Wake Up!

 Letting things skate a bit here lately. Let the queue run dry.

Getting a bit lost in looking at new cars. The 17 year old one that she bought for $2500 already with 170+k miles on it is reaching a point where I don't feel like it's worth putting any more money into after about five years of driving. I'm feeling like we've already gotten our money's worth out of it, but it's time to update to something more recent and modern.

So many fucking options. So many opinions. Reviews. Sources.

Normally I'd be scouring the used market since I well know that value depreciated significantly the moment you drive it off the lot, but the market is really really fucking tight right now and the price of newer used vehicles is not significantly less than new ones. So with that in mind I'm figuring that I may as well buy a new one. But even those are hard to come by with the chip shortage and all that crap, so it looks like I'm going to have to order what I want through the dealer. Which is certainly a weird situation to be in, but here we are.

Which has nothing to do with anything except that I got up earlier than usual this morning and I'm still a little groggy this many hours later despite two espressos.

You might say I'm a "Sleepyhead"

Play (1990)

Sleepyhead.

Their first bleat straight from the basement of NYU and produced by Kramer of Shimmy Disc/Bongwater/Shockabilly fame and who I think is a much better maker of records than Albini ever was or will be.

There. 

It needed to be said.

Oh yeah, Sleepyhead. Noisy pop music with boy/girl voices.

 

 Fairyboat (1991)

This is the second single and more of the same.
It's one of those sounds that really encapsulates a time for me.
While the rest of everybody was sniffing Teen Spirit for the first time I was here.
This isn't life changing music, but it's, at least for me, kind of like sonic comfort food.
It's good enough and lingers with a pleasant nostalgia on the palate, but not necessarily going to be what I'm humming tomorrow. I will tap a foot while it's playing though.

Sometimes that's more than enough.

Matters of Convenience

 

Blah blah.

Some days everything is much more inconvenient and annoying than you might normally want it to  be. Which, speaking for myself, is a solid zero.

But alas, we live in a world of imperfection and bad grammar and poor typing skills.

90-95 (1995)

I'm a lazy fuck and didn't scan this myself and the only jpg I could find are all this tiny and shit.

Maybe I'll fix this some day.
But probably not.

This is however a nice compilation of the majority of the Laurels singles and miscellaneous output during their short and noisy rock existence. I have all off these, but not the full lengths for some reason.  I'll rectify that at some point, I'm sure but for now this is what I have to offer in one neat digital package which I can present as a single post rather than split across several.

It's so much more convenient this way.
I have shit to do.

Trying to Stay Awake. Trying to Stay Ahead

 

I've been on "vacation". We moved to a new apartment. Things have happened and come and gone and I've let this particular venture sit for a long while with the idea of catching up a little closer to real time for posts rather than setting things up months in advance.

And here we are.
There's only one more post in the queue and I feel like I need to make a cushion or two between myself and the disappointment of the dozen people who stop by here if there's not something new to listen to.

Plus I flipped my sleep schedule to more normal people time for the last couple of weeks and I need to unflip it back to a nocturnal schedule before I go back to work in a couple of days. I'm mostly there, but I'm using this to keep myself occupied and awake for another hour or two so as to lessen the inevitable wrenching horror that will be trying to get back to my normal sleep habits.

The other thing is that I'm running out of the free space on the Mediafire account and I'm thinking I might have to start deleting things. I mean, nothing was ever meant to be permanent but so long as I had the space and nobody got their panties in a ruffle about it I was willing to keep them up given that the internet is just rife with dead ends when it comes to these kinds of blogs.
I figure seven or so years is a good long time. I probably won't do any reposts. I've got plenty of other stuff to go up.
Consider it a heads up.

Playtime (1990)

This is one of those things I've had kicking around for a while without listening to. It came as a bonus record or extra packing or something with a package of other records. I had no idea what it was so it languished until a day when I was curious about whether I was going to listen to it or sell it or toss it or something.
I listened to it. I kinda liked it.

It turns out that Marc Jeffrey was previous to this solo effort in Band of Outsiders whose beginnings are in that Power Pop/Punk rock nexus that was New York City in the late 70's in a band which morphed into Band of Outsiders in the early 80's and limped along through several albums before dissolving at the end of the decade. (though they apparently reformed in the teens of this century for one more album) Based on some of the things I found in the last ten minutes it feels like they were much more enjoyed by a European audience than over this side of the pond.

Which is neither here nor there where this particular Lp is involved. This is a Marc Jeffrey solo Lp produced by Ivan Kral (of Richard Hell and the Voidoids fame) and with a secret uncredited appearance by Nikki Sudden which makes perfect sense when you listen to the record.

All in all I'm going to call this one a pleasant surprise for a "free" lp.
It's not ever going to be the first thing out of the stacks when I'm thirsty to listen to something, but I'm not going to be getting rid of it anytime soon.

If that makes any sense to y'all.

I Don't Know What to Do With Splits Pt 3.

More Splits

This is a pair of Flexis.

Adjust sonic expectations accordingly.

Choo Choo Train/ Eye Pilgrims (1989)




Choo Choo Train. Ric Menck & Paul Chastain pre-Velvet Crush.


Eye Pilgrims were from Hartlepool, UK and only existed on various compilations which is a bit of shame. I like their contribution here.

Spinning Jennys/the Fat Tulips (1990)


I have no idea where precisely Spinning Jennys were from. (I went with Bristol since that's where the label that put out their sole single was based.) It's unfortunate because their song here is fucking great. A masterwork of the genre. Kudos to them.

The Fat Tulips hailed from Peterborough. They put out a bunch of seven inches but only managed a singular full length in their career. Several of those releases were on Sunday Records. You know what you're getting into with that.

That said. Probably not my favorite song of theirs that I've heard so far.

Play the other one.

*

No Talking.

Just posting.

Google is your friend.

The Greatest Time ep (1995)

the Mad Scene

Relentless (1990)

Men & Volts

Sweet Pop Music

Another night. Another laborious task of clipping several dozen loud pops and clicks out of cheap Duke Ellington radio check bootlegs from the late 70's.

This may be a task that requires whiskey to steady the hands and quell the annoyance.

Meanwhile, you enjoy some sweet pop music set apart by a decade.

AM (1980)

If Jonathan Richman made driving around listening to music on AM radio legit with "Roadrunner", then the Marshalls put in the final word with this bit of Bubblegum Power Pop.

It's every bit as wholesome sounding as the fresh faced youngsters gracing the sleeve.

Hold somebody's hand while you drive past the Stop n Shop.

Light of Day (1990)

I still don't really understand why this kind of stuff isn't as valued as it deserves. It's light, and catchy and enjoyable home recordings. I mean, the most pretentious overblown depressed bullshit is the stuff that the hipsters drool over (and yes, I'm looking at you, Nick Cave), but the happy pop stuff is routinely dismissed as so much fluff when it's a lot fucking harder to write a really good catchy pop tune than your fiftieth song about stabbing a woman in the head. (still looking at you, Nick)

Love Positions were yet another home recording side project by one man Australian recording industry Nic Dalton. who while probably most famous as a former member of the Lemonheads, also helps run Half a Cow records.

This one is worth your time if for no other reason than the lovely low fidelity four track cassette styling of the Purple One's "Kiss" that is a lot more enjoyable and much less creepy than the middle aged Tom Jones collaboration with Art of Noise.

Find that hand and hold it again.

Something to do.

I was listening to/digitizing some new arrivals and thinking about next big things I want to post from recent obsessions.
I ended up quarantining a large list of MN cds from the 90's into their very own folder in the SSC folder titled "MN Rocks" with the intent that in some future time I will spend a few months running down a long list of the local stuff that nobody outside of the Twin Cities Metro ever really heard. Still a few holes I need to plug to make it be what I want so who knows when it will happen.

I'll probably end up running with a Duke Ellington radio bootleg bonanza before that.

Or I'll just continue to peck away with the things that are still clogging up the SSC works waiting for their day in the spotlight.

Speaking of which..

Liquorice (1995)

Discogs sez:

" US indie 'supergroup' Liquorice featured Jenny Toomey (Tsunami (6), Grenadine), Dan Littleton (The Hated, Ida (3)) and Trey Many (His Name Is Alive). Jenny and Dan were close friends and had been playing music together sporadically for the several years. However, commitments to their main bands made collaboration increasingly difficult. In 1995, Ivo invited Jenny to make a one-off solo album for 4AD. She worked with Dan on the demos and Liquorice was born...

I tend to believe them. They seem like they know what they're talking about.

Bad September (1990)


On the other side of the globe and five years previous the Kryptonics from Perth, Australia released their final blurt into the world. Notable for a couple of fine original hard and fast Aussie punk pop and a reasonable cover of the oft covered "Another Girl, Another Planet" by the Only Ones.
It's not the sort of thing you might seek out for itself, but one that you find coming across your random play and nodding along with while you're driving.


Maybe you ought to go on a road trip.

This is not a suggestion.

I Just Woke Up

I haven't had my second cup of coffee yet.

Lover Boy (1978)

Gonna keep it real. Going local.

The Jets. Power Pop from the Twin Cities.

It's on Twin Tone.

I really like the flip "Paper Girl"

Enough said.

Climbing Vine (1990)

Liquid Pink were from Milwukee, WI.

It's some swirling psychedelicate pop in that weird zone between pop and the lost era of undefined sounds that was the end of the 80s. It's really a musical gray area.

The flip "Pretty Lizard" is a rousing rocker about an actual lizard. Even reptiles need songs now and again.

One has to wonder how many times they played with Plasticland.

I'm Not a Fan of February.

It's the shortest and the longest month. It's the point in the year where I'm generally just completely over being cold and it being Winter and it just keeps on snowing and snowing.
Made even worse this year since it's a Leap Year and there's a whole extra day of the scourge that is the second month.

This calls for happy pop music and a few moments of blissful forgetfulness that I may be called on to shovel a foot of wet miserable winter off the driveway at any moment....

Here Comes Everybody (1993)

This is sweet harmonic pop music. Joyous and happy.
Very unlike my mood.
but it helps.

They put out three full lengths and a handful of singles in their existence and are almost entirely unknown.

Probably because they named themselves "Me" which doesn't make it any easier to look them up on the internet.

That and it's the very sort of harmony filled pop that would get entirely lost in the shuffle of everything else that was going on at the time competing for people's attention.

Let it wash over your weary soul.

Easy Peazy Lemon Squeezy (1990)

You have to appreciate a record that when it starts out you wonder if you've got it actually at the right speed. The first song on this ep by Strawberry Story is just that. Very fast, lo-fi and buzzy.

So with nothing else to stop us... One, Two Three, Four Strawberry's Let's Go!

Not Actually Dull

Far from it.

Last Great Challenge in a Dull World (1990)


First full length solo effort by Peter Jefferies

The Best Part of Travel

You go to new record stores in different cities and there's always stuff you would be less likely to find in your own town.

And so it was that this was the most amazing find I had on a trip to Seattle where we traveled halfway across the country to see Scientists play on their first real US tour. And it was totally fucking worth it....

But I digress.

I also found this record.

Ki Ra I (1983)

The band is called D-Day which is different from a previously posted band with that name.

This one is a Japanese New Wave band.

This four song ep is fucking great. Each song is unique and sounds kind of unlike most anything else I can think of. It's atmospheric and experimental but never unlistenable.

 I dig it greatly.

Enough that I feel like I want to post scans of the inserts for no particular reason other than I like it so much.

So there.

Guys with Glasses (1990)

 And then there's this.

One night as we were hanging out with one of my oldest friends a couple of days after the Scientists/Mudhoney show he hands me this single because he doesn't like it and thinks I might.

I already have and have posted the double single by these guys so he obviously was correct.

Fast pop songs not very well recorded and played kind of amateurishly?

That shit's right in my wheelhouse.

It's good stuff and I'd have put this on a hundred tapes for girls if I'd known about it at the time.

"Guys with glasses think...."

Thanks, Roger

I Almost Forgot a Title

I'm running on fumes and the cat has taken up position to stare me into feeding her.

So Said Kay (1990)

So I pulled out the small stack of 10" records too the other day in search of something else and found this one by the Field Mice. They were pretty much the best band on Sarah Records by my estimation and there's no point arguing that. I didn't really need to digitize this. All the tracks are on the  "Where'd You Learn to Kiss Like That?" compilation that Shinkansen put out in 1998, but I wanted to listen to it again. So I made this to post.
You're welcome.

From B to B in short distances

Short and to the point. 

Both from New Zealand

Apparatus of Love (1990)

The Axel Grinders.

King Acid (1994)

Brother Love

Fedoras all around

Here we are with Gentle Despite on Sarah Records

The Darkest Blue (1990)

Let's see. Quiet introspective songs about girls with jangling guitars and wispy vocals? Check.

The eternal whinging forsaken love call of the beta male? Check.

 Sarah Records? Check.
 
After listening to limp wristed stuff like this I find it difficult to imagine that there was a time that the English were capable of an empire encompassing half the planet.

I mean, I'm pretty sure that even I could have beaten these guys up for their lunch money.

Torment to Me (1991)

But lo! The title track here has some balls. A bit of distortion! Are they having a breakthrough?

And then it's over and we're back to the friend zone with "Bittersweet Kiss".

On the plus side, "Shadow of a Girl" appears to trying pretty hard to be an Only Ones outtake. It just needs more heroin addiction to succeed.



And thus began and ended the recorded existence of Gentle Despite in 6 songs.

Post #250

And there's nothing particularly momentous about it.

Just a couple more singles.

Ho hum.

Blue Noize ep (1996)

To add to posts of whatever whatever pasts comes the first in a trio of color themed (or more should that be "colour themed" since they're English and all that) Beatnik Filmstars releases....

Except just now looking back, I find don't exist.

 I'm surprised since I thought I'd posted the other two already which was a gross oversight on my part that I'll rectify at some point.
Just not right now.

I'd have to move into the other room to do that and I'm lazily comfortable right where I am, thank you very much.

Your Goddamned Mouth (1990)

Freakwater. It's them.

I don't know. I've never been a big alt-country or folk kind of guy. They're really good at what they do and their 2nd Lp "Feels Like the Third Time" has one of the best titles ever, but I've mostly kept this around for a passable acoustic take on Black Sabbath's "War Pigs" on the flip that I used to like to slip in DJ sets now and again to make people look up and wonder what the fuck it was they were listening to.
Now you have the opportunity to do the same.
It's amusing. Trust me.

Your brain splits each day from information anxiety

High Tension Line (1990)

The beginning of the much less verbose MES starts sometime here at the start of the 90's. He still commands a pretty imposing and formidable band, but he has a lot less verbiage to throw and more time to piss them all off individually by going around and messing with their shit on stage. (as witnessed more than once. Wander over to the guitar amp and randomly twiddle with knobs. Saunter behind the keyboards and elbow away Marcia Schofield and bang on them randomly for a little bit...)

But don't let that scare you away from this. It's got a terrible Christmas song on it! (and if you've been following along with me, you know how I feel about that).

Shitty holiday music aside, the contemporaneous Fall full length for this time period was "Shift-Work" which was probably the best record they'd done since "This Nation's Saving Grace"

Feel free to argue if you want. It won't change how wrong you are.

"High Tension Line" would have fit on "Shift-Work" pretty easy, but it's the flip that's the real winner despite the less than promising title of "Don't Take the Pizza". It's a really great lost Fall track.
It truly is.