That's The Curse Of Being Young: Fall Mix 2011

This mix got started, like most mixes do, when a couple of songs got stuck in my head like malignant earworms and refused to let my brain and heart go. In this current Facebook-fueled "share everything" culture, I'm not afraid to say that I talk to myself a lot, and on most days I engage myself in day-long conversations that might contain rehearsals for phone calls I have to make at work, verbalizations of my plans for this evening, or repeated karaoke renditions of lines from songs I haven't heard in forever, followed by mental notes to listen to those songs. I almost never follow through on those urges though, because I've probably heard those fuckers enough to internalize them, and who really has the time to listen to every classic song every day?! There's just too much culture to keep up with these days, and looking backwards inevitably seems like a cop-out because there's more than enough out there to get lost in, and I've always felt like looking forward is a better alternative to nostalgic navel-gazing.

If you've read this blog with any regularity, you'd know that I like a whole lot of current music, find the recorded output of the 2000s mostly detestable, and hold the 90s up on a pedestal as a golden age of music and culture. This mix touches on some malignant earworms from all three periods. "So this is goodbye more or less, and things have changed a lot I guess" is the opening line from "Deep Deep Down" by Mr. T Experience, and it sounds just as good as the first time I heard it fifteen years ago. Has it really been fifteen years since Love Is Dead came out and blew my mind with it's mix of Ramones muscle and Jonathan Richman awkwardness?! I guess so. It took me this long to decipher that the lyrics were about burying your girlfriend six feet deep and moving along, because back then I was a horny and impressionable teenager, and my brain never could understand irony and humor when matters of the heart were concerned. I was all, I'm the man on the mountain, come on up. I'm the man that brings you roses when I ain't got none. Cutting off the object of your affections isn't always an option, and when you're puffing your chest on top of the hill, you can't really grasp the concept of a slick metaphor. You're too busy roaring, and there's no shame, no pain, no gain.

Turning off your brain, shutting up, and opening your heart can be a revelation, and it's really fucking hard when you've spent your life listening to music made by frustrated and emotionally-stunted rock n' rollers. Everyone's read on the Internet recently that pop songs are a highly advanced form of brainwashing, and I've been suckered in more than your average fellow. I'm a hopeless fuckin' case. You're young. So what? I'm young, so what?! Being young really is a fucking curse, but once you make it over that hump, it's all gravy. You spend those first couple crucial decades accumulating grey hairs, scars, and life lessons, and once you realize that there's more important big-picture shit to work through, all that piddly stuff seems embarrassing and insignificant. Why look backwards and reflect on all the things you've done in the past when the future offers limitless potential and beds of dreamy California stars?

Anyways, this mix is perfect for romantics that still get excited for hoodie weather. These thirteen songs are about love gained, love lost, love unusual, love of the spirit and heart, and love both happy and unhappy. There's a good bit of acoustic strumming for driving past miles of fall foliage, a fair amount of Americana harmonizing, and an honest depiction of what happens when an obsessive soul that still talks to themselves too much emerges on the other side a smarter, happier person almost by accident. Hope y'all enjoy it as much as I did putting it together!

That's The Curse Of Being Young: Fall 2011
1. The Strange Boys - "I See"
2. Wilco - "California Stars"
3. Beachwood Sparks - "The Sun Surrounds Me"
4. The Jayhawks - "Somewhere In Ohio"
5. Mojave 3 - "Some Kinda Angel"
6. The Rolling Stones - "Loving Cup"
7. The Ettes - "Love Lies Bleeding"
8. Screeching Weasel - "99"
9. Mr T. Experience - "Deep Deep Down"
10. Harlem - "Friendly Ghost"
11. Hunx & His Punx - "The Curse Of Being Young"
12. Shannon & The Clams - "Sleep Talk"
13. Primal Scream - "Movin' On Up"

Download it HERE.

Nectarine Pie - Dreamdaze/Chameleon 7"

(Southpaw, 2011)

Well, there isn't fuck-all in the way of information anywhere regarding this band, so I've carefully pieced something together after 15 minutes of frenzied Googling, so you don't have to! Apparently, Nectarine Pie is the main gig of Nathan Price, who most recently did time in Matthew Melton's ever-evolving Bare Wires lineup, and Melton himself plays bass on these two songs, along with recording them, and appearing on the cover looking, as always, like a young John Holmes. While Melton's music draws inspiration from NYC and Detroit for the most part, Nectarine Pie's debut single is California down to the bone, from it's mountains and sunshine artwork to the desert-baked sonics within.

Unlike a lot of modern bands that look to the 60s for inspiration, Nectarine Pie actually does a spectacular job of emulating the sound of San Francisco in 1968. Keeping with the theme of overall mystery, the labels on the 7" can't be bothered with anything so basic as printing the song titles on them, but since I'm a huge nerd, I can tell you that most pressing plants etch "A" or "B" next to the catalogue number in the dead wax, and this record is no different. Pretty much any information on any topic is available at anyone's fingertips at any time, and it's not like I make my monthly podcast playlists easy to find, so I definitely salute the attempt to make a listener have to dig up shit like that, instead of shoving it in their faces.

Speaking of saluting something shoved in my face, the guitar-work on this 7" is some of the best I've heard in a long time. Price layers on thick cakes of sinister, Twin Reverb-infused strumming in true Link Wray knife-fight fashion, while lead guitarist Billy Trujillo says to hell with pop melody and simply solos all through both tracks, bringing out the ghosts of John Cippolina, Jorma Kaukonen, and (ulp) even Jerry Garcia, showering everything with torrents of bendy notes and controlled fretboard shredding. "Dreamdaze" wouldn't have sounded out of place on Quicksilver Messenger Service's classic Happy Trails album, melding a bluesy bottom end and just enough exploratory lift-off to indicate that it would get twice and longer and wilder aired out in a live setting. Flipside "Chameleon" actually apes "Gimme Danger" by the Stooges a little too closely, stripping out the acoustic guitar and adding in layers of murky fuzz before heading off into the sun once again, while bits of Queens Of The Stone Age-style desert rock work their way into the sound.

Like Bare Wires, this is record collector rock n' roll at it's very finest. Listen to hundreds of songs, dig the depths, piece together the parts of a genre that resonate the most, then file them down to a fine point, and reconstruct them into the perfect songs you hear in your head. If it was 1971, Nectarine Pie would be labelled "biker rock" and relegated to the last page of the reviews section in your favorite rock mag, celebrated by Lester Bangs and Greg Shaw, and ignored by everyone else, then resurrected by bootleggers and Ebay scum as a great lost classic. Maybe that's why it's on white vinyl, limited to 400 copies, and harder to find than truffles in Saudi Arabia? This single is worth seeking out, not as a trophy, but as something to listen the fuck out of, and as a soundtrack to the next night you feel like getting out of your head.

Let's Wrestle - Nursing Home

(Merge, 2011)

In my mind, England in the mid-90s was like Camelot or some shit, at least musically. Geographically and intellectually miles away from my small-town suburban bedroom, Britpop injected a whole bunch of escapist fun to a rock n' roll landscape that was haunted by the suicide of Kurt Cobain and dominated by the aggressive angst of Nine Inch Nails and Smashing Pumpkins. Sure, I felt like a rat in a cage some days, but most of the time I yearned to put on a smart suit and dance like Jarvis Cocker in the "Common People" video and knock back a few pints with some dudes from Menswear at the Good Mixer in Camden town. I was fifteen, well read, listened to the import show on 97X like it was my job, and dreamed that writing for the NME would be my job someday.

Things didn't work out that way though, and I saw Britpop crumble and fall away, while a whole bunch of awful shit like Coldplay, Klaxons, and Glasvegas were hoisted upon shoulders and given the royal treatment for making music that wasn't any more fun or substantial than a hangover fart. Every once in a while, bands like Len Price 3 or Male Bonding or the Long Blondes would emerge, but while excellent, none of them could equal the rush I got from hearing "Wake Up Boo" or "Wonderwall" the first time. Damn near 15 years after Blur kicked off the Britpop revolution with "Girls & Boys," London trio Let's Wrestle finally gave some hope to us jaded Anglophiles with their debut album In The Court Of The Wrestling Let's, an insanely smart and hooky collection of songs that proved the ghost of Supergrass wasn't ready to be buried quite yet.

From the sounds of second LP Nursing Home, Let's Wrestle wasn't too happy about constant (and unfounded) comparisons to overrated late 80s UK jangle-punks The Wedding Present, as everything is louder, noisier, and tougher here, with nary a bit of the speedy, folky strumming that occasionally dusted In The Court Of The Wrestling Let's. These guys were probably way psyched to record with Steve Albini, and I'd like to imagine the phrase "Hey Steve, remember Seamonsters? Yeah, not so much this time, eh?!" was bandied about more than once during the sessions. Shit is more compact as well, with the pointless samples n' instrumental interludes that made the first album a bit of a slog scissored out, leaving twelve tracks that barely crack a half-hour, which is a much better fit for a band with this kind of punk rock attack and nervous energy.

That might be a bit of presumptuous interpretation on my part, as frontman Wesley Patrick Gonzalez doesn't appear to give much of a shit about ANYTHING. He still delivers his vocals in a flat, conversational tone that suggests that he couldn't be bothered to get out of bed most days, let alone care about negative press from a bunch of jaded, ignorant rock n' roll writers. The first LP's jaunty love ballad "In Dreams" is given a dirty, abrasive re-take in the opening track on Nursing Home, and instead of puffy clouds and cartoon hearts, Gonzalez imagines fire and Greek dudes fighting in the pharmacy and bad actresses from bad TV shows and old guys named Tony that bedded Queen Victoria. It doesn't make a lot of sense, but it's catchy as fuck, and under all the volume and grit, it's still a love song. After all, no one understands, but you get it right away.

Albini does what he's always done, presenting a shit-hot punk rock band with sympathetic, bruising clarity. In fact, it might be the best thing he's done since the first Magnolia Electric Company record a decade ago or the last Shellac LP back in 2007. I've seen Let's Wrestle classified as "lo-fi," but seriously, since when did any rock song not outfitted with beat-doctored drums and auto-tune automatically become classified as "lo-fi"?! Rock n' roll had been documented as such for nearly fifty fucking years before computers came in and sorta ruined shit. Everything Let's Wrestle has recorded doesn't sound any different from hundreds of classic albums that were made with real tape machines and microphones and amplifiers, and anyone suggesting this kinda stuff sounds bad is smoking crack.

Forget about the Wedding Present, OK?! Let's Wrestle clearly find their inspiration in American indie rock circa 1994. Picture a punkier Pavement, a sillier Sebadoh, or a less-dumb Dinosaur Jr. cranking out a concise song suite about an early twentysomething that's too smart for his own damn good, who would rather get high and eat dinner with mum and waste some fools in Halo than go out and bar-hop for some emotionally-empty (and INTIMIDATING!) girls. Remember "Suburban Home" by the Descendents? I always thought that song was supposed to be sarcastic, but Let's Wrestle seems to have taken it to heart. Really though, I spent those years of my life trapped in the same post-adolescent bubble and feel like I came out of things better in my early 30s than my more overly-ambitious high school classmates. Seriously, do you want to become a productive, mindless cog in society, or do you want to cram as much lazy fun as possible in before your body and brain tell you to just grow the fuck up already?! Better to hang back and pick your spots and make a bunch of noise instead, huh?

Beneath his lazy hero-worship of the 90s slacker archetype, Wesley Patrick Gonzalez proves that he's like way smarter than you, all of you. Near the end of Nursing Home, he paints a chilling portrait of the future he's trying to prolong in "I'm So Useful." He's busy weatherproofing his summer villa in Tuscany and the tract home in the suburbs, and wondering why if he's so useful, than why did you leave him? He's already got it sussed out that everyone gets old and boring someday, and it's like he's anticipating failure because that's what's ingrained in the psyche of anyone that spent a decade of life in war-torn, recession-riddled hopelessness. In the rock n' roll lexicon, getting old and irrelevant is the biggest sin possible, and no one wants to become Liam and Noel Gallagher, fighting over the scraps of a legacy no one in their right mind cares about anymore. Perhaps that's why the cynicism of Let's Wrestle sounds so fucking good in 2011, because everyone hopes they die before they get old, even before they know what such a weighty statement really means.

Maybe it's because I was an idealistic teenager back then, but the 90s really does seem like a golden age, much like the 60s must have seemed to grown-ups in the 80s. All I remember is neon colors, big pants, MTV, decent FM radio, bookstores crammed full of messy, interesting magazines, bins full of vital CDs, and a president that wasn't afraid to crack a stupid joke every now and then. I can't state enough how refreshing it is to see a bunch of young punks putting a wry, British smile on things and bashing out fun and smart rock n' roll like the Britpop days of yore. Maybe they don't give a shit, but I do, and Nursing Home means more than anything Green Day or Coldplay has farted out in the last ten years. Fuck a bunch of ambition; just give me a smart suit and some fun.

Spider Fever - She's No Saint/Back To You 7"

(Cave Punk, 2011)

I raved about the first Spider Fever single on Hozac way back in April, and was seriously jazzed to get this follow-up in the mail recently. Frontman Mario Rubacalba has put in his time playing drums for Rocket From The Crypt, Hot Snakes, and loads of 90s post-hardcore bands, and was most recently seen in extremely disappointing "hardcore supergroup" Off!, cranking out punk rock nostalgia that wasn't anywhere near as satisfying as a real, legit Black Flag reunion would have been. Reverence and nostalgia goes out the window when Rubacalba picks up a guitar and starts shouting though, and this release on Cave Punk Records out of San Diego is a second straight notch in Spider Fever's belt.

If their debut 7" played out like a great lost sequel to Black Flag's Damaged album (one where Ginn and Rollins stopped hating life so much and started talking to girls more often), the two tracks here delve into tougher, sludgier, and more sinister places. "She's No Saint" builds off of the standard-issue "Suspect Device"/"Blitzkrieg Bop" template before offering up an insanely catchy chorus and then some face-melting Wipers-style guitar soloing. Truth be told, it sounds a helluva lot like Columbus Ohio's fearsome New Bomb Turks on their Epitaph LPs, which were rough, raw, and ready, and not afraid to sock you upside the head with melody when you weren't paying attention.

On the other side, "Back To You" slows things into a jackhammer rhythm, which brings to mind some mid-80s punk/hardcore/metal hybrid action with a grinding pogo pulse and even more nasty guitar strangulation. It's a song appropriate for dancing, drinking, fighting, or fucking, or some wicked combination of the above. This reviewer wishes that more bands had this kind of fire and drive, and just stopped respecting the past and started fucking going for it, man. Spider Fever have come up with another winner, a single which maintains the catchy, euphoric rush they started, while stretching out and letting people know that they've probably got a killer LP waiting to be unleashed. When is that record coming out, again?!

Hoop Dreams - XCPR/Memory Light 7"

(Captured Tracks, 2011)

Even in 2011, when decent band names seem harder and harder to come by (deep breath...Bare Wires, High Tension Wires, White Wires, White Mystery, White Fence, etc.), "Hoop Dreams" is particularly lousy. Naming your indie rock ensemble after the sprawling 1994 documentary about inner-city basketball prospects is a pretty gutsy and disingenuous move, especially when your music is decidedly pale and reeking of synth-heavy mid-80s pop from England. Luckily, I stopped judging bands by their name when I was like nine. My favorite group of all time are the Manic Street Preachers, which might have the dumbest name ever, except for maybe !!! or a million mall-emo bands. Really, a name is just a name, and Hoop Dreams deliver a promising debut single that continues the heavy roll that Captured Tracks has been on in 2011.

This 7" contains everything I like in a classic single, sporting two tracks that are totally different from one another. A side "XCPR" (featured on Random Old Records Podcast #34 last month) is a tight, propulsive two-minute jam which works off a simple, jittery, killer guitar riff that rushes into a soaring chorus lightly dusted with synths and shouts before ending abruptly and much too soon. It kinda reminds me of an early 80s DIY band off one of those Messthetics comps that listened to The Smiths way more than they let on to their punk rock friends. B side "Memory Light" is a swirling, slow-moving reverb n' keyboard haze that is more atmosphere than song, packing in bright tones and goth-lite brooding that makes me wonder if kids in Blacksburg, Virginia are really getting deep into the Cocteau Twins in 2011. Shit sounds like an outtake off Treasure with Peter Murphy or Morrissey singing, and that ain't a bad thing in my book.

Back when I was a kid, it seemed like every 45 or cassingle I bought featured a sure-fire pop hit on the A side and some kinda weird shit on the flip. "Welcome To The Jungle" was backed with the funky heroin hell of "Mr. Brownstone," and Jane's Addiction's "Been Caught Stealing" had a head-scratching demo lurking on the other side. I'm not sure what direction Hoop Dreams are headed, and I'd be really happy if they continue to crank out schizophrenic singles like this for awhile. A mutant cross between the two sounds on this 7" would be pretty fucking impressive, though. Mike Sniper of Captured Tracks is one of the most astute talent-spotters in music today, and I'd bet that this good band with an unfortunate name are just gonna get better and better.

White Mystery @ Spoonful Records & Nobunny @ The Boneyard: Columbus OH 07/11/2011

Well shit, it feels like I haven't done a proper show review in a long time, and after looking at the blog archives, it proves that the last time I put my fancy PRESS hat on and spoke on a live event was almost a year ago when the Greenhornes put on an epic, super-crowded show at the Comet in Cincinnati. That was a hell of an EVENT, so it makes sense that I take some time to talk about another epic show I went to a couple months ago. Usually, I'm too busy losing myself in the moment (or a beer or three) to remember the whats and whys outside of Twitter posts (FOLLOW ME), but this time I started earlier and soberer than normal.

After a pleasant and not-so-scenic drive to Columbus, I ended up at a semi-isolated spot called Spoonful Records, right outside of downtown and plopped between a bike shop and a couple of ominous "customers only" parking lots. Inside was a warm, comfortable space made more inviting by immaculate racks of LPs waiting to be picked over and a raggedy air conditioner that was absolutely perfect if you were in its line of fire. The night before, a fearsome garage rock twosome from Chicago called White Mystery had laid waste to The Summit, or so I'd been told. I couldn't make it to that show, but luckily Miss Alex White and her impressively-named brother Francis Scott Key White had decided to set up right in the middle of Spoonful to do a retake of the previous night before taking off for another show in Cleveland. They did so while decked out in the most ferocious Hello Kitty and Iron Maiden t-shirts and house pants that I've ever seen.

White Mystery @ Spoonful Records, 07/11/2011

Photo: Christopher Olvis

If you haven't heard the latest White Mystery LP, Blood & Venom, then you need to quit being such an asshole and pick it up. It takes the surprisingly tough blues howl Alex White developed while fronting the Red Orchestra for a few years and pits it against the (dare I say it?!) Meg White-inspired thud of brother Francis' drums to create an absolutely massive sound that was only hinted at on their debut LP from 2009. I'm definitely an old fogey, so I still get excited at the thought of such quaint things as "artistic development" and bands getting better in between albums, even in this quick-fix culture. Besides, I'm a sucker for call-and-response male/female vocals from Porter & Dolly to Peaches & Herb to Joe Cocker & Jennifer Warnes and beyond. My point is that White Mystery ripped this motherfucker up in their brief set, played all the best tracks from the new LP, turned the shit into a lazy Saturday afternoon hangover party, then slipped in "Powerglove" and "Take A Walk" from the first one way better than most folks could have when asked to do their jobs at 3 PM on a hot and hazy July afternoon. While picking through the racks, I found a cherry copy of Happy Trails by Quicksilver Messenger Service, because one can't have enough psychedelic Bo Diddley workouts in their collection, and a sealed Happy Birthday LP because I’d gone way too long without picking that one up. If you ever find yourself in Columbus, make sure to visit Spoonful. It's staffed by a cool dude and his buds and his super-cool dad who seriously lit up the room offering album recommendations, bottled water, cookies, and correct change to the appreciative crowd.

White Mystery @ Spoonful Records, 07/11/2011

Photo: Christopher Olvis

It was time to venture off to Used Kids after a quick jaunt over the knotty, confusing streets of Columbus, and I'm probably not the first person to venture into that store speaking of its limitless bounty, so I'm not about to gloat about my haul, except to say I picked up a Keef Hartley Band LP that 99% of my readers would be ashamed to throw on their turntables. Yeah, it was one of THOSE days. You charge into battle to see your latest fave raves and lose your goddamn mind over some cut-rate proto-prog psych records that no one gives a fuck about and theoretically blow your wad before the climactic portion of the evening. Nah, dawg. I was seriously jazzed to find some of my favorite records at budget prices, but I came to see Nobunny at some dude's house, and I wasn't gonna leave until I saw Nobunny at some dude's house. Forget that the last time I went to a house show was in 2007, crowding into a basement to see a REUNION show of a band I saw probably five or six times like ten years ago, and I spent that night slamming keg beer in the back corner while people sweated and conversed. I saw the flyer on the wall at Used Kids, and that shit said "NOBUNNY @ THE BONEYARD, 7/11 @ 8 PM. So, me being old and shit, I filled up a styrofoam cooler with icy refreshments and headed to the spot around nine.

I hadn't been to a show in Columbus in over a year, and hadn't been to a house/basement show in longer, but still wasn't too shocked that the friendly face at the backyard gate said "EIGHT BUCKS for the touring band, there's four opening bands, so come on in and hang out!" Shit starts LATE in Columbus. I dutifully paid my dough to see Nobunny at some dude's house, crushed a couple beers in the backyard, then went in to see a bunch of kids playing perfect '77 punk for a few minutes while surveying the lay of the land. I'm pretty sure that the dude wearing a vest and an "I Don't Wanna Grow Up" shirt was the singer, but I can't remember their name, and the sickly sweet smell of ball sweat and Mad Dog 20/20 drove me back outside again. Maybe they were local. Seriously though, Nobunny looks like this. I like Nobunny.

Nobunny @ The Boneyard, 07/11/2011

Photo: Christopher Olvis

I saw Nobunny for the first time at Mayday in Cincinnati last spring, and the place was semi-filled with like forty people and the band, and the whole club still managed to smell like two shit-stained rats fucking in a wool sock. Somehow like fifty punk rockers in a backyard wearing crust pants and drinking heavily on a hot summer evening smelled better, and I can't even begin to break that particular observation down logically. It was one of those Ohio nights that manages to be cool and still yet muggy and sweaty as crap at the same time, and all I could smell was fabric softener and Herbal Essences and bum wine as I climbed up on an amp close to the wall and braced myself as the room filled up and surged like a bunch of heshers trying to get into a Who concert. Yeah, I ran for cover because I'm fucking old and I no longer feel like taking an elbow to the cheek determines whether I'd been to a good show or not. That mass of people lost their goddamn minds when Nobunny and his band started playing, and it wasn't long until everyone was screaming "NOBUNNY LOVES YOU!" and bodies started flying and feet started kicking the ceiling fan that was like eight feet above everybody's heads.

Nobunny @ The Boneyard, 07/11/2011

Photo: Christopher Olvis

In the meantime I heard the opening riff from "Boneyard" teased at least five times, and a whole bunch of bangers from Love Visions aired out, instead of the smarter, poppier tracks from Nobunny's superior follow-up First Blood. Well, duh. When you go see REO Speedwagon at the state fair, you don't wanna hear the NEW SHIT, you wanna hear "Keep On Loving You,” so if someone is paying you cold, hard cash to play a semi-private concert in their living room, you'd better play the fuckin' HITS, right?! Like Johnny Rotten, Joey Ramone, and Joe Strummer before him, Nobunny is an entertainer first and a punk rocker second. He can work a room like fuckin' Elvis, man. While he was doing his thing, a couple chicks got their tits out, some people got kicked in the face, and a dude with a denim vest and zebra pants who looked straight out of Heavy Metal Parking Lot first offered me a swig of his Mad Dog 20/20, and then tried to climb on my shoulders for what I'd assume was a very good reason. About twenty-five minutes into the shit, the mood started turning weird and I bolted for the door, my shirt soaked in sweat, and I'm sure that at least 45% of it wasn't mine.

Nobunny @ The Boneyard, 07/11/2011

Photo: Christopher Olvis

I was still standing in the backyard catching my breath when I could hear the music stopping inside the house, and then a bunch of people stumbled out, much worse for the wear than I was. Soon, a bald dude in a straw hat and khaki shorts appeared with a serene look on his face. So that's Nobunny?! He seemed a bit aloof and a lot confused by what had just happened, and why so many people had shown up to watch a dude in a filthy bunny mask and a pair of black BVDs do his thing. He was happy though, and so was everybody else, myself included. On Monday morning, more than a few people started a conversation with "What did you do Saturday night? Oh yeah?! Well, I saw fuckin' NOBUNNY! Man, that was a lot of fun..."

Wax Museums - Eye Times

(Trouble In Mind, 2011)

When I first heard the Wax Museums back in 2008, they were like a slap in the face. After all, the 2000s were ruled by bands like the Decemberists, Wilco, The Arcade Fire, and Radiohead; very serious bands making very serious music. By contrast, this quartet of Denton, Texas weirdos started off their debut album by screaming, "HEY! I GOT LOCKED IN THE MALL! SOMEBODY LET ME OUT!!" The message was clear: to hell with "expanding the sonic palette" or some similar malarkey, let's have some fucking FUN! Instead of singing about the death of the American dream or whining about your prescription-pill habit or making concept albums that would have Rick Wakeman saying "Too much, man," let's write songs about miniature figurines, doing dishes, and going to the grocery store. Let's forget about our college degrees and European influences, and play some rock n' roll like the suburban middle-class kids we really are, and quit play-acting like junior Bono's in training.

Fuck if I know if the Wax Museums put that much thought into forming a band, but that was what I got out of them, and I adjusted my listening habits accordingly. Soon afterwards, they broke up and spent a few years making killer LPs with bands like Silver Shampoo, Bad Sports, and High Tension Wires, but none of them came close to the sense of euphoria I got from hearing tracks like "Safety In Numbers" and "Got No Guts" for the first time. So when news came in the spring that the Wax Museums were coming out with a second LP, I pre-ordered that shit. Now that I've spun it a bunch of times, I can say that Eye Times is up there with the best punk records of the year, and it's approximately 1/4th the length of The Suburbs.

Trouble In Mind is throwing around the word "mature" in the press for Eye Times, and I take that to mean "this one's got one less song and is about three minutes longer than the first one." It comes pressed on swirly vinyl that looks like some kid puked up cotton candy and peas all over it, and that might be an adequate description for the music on the record, as well. They still sing about silly shit, and their brand of punk rock still suggests what the Adolescents would have sounded like if they'd listened to way more Devo and way less Sham 69. Most of the tunes are filled with spastic stops and starts, and even the ones barely cracking a minute seem to cram in a weird little instrumental bit of surf-band-on-heavy-drugs madness. "Sunburn" sounds like an outtake from the first album, telling a tale of faux-macho bluster about hating taking a sunscreen bath before hitting the beach. Who doesn't?! The best rock n' roll is about first world problems, folks. Just ask Chuck Berry.

Really, the Wax Museums have simply remade their first album, only a lot tougher, smarter, and BETTER, but "maturity"? Eh...I dunno about all that. The two longest songs are "Bruiser," which retells "Whole Lotta Rosie" with a bratty sneer, and "Breakfast For Dinner," which is sludgy and kinda heavy and rhymes with "I'd rather be in her." Love songs, I guess? Just as much as "Mosquito Enormo" is a love song about a big-ass bug bite. Eye Times very rarely breaks into straight-up pop stuff, but "Chase Your Shadow" and "(Nothing To Do With) The 60s" do tread pretty close to Lookout Records-style Ramonescore pop-punk with some righteous power chords and "WOO-OOO" backing shouts. I wouldn't mind the Wax Museums making a whole album that sounds like those two tracks, but it would be robbing me of my right to hear more songs about skin problems and mad gassers and such. Expand your palette all you want, Wax Museums, but don't grow up, OK? I've already heard The Crane Wife once, and my ears still hate me for it.

Random Old Records Podcast #35

Yeah dude, episode #35 of Random Old Records is finished, fresh off my hard drive to yours, and this one is chock-full of jams! Not only that, but this time around there's no dance pop. Yep, 100% dance pop free! It kicks off with a track from Vancouver's Dead Ghosts, who put out one of the best rock n' roll debut albums I've heard in a long time earlier this year. Shit sounds like a bunch of degenerate punk kids who grew up on beat-up vinyl copies of early Stones records. A few minutes later, there's a tune from the upcoming second Dum Dum Girls record on Sub Pop, and goddamn, Dee Dee Dum Dum has morphed into a master of the pop song. "Bedroom Eyes" sounds straight outta 1985, a simpler time when songs that still resembled rock n' roll made it onto pop radio. It sounds like the love song from a classic big-budget 80s flick, and just try to make it through without getting that chorus stuck in your head. It's unpossible!

Elsewhere, I dig deep into my bank of classic tunes and pull out stuff by Big Star, The Raspberries, Captain Beefheart, Thee Headcoats, and Louis Jordan. Plus, you'll hear a set of original punk rock from The Ramones, Stiff Little Fingers, and The Rezillos, and a sprinkling of newer tracks by Jacuzzi Boys, Bare Wires, Fungi Girls, and Missing Monuments. Hot DAMN! Nestled deep in the playlist, you'll find a track from The Streys, a bunch of kids from the Cleveland suburbs who cranked out a few singles of hammer-dumb 60s garage punk before disappearing forever. It all wraps up with "Since You've Gone" by Spanky & Our Gang, one of the most dazzling displays of psychedelic vocal harmony I've ever heard.

All in all, this is one of the best episodes of Random Old Records I've put together in awhile, so go to the normal locations and download it right away! There's lots of loud guitars, simplistic hooks, and plenty of "fuck yeah!" moments to be had, and it's a perfect soundtrack for jumping around your room for like an hour. As always, thanks for reading and listening!

STREAM/SUBSCRIBE/DOWNLOAD: HERE or HERE

DIRECT ZIP DOWNLOAD WITH PLAYLIST: HERE

Random Old Records Podcast #35
1. Dead Ghosts - "When It Comes To You"
(Dead Ghosts, Florida's Dying 2011)
2. Bare Wires - "I Lie Awake"
(Artificial Clouds, Tic Tac Totally 2009)
3. Jacuzzi Boys - "Crush"
(Glazin', Hardly Art 2011)
4. Fungi Girls - "Thanks For Following, Love Yoko"
(Denton Denton USA!, Play Pinball 2010)
5. Dum Dum Girls - "Bedroom Eyes"
(Only In Dreams, Sub Pop 2011)
6. The Rifles - "Local Boy"
(No Love Lost, Red Ink 2006)
--The kinda woman they write books about.
7. Louis Jordan - "Caldonia"
(No Moe! Louis Jordan's Greatest Hits, MCA 1992)
8. The Ramones - "Cretin Hop"
(Rocket To Russia, Sire 1978)
9. Stiff Little Fingers - "No More Of That"
(Inflammable Material, Rough Trade 1979)
10. The Rezillos - "No"
(Can't Stand The Rezillos, Sire 1978)
11. The Weirdos - "Solitary Confinement"
(Weird World Vol. 1, Frontier 1993)
--Good times...
12. King Tuff - "Connection"
(Was Dead, The Colonel 2008)
13. Missing Monuments - "Painted White"
(Painted White, Douchemaster 2011)
14. Big Star - "Way Out West"
(Radio City, Stax 1974)
15. Raspberries - "Every Way I Can"
(Fresh, Capitol 1972)
16. Thee Headcoats - "No Way Out"
(Heavens To Murgatroyd, Sub Pop 1992)
17. Len Price 3 - "Chinese Burn"
(Chinese Burn, Wicked Cool 2007)
18. The Nightcrawlers - "Little Black Egg"
(Nuggets, Rhino 1998)
--Zappa does Allen
19. Captain Beefheart & The Magic Band - "Zig Zag Wanderer"
(Safe As Milk, Buddah 1967)
20. The Streys - "She Cools My Mind"
(Psychedelic States: Ohio In The 60s, Vol.3, Gear Fab 2000)
21. Brenda Lee - "Is It True"
(One Kiss Can Lead To Another, Rhino 2005)
22. Jail Weddings - "One Of These Days"
(Love Is Lawless, White Noise 2010)
23. Spanky & Our Gang - "Since You've Gone"
(Without Rhyme Or Reason, Mercury 1968)

LA Vampires Goes Ital - Streetwise

(Not Not Fun, 2011)

Oh man, do I love this fucking record. Like, I want to pull the record out of the sleeve and lick it a whole bunch, sing its praises, and play it for everyone I know. I want to climb up a hill and shout about how great it is and how everyone with ears should at least give it a fighting chance. If you've read any of my previous blog posts, you'd know that I'm big on context and mood when it comes to enhancing the mood of music, and I gotta say this four track 12" EP came into my world at the right place at the right time. I've spent the last few years neck-deep in the simple pleasures of lo-fi garage/punk/pop, and every basic, loud, instantly-catchy hook that genre had to offer. A few months ago, that well seemed to dry up, and every new bit of nursery-rhyme chorus seemed to come across a little bit STALE. Maybe the newest releases were a little bit weak, or maybe my ears had gotten blown out by listening to the same routine over and over again. Who knows?! I downloaded Streetwise back in mid-July, mostly because I wanted to hear what Bethany "Best Coast" Cosentino's band-mate in Pocahaunted was up to now. I've since listened to it probably a hundred times, enough to make this entrancing mix of blown-out drum machine beats and reverb-soaked shards of diva chants embed themselves in my skin almost permanently.

Amanda Brown is LA Vampires, the aforementioned Pocahaunted founder, and Daniel Martin-McCormick is Ital, the uber-nerdy beat-maker and DJ who gives interviews that talk more about WAV file editing than world domination. Together they make music that sounds like a cassingle from the early 90s that was left out in the sun to bake too long. Everything sounds warped and cooked. When I first heard this record, it was 95 degrees outside, and that day melted into weeks and every day turned into a pitched battle for sweat-soaked survival. Streetwise sounded like a cloud filled with Club MTV fever dreams, of endless dance parties that existed slightly out of reach, teeming with sweaty, gyrating folks that rolled up in cars with no air conditioning and all-black interiors. It sounded dreamy and defiant at the same time. It still sounds that way, a month later.

All four tracks on this EP drift and dream and float and sound like the perfect floor-fillers in a dystopian universe, teeming with lock-step beats and hypnotic repeated phrases that sound like a demented take on vintage Parliament west coast funk jams, or more likely stolen moments of listening to The Chronic on repeat in junior high. The title track is like a vintage raver club throwback jam, the one the DJ throws on at three in the morning, all sleek and sinister and LOUD and just familiar enough to whip the crowd into a fever pitch. Little bits of various influences crop up and disappear quickly, most noticeably European house music, Enigma-style Pure Moods beats, and Beastie Boys sample soundscapes, which all form into a song that's both strident and sprawling, instantly recognizable and fearlessly experimental. It's a fuckin' trip, dude!

So really, I pulled a lateral move and started to listen to lo-fi dance music instead of lo-fi garage rock, and there's really not much of a difference when you start to break the shit down. Both are noisy, obnoxious, and defiant, and even in their simplicity explore loads of traditional sounds lost in the transition from an analog to a digital world. We've got computers that can make the phony mechanical beats and distorted vocal echo of "A Woman Is A Woman" sound less phony and mechanical and distorted and echoey, and make the cheesy keytar synths of "The Chic Shall Inherit The Earth" sound reality show ready. But really, where's the fun in that? This whole EP sounds like a relic from a forgotten and relentlessly optimistic time. Unlike most time capsules, you can dance to this one, think about it a little bit, and vibe out to the sunglasses and glow stick keyboard washes that bring you to the fade-out. Hey LA Vampires and Ital? This meeting of the minds should happen more often.