Thursday, December 21st, 2006
its been quiet on the active listening front lately… here are the lyrics to the best christmas song in recent years, the song ‘if you were born today’ by the minnesota band low. merry christmas! if you were born todayif you were born today we’d kill ya by age eight never get the chance to say: joy to the world and peace on the earth forgive them for they know not what they do blessed are the meek and blessed are the humble blessed are the ninety and nine deny the flesh deny all that’s evil tonight you’ll deny me thrice if you were born today we’d kill ya by age eight never get the chance to say… ooooo….
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Wednesday, November 22nd, 2006
another year of war. so here’s my thanksgiving post. the following lyrics were written by the mob. great british punk band of many years ago.. Â NO DOVES FLY HERE The sky is empty and it’s turning different shades of colour It never did before and we never asked for war My mind is empty and my body different shades of torture It never was before and we never asked for war No-one is moving and no doves fly here No-one is thinking and no doves fly here No-one remembers beyond all this fear No doves fly here No doves fly here No doves fly here No doves fly here No doves fly here Tuesday, October 31st, 2006
Joe requested we write lists of 7 songs that changed our lives. Coming up with 7 was impossible. So I (more or less) separated it by age group. For better or for worse- here it is…
Things started happening fast. Minor Threat made me understand Hardcore. They spoke to me in the same language I spoke in. This led me into New York,  to the Hardcore Matinees at CBGB’s. A NY band that only played one matinee that I recall (Easter Sunday with New Republic) was the mighty trio known as Urgent Fury. Their singer/bassist Abe Rodriguez was the voice of an alternative Hardcore that went beyond the NYHC goonishness. He expressed dissatisfaction with the scene and with the aggressive military stance of the U.S. government. If more then several hundred people were aware of Urgent Fury they could have been America’s answer to the Clash. The song ‘Cog’ warned me of the next stage of my life. While playing tribute to the worker. “Slaving hard for a minimum wage as a master thief steals your life away and your life goes by chained to a desk a production line and you get no rest oh this is for the working man take a bow take a bow mr. working manâ€. Husker Du internalized all those feelings of being uncomfortable in ones body, of post-adolescence, the fear of disappointing your parents. Bob Mould was specifically speaking of issues of sexuality, but it could be related on a much deeper level. The album ‘Zen Arcade’ where this track is taken from was really my soundtrack to High School. Husker Du was the perfect lead in to what came next…
It could be said Urgent Fury politicized me. Crass radicalized me. This was totally an English thing but it was so clear it felt like it came from my backyard. This music came out during the Falkland Islands War and it was a shock listening to a band so openly attack its government. This was going beyond folk music or even political punk. This band was all but openly calling for Revolution. Again, I heard this music a couple years after the fact but its power never wavered. That the vocals could be so raw yet so poetic. From obscenity to …to images of flowers in fields. What could come next? (Ah, that is exactly what they were asking). What is criminally ignored about Crass is their music. People focus too much on the lyrics (and oh ok, i’m sure this is a band where the lyrics came first) but its music was weird and experimental and you really didn’t know where things were headed. This band has been totally ignored in the punk histories and this is wrong.
Out of nowhere Happy Go Licky rose up from the ashes of Rites of Spring. With the exact same line-up as RoS they had totally changed their style. A complete 180 from the sincere proto-emo of RoS, they surprised everyone with a 5 song 12†packaged in a manila envelope. This changed my concept of the idea of the song. As there were NO songs per se, just “jagged dancceable†(in your death disco) â€sheets of noiseâ€. (as Mark Anderson described it in the book ‘dance of days’.) Happy Go Licky rarely practiced, they relied on intuition and smarts and an art school aesthetic that colored it all in. They did not record in a studio, the tracks on the ep (later expanded into an amazing cd on dischord with 21 tracks,  some repeated in different versions-they never played the same song the same way twice) are culled from their 6 or so live shows. these songs are moments that occured and will never occur again. ‘White Lines’ is actually a cover of the Melle Mel song. But HgL idea of covering a song was the bass player would play the bassline as best as he could from remembering the original and the rest of the would let their guitars shriek and yell out lyrics of the song they could remember- “take me higher babyâ€, “freebaseâ€, “crystal eyesâ€, “blown awayâ€. almost like a cut up of the lyrics. It was an amazing thing. Another out of nowhere band was Slint. They showed how to strip down the sound to its bare essentials. I think Steve Albini said Slint’s drummer, Britt Walford (later in first lineup of The Breeders, the one that made the amazing ‘Pod’ album) was the thing that made him a great drummer was that he knew when not to play. ‘Good Morning, Captain’ takes you on a slow burn for 6 months, you hear a long story of a shipwreck or a dream until suddenly the music rises and Brian McMahon starts screaming “I MISS YOU!!!†over and over again as the song fades to its cruel end. 7. Ages late 20s to present My Bloody Valentine ‘To Here Knows When’, Dead C ‘Helen Said This’ This is a song I heard in 1991 when I bought the ‘Loveless’ album. But this is a song I carry with me wherever I go. The guitars and vocals are blur into one and the music shifts and leaves you woozy. Its the sound of a dream and I can’t think of anything else like it. So many bands tried to emulate them and though many great bands (and a whole bunch of lousy ones) came in their wake, no one sounded like them. This Dead C track is another song I heard before 30 but I cannot get away from it. There is nothing so raw. Guitar as noise, drums like falling down a staircase and Michael Morley imploring “Helen she said/Helen she said/Helen she said/I don’t need you… Friday, October 27th, 2006
Its almost Halloween so today here are some spooky lyrics from Glenn Danzig’s incredible slow burn post-Misfits band Samhain.  Archangel Go Heaven sends me here to you And if a-you fear you’ve reason to Open up all seven seals The beast is come to claim the youth Archangel Archangel Defiant brood Defiant brood I call on you Casted down my bretheren Rebels from authority Power, pride, contempt and lust All these things I give to you Archangel Archangel Defiant brood Defiant brood I call on youI am not your son of God The prince of light will show no fear Mine is that which rules this world The beast is come, I am the end Archangel Archangel And when they cast out the brood For the sin of pride misused And when they cast down to Hell Fucking brood Archangel Archangel Heaven sends me here to you And if a-you fear you’ve reason to Open up all seven seals The beast is come to claim the youth Archangel Archangel Archangel Archangel Go Archangel Wednesday, October 18th, 2006 This year has been very quiet on the Groovy Times front with the only material issued being the Fiskadoro ‘Wilford’ EP, and ‘Sunburn’ cassette. But this will be changing very soon. First the holidays shall bring us the CD reissue/rethink of ‘Christmas on the Brazos’ by the Spies which will include new material.
Following the holidays we will get a major jumpstart as The Year of the Vampire will bring a new commitment to Groovy Times. Fiskadoro is in the process of recording their first album (tentatively titled ‘Houston DNA’). We hope to have this out early in the year along with a Groovy Times Website to keep track of the other material coming which includes- Pablo Unidos & The Sound of Revolution New ep, a follow up to the album they released on Groovy Times in 2005. This will see a new direction for the band, percussion heavy. Getting away from the strict dub of their debut. Pablo (ex-The Spies) also guested on the Boomchasers album, released this past year on Ice-Nine. Dance Ditch New ep including 3 remixes of songs by The Kimballs (Tom Burns ex-the V.T.O.) and other material as well, brought to you from Steve Ditch (The Republic of Texas). Solid State Shocking new free improv band featuring Rich Kimball (Fiskadoro) on guitar and Tom Burns (The Kimballs) on drums. Neither of these individuals has been involved in anything like this before. Think John Coltrane, not John Rotten. There should be an ep out hopefully spring. Other stuff is still in the planning stages. More news on that when it comes. -Sharpe James Wednesday, October 18th, 2006
Beefeater (1984-1986) was one of the flagship Revolution Summer bands in Washington, DC. Led by fiery singer Tomas Squip, guitar player Fred Smith and bass player Dug E. Bird they concocted a punk/metal/funk hybrid (with a dash of reggae as well) and took over the stage. They also brought a political element into the DC scene. Something that had not really been delved into by the original class of HarDCore bands. The lyrics I bring forth today are from the bands song ‘Beefeater’ which Squip describes as “A dialogue between the subject and its conscience, then myself and the subjectâ€. Beefeater Sit down to this and close your eyes(if you’re doing wrong you’re not alone) sweep those thoughts right out of your mind (there’s no place like hell but there’s no place like home) settle down and doze awhile (it couldn’t be right but who’s to say so) while you’re eating that let me see you smile (everyone else is doing it you know) let me run down to the store for a pound of meat make yourself at home the flowers are blooming and the birds are all out (you can’t catch me cause i’m lost in a crowd) let me think of something nice to write about (everything’s smiling for crying out loud) the sky is like water, the clouds are like snow (its a beautiful day so lets think real slow) its great to be alive if they tell you so (i close my eyes and away we go) i hope it was good it was $2.99 now pay no mind while i run through this rhyme: a life in a box with no place to piss looks something like this an innocent body slung by its heels molested by chainsaws think how that feels my mothers creation done nobody wrong get shot with a gun, you know this song? a four legged loser born in a trap with less then a future this sound like crap? a new born is crying why am i alone? a mother is dying cut to the bone sleep on this when you go to bed (to be led down a hallway and crushed in the head) and never live at all a chrome plated graveyard, a ceramic tomb a sad rivers running, of blood, for whom? to be all alone, to call a slaughterhouse home lets say it don’t happen lets just forget it there’s no place like home where the deer and the antelope roam to call a slaughterhouse home? merrily merrily merrily merrily life is but a dream sleep it off! (1985) |
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