First off let me give credit where credit is due. Shiny Grey Monotone turned me on to these guys awhile back and have just posted the same album I'm about to a week ago. If you haven't checked out that blog yet, do so as they are my favorite blog of that style on the net.
On to Pride Parade... as I said, I downloaded this last week over at SGM and love it. Pride Parade is a band from Athens, GA and from my best descriptive assessment have a Mule meets Red Red Meat by way of Young Widows sound. In other words, Mule's country noise rock vibe mixed with Young Widows modern take on noise rock. The Red Red Meat comes in via the vocals and more of the indie rock/Sub Pop moments. Over all, a good, well rounded rocking band with some earnest, well written songs.
As a bonus, this is also a "guilt free" download and by that I mean the link I'm providing will take you to the bands website where they themselves are offering this album up for free download. They also have a "Donate" button as well as a vinyl pressing available to those that can spare a dime.
So go on... take a chance and download it. The band want you to. If you don't like it, nothing lost but who knows, you may just discover your favorite new band.
Inspired by the Brothers of the Sonic Cloth post over at Mindgrinder (which also included some Tad b-sides I didn't have) I'm finally get this up here. TAD...you should know him, you should love him. This ->HERE<- is their final release musically as TAD the band and a fine one at that. As I stated in my previous Tad post, there were talks of releasing a discs worth of some unreleased, post-"Infrared Riding Hood" jams (like maybe "Mummified Cop" from the Tad myspace?) but with BotSC in what seems to be full swing who knows how long that could take to see the light of day. Hopefully this is just a teaser of what that disc could have in store. This is a vinyl rip I did so it does have some scratches and pops but it's cool, right? We'll just call those "character noises".
Screw it! For the hell of it I'll throw in the two songs from "Live Alien Broadcast" that to the best of my knowledge have never been on a proper studio release as well.
If you know anything about a Jesus Lizard show you know this, it's sweaty and drunken. Believe me, there were plenty in Nashville last night filling this criteria. Drunk bumps into me, I in turn bump into girl next to me. Whoops! NO big deal. She than has the nerve to turn to me and say, "Your arm is sweeaty!"
Well, excuse-fucking-me princess! Do you have any fucking clue at all as to where the fuck you are?! You should've felt the dude that bummed me!
I just calmly turned to her however and replied, "No, I think it's you."
Zing bitch!
Just be luck then you weren't this guy...
Last night I felt 16 all over again.
Today however, I feel twice that and in pain.
The show last night at the Exit/In was phenomenal further sealing the fact that they were the best live band of the 90's! Dare I say Dave Yow may very well be...fuck that...IS the best frontman since Iggy Pop and a band that original and tight (and shiny) has been sorely, SORELY missed for the last decade and change. I was lucky enough to see them a hand full of times in the mid-nineties and they always left me standing with my mouth agape. The closest it got to a religious experience for me was going to a JL show. Last night was no exception. It's no wonder these guys seem to be just as influential now as they were two decades ago when they first came out.
So here are some John Peel sessions dating back to their original hey day of '91 and '92 in honor of last night. Not sure how terribly hard to find these are but I'm pretty sure they've never found their way onto a proper release. I can't even remember where I got them anymore to be honest.
In true Jesus Lizard "one word title" form, we'll refer to this simply as "Peel".
Here's video of their set opener "Puss" last night. Oh Mr. Yow, yer such a cut up with yer jokes and yer antics!
At the tender age of 13 this was easily one of my top 3 favorite bands. Right behind Nirvana and Tool I suppose. (Hey, cut some slack, I was 13 after all.) At the time Kalamazoo's Twitch was easily the most promising band playing in west Michigan, if not all of MI.
What really set Twitch apart from their proggy, art-metal leaning K-zoo brethren was their more rock based verse chorus verse song structures and the amazingly unique croon of vocalist Chris Bryers. It was heavy and original enough for the metal guys and musicians, noisy and simple enough for the grunge kids, and yet still accessible enough for the college rock crowd. I'm sure Bryers' vocals helped with the later as well. There was a warm honesty in his almost "Peter Gabriel via Satan" voice that I'm sure wet a panty or two. (If I remember correctly, the one and only time I got to see them he got hit in the face by the bra of an over enthusiastic female.)
Based on the strength of their self released "Homewrecker" EP they got signed to Grass Records. Based on the strength of that Grass release "Beaten Senseless and Giddy With Love" they got signed to RCA. What happened from there remains a mystery to most. I remember reading a review of the advanced copy of "Medicine Ball" in a local music rag. I think it even showed some art work (be it small) that I never saw again. Rumor had it that RCA could only keep one of their MI signings (the other being the one hit blunder Verve Pipe. Fucking "Freshmen"!). Subsequently, Twitch was dropped and this EP went unreleased. From the sounds of it there was a whole other albums worth of material recorded that got shit canned as well. As it seems to happen too often in situations like this, this prematurely ended a band that had yet to peak in popularity or potential.
I got this on cassette tape at one of thier (last?) shows in K-zoo. I'm not sure if it followed being dropped or if it was during them floating in label limbo. It did seem like they were selling these out of spite either way. Just a hand dubbed 90 minute tape with a Xeroxed lime green sleeve that simply read "TWITCH - Medicine Ball".
I'm throwing in their contribution to the Grass Records tribute to Frank Sinatra ("Pretty Colors") and the b-side to the Jedi 7" ("Wick") just to fatten to zip and sweeten the deal. More info on Twitch can be found here and here. "Homewrecker" and "Beaten Senseless..." are available on iTunes. I suggest you get them both. They are phenomenal. Chances are good though that if you're here getting this from me, you own both and already know that.
Sorry for the lengthy delay. Solid internet is finally up and running. In true bitter irony however, the day the net went up my external HD went DOWN! As in, "To the floor" down. Needless to say, a lot of music went bye-bye!
Any who...
Do you love this album like I do? When it came out in '99 did you jams this til you puked! (Oh wait, that was my early 20's partying!) Did it make you bang your head so hard you strangely resembled King Buzzo on a less than humid day? Me too my friend! This is easily one of the top Melvins releases in my book as it's pretty fucking solid throughout. Every track owns right down to the Fleetwood Mac cover of "Green Manalichi (with the Two Pronged Crown)". The only bad thing that could've ever been said about this album is the way the Melvins; with all their "wit, humor, wisdom and glory"; broke each song into two (count 'em...2) individual tracks.
Why was this a problem you ask? Well, at the time I suppose it wasn't. Put the CD on, listen through it...no problem. But you see, in the "Dark Ages" of the late 90's, before the time of Ipods and the like, I had a 400 disc CD player and liked shuffle. Here in lied the problem. You'd be rockin' along to "AMAZON" and then somewhere in the middle *POOF* next song! LAME! Now with Ipods and my persistent inability to choose only one Melvins album to listen to at a time (Come on, it's like your own personal jukebox!) it seemes like even more of a bummer no one has fixed this.
That is, until now!
Thanks to Garageband and my lack of anything better to do, Melvins fans (and fans of the act of shuffling) can now rejoice! I present to you "The (fixed) Maggot"!
In honor of Hum's upcoming New Years Eve and New Years Day shows at the Double Door in Chicago I'm gonna post their virtually unknown first album. I only very recently found out about these shows and tried to get tickets but of course, to no avail. This album is also another recent discovery. I've known about it for a while now but only acquired it as of late. I think the first thing you'll notice right off the bat is some one else takes over lead vocal duties other than Matt Talbot on a couple songs. Those also tend to be the songs that sound least like what people came to recognize as Hum's sound. Also, the lush drone, expansive song writing and almost metal-like wallop is traded in for more of a poppy, stripped down indie-punk sound more similar to that of their neighbors in the Poster Children (who will show up on here eventually). I'm very glad they developed the way they did. This is by no means as essential as "Electra 2000" is, that being the first album from the "quintessential" line up. This is however kind of a neat glimpse into where this band started out if you are a fan and a nerd like myself.
Also, I'm gonna include the most relevant b-sides and rarities I acquired from h-u-m.net. If you're a fan and haven't ever checked that site out, do so. From what i can tell it's a fairly well maintained fan site. There are some full demos, videos and wallpapers for download and other info that might be worth a look.
For your viewing pleasure we have a video for "The Pod". The first song off their major label debut "You'd Prefer An Astronaut". Shit, I didn't even know a video for this song existed!
If you are one of the lucky ones who gets to see this on New Years...bite me. (I remember seeing this 120 Minutes and being amazed by their drummer. He hits hard as hell!!!)
Tad is the shit! You should really know this by know. The whole ax wielding, ex-butcher/lumber jack insano redneck mystique rules! Sheer genius! I mean seriously, who wouldn't want to party with (or listen to jams by...) this guy?!
Redefining heavy in the age of Sub Pop, Tad should have been huge. (No pun intended.) Tad was the human embodiment of the sound he created. Taking their name from the main man himself, the sheer girth of their sound was only ever rivaled really by the Melvins. Squealing, belching, grunting, riffs just throbbing...it truly does sound like a fucking maniac beating his guitar with a rack of lamb ham-fistedly into oblivion. Especially on this older, more primal sounding stuff. That's not to say there is no musical value here. Tad truly had an amazing ability to combine a real "wam and thud" mentality with a pop sensibility and some descent vocals. They always "tongue in cheekly" played so beautifully into the persona created that you couldn't help but smirk along and sell the legend with 'em, sweatily head banging the whole way. I mean fuck, the guitars sound like a fucking chain-saw!
This is a collection of early 7" b-sides and compilation contributions I entitled "Kills Roaches Dead". The title is lifted from the back of a Tad shirt I got when I saw them open for Soundgarden on the "Superunknown" tour in high school. This might not be absolutely everything but it's all I could find and I think honestly, it's a pretty comprehensive collection. Missing are some of the post-"Infrared Riding Hood" 7"s. I read recently here that there is a plan in the works to release those songs and other unreleased recordings from the time right before Tad called it quits sometime in '09.
Here's the infamous "banned from MTV" video for "Woodgoblins" playing up the lumberjack thing. They were deemed to ugly for MTV's sensitive eyes. hahahaha
Here's Tad performing live on some random talk show or something.
Here's a teaser trailer for the Tad DVD that's out entitled "Busted Circuits and Ringing Ears".
I by no means feel like I'm reinventing the wheel or revealing some great secret here by posting about this band. I've seen it a couple other places (shit, their own bass player has it posted on his blog) but for me not to would be weird because this album was one of my favorites growing up and is still one I love to jam on more than an occasional basis.
I've heard it said that they sound like "Neil Fallon fronting Helmet" and i guess for the most part this could be true. Imagine further maybe if "Inhaler"-era TAD and Page Hamilton started a band and invited early Clutch's Neil Fallon and Iron Lung of Scissorfight to trade off on vocal duties. However, unlike the other bands I've mentioned so far, Stompbox had way more of a bouncy "moshable" quality. Maybe it was that hometown Boston hardcore influence sneaking in.
I first discovered this band on Headbanger's Ball and was instantly hooked by there ultra heavy, down right hammering, staccato groove. It also didn't hurt that I was completely stoned and their singer resembled some grungy, bellowing burn out that would always be down with "puffing a J" with ya. There was always something very tongue in cheek about this band that
I admired. Could've been that they had songs called "Carry On My Wayward Son" and "Fool For The City" that had nothing to do with the classic rock originals. For the most part the album maintains it's heavy, head bobbing riffathon giving way to frequent melodic "grunge like" vocal tendencies. Even though Stompbox play some "lunkhead-ish" type of metal I think some real solid musicianship shines through. I remember reading the vocalist was the original choice to front Geezer Butler's GZR project. It would've been a lot cooler if he did.
Like S2R in my previous post...Stompbox was another fantastic band that was scooped up in the post-Nirvana signing frenzy, slated to be the next "Big Thing", was improperly pushed, failed to put up winning numbers and was subsequently dropped. I spent years after trying to find anything else recorded by this band as this was there only "proper" release.
Recently, much to my surprise, I came across the only previously read about "Travis" EP on iTunes. Even more surprisingly, through blogging around, I acquired unreleased tracks from the "Stress" recording session as well as some rare comp tracks. Most of the tracks are re-recorded songs from the "Travis" EP but there's a couple I hadn't heard along with a Gang Green cover "Alcohol" (b-side to the Halloween Day Massacre 7") and a cover of the Tree (another awesome Beantown band!) song "Question Abuse". I've compiled those plus the only un re-recorded "Travis" track "Lobotomizer" and another single b-side I had here under the fitting title "Now, What's It Worth".
As always, you can find a shit load of copies of "Stress" here for cheap or in bargain bins across America.
Here's the "No Woods" video I saw on wheeed. A lot of people feel that Disturbed ripped off the verse riff. I couldn't agree more!
Here's a interview with the previously mentioned bass player, Patrick, telling what happened post-"Stress".
Grunge-y 90's noise rawk/The Jesus Lizard worship from Kanass City, MS.
Swept up in what was the "Grunge" signing/feeding frenzy of the early 90's, Season To Risk seems far too ugly for a major label. Maybe Colombia big wigs just figured their melodies would get sweeter with time. No wonder they didn't know how to push this band. This is the second full length from this criminally underrated act and their final LP for Colombia. With producing credits going to Martin Bisi (Sonic Youth, Helmet, Unsane, Swans) and art credits going to Derek Hess, it only further complements S2R's rawest and darkest release. I remember not being overly fond of it myself at first being a big fan of their self titled debut. It was just so noisy and hard to distinguish the bass from the guitars. Oh, but how it grew on me like some sick, puss filled boil. It seemed to speak to my drunken, alienated, misguided late teenage self. You know, it still speaks to the early 30's version of that same asshole to this day. "Absolution", "Terrain Vague" and "Time Bomb" seem to stand out though I feel every song on here is a keeper. Grinding bent guitars, jagged, distorted bass rhythms and tight snappy drums lend themselves nicely to Steven Tulipana's poetic, fuzz box, carnival-barker ranting. Aptly titled "In A Perfect World"...indeed, in a perfect world this would be huge.
Myself and a friend of mine at the time drove two hours in a snow storm to see them on tour for this album. Due to the weather, we ended up being the only two there. Well, besides the three misdirected middle agers that were sitting at a table in the back of the bar. The fact that they were only there for drinks and "atmosphere" became evident when they got up and left half way through S2R's second song. They played to "us" that night. The show might as well been in my living room. They played our request of "Snakes" off the first album and obliged us the favor years later at a far better attended show in the same town. Even though we almost died twice on the way, it was so worth it and remains to be one of my favorite concerts to this day.
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It also goes without saying that if one of these bands come to your town, go see them and support touring musicians by buying their shit or putting them up. You could also help by getting them hammered, by allowing them to make drunken passes at your mother or by looking the other way when they puke and/or piss on your favorite Barcalounger in your families den.
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