkmus, at right) launched their first-ever tour after a decade-plus career. The 40 Watt gig in March was the stuff dreams are made of. Berman did appear nervous and frail; however, if any of those bootlegs circulating wildly about on the para-Web are any indicator (and our friend largeheartedboy being a major purveyor of), he certainly hit a stride on later dates.

zip (64 MB)

This classic record from 1998 is an all-time fave-- & presented here, for you, dear friends-- in its entirety. Quite addictive, too-- so much that I had to ween myself off it slowly back in the day. Perfect sequencing (or flow) and not a bum note on the whole fucking thing. A must-have!

---------------------------------------------

Whenever You See Fit mp3

Sometimes a song can drag you down in a good way, like the holiday season itself. And very rarely can any artist(s) grab my full attention throughout a full 14-and-a-half minutes of such beautifully rendered, slow, repetitive squalor. Nevermind how popular (and boring) Mouse have become the last several years-- there will always be songs like these, which force me to recall their former glory.

----------------------------------------------

Originally released in 1980, and then reissued through Atavistic, Operetta is essentially the world's only No Wave opera-- brought about by members of DNA & friends. So sayeth Wikipedia:

The opera is a loose retelling of Mozart's opera Don Giovanni, which in turn is based on the legend of Don Juan. The title character is a licentious figure endowed with magical powers, and the songs of the opera follow him on a series of adventures, many of them involving the pursuit of various females (including a female lion, a young girl and a grandmother "in the beautiful autumn of life").

Official story aside-- I just love the sound of this album. Reminds me of some kinda insane Sumo wrestler-cum-pirate-- off on some wild journey, raping and plundering. He's basically an asshole, but fun to watch.

SIDE ONE:

Overture mp3
I Awake mp3
Down to the Ocean mp3
On Board Ship mp3
Gavanti Samba mp3
Lo! La! mp3
Oh Ancient Ocean mp3
New York Blues mp3

----------------------------------------------

My friend Andy turned me on to this one recently. He bought it one day from the FYE "used" section, and I think the story goes that the cashier was very busy on the phone as Andy placed the CD on the counter. When said cashier returned from the call or whatever it was, he threw the CD into the nearby trashcan. "Can I help you?" he asked. "Um," Andy pointed to the wastebasket, "Yeah, I wanted to buy that CD you just threw away." "Oh, sorry."

And so it kind of naturally follows that, when one's first impulse looking at the cover of this album from '81 (above) is to disgard it to the dustbin-- you know how it sounds. But we are proud to have bad taste here-- so much that we have to let everyone know.

I have to admit that the cover "art"/photo is revolting, and yet I couldn't stop looking at it as Andy I cruised down the rainy Burrah streets that afternoon.

"What the hell," I squealed. "Check out the last three tracks listed on this fucking thing... Oh, you gotta play it right now!"

And this is what we heard... Enjoy!

Big Mac mp3
Diet mp3
Food Fight mp3

----------------------------------------------

The last offering of 2006 (also thanks to Andy & Austin):

"A Conversation with Jim Morrison" zip (85 very short tracks, 101 MB)

From the CD liner notes, by Ben Fong-Torres:

Working for Rolling Stone, I used to pop into Hollywood on a regular basis. Sometimes I stayed at the apartment of a rock publicist friend, Diane. One of her neighbors was Pamela Courson - Jim Morrison’s old lady. One February afternoon in 1971, Jim came around, looking for Pamela. She wasn’t there, so he decided to hang out & wait.

When Diane introduced us, I asked for an interview. He and I hit it off right away, and got into doing this parody of a TV talk show. I played Dick Cavett; he was a rock star.

He told a couple of jokes so risque that they would have gotten Cavett canned, and then, with my cheap cassette recorder running, we settled into a pretty serious chat about the Doors and the blues; the future of rock, and his own future.

Despite his reputation as a wild man; despite his busts for obscenity and for exposing himself on stage, Morrison had struck me, in published interviews, as a smart, thoughtful guy. Maybe he wasn't quite the poet and artiste he fancied himself to be, but at least he was playing with the conventions of rock, performance, and theater. He was at home on the edge.

Jim was planning to move to Paris within weeks, and this turned out to be his last interview before his departure in March. In July, I was in Hollywood again - visiting with his friends and associates, and writing his obituary.

----------------------------------------------

Well, that's it!!! A pleasure, as always. Expect my return sometime around Jan 4th (I will probably take all tracks down that you see now, just a little bit prior to this). For next year, I have some truly great posts in mind. Don't forget me.

<**the unavoidable shout out to Scot, right here**>

And Happy Holidays to all.

Make it to '07 alive, please.

Cheers.

bc7B concl.

2006-12-19T14:30:00.000-05:00

The second-to-last offerings in '06 here at Blank Crisis. Thursday (or Friday, if need be) will be a Grand Finale of sorts-- and you don't want to miss it.

POLVO "Rock, Post-Rock" mp3

This just in courtesy of J.Ralzius. Doesn't look too good for us, eh? I'm really considering going to podcast format-- not due to these types of industry crackdowns (or threats)-- I don't think that my mixtape thing makes a whole lot of sense as I've been presenting it.

NEUTRAL MILK HOTEL "Everything Is" mp3

Even though I've opted out of the End-Of-Year listmania this time around, I would like to say (because I feel like I never say it enough) how much I love several of the other bloggers' work out there. For instance...

WFMU is God. Nuff said.

Post-Punk Junk's podcasts are one of very few reasons to look forward to a Monday, folks. This isn't to say that our Bret doesn't deliver on regular posts, too-- but he seems to save a great many-a gem for his mixes.

Evan at Communcations Major/English Minor -- probably my favorite writer of blogs this year. The man has a rather simple web design, but his text is consistently superior to just about all of us doing it. He pulls no punches on just about every topic--least of all I forget that his taste in music is always way way up there, too. Long live you, CM/EM!

We lost a lot of great blogs this year (mostly due to burnout)-- but Tesco and his 100 Records getting shut down was perhaps the most upsetting for me. He was one of the first to catch me when I started the Crisis, and I was one of the last to really pay attention to what he was doing.

MODEST MOUSE "Out of Gas" mp3

I'm working off 4 hours of sleep today. Lots of weird nightmares wrought by holiday stress factors, money woes, etc.

But anyway, this concludes mixtape #7. Yes, we will be in... er, 1999 pretty soon. Ha! I have the most anachronistic mp3 blog ever! ... So I think.

The truth is-- I hated most of what was released in 2006 (And godfuckingdamnit am I so glad this shit seems to be over. BerkeleyPlace, consider yourself on notice!). If you really wanna what's got me panting heavy as of late (and I shock even myself at times!): right here, kids.

Send your emails & comments now, as I won't be able to get back to you for a while. Cheers!

7B (2 of 3)

2006-12-17T16:20:00.000-05:00

ELVIS COSTELLO "Lipstick Vogue" mp3

THE WEIRDOS "We Got the Neutron Bomb" (live) mp3

RICHARD HELL & THE VOIDOIDS "Love Comes in Spurts" mp3

THE REPLACEMENTS "Go" mp3

#7 Side B (1 o' 3)

2006-12-14T17:49:00.000-05:00

THE DAMNED "Sick of This and That" mp3

None more appropriate to how I'm feeling today. And I shant go into the reason why. A little tune from the band's 1980 release, The Black Album.

But this next one is another "micro-podcast"-- I think the last one, as a matter of fact:
mix: Unknown noise + THE FALL "Glam Racket" mp3

The first track (combed from radio cassette recordings) I first thought had to be Sonic Youth, which sent me into a frenzy trying to locate it. After all, my original comp (#7) was made just around the time SYR had been established. So about two months ago, I bought all that stuff and the track was nowhere to be found. Dammit. So, if you know who it is-- please drop a line. It reminds me of a Satanic car wash or something. I dig it.

If you're not into that, and just wanna go straight to Mark E. doing his thing, skip ahead to 2:15 or thereabouts...

When Smith (above) scoffs, the whole world scoffs with him.

Why don't you bug off back to Xanadu, in Ireland?...

is how he procedes, into the fucking litany of sins commited by one Glam Rick (who I like to call Glam Wreck):

Your Clearasil produces Richthofen rashes/Sideboard-like on mountains...

And he does this all sounding half-pissed-- physically worn-out by the mere existence of Glam Wreck, who very well lives among us even still.

You are working on a video project/You hog the bathroom/And never put your hand in your pocket.../You post out sixty-page computer printouts/On the end of forests/All the above will come back to you/And confirm you as a damn pest...

I could easily gush on The Fall for an entire post, but there's more ground to cover today...

PERE UBU "Non-Alignment Pact" mp3

Ahh yes-- it's the classic opener to Thomas & Co's 1978 masterpiece, The Modern Dance. It's always sounded to me like a happily-unrequited love song: the romantic interest which one has good sense to avoid, yet doesn't quite trust themselves to do so-- hence, a pact is made. The bridge, a rattling off of generic white-bread names of those officially textbook-cute, young ladies who would never be satisfied with the attention of any one man. Ever. The guy knows it, though. It's all because of you, girl...

BAD BRAINS "Attitude" mp3

HR doesn't mean Human Resources, folx. I've always heard of this song as being titled "P.M.A." for positive mental attitude. Am I the only one?

Lastly...

RAINER MARIA "Tinfoil" mp3

There was a time when the word emo strictly referred to either this guy or (more obscurely)that venue. This was of course pre-1998 when the Rainers came out with this song, which I actually loved. Twas the first instance I'd ever seen the term in an album or singles review. I didn't get it then, and in some ways-- I still don't. Funny hearing people still trying to categorize bands like Rites as being the first-ever emo band, total and complete bullshit! For me, it will always be the Rainers. This song was whiny, before whiny was cool and overdone. Their show this Saturday at The Bowery Ballroom is going to be their last. Farewell, RM. Good riddance, so-called emo rock.

bc7A concl

2006-12-12T17:30:00.000-05:00

Skimpy post, with twice the irony & minerals...

THE GREAT KAT "Blood" mp3. A 39-second blast of pain-- the Juliard grad Kat (real name: Katherine Thomas) lets us know how much she hearts the feel, taste, smell, and everything else there is to like about the thick red stuff. Total time on this EP from '98 is a whopping 6 minutes. She uses third-person in interviews, and claims to be (among other things) God, and the reincarnation of Beethoven. So Beethoven was God. And just in case you're wondering (not really): she's a patriot, too (YouTube)! Does she scare me? Yeah.

I don't think you quite understand-- she really wants to drink our blood!

So who will come and save us?!!

UNBUNNY "Wonder Woman" mp3

That's right-- she's in her satin tights, fighting for her rights, and the old Red White and Bluuuuuuuue! (Opening credits via YouTube) Okay, so they're both patriots. How about a dissenting superheroine for a change?-- anyone in comic book world?

THE GLANDS "Two Dollar Wine" mp3. From Athens, GA-- the last track for side A. I managed to catch the Glands live once, at what used to be the High Hat (now the Firehouse). It must have been one of the last shows ever there-- and I think Patterson was still working the soundboard. Anyway, twas a spectacular set. This is the song that led me to them. Oh god, and that album cover! The homeless guy was something of an Athens legend, I don't know what happened to him, if he's still there or not... But when I first moved there, I had to get a job right away, which was at Mickey D's on the East side (of course). This guy would come in and sit all day, drink his coffee. One afternoon, a co-worker had to clean up the restrooms where he'd left some wonderful fingerpaintings on the stall walls!

#7mix side A (2 of 3)

2006-12-10T15:47:00.000-05:00

Correction to that last post: There will be a lot of updates here-- but will take a week-long break (around Xmas-NewYears). Thanks.

SOFT BOYS "Sandra's Having Her Brain Out" mp3

Read reviews and/or buy the book pictured above here. Look, I'd like to have my brain out every once in a while, too.

...And now, a word from our sponsor...

?UNKNOWN? "Cheeseus" mp3

Anyone who knows the artist(s) that created this piece, please mail to: blankcrisis@yahoo.com

CLASSIC RUINS "1+1<2" mp3

Keep their expectations low, guys-- and at all times. You won't wind up like the character in this song.

CIRCLE JERKS "Under the Gun" mp3

OK, I'm hearing a lot of crappy music on the blogs today.

BUZZCOCKS "16 Again" mp3

DEAD MILKMEN "Milkmen Stomp (live)" mp3

DANIELSON FAMILE "Big Baby" mp3

That last picture--> thanks to Joel (find more along those lines here). Will return (probably around Tues) for the stunning conclusion of this side's mix.

End of Finals mix!

2006-12-07T14:21:00.000-05:00

Ahhhhhhhhhhh. Take a deep breath with me.

And you don't have to be in school like me to appreciate it. Some of you might have just finished Xmas shopping or just signed one of these (pdf) with a loved one, or received a fat holiday bonus from the boss. I don't know. Make some time for breathing is all I'm sayin'...

GUIDED BY VOICES "If We Wait" mp3

Bob raises his bottle on this one; kinda reminding me of the ritual a beloved writing professor performed for us last night.

Next, some kind of exorcism. Getting a Stiv on...

DEAD BOYS "Sonic Reducer" mp3

People out on the streets, they don't know who he was... Like, for instance, did you know he cameoed in Polyester? Or that he bagged Liv's mom, Bebe for a time in the '80's?

Watch a blistering performance of "Sonic Reducer"-- live at CBGB's '77. (YouTube)

JULIE RUIN "Radical Or Pro-Parental" mp3

Ms. Hanna, starring as Ruin-- gettin' down on the low-fi tip. I totally dig her work, and this song-- those fucking harmonized Oh yeah's -- incredible. Psychedelic, even! I know nothing of the other tracks from this LP, so if you do-- drop a line in the comments/email. Also, if you know where the opening sample originates...

THE FROGS "I've Got Drugs (Out of the Mist)" mp3

The Brothers Frog again on the blog, with the penultimate trophy fan above... I finally scored a wonderful Frogs bootleg from '89 a couple of months ago and I promise I will post it one of these days. All I can say is: Electrified live renditions of old classics like this one are churned out one after another after another until an hour has escaped you. They are pop-tunesmiths of the highest order. Head over to the Frogs Archive, and sub us that Toy Porno viddee for the holiday, why doncha? (Only $10 plus shipping!!!)

REPLACEMENTS "Stuck in the Middle" mp3

Sorry, I had to with the picture.

So, guess I should talk about holiday plans now...? Basically getting outta town whenever possible, hitchin' rides with Joel and Andreas up to the ACC possibly (To JRoss: what are your plans? If you're handling Break Radio this season and need help, lemme know!)...Moving Ben to his new house around Xmas (maybe). Spending time with Marie, her folks, my folks... I'm up for anything. And I have stacks and stacks of books I've neglected-- always shitty about school, y'know, you hardly ever get to read fer pleasure...

This just in, courtesy of Ralzius.

And finally...

mix: MISSION OF BURMA + THE LURKERS "Mica"/ "Ain't Got A Clue"mp3.
This is not a mashup (although it would be interesting enough if it were): it's an attempt to reproduce the original mix tape from '98. (Almost forgot to mention that this is the first part of Side A, "offical compilation" #7) Think of it as the shortest podcast you have. (Not to be confused with always appropriately titled Best Podcast You Have...

Will be posting with substantial frequency in the next few weeks. Keep checking in for more music and fun.

Doug (...and w/ Calvin)

2006-11-29T20:52:00.000-05:00

I could do with some revision every once in a while here, right? Jeez. Seems like every other post has some grammatical mishap or other. It's becuz I'm spitting this stuff out in ten minutes flat. But no excuse and thankfully, no complaints...

This band is already lined up for All Tomorrow's Parties next year. Wish I was goin'. In other news, here's an article you might not have caught where ol' Doug claims he is "not a good guitar player". So who is playing on all those records then? Props to Martsch for givin' 'em hell at Lolla this past year, too.

The Plan mp3
Center of the Universe mp3
Carry the Zero mp3

I'd really like to get your feedback on BTS's last album. Myself and Rowsdower? We didn't care fer it, honestly... But it's sure to rank high on the approaching end-of-year lists all mp3 bloggers must make. (Oh, and I'll probably skip this time out. Too lazy. But you go on ahead...)

Personally, I'd love to see Calvin and Doug pair up again for at least one more album (and tour,even!) But who wouldn't? The answer to that one may very well be: Doug and Calvin. Anyway, the classic IM interview with Mr. Johnson all the kids were talkin' 'bout earlier this year is right here.

Don't Touch My Bikini mp3
Will Work For Food mp3
Freedom Ride mp3
Sit On It mp3
Canned Oxygen mp3

More mix action on the way. And I'd like t' close by wishing Mista Throck a happy late birthday. Apparently, he and I are both committed the idea of seeing just how old we can get! The drinks are on me, Scot. Comin' 'round the bend, only 2 months behind ye!

GEORGIA MUSIC POST for Nov: VIC

2006-11-21T13:04:00.000-05:00

Back & certified. No pictures, as of yet. The camping sucked-- big surprise there, right? That is, unless you're one of those pining to get away from the evil modern distractions of, say, toilet flushing. Having to sleep in the high 30's on the hard ground? No one should have to endure that bullshit. To top it off, leftover water in my ears has dried up since I've been home & I can't hear a damn thing out of the right one. So much for perusing your blogs this afternoon... I'll still try, who am I kidding?

Today's selection is, as mentioned before, the last until after the Thanksgiving holiday...

The artist to thank for this beaut-- I thought I once overheard him telling someone in the midnight air, is "the only man in Athens who can get away with pissing on the sidewalk." And if you don't have a clue as to his musical career, you've probably know him for his appearance as Terence in the film Sling Blade. I miss so much about living in Athens, as I've whined countless posts away. But going to his shows, seeing him in attendance of others' shows, sipping a few tasty beverages (sometimes even smiling!)-- these are definitely up there! In general, being in the presence of greatness.

And this is one of my all-time faves; recorded with the Nashville wonders Lambchop. I remember Vic's appearance on WUOG's Sound of the City program the year it came out, promoting the album with backing pre-recorded tracks of the band. He talked to the tape as if they were there with him. Something like, "Hold up, little Lambchop. I'm not ready yet..."

I went to see both artists not long after on a double-bill, & smoked schwag from a rusty old bowl directly in front of stage right-- prompting knowing smiles 'round the 'Chop's horn section.

But back to the album... Perhaps the most stunning of all is "Parade." I like to think of it as Vic's own "Sad Eyed Lady". About half as long, though. By the last verse, Chesnutt has pulled back his vocals, sounding somewhere between sulky and/or embarassed?-- and it pulls you in even more. I love that one a lot.

Maiden mp3
Until the Led mp3
Parade mp3
Blanket Over the Head mp3
Old Hotel mp3

Will try to return again on Sunday.

Moz "yr arse&all"

2006-11-16T16:30:00.000-05:00

NOTE: I will be vacationing in Florida this weekend-- getting certified for scuba. Will be back to post one more before Thanksgiving...

Remember when SPIN was still pretty cool? (And I'm specifically thinking 80's-1991.) My mom bought me a subscription around that time-- a very nice gift, but unwittingly detrimental to my academic scores... I would sit in classes reading it front to back to front again, going like: Who the hell is this guy? or these cats? What's up with this? It definitely opened up a new world to me, and what a very exciting time it was.

One gentleman receiving a great deal of print space back then, within any given issue, was Moz. Critics praised his previous band (something else I knew nothing of, living in suburban Georgia) almost unanimously, and his solo career was proving to be just as great, so they said. He was quite an intriguing figure, an anti-pop or anti-rock star: one that came off as too bitter to ever love, claiming a life of celibacy. What rocker announces that kind of shit to the world? I wondered. It actually seemed more "rock" to me (Remember I was 15 and 16 at the time!), that this guy took a different position, like, F**k that cliched groupie-baggin' bullshit. So I was intrigued long before I saw this, late one night on 120 Minutes...

I bought the album, just from hearing this one song-- with a week's worth of school lunch money the next day. (On a sad note, it's one of the last things Mick from Hull was to ever complete)

But you don't have to!!!... Listen to it all right here: zip (53 MB). Very limited!

the letter U, the numeral 2

2006-11-12T17:36:00.000-05:00

I can remember my friend Ben buying this record for me, long long ago. Back during the time in which I lived with him and his folks (my dad kicked me out at 16). We didn't have much in the way of resources, but Ben was-- and still is-- an extremely generous guy. The funds simply wouldn't have been there, to do anything entertaining, or just to have something in our stomachs, if not for his job at the mall. His folks squandered the cash my parents sent to take care of me ($400/mo). I saw none of it. But they had a great Christmas that year, or so I heard; they kicked me out swiftly before the holidays.

Not long ago the Stereogummers posited the question"Bono or Stipe?" (as a response to Slate and Stylus articles), with interesting returns. And I'll admit that I was definitely pro-Utwo as a child-- (f**king Mullen's loud & tight drumming?... are you kidding me?!!!) I got hip to the AireeM's much later, as a teen. But anyway, Rattle came off as a little self-aggrandizing if you ask me... the whole "We're discovering America" trip and all.

But later with the ironic Achtung and the Zoo tours, I was back on board. I dug that they'd redefined themselves in a such a way, mocking the sick, ubiquitous infotainment culture on that massive of a scale. By the dawn of the '90's, they had to do something different and I thought they did a great job. Often I wondered: how does this mesh with a band that often characterized itself as Christian? I remember one rock journalist describing it as "looking for baby Jesus in the trash" (which was later co-opted, I believe, for a line in their song "Mofo", '97)-- that if one is to embark upon a quest for spirituality in this mass media age, that is (figuratively speaking) what one must do. The band became more like satirists and less overtly political. Saracasm in, earnestness out. (And we can see this with both You2 and Are ee eM, and then attempts to return to -- albeit weakened-- those former aesthetics in the late 90's/early 00's.)

I was initially going to write this piece as a call out to those of us who are politically aware (and those who are not), as a call to march during the election. So I'm a little late. I would have conjured Edge and co. playing their (...wait, is that a JoyDivision influence I'm hearing?..) torch-burning anthems in that snowy forest, raising the white flag for/to humanity; sometimes telling us its okay, we'll make it through, while at times telling us to get up off our asses. It looked like most of America did just that. Bye, Nazi Congress. Bye, Rummy. Go die now.

So what do I think of the band in question... now? You can probably tell, seeing as how this is in the Guilty Pleasures department. But honestly I don't feel as guilty as some of the others I've posted. Similar to the last post on BC, it's hard for me to separate bands from the extremely bad choices made in their senility. But nobody can be perfect forever, right? Particularly if they're to continue on with their careers. Earlier works can, and in many cases, do survive-- esp. as long as they aren't run into the ground by commerical forces. A song like "Seconds", for example, will probably remain relevant to every living creature outside the cockroaches until that time comes, so long as it is appreciated in its own right, in context.

Seconds mp3
Like a Song mp3
Drowning Man mp3
Two Hearts Beat As One mp3
Surrender mp3
'40 mp3

bzzcx

2006-11-08T16:45:00.000-05:00

Forgive them that they inspired insipid little craps like Green Day, and the
legions of boring acts following them...

And I'll try to ignore the fact that last year the band's frontman Shelley decided to re-record "Ever Fallen in Love" with Roger Daltrey, David Gilmour, Peter Hook, Elton John, Robert Plant and several contemporary bands, "as a tribute to John Peel." I'm sure ol' Peel would've spun that one on his show... Even though the proceeds went to Amnesty International, why not write something new-- rather than killing a classic?

And more recently, playing on Vans Warped?! Vomitrocious!

Other than that, great band.

Everybody's Happy Nowadays mp3
Autonomy mp3
Noise Annoys mp3
Lipstick mp3
Why Can't I Touch It? mp3

GEORGIA MUSIC POST: RAT's "golden time"

2006-11-02T16:36:00.000-05:00

The return of the mighty Atlanta band, The Rock*A*Teens. On this blog. God, I wish I was sayin' that just in general, that they were back with a new album... But hey, you can still keep up with mainman Chris Lopez via his (sorta) new group Tenement Halls-- of which I haven't heard anything, but am looking forward to it.

What we're listenin' to today is some stuff from their third LP, 1999's Golden Time. It's mostly a walk through deperation and heartache, as felt in the Southern Gothic tradition. A great live band, I was able to catch them many times in Athens-- especially after good ol' Ballard joined the fold. Another great show was on New Year's Day at The Earl. (p.s. I've witnessed, on occasion, their lead guitarist wielding onstage a guitar identical to the first one I ever owned!... my grandmother got it for me as an Xmas present from JC Penny's. cost: $70...)

Enjoy!

Black Metal Stars mp3
Small Town Soap Opera mp3
In the Woods of Hemlock Park mp3
Freedom Puff (Good Enough Apparently) mp3
The Wreck in Front of Your House mp3
Clarissa, Just Do it Anyway mp3

#6 side B finale

2006-10-31T18:02:00.000-05:00

Because Friday is still a long ways away...

KING MISSILE "Take Stuff From Work" mp3.

Anyone else listen to This American Life's spooky Halloween edition this past Sunday. God, that one about the rabid raccoon! Man, motherf*** the wild outdoors.

JON SPENCER BLUES EXPLOSION "Skunk" mp3

WIRE "12XU" mp3. I am one of those people that believes that you can never have too much Wire in your life. I've been to punk shows where bands would cover this, like, 50 times in one set-- over and over and over! And it was great-- the more its played, the more frenzied it got. However, when I finally got to see the original band on their 2002 reunion tour, they refused to play this song (and it was screamed between every song they performed by one dude-- no, not me).

And finally, one of the worst songs ever to be recorded. In fact, I've heard that if you play this more than three hours straight, it will make you lose your mind. A hit among truck drivers, and a knockoff of The Chipmunks-- oh, dear God. I give to you the 1976 song credited to Shirley & Squirrely and released by the nation's leader in CB radio sales at the time, Radio Shack.

Shirley and Squirrely mp3

It's the best I can do for Halloween this year. Have a safe one.

6mix B part iii

2006-10-27T10:20:00.000-04:00

Vishnu is reborn whenever there is a Crisis on Earth-- and then sets the world to right...

Other things from Geography class yesterday: My instructor is a really cool cat, but he did something that really pissed me off. He was making a point about students using Wikipedia for term papers. He said, "This is why you don't want to do this." And he went in to the entry for monsoon and typed in: "Monsoons rainwater tastes like paprika." And then, he typed in a new religion using his own name (underneath the heading "Present day adherents" for the religion entry). Thankfully, all of these have since been removed.

Want some music?

SOFT BOYS "Yodeling Hoover" mp3

Does Ashley Blue (above) remind anyone else of a younger, Breeders-era Kim Deal? Oh, so it is just me.

PERE UBU "The Modern Dance" mp3

"Yes, our poor boy/believes in chance... "
(Thanx, Joel)

WALL OF VOODOO "Good Times" mp3

CAP'N JAZZ "Oh Messy Life" mp3

Christ! I got some serious house cleaning I need to do this weekend!

THE MEKONS "Never Been in a Riot" mp3 But hey-- who knows? Maybe soon. This song Greil Marcus called "the shout of people who have invaded the bandstand during someone else’s tune-up" something that I have actually had experience with. Bum rush the stage!

THE EYES "Topological Lies" mp3

The final conclusion to this mixtape is coming soon. Thanks for indulging me once again.

six mix B (2 of 4)

2006-10-25T17:20:00.000-04:00

STIFF LITTLE FINGERS "Suspect Device" mp3

REPLACEMENTS "Hootenanny" mp3

HUMAN SEXUAL RESPONSE "Jackie Onassis" mp3

six mix: B (1 of 4)

2006-10-22T17:18:00.000-04:00

ROBERT POLLARD "Maggie Turns to Flies" mp3

MINUTEMEN "Bob Dylan Wrote Propaganda Songs" mp3

THE STRANGLERS "Get a Grip" mp3

#6-A (conclusion) w/ unknown track (help!!!)

2006-10-19T19:02:00.000-04:00

Picking up where we left off last week-- this, as the title indicates, is the remainder of Side A to official mixtape #6 (Fall '98). And you can now navigate this blog with the handy dandy "labels" which conclude each post (one of beta Blogger's few genuinely new features, from what I can tell). This allows one to find posts that are linked together somehow. However, I won't be labelling band names directly (and most likely not genres, either). One can find future Georgia Music posts, "official" mixes, and Guilty Pleasure posts labeled.

WIRE "Ex-Lion Tamer" mp3 One of the greatest songs ever by one of the greatest bands ever. I dig the way the refrain fucking negates its literal command. Oh, the sweet disdain! But if Wire were ever to sell the license to this song for say, a Best Buy commercial-- I'm out.

HALO BENDERS "Love Travels Faster" mp3
How many times have I been hanging out with someone and this song will come on, and they'll say, "I've heard this before, I know I have....Who is it?" And then I tell them, and they go, "Who?" Then they try to convince me it's a cover of some old number they can't remember now. That's part of the beauty I guess-- the perceived familiarity Calvin & Co. touch on. We think we know the girlwoman in this song. But really, we don't.

GANG OF FOUR "Ether" mp3 Consider this the opposite of that Halo Benders track. In fact let's hope that one day this song will no longer be applicable to current events (I know, I'm being very naive). Yes, the names and places have changed, the story remains the same as it was upon release in 1979.

The "dirt behind the daydream" follows...

MISFITS "Hollywood Babylon" mp3

The next and last song I put on Side A is really great-- and unfortunately, I have no clue who or what it is...

?UNKNOWN? TRACK mp3... So I'm asking you bloggers out there to help me, as I have in the past (and you all have never let me down). It's a nice ethereal contrast to the Misfits, doncha think?

mixtape #6 side A

2006-10-13T14:15:00.000-04:00

Today's selections are from an "official" Blank Crisis mixtape that I did way way back in the Fall of '98. This is the first installment of Side A-- mostly on the classic punk & new wave tip, with the odd indie number thrown in for good measure. Songs are meant to be heard sequentially as they appear below. Enjoy!

SEX PISTOLS "Pretty Vacant" (live radio performance) mp3. I had to actually splice two bits of audio together for this tune: the intro which was on cassette, and the higher quality CD version of the song. Labels (or manufacturers thereof) really piss me off when they master live recordings to where the intros are separated from the songs they're supposed to go with.

And this marks the first-ever appearance of the Pistols on this blog. By the way, regardless of what anyone might say-- they get major props here for sending that glorious letter to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this past February.

...Oh, and I wish I had thought to rip that old uproarious "Weekend Blastoff" WUOG did, it was featured on the original mixtape. The countdown would go off every Friday night at 6 pm, with Mr. Brian Crews and/or DJ Hammond--and it had this next song song in it...

YO LA TENGO "Sugarcube" mp3 Whoa. The new I'm Not Afraid of You... album is so fabulous, possibly my fave release of the year!

PERE UBU "Life Stinks" mp3 This song is solely credited to their late guitarist Peter Laughner on The Modern Dance LP (and last ever?). Laughner was also the founder of legendary band Rocket From the Tombs, and this site features a number of great articles written by or for him-- including the 1977 eulogy by Lester Bangs.

MODEST MOUSE "Break Through" mp3 Back when they were great-- or at least when they were great to me. The first time I saw MM perform was at the 40 Watt, and I'll never forget Isaac hanging out by the door talking to people as they walked into the club. He looked road-worn and vaguely heroic. (Actually I didn't realize it was him until later, when I watched him board the stage and shotgun a doob with the rest of the 2 Mouse'rs). Some guy in front of me in line made a point to say something about how crazy they were planning on getting: Oh man, we're...we're...we're gonna go to jail tonight, dude!!! Isaac said, You know, I'd like to see that. You go to jail. Anyway, one of the best shows I've ever attended, and they even honored my wailing request for this song.

RADICAL RADIATORS "Shoot That Dog" mp3 Speaking of WUOG earlier in the post, believe it or not-- this song was actually in heavy rotation for quite some time on that station. A cappella studio fun from two of their own, as it were-- The Darkness (Ryan Martin) and what sounds like one of those Masters of the Hemisphere guys, although I dunno which one. This is absolutely representative of how much fun college radio could be in Athens during the late '90s.

X "Blue Spark" mp3

X "Dancing With Tears in My Eye" mp3

John Doe, Exene & the band making yet another appearance on the Crisis (a double, at that!). No surpirse there. I love them so much and often fanatasize about them being my real parents...(not really)

GARY NUMAN & TUBEWAY ARMY "My Shadow in Vain" mp3

"Faces at random
I quote people I knew
I'd love to be like me
If I could feel like you"

ELVIS COSTELLO "Oliver's Army" mp3

So sayeth Wikipedia:

Written after [Costello] visited Belfast in Northern Ireland, [the song] criticizes the British Army for targeting disadvantaged young men leaving secondary school (when the song was written in the late 1970s, England had a high unemployment rate). The title refers to Oliver Cromwell, who as Protector of the Commonwealth created the New Model Army, an earlier version of the modern British Army. The song also mentions specific "trouble spots" in the world, such as South Africa (at the time experiencing turmoil over Apartheid), Palestine, and most prominently Northern Ireland. In reference to the latter country, Costello included the controversial lyric "Only takes one itchy trigger/One more widow, one less white nigger", referring to the Irish, as they have historically been oppressed by the English, much as black people have been oppressed in many countries.

And finally a song about what can happen in complacent times...

DEAD KENNEDYS "Kill the Poor" mp3

Back with rest of Side A very soon...

"Presence" ('76)

2006-10-06T15:08:00.000-04:00

There is perhaps but one decent album from this band left unmolested for/by commercial entitites. And it's the only one I still find myself cracking open every now and again. Because it represents the bottom end of a downward slide...a rot fully setting in.

Coming off a six year (or so) run of basking in worldwide success that many would say was the "prime" of their careers, the glut of youthful excess caught up with them-- and it was about time. No surprise that the punk revolution happened the same year.

This is not to say that the band doesn't play well, just simply gasping its last...

Achille's Last Stand mp3

Presence was recorded in three weeks with Plant delivering his vocal tracks from a wheelchair. He'd sustained injuries from a severe car accident that occured in Greece, and also involved his wife Maureen (A blood transfusion saved her life). Plant would come to blame the song "In My Time of Dying" for the accident, and would rarely perform it live afterwards.

Page had developed a junk habit and for long had been considered an avid black magik and Aleister Crowley devotee (Even purchasing the Boleskine House). Rock folklore commonly attributes Zep's downfall to a "curse"-- a supposed blood pact with the devil, instigated by Page and his interests. I like to think that the Hypgnosis company's art for the album (above) suggests a manifestation of some "dark side". Not that there's anything wrong with that-- I love it. Looking at the back cover below, the "Object" (as it was so called) can be seen for its practical use in the classroom setting...

Tea For One mp3

The album's closer is almost a farewell for Zep, and a continuation of III's "Since I've Been Loving You" thematically and structurally. I often wished, back when I was really into them (a soundtrack for my puberty, or something like that), that they'd just packed it in after such a perfect ending. Page's record label was called Swan Song, after all... Guess he couldn't hear it for himself.

Vaselines

2006-10-02T09:50:00.000-04:00

First, I wanna to take a moment here to admonish some of my fellow mp3 blogger bretheren & sist-ren (in case none of your readers has told you yet):

E-ZArchive has gone to shite!

Gone are the days when downloading (from most of you) meant hearing a song without having to paw the goddamned link like...50 times! And if you check your traffic like I do, you know that one person isn't gonna download the same tune repeatedly in a 30-second period just because they love it...

Look-- and I know it's not your fault. You're trying to get a good deal, and that's okay. Really, I don't blame ye. But please-- get a new file host. Please!!! It has gotten too popular for that very reason, thereby cutting your bandwidth to nil.

Okay... (sigh)

CHRIS McCALL, a nice chap from Edinburg, wrote:

The Vaselines were Eugene Kelly and Frances McKee, teenage lovers and music fanatics from East Kilbride, just down the road from Glasgow. They didn't set out to conquer the world, or even get a recording contract; they just fancied writing some songs and maybe playing some gigs.

The Vaselines wrote songs about many things, but mainly they wrote about sex. Sometimes they wrote about dreaming they were horses, but sex would probably feature somewhere.

At one of the early gigs, local indie hero Stephen Pastel saw them and liked these sex songs. He quickly signed them to his now legendary label 53rd&3rd. When they recorded their debut EP, the joyous and utterly brilliant "Son of A Gun" it was the first time The Vaselines had even looked at a recording studio, let alone used one. Another fantastic EP, "Dying For It" followed (which included a little ditty called Molly's Lips) and soon after the band, which now included Eugene's brother Charles on drums and pal James Seenan on bass, set about recording "Dum-Dum", their debut album.

By the time of its release in 1989, 53rd&3rd had ceased to be, and so had The Vaselines. Few people outside of Edinburgh or Glasgow had ever heard of them, but that didn't matter. Having released some great records and had a lot of fun, it seemed to The Vaselines there wasn't much more a band could do. A few months later, a scruffy looking songwriter from Seattle said in an interview that the Vaselines were his most favourite songwriters in the whole world. Maybe some people from outside Scotland had been listening all along...?

Kurt Cobain (left) onstage with personal hero Eugene Kelly (at Reading, '91)

Son of a Gun mp3
Rory Rides Me Raw mp3
Molly's Lips mp3
Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam mp3
Monsterpussy mp3
Slushy mp3
Bitch mp3
No Hope mp3

GEORGIA (label) MUSIC POST: Old Gold septemberer mix ('97)

2006-09-25T09:40:00.000-04:00

Fans of lo-fi avant-noise improv--we got the good right 'cheer...

Celebrating their 10th year, Atlanta label Old Gold (run by Ben Young of The Bon Vivants) has been home to some of the most far-out releases you could ever wrap your ears around. OG's primary format in the early days was the cassette, with a few albums on vinyl here and there. Today, there are good deal of CD's available, too. I first became aware of it through the underground-- that they'd released two FLAP recordings (not to mention Gold Sparkle Band!)... Also in the catalog, some fairly prestigious artists you may have heard of (should have): Jad Fair and DQE.

I snail-mail corresponded with Ben a couple of times in '97, and he was kind enough to send me a cassette mixer he labelled Septemberer. What is below are some of my favorites from that. Song titles weren't listed on my copy, in case you're wondering....

TWO GENIUSES mp3 (Not safe for work) I'd like to get all the 2G's stuff if it's anything like this. Reminds me of the tapes Aaron and I made in junior high. How awesome is it that they're apparently still around? (My research indicates that they did a show at Lenny's a year ago. )

MORE mp3 Getcha getcha skronk on, your skronk on... Oh hell if this doesn't feel like hanging out in L5P... (from what I recall)

ISAAC GJ COLBERT mp3 Can't find a damn thing about this guy anywhere. I've always pictured him to be a sort of street musician. Maybe I don't want to know he's actually like, an Emory grad, or something... Dig that solo at the end.

YXIMALLOO mp3 And our friend(s?) at Thought for the Day (which, correct me if I'm wrong, appears to be an old Momus page) had this to say:

[YXIMALLOO]... the exemplary unpop musician: a one-man encyclopaedia of richly interesting, deeply eccentric ideas, living proof that you can survive without sales success, a total vindication of the joys of unpop.

PETLAND TOY FAKTORY mp3 Short sound collage by Atlanta artist Marshall Avett, who also played in More (above).

For more info on Old Gold, you can join the Yahoo! music group here. I'll try to put together another post before the weekend.

"Requiem 4AD-ream"

2006-09-22T17:27:00.000-04:00

Autumn is the favorite season here at the Crisis. My geographical digs become more condusive to living in general-- that is to say, not sweating my ass off and losing quarts of blood weekly to the mosquitos. On the plus of the plus-side, the air turns to an almost bluish (and orange-ish)haze (reminding me of this album cover, which coincidentally is in heavy rotation here as well), the nights begin early, electricity bills go down...

On the bum-side, there are the evil ragweed allergies, which begin for me promptly on September 1st every year. I do not know much about this devil herb, but I'd bet that it serves no ecological purpose whatsoever.

Fall also happens to be the season when everything goes wrong for Selby's characters Sara & Harry Goldfarb...

But I'm putting you in good hands, here, either way. The Kronos (below) providing the soundtrack for 3 seasons...

Get the whole thing on one zip (71 MB)

double-up!

2006-09-18T17:18:00.000-04:00

Let me tell you how much I love these Internets... The reach that I have with this thing only continues to blow my fucking mind. About a week ago, my best friend from 6th & 7th grades found me (based on a post that I did almost a year ago)! What this means to you, casual reader- probably not much of anything. But for me, it's a Holy Shit BFD!!!

Surely, someone out there can relate these things... In celebration of this personal joy: you get a double feature from me today.

Three sisters in '69, at the insistence of their father to become pop stars (he even took them out of high school for chrissakes!)-- doing their beautiful ramshackle innocence thing. An idiosyncratic approach to verse, rhythm, melody, you-name-it. Mandatory listening for all humans!

Philosophy of the World mp3
That Little Sports Car mp3
Who Are Parents? mp3
My Pal Foot Foot mp3
My Companion mp3

The next one is a Guilty Pleasure post, because I haven't done one in a while.

Going back to '91 and the summer I worked at SixFlags. After seeing Jucifer last week, I've dusted off a few of the old speed metal classics from back in the day, this being one of them.
zip (57 MB)

Watt

2006-09-13T17:05:00.000-04:00

Ahhhhhmmmmmmmm.... Well, Marie & I went with Mr. and soon-to-be-Mrs. Rowsdower to see Jucifer in action at the The Jinx in Savannah on Saturday night. Great show. I should have some pics up for you in the week ahead.

I got awful sick (fever, congestion) on Sunday and I'm still trying to recoup. Falling way behind in my studies so I will have to make this quick.

My first introduction to the Watt came in the form of this album, the solo debut circa 94. Lots of guest players on here as you will see below. About a year later, I had all the Minutemen stuff on vinyl. And I have seen Watt live twice at the 40 Watt in the late 90's...

Drove Up From Pedro mp3 (Carla Bozulich, vocals)
Piss Bottle Man mp3 (Evan Dando, vocals)
Chinese Firedrill mp3 (Frank Black, vocals)
Intense Song for Madonna to Sing mp3
Tuff Gnarl mp3 (Carla Bozulich, vocals; Sonic Youth, guitars; J. Mascis, drums on first part)

Charles Bukowski

2006-09-06T13:17:00.000-04:00

Christ/ You'll Never Know/
The Closing of the Topless & Bottomless Bars mp3

Cloud Nine/ I Live in a Neighborhood of Murderers/
Two Horse Collar mp3

The Best Love Poem mp3

A Smart Girl mp3

The Pleasures mp3

No Lady Godiva mp3

Number 6 mp3

Sour Ghost mp3

Earthquake mp3

The Poetry Reading mp3

From the Department of English mp3

Fan Letter mp3

Reading of the Poets mp3

BANDWAY

2006-08-31T10:48:00.000-04:00

Not really a Georgia Music post ('cuz you already got the Roderick Parks, right?)- but damn, when these boys, Bo and Brooks, used to come to Athens from N.C. to play a show in the late 90's- it was a fucking show.

It's two guys playing AC/DC and Montrose-inspired RAWK that would've make these boys pump their fists of Judge-ment (okay I must stop now) declaring, "Uh.. these guys rule! Kick assssss!!!" In fact, take a gander at their second album cover- a little conscious of it perhaps?

It's funny, they even have a track called "Fayette-nam". Fellow Southside ATLiens, that one is for you! Reminds me of a friend's dad, who was a vet from that area. Fourth of July fireworks with him were pretty terrifying! Once, there was this friend of a friend's kid over there with us, she must have been about sixteen. And I'm talking with old Ralph (the vet) about Dylan and 60's music in general. And so, the 16-year-old comes in at the tail end of the conversation, with the whole "Well, you know what they say about the 60's... If you remember it..." and you know Ralph just went fucking off! Before she could even get it out of her mouth, it seemed like we'd went to the fucking rice paddies! She boo-hooed, and so I had to console ol' Ralph. He felt pretty guilty about what he did. But I was just like, you know, you probably gave her some history she wouldn't have received otherwise. But I guess I felt bad for them both, really.

But whatever. When the liquor runs out, you guys know what to do...

Balls Out mp3
Turn to the Bong mp3
Winner mp3
I, Rock mp3
Fayettenam/Futuristic Fuckup mp3
Are You Mad at Me? mp3
Rock in Peace mp3
Do it Yourself mp3...Does this chorus remind anyone else of "Almost Human"?

Krautrock

2006-08-29T10:39:00.000-04:00

Every time I think about Krautrock, I picture Steve and I riding around The ACC- 'pposed to be looking for jobs, and just deciding fuck it. You know what, let's get some Mexican food, beer, and toke down! And we did this a few times. I didn't regret it then, and I'm sure as shit not gonna start.

Today is one of those days-- just put shit off if you can. Unfortunately, I can't.

Search for Krautrock related: WFMU has posted a lot of it recently; or try your luck at YouTube for chrissakes.

McCHURCH SOUNDROOM "Trouble (part 1)" mp3
AMON DUUL II "Kannan" mp3
TANGERINE DREAM "Electronic Meditation" mp3
XHOL CARAVAN "Orgelsolo" mp3
ASH RA TEMPEL "Deep Distance" mp3

Faces

2006-08-25T11:13:00.000-04:00

The first and only time you get any Rod from me (heheh)! If need be, put all your prejudice towards this man aside for one second, or a few songs. And then you may go back to your hatred for what was to come after this 1970 album:

Wicked Messenger (Dylan cover) mp3
Shake, Shudder mp3
Around the Plynth mp3
Flying mp3

Exclusive found audio: Roderick Parks

2006-08-23T09:21:00.000-04:00

A new era has begun for this blog, dear readers. A couple of weeks ago, I recieved a submission from a megamedia conglomerate (as other mp3 bloggers might have also) to promote one of their newest talents here. I was a little bit baffled, to tell ya the truth. But because I have no ambitions of breaking "the next big thing" (this is where I differ from most), I continue to post only that which I dig.

And I dig Roderick Parks.

Because the sound of failure is oftentimes sweeter than actual skills or real talent coming through. Our example today was found by a friend whom I thank for sharing it with me, and in turn, you readers out there...

Amateur rap culled from one nondescript microcassette; a little warbly, a little hiss.

Unfortunately there are no pics of the guy, but nevertheless-- Parks was a one-time clingon (a term used to describe the no-job-having losers that leech onto their former high school friends whom are currently attending college). The friend I mentioned and his buddies let Parks stay with them for a long while during 2004. It was hard to get rid of the guy (he pulled the cliche Crazy Tribesman routine to strike fear in the hearts of whitey)--but ultimately, they prevailed. The last I heard, Roderick was in jail. This will undoubtedly earn him the respect he has sought.

If you're really curious (or a cut-up artist), you can download the entire unedited tape here: zip (71 MB) And if any of youse cats out there know of a good "Found Audio" site (esp. that one that is still in operation), please drop a line. I'd like to share Roderick's dream with the world. It's the least I can do.

Another note: He's reppin' the V-Town.

THE A LA CARTE MENU:

For those of you who just want a few highlights (albiet many are cut-ups by yours truly and I must admit that I'm no Norel Pref here, to be sure. But it was fun doing. Also, most of the titles I've arbitarily devised):

"Welcome" (beat and vocal) mp3
"Welcome" (a capella) mp3
(Pref recently did a cool piece with this audio, he called it "Mostly Freestyle".)

"Heard His Homie Heard" mp3

Other highlights I've only slightly altered to underscore Roderick's command of the language and the hip-hop genre, but mostly unedited:
"Bankin' A.M.T." mp3

"T.J." mp3. Maybe his dad would have stayed around if only he'd not referred to him as a "nigger" so much? I dunno, what do you think?

Part Two (uncut) mp3 The second side of the tape is pretty damn good without any editing. You get the feeling that you're hanging with Roderick, walking down the street as he "spits flow". Keep in mind, that while complains about his wardrobe, he is most likely wearing what he had to borrow (from dem white boys). And the rabbit metaphor gets pushed to the brink.

Well, that's it. Take care and live by the wisdom of Roderick every day of your life: Affirmative action doesn't solve anything.

Clinic

2006-08-18T11:08:00.000-04:00

Well, folx. I gotta tell you that I'm (yet again) about to change the format of this blog. The main thing being that there will be a lot less text here (not that anyone cares about this, really) and less frequent posting.

Here's why: I have been fortunate enough to have a very engaging schedule this semester. I am going to make the most of it, and push myself as hard as I can. Also, I've been accepted into a particular academic program of which I plan to take full advantage, but my spare time will be in scant supply.

So, I'm trying to decide, but I'm asking for your input as well (comment or email me.) Which do you prefer, dear friends?

a) Bumrocks-style: one song per day, no text. If you want to find out about a band I've posted, well, you're on your own already with this blog. I prefer not to go on and on describing a band's sound (fuck, the mp3 is there-- you make your own conclusions anyway, right?), and who needs to get my associations with an artist or song (or anyone else's) when you can and will invariably make your own (which should not be inundated with my own)?

b) Podcast-style to be delivered every-other-week or so.

c) As-is with little or no text.

d) As-is with very infrequent posting.

The plus side, for what it's worth, is that the music may stay up a little longer. But here's today's post. Four lads from Liverpool... Oh, and enjoy the summer, kiddies-- it's almost over.

T.K. mp3
Distortions mp3
2/4 mp3
Goodnight Georgie mp3
Porno mp3
D.P. mp3
D.T. mp3
Cement Mixer mp3

Norel Pref

2006-08-12T12:59:00.000-04:00

I am a huge fan of Norel Pref's work. He is a mysterious figure, regularly churning out some of the best cut-up & collage art with a frequency that astonishes. The man is an appropriating (and re-appropriating) monster!

The tracks below are just a taste of treats from Spring-Summer '05. If you like this sort of thing, you have to check out the site for more (or go the The Subgenius Hour of Slack page to download episodes).

An Idiot, Not Worthy mp3
Can you decode the message? Find out the answers from Pref here (notepad file).

Zero Minus One mp3
I Think I Will mp3
Go Ahead, Next Question mp3
Big Head mp3
All Sinners mp3

I did an interview with Norel earlier this year via email (granted, I'm not the best interviewer), here are some excerpts:

PREF: I've been a musician probably every since Junior High. I used a four track recording deck up until around 1998, when I finally made the decision to go fully digital. the four track machine became mainly a mixing console.

Norel uses this site for posting his equally brilliant original scores and instrumental work: HeavyConfetti.com

I would say, though that while I've been a practicing and performing and recording musician for a long time, I didn't begin "cut ups" in earnest until about 1999, when I discovered "Acid." (the program, not the chemical compound). I had developed some proficiency with Photoshop and I found that Acid was sort of like Photoshop, but with music. You could "paint" with sound. I've been using Acid ever since, and pretty much use it exclusively for doing cutups, while I use Sound Forge for mastering. James Joyce. The media. Mediating. Stopping the media and reevaluating all values Nietzsche. Organizing sound. music. ambient music. robert rich. brian eno. zapa. love of radio. am radio.

BLANK CRISIS: Of what percentage is work to you, and what is play?

PREF: While there is physical effort involved in sound collage, I engage in it mainly for play. I would consider most of it play, though the lines here blur considerably. Actually, our culture wants to segregate the words and the reality. Work and play must never intermingle. However, when one is engaged in creative activity-regardless of the toil involved--all is bliss, all is bliss. You lose track of time and space. Is this work? Is this play? Classical physics says that work is performed when energy is engaged, is put forth to perform an action, so in a sense there's a "mind and body" analogy possibly applicable here. Mind drives the art while the body drives the mouse and keyboard.

Gall-Mart mp3

PREF: ...I don't subscribe to the "grow a goutee, learn music later" approach to art, you know, where someone's motives for doing art are not for the art itself, but for other things, to GET other things (in a capitalist mode) e.g., to get laid, to become "famous" and so on. Like the composer Charles Ives, I regard all these pursuits as juvenile and antithetic to art. One of my favorite lines from Charles Ives is :"Awards are the badges of mediocrity." Or as Bill Hicks said when doing a bit on "the trainwreck that is the tonight show with Jay Leno": he's a company man to the bitter end. Last year I "won" a remix contest with prize being that my track would appear on a Chuck D. album. Woopee. Hasn't happened yet, probably won't ever happen, and that's probably for the best. I did the contest as a personal challenge to myself, and to take other people'smaterial, mix it with my own inclinations and see what I could create. I was actually shocked to have "won." However my relative obscurity is assured I think, thus far in my little cubbyhole of creativity.

Free Markets mp3
All-Ass Company mp3

White House Plant mp3

BLANK CRISIS: I was completely blown away by the timeliness of your Katrina-era output (and sorry, readers, for not having a link to it)... Do your cut-ups ever feel like revenge?

PREF: I am reminded of a scene from the Coen brothers' "Barton Fink...." Where Barton says that his art has to come from a deep, dark, place, from a painful place, and that good art isn't possible without this aspect....William P. Mayhew (a character clearly modeled after William Faulkner) replies, "myself, I just like to make stuff up." while his answer was flip and a tad disingenuous, it expresses somewhat how I feel about doing sound collage. I too like to make stuff up, but I wouldn't be honest if I said I had no other "agenda."

While I don't have any explicit political agenda, I do find much that is simply "fucked up" in
the world and rather than wring my hands I do sound collage and try to transform tragedy and
absurdity into comedy or sometimes a more "serious" dig at the world.

The media "mediates." They produce perceptions of reality which are controlled by a minority of powerful interests and we're just supposed to ingest this product without any dissent--at least any serious dissent. Well, sound collage is a way for me to stop this process, analyze it and
spin it again, to rethink the content, the veracity of the message (if there is any) and come up
with a mix that I feel is more in tune with the real deal than what they're dishing out(sometimes this is called "culture jamming.") And sometimes, too, I simply spin the stuff in a dadaist manner, without much regard for imparting any specific message or anything.

Wretched State mp3

Stylex

2006-08-08T13:05:00.000-04:00

Sorry about my recent prolonged absence (especially to The Throck-- what's up, mate?!), what can I say-- the Summer has been full of twists and turns indeed. So here's one ah them kinds where I just barf up a post that's the most.

First heard of Stylex last year by way of The Church of the Subgenius's Hour of Slack radio program. Speaking of which, we'll have some serious Dobbsian stuff right here by the weekend (I promise). I want to mention that this year's 9X-Day Reports (which you can actually listen to on this page) sounded a little more Sub-dude (haha I'm so fucking clever, right?) than past years-- the one I'm thinking specifically of happened two years ago (which they are supposedly coming out with a DVD for!). But holy shit, this X-Day festival did include The Amino Acids as well as The Billy Nayer Show... HOT DAMN!!!

Video from the Billy Nayer Show's American Astronaut... (buy the video here. Hell, buy me a copy while you're at it!)

Major props go out to both Dr. Hal and Princess Wei for turning out what was to me, the most moving, touching Bob hymnal ever ("X Day is Here").

Well, I gots to run off of this tangent. Enjoy the Stylex below, they're a little Devo-ish-- but hey, nothin' wrong with that, right?

Wake Up, Go to Work mp3
Die Bold mp3
False Start mp3
In$ider mp3
Duress mp3

(bonus from a past episode of The Hour of Slack)
Wake Up, Go to Work (live) mp3

are he him?

2006-08-02T13:23:00.000-04:00

So far, there have been 14 Georgia Music Posts on this blog. I felt that it was high time we do a little something for the "boys from Athens" (as a mersh station DJ coyly referred to them while I was driving through ATL recently).

This group had been very much a part of my musical growing up, as they probably were for many of you guys, too maybe (?). REMembering all the MTV "World Premier Videos" for "Fall on Me", "The One I Love", "...End of the World...", etc. I had a discreet appreciation for them; they were so counter to my expectations at 12- and 13- years old as I more outwardly endorsed fuzzy extended blues guitar solos a la Page and Hendrix.

But when, at 16, I first heard "Drive" off of the Automatic... LP, I became a huge fan. I attribute this to the (for those times) odd structure of that song; it blurred some basic tenets of what pop singles were supposed to consist of (Like, which was the verse and where was the chorus? And no bridge?). It was a voice speaking from somewhere sinister underneath my then-naive experience that really hit me. "Hey, kids- rock and roll/Nobody tells you where to go": words that sound utterly trite and cliched on the page, but a truly epitaphic delivery nevertheless.

As for the rest of Automatic: Great songs although "Everybody Hurts" was one of my least favorite, what with the Mariah-esque vocalizing at the end and all. This was a turning point for them, is my contention.

Anyway, I pursued all their earlier work from Murmur and Reckoning to Green. I've always felt that Michael
was a much better singer when he hid himself and mumbled lyrics. Not that they could do no wrong in what was by then a 14-year-long career (Fables... and Out of Time both being particularly horrendous in my opinion), but the few gems here and there would completely redeem them (Specifically, I always think of Reckoning's "Harborcoat" and "Camera" when anyone so much as mentions them). A 4-year love I had for this band, folks.

Monster was pretty good, too, I thought. They were making a stab at a harder rock sound. But once again, heavy-handed vocal acrobatics applied to the ballads. Yawn. Like a black woman in church choir. When I found out they would once again be touring, I wrote a letter requesting that they play bunch of older material; I'm sure this was a faux pas on my part.

They completely dropped off this writer's radar once New Adventures... hit in '96 (and was this title meant to be ironic I wonder?), although there are a few songs I like more now that I didn't like then.

I moved to Athens anyway, in '97. In my less-than-profitable working life there (I detailed rental cars for a dealership), I had the opportunity to meet one of the guys. This was right before Berry
quit in '97 or-- y'know, after they'd always maintained the all-for-one one-for-all credo. So, they rented two vehicles: a black Continental and an equally black Navigator. The former was the first one to come back, used by Mr Buck.
REMnants were primarily in the form of credit card receipts (Don't worry, Pete, I trashed them): note $400 for one T-shirt at Sac's.

Later on that Summer, Mills returned the aforementioned SUV; I had to pick him up from Keane's place, and he drove me back. He was a real nice dude, although I felt sorry for his wearing the rock star outfit in the blistering Georgia Summer heat.
It was sort of surreal to me. I was thinking like Good God, if I was 19 right now, I'd be shitting myself. Turned out to be a very quiet ride down Atlanta Hwy: me in the passenger seat, Mike at the wheel. He did make small talk about the Navigator: how nice it handled, how he was planning to buy one from our dealership. I wanted to say something, but I didn't.

You guys, man... y'all were fucking great. I loved the shit you did in the early 80's...

Cleaning up the Navigator that night, I managed to find a half-smoked doobie in the back. Alright, REM dope! (Was a very dry summer, I recall.) When I got home, I made a beeline for the bathroom and toked it up. Nothing but fucking headache schwag. I couldn't help but thinking, They're smoking this dirt weed shit? No wonder why they blow these days.

THE END... Now here's some music. (Oh, and check out The Smudge of Ashen Fluff's recent post of the band live at the 1985 Werchter Festival.)

B-Sides Compiled (from Dead Letter...).
All notes below by guitarist Buck.

Crazy mp3 A song by Pylon. I remember hearing their version on the radio the day that Chronic Town came out and being suddenly depressed by how much better it was than our record. (Outtake from Fables)

Voice of Harold mp3 This is the backing track to Seven Chinese Brothers (Reckoning) with, um, well, extemporaneous lyrics added by Michael in one take. A must.

Burning Hell mp3 Sometimes you write a song without trying to. Sometimes those songs are the very best ones. That's not quite the case with this one however. (Outtake from Fables)

Bandwagon mp3 This song was originally called "the fruity song" because of all the stupid chord changes. Still one of the funniest songs we've written.

Walters Theme mp3/ King of the Road mp3 I suppose that if we had any shame we would have never allowed this little gem to see the light of day. This was recorde at the very end of a long alcohol soaked day, and I can barely remember cutting it. The first part was an attempt at writing a commercial for Walters Bar-B-Q. The second part is "King of the Road", kind of. If there was any justice in the world, Roger Miller should be able to sue for what we did to this song.

TFUL282

2006-07-28T14:01:00.000-04:00

Matador should really consider reissuing this 1994 release from the San Fran experimental pop band. It has been woefully outta print for some time.

All files YouSendIt...

My Pal the Tortoise mp3
Socket mp3
Hundreds of Years mp3
Guillotine mp3
February mp3
Cup of Dreams mp3
The Operation mp3
The Piston and the Shaft mp3
Noble Experiment mp3

a few NY faves

2006-07-25T12:50:00.000-04:00

No, not "New York" (or No New York for that matter)...

Okay, so the new album is a little "shrill", supposedly. Does it help or hurt Dems in '08? You tell me.

I was let down a bit when I finally read the Sonic Youth biography Confusion is Next that Young was such an egomaniac; that during the early 90's tour with SY opening, he would routinely force his openers to play at considerably lower volumes, so that he made a real bang when he came out. Also, he apparently was a big proponent of Reagan in the 80's. WTF.

Hopefully I haven't soured your love for the man (or nascent love anyways) with these little factoids. All of the below come from the Decade compilation, which belongs in every true rock fan's collection. The last song I'm featuring here, is probably my all-time favorite ("Soldier")-- just Young and a piano beside a fireplace.

Down to the Wire MP3
Burned MP3
Mr. Soul MP3
Broken Arrow MP3
Expecting to Fly MP3

Soldier MP3

(Still on vacation and will get to some email soon, as well as the highly-anticipated Norel Pref post!!!)

"Rembrandt P-horse"

2006-07-21T14:32:00.000-04:00

(Blank Crisis is on vacation... will be back ASAP, but until then-- enjoy this one!)

Side One.zip
Side Two.zip

Who wants some "Pleasure"?

2006-07-17T14:19:00.000-04:00

This has got to be one of the sexiest albums of all time, to me. But of course, I'd say something like that simply because I grew up in the early 80's, with my old man watching Electric Blue on the Playboy Channel late at night. (The theme song for said program was very similar to this album's lead cut, "Airplanes".) And while I never was able to sneak a peek of what dad was watching, its sounds spilled into my bedroom. I could make out the "plots", the moaning, and so forth. One particular episode I recall involved two women in a gym locker room. Ahhhhh, my young mind reeled...how deeply enthralled I was!

I really dug the hit "Cars" (it peaked at #9 on US charts)- Numan's vocals were almost like...inhuman to me. There was a cold paranoia about the lyrics and short stacatto-like delivery to the lines that permeate the entire record ("Don't let them see me"...). I was happily surprised with its consistent greatness once I finally picked it up at a secondhand vinyl store over a decade ago.

While Numan certainly didn't invent the sound captured here, he certainly had a major impact on electronica that will continue to reverberate. Think of an infant Trans Am nursing to these fantastic tracks. Very limited:

Side One.zip (YouSendIt)

Side Two.zip

Yet another new template

2006-07-12T12:36:00.000-04:00

Let's hope this one doesn't give me any more troubles. Jesus Christ, I almost felt like giving up the last couple of days. At least comments are indeed working again. At least you can see previous posts all on one page. I do have some work with the links/menu boxes ahead of me-- but for right now, I'm just fucking cashed out. A mix and a tribute (you knew it was coming):

DOGS "Younger Point of View" mp3

PORNO FOR PYROS "Tahitian Moon" mp3

GARY NUMAN "Down in the Park" mp3

A FAREWELL TO SYD BARRETT, R.I.P.

I was as saddened by the news yesterday as anyone. And even though Syd had done everything he could to avoid his former life as rock god the last thirty or so years, just knowing that he was still around... I don't know, y'know? Better to burn out than to fade away.

And American rock radio once again proves itself irrelevant by not so much as barely mentioning Barrett's name or how important he was to music. And once again Steven Tyler and Mick Jagger continue to live on to make more and more trite bullshit. But I do wonder how Anton Newcombe is going to take this.

Syd could easily take us on a whimsical journey, but he couldn't guarantee that we would be safe in his keeping. I can't help but feel sometimes that he'd been a victim of his gift as much as his excesses. Shine on, you crazy diamond.

Opel mp3
Vegetable Man mp3
No Good Trying mp3
Dark Globe (Wouldn't You Miss Me?) mp3
Octopus mp3
Feel mp3
If It's in You mp3
Late Night mp3

2006-07-11T12:31:00.000-04:00

Ugh. What a week.

Things get steadily more weird with this template. As you can see after the last post, all previous ones disappeared. I mean, they're still there if you search for 'em-- but anyway it's too screwed up for me to fix right now. I just don't have the time.

The experiment with Hype didn't come off as I'd planned, either. My post was listed, however, showing the UploadHut code, not the "headline". But today YouSendIt seems to want to work for me, so here goes another try:

Mix: DAMNED, SKULLS, DANIELSON, AND GERMS

DAMNED "Neat Neat Neat" mp3

SKULLS "Nervous Breakdown" (live at the Masque 1978) mp3

DANIELSON FAMILE "Potty Mouth" mp3

GERMS "Communist Eyes" mp3

This might hold you all till Tuesday. I should have a more substantial post by then. A blog on blogs, perhaps...?

2006-07-07T12:24:00.000-04:00

Trying something new to reach more people, lets see if it works.

First of all, lemme just say that my comments are still not working properly-- so please email if so inclined...

Okay now, here's the deal: for each new post I will include a short mp3 sample of something goofy at the beginning hosted by UploadHut. Feel free to skip over it. The purpose for this is that I will label said mp3 with the contents of each new post, as sort of a headline for Hype Machine, as it doesn't recognize my file host server. The Headline is this (download if you wanna, then go to the real music below):

Mix: JOY DIVISION, E.C., SOFT BOYS, UNKNOWN PSYCH (help!), and DRAKE on Blank Crisis

JOY DIVISION "Transmission" (Peel session) mp3
What can more be said about this? I love the way this version drags a little (compared to the album version) and totally explodes by the end. Do you ever get the feeling that you're coming out of your skin? I do. And this song acts as conduit for such emotion.

ELVIS COSTELLO "From a Whisper to a Scream" mp3
Don't ask about the picture-- it just kind of came up in the search. Reminds me of when I checked out these movies from the University library last week. The clerk looked at the titles and kind of went aha at me. I was like Wha? She said, Looks like you're gonna be 'gettin' down to it tonight'. Nosy bitch. One's a documentary and one is the lamest French love story I have ever fucking seen.

UNKNOWN??? psych rock mp3
From the I'm posting this, but have no fucking clue category: If you know anything about the above track, please (I'm begging) get in touch!!!

SOFT BOYS "Tonight" mp3
(check out Teddyboys.co.uk)

And finally...

NICK DRAKE "Things Behind the Sun" mp3

2006-07-03T12:56:00.000-04:00

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

But is it working?

I'm having major problems here, will be back up shortly.

the weekend continues...

2006-07-02T12:16:00.000-04:00

the weekend continues...

So my lady and I hung out at Tybee Island for most of yesterday, caught some sun-sand-surf. Surprised how relatively cool it was (temperature wise) for the end of June. No shark sightings this time. Later, we walked around Savannah-- counting crime scene markers and feasting on fajitas at One Eyed Lizzy's. More business to attend to, so just enjoy the random mix & photo essay below:

First, from an old John Peel radio broadcast, we've got...

THE MALE NURSE
"My Own Private Patrick Swayze" mp3
Swayze, you're crazy...

THE EMBARASSMENT "Sex Drive" mp3

MISSION OF BURMA "That's When I Reach For My Revolver" mp3

CIRCLE JERKS "American Heavy Metal Weekend" mp3

THE FALL "Hot Aftershave Bop" mp3

Yr 4th o' July mix

2006-06-30T12:05:00.000-04:00

Yr 4th o' July weekend mix

Granted, none of these tracks have anything to do with Independence Day per se (although "When You Get Drafted" and "Back in Flesh" might, depending on your own political stance). I'll leave the whole sticking to a theme to the other bloggers out there...

This holiday to me, like Memorial or Labor Day--just a great excuse for some outdoor partying. So have a safe, fun time.

SHARK QUEST "Armadillotron" mp3

DEAD KENNEDYS "When You Get Drafted" mp3
"Let's Lynch the Landlord" mp3

BUFFALO DAUGHTER "Socks, Drugs, and Rock 'n' Roll" mp3

T REX "Street and Babe Shadow" mp3

CRAMPS "Can Your Pussy Do the Dog?" mp3

WALL OF VOODOO "Back in Flesh" mp3

X "Los Angeles" mp3

WIRE "Reuters" mp3

Georgia Music Post for June- THE MELTED MEN

2006-06-27T11:32:00.000-04:00

Georgia Music Post for June- THE MELTED MEN

To me, the most consistently exciting avant garde act to come out of the Athens' scene is The Melted Men. Their shows combine experimental electronic sampling and bizarre performance art that is simply unlike anything you've ever seen. The Europeans absolutely love them-- as they make several treks in and around Amsterdam, Italy, Germany, Belgium, etc.

I feel deeply privileged to have seen them as many times as I have. You never know what to expect, other than massive amounts of fog spilling out from the stage to the crowd. The last show I attended began in this fashion, and they were opening NYC's Flux Information Sciences (around 2002, I think). There was this sort of plastic toy electronic cat head that lit up attached to a pole or stand. The cat head would make this rrrrrrrrrrrr sound as it turned from side to side. It was positively evil, and created such a level of anticipation. Whoa, when these guys hit the floor (never confining themselves to any stage platform), donning costumes, breaking out spastic skewed rhythms -- good God, I just can't describe how awesome it was!!! One thing that really sticks with me about that night: they brought out these long canes and performed this very surreal, almost tribal dance ritual. It was like they were communicating something to us that we could only understand at this very base, primal level... Ultimately, their leader (who sometimes calls himself Lobster Lung) got butt-naked and danced with some rather hot young ladies in the crowd. That night was tops.

I implore you to see the MM if you ever get the chance to do so. But right now, what we have is one side of their 1997 Champagne Audio vinyl release, The Sheets Are Soaked. It doesn't compare to later releases-- but sadly, it's all I have at present. As the back jacket proclaims: Moths will never eat this. And further:

The Melted Men's repertiore runs the gamut from old favorites, latin, jazz, swing, country, and orginal comedy to the old and new rock and pop hits. They are currently appearing nightly at the Rib and Loin Steakhouse , Waikiki, Hawaii. Reservations please--Mahalo, and Come Back!

Side One mp3: Snake Milk/ Frosting on the Cake/ Patio Melt/ Tumuck Ache/ Lemon Merorangutan/ Dry Ice & Fur Apes/ Shrimp Dip/ The Speeaking Mirror/ Wolfman Got a Backache/ Peeling the Skin Off My Chicken/ He Was Holding a Potted Plant

2006-06-25T14:10:00.000-04:00

"Hey, what's up?"

Do you ever get those calls from your buddies who are simply bored and have nothing to say? As if dialing my digits entitles them to grade-A entertainment as performed by me. They just sit there. What the fuck? You called me, asshole! Talk! I'm waiting! And I'm sick of stupid questions lately, too...

But let's forget about all that for a while. Say you wanna skronk out, but not for too long? Then this song is for you, coming out of the mysterious files:

"Fragments"- (?) mp3

(My notes say the band is Kroko, but ummmm... My research is a dead end on that one.)

Believe it or not, this next group spent more time on the UK singles charts than the Beatles, between in the period of 1965-1969:

"The Legend of Xanadu"- DAVE DEE, DOZY, BEAKY, MICK & TICH mp3

I'm having a kitsch-fest here as of late! A lot of these 60's songs are just too much fun... No need to fucking rhapsodize.

"I'm a Mummy"- McFADDEN & DIOR mp3

And you know one thing about Nefertiti?

You'll nefer see her titis...

Blank Crisis hearts... THE MONKS!!! (below: live on mid-60's German TV show The Beat Club performing "Monks Chant" and "How to Do Now"!)

"I Hate You"- MONKS mp3 ("But call meeeeeeeee....") I want to get every Monks album ever made. They are the bee's knees, the cat's whiskers (and/or pajamas), the eel's ankle, the elephant's instep, the snake's hip...

(deep panting, gulp!)

"Shut Up"- MONKS mp3 The Fall covered this 'un, so dig! And that concludes our Fall-related bid-ness. (Oh, I really wanted to include Ron Haydock & The Bopper's version of "Rollin' Danny" but the CD was scratched up all to hell. If you have it, please send to yer pal Neal here. I'll love you forever and ever. Or put it on your blog or podcast!)

2006-06-22T14:08:00.000-04:00

I apologize for the file server being down a day and a half. Not long ago, I was just telling myself that it had been a while.

Not really a whole lot to write about. The class I'm taking now is a breeze...

"Cheesy (Gigolo mix)"- PLUG mp3

This next song is yet another in The Fall category; covered by them on a few complilations, as well as the CD version of Frenz Experiment. R Dean Taylor holds the honor of being the first white act on Motown to break number one ("Indiana Wants Me"; 1970). Taylor also co-wrote Diana Ross' hit "Love Child", among a few others.

"There's a Ghost in My House"- R. DEAN TAYLOR mp3

I've already planned out tunes for posting all the way up through autumn- shall be most exciting! I am planning on cleaning up my design here a little more. The comments haven't been working for shit. Just send me an email.

I wish I'd known that EZArchive offered a free 100 MB deal and that the Hype recognizes mostly stuff from it- because even though I'm finally listed, nothing shows. Oh well, with about 3 months worth of posts already loaded up, I don't really feel like starting over.

A little background for this next band (like you need it...):

Can spent some time recording soundtracks for art films and porno movies (music that was compiled on the album Soundtracks) before releasing its second proper effort in 1971. Tago Mago introduced a new vocalist, Damo Suzuki, a twenty-one-year-old Japanese singer whom Liebezeit and Czukay saw busking outside a cafe in Munich. “I saw Damo from far away, and he was screaming and sort of adoring the sun,” Czukay told Bussy and Hall. “I said to Jaki, ‘Here comes our vocalist!’ and Jaki said, ‘No, no, it can’t be true!’” Suzuki was invited to that night’s performance. He began screaming at the audience and cleared the room in record time, thereby assuring his position in the band.
-JIM DeROGATIS, from the (I believe, forthcoming book) Then I Saw Mushroom Head: The Story of Can

"Oh Yeah"- CAN mp3

I found a song that I had not heard in almost 5 years and it's a bit louder than the above tracks- but heyheyhey now, don't touch that volume! You need to feel this! Sounds like Iggy, but that's okay...

"In My Life" - ARK mp3

Well. I'm off to fight the heat and the mosquitos. Until next time, here's a bonus track- wishing that my server stays alive:

"Good Technology" - RED GUITARS mp3

2006-06-18T14:07:00.000-04:00

Just sittin' here waitin' for my emusic account to reload...

"Mr. Pharmacist"- THE OTHER HALF
mp3

"Password"- PIANO MAGIC
mp3

"baby, you're the ginchiest..."

2006-06-16T13:50:00.000-04:00

(extenuated sigh)

First term of Summer is over! And I'm still alive. Looking forward to much drinking tonight and merriment! Some happy music, if you will? (and you weeeee-allll...)

"Lend Me Your Comb"- EDD BYRNES & CONNIE STEVENS mp3

The portfolio I had to work on for the last week or so made me realize ummm...I-I-I-I-I-I-I don't think I wanna teach writing. (sniff) I'm tired of writing about writing period ---->(.) Blah. Scoff.

Okay, well: this next artist I know scant-fuck about. If you know anything about them, enlighten me please... 'Twas sent to I, back in a former life, through the telephone wires of a crackhead-infested hell of a dump, from some kind human being (most likely the actual artist, given the acutely lo-fi manifestation). I dig it. It's called "Ed", and when I Googled the word "Ed", this below is what came up. It's very fitting for the song, too, I think.

"Ed" (1998 version)- DIRTY JERK mp3

And now, for the first in a long line of Fall-related the next couple of weeks...

We're going to hit the arcade...

...hit the bee-ah!!!

(just my preference, btw)

... Hit tha North!!!

"Hit the North!"- FRANK SIDEBOTTOM mp3

Can please we watch a viddy of Mr. Sidebottom, too? Absolutely, right here- although its quality leaves much to be desired. (c/0 YouTube)

"Going Rate"- MARC RILEY & THE CREEPS mp3

And finally, (whew!):

"Map Ref 41N 93W" (Wire cover)- MY BLOODY VALENTINE mp3

Going for a disco nap now... Come back Sundee!

"betty"

2006-06-13T22:57:00.000-04:00

The first nostalgic/Guilty Pleasure post this year! (How did I manage to stave it off for so long? And then, how did you get by without it?)

Most people seem to prefer the first two over this one, but there's something about the production here I really like. Yeah, it's slicker- but fuck if those drums aren't perfect! I always dug the way that guitar-wise, they opted for skronked-out solos versus the standard noodly-noodly. And if skronk is what you're into, check out "Beautiful Love"- Hamilton seems to be saying Yeah I studied jazz, fuck you. Minimalist drop-D power chordfest with odd time signature changes that really made them stick out from all the other hardcore bands of the day.

Overrated mp3
Clean mp3
Vaccination mp3
Beautiful Love mp3

Look for more mix tape-style posts for about the next month or so.

2001: A Space Oddity

2006-06-11T10:23:00.000-04:00

CASSETTE BOY "Bowie" (short cut-up) mp3

Holy hell, I've been away for a while. Good to be back, though, and I don't plan on taking leave again for a while... at least not until the end of July. My daughter and I will be going to Hawaii for a couple of weeks. There are some major layovers in my travel, and so I'm wondering (because I don't have a laptop) if anyone can tell me if LAX has a computer lab/Internet cafe? Figured it would be a good time killer and I can post there.

I'm thinking about doing something very soon featuring all my favorite cut-ups. I even have one of my own that I'd worked on last Summer. Typical of me, it's not completely finished, but I might show you what I have thus far and leave it open to others to cut it as they wish. It involves some found audio of a loser wanna-be rapper. It so fucking totally awesome. You'll love it.

Until then, let's go to the movies... Back with the music on Tuesday.

2001: A Space Odyssey (dialogue montage) mp3

"Ritual Satanic Abuse"

2006-06-06T13:04:00.000-04:00

I don't know what's happening... The Antichrist is having a rough time getting here apparently, something about spiritual traffic. The "good angels" are racing back and forth, taking their kids to see that Da Vinci Code. On the other hand, the Horned One (below) is having second thoughts about making appareances on this planet. Too much pollution... And besides, He actually loves His Kids- unlike certain deities which I do not want to mention here.

All kidding aside: Have you ever come across a situation where triple-6 digits occur in a public setting, to only invoke the fear of someone who actually believes that this number has some supernatural powers? Well, I have. I can't even count the number of times (maybe 666 times?) I've worked as cashier somewhere, and the amount total comes as $6.66, which my customer adamently refuses to accept. So, things are taken off the purchase or added

. Did you know that this number is actually considered good luck to Malaysian Chinese? Anyway. I love playing with people's symbols. It's like a bogeyman, really.

So, Happy 666. Today we have a rare release: Ritual Satanic Abuse, by those merry techno-industrial pranksters The Christal Methodists. I've searched high and low for an original copy, to no avail. What you get here comes from the sacred radio signals of WUOG Athens circa 1999 (and actually, the quality isn't terrible this time around). If anyone knows whereabouts I can score a better copy of this, please don't hesitate to share that info.

Will try to post later in the week- probably over the weekend. Enjoy.

Numerology mp3
Raped: Can I Get a Witness? mp3
Bible of Blood mp3
Glory in the Flesh mp3
Satanism Pays mp3
Angel of Light mp3
California Bird Worshippers mp3
I Only Have Eyes For Jew mp3
Warm Fuzzies mp3
Educating Pagans mp3
Conspiracy of Heathens mp3
Ecumaniacs mp3
Jesus is Coming mp3
Turn Your Radio Off mp3

"Have You Seen Me Lately?"

2006-06-04T13:43:00.000-04:00

I shouldn't have to say this, but just to be sure...

WARNING: Blank Crisis supports free speech. This oftentimes means supporting the right to express views that one does not necessarily hold true for oneself. Today's selection contains points of view regarding homosexuality and the AIDS virus, as well as a rather misogynistic worldview, that were part-and-parcel for standup comedy in the 1980s. Don't send me hatemail. Please.

mp3 (full length/68MB) Includes the cover of The Troggs' "Wild Thing" at the very end.

Former preacher-turned-shock comedian Sam Kinison died on April 10, 1992. He places second to my favorite comedian of all time, Bill Hicks (a close friend of Kinison's, incidentally). I wonder sometimes if/how Sam's routine might have survived the shift to make all "p.c." following his death. Ironically (as evidence by the first five or ten minutes into the routine), Sam was killed by a 17-year-old drunk driver.

I would like to remind everyone that Tuesday is 06-06-06, fun stuff is in store! So, come on back.

Oh, and um...like Hail Satan! or something