Babes in Toyland - House

Lots of work road trips have cut into blogging and ripping time. I've  accumulated about a dozen 7" to rip over the last 2 months, and they're just gathering dust while I'm in Ohio or Michigan for work. I'll see if I can get moving on these.

I'm marching slowly but steadily towards the goal of getting the whole Singles Club Part 1 together. Of course that first single might not happen, it's a bit rare, but I'll get the rest of them in place.

As for this band- they weren't really a part of Riot Grrrl, they actually pre-date it. I guess they're sort of a girl grunge band, and they sound the part on this single. The vocals take some getting used to; Kat Bjelland is all over the place. She screeches, howls and screams her way through both tracks.

A: House
B: Arriba
Enjoy!

Big Chief - Chrome Helmet

Sub Pop Singles Club March 1990

Big Chief formed out of the ashes of the Laughing Hyenas and the Necros. Sub Pop signed them before they recorded anything based on their pedigree. This was an early venture outside of Seattle by Sub Pop. If the car reference (or the Necros reference) doesn't give it away, they're from Michigan. They cut three albums, one for SubPop before packing it in.

Both songs rock. Chrome Helmet seems a bit dated, I think it's the vocals, but it's still good.

A: Chrome Helmet
B: Blowout Kit
Enjoy!

Nirvana - Sliver

Picked this up at Newbury Comics in Cambridge. I knew they had released a full length album on Sub Pop, and the label had big aspirations for them. They were described in the Sub Pop mail order catalog as "They're young, have their own van and are gonna make us rich."

I still hadn't heard anything by them, but shelling out $3 for a 7" seemed reasonable, and I noticed that Mudhoney's drummer appeared on one of the tracks. Sold! It's on black vinyl, unfortunately, I know lots of blue ones to match the cover were made. It's still got the Singles Club sign up card from 1990 in there.

Most people have heard the songs, as they were later released on Insesticide, but most people probably have not heard the phone call between Jon Poneman of Sub Pop and a confused/hungover Krist Novoselic that appeared after this version of "Sliver". I'd even forgotten about it, cutting the recording until I realized the record was still playing. I split it out as a separate track.

A: Sliver, Phone Call
B: Dive
Enjoy!

Various Artists - Wheel

Another one of the Simple Machines records. Not as good as the other one.

This one has some spoken word by Juliana Leucking, a song by The Holy Rollers, and a collaboration between the two.

Juliana's stuff is about the trashy side of Baltimore and bullying. The Roller's "Moment of Impact" is pretty cool, and the noisy guitar sounds break up the music-less talking.

A: Juliana Experience- "So Fuckin' Perfec", Holy Rollers w/Juliana "Swallowing My Swallow"
B: Juliana Experience - "The Chase", Holy Rollers "Moment Before Impact"
Enjoy!

Thee Headcoats - Time Will Tell

More Billy Childish, seems like he was just here yesterday, too. Also, I guess it's fitting to have the guy from Thee Mighty Caesars here on this day. I didn't plan this, either. Fate. It was meant to be.

The King of UK Garage Rock, with a list of releases a mile long. Even with a catalog that long, you can start anywhere with Billy Childish. It's sort of all the same, but in a good way. It's straight up, stripped down, no-frills garage rock. It's also timeless. These songs sound like they could have been recorded in 1966 or 2006.

I found a copy of this in Boston after Mudhoney's "You're Gone" single introduced me to this guy.

A: Time Will Tell
B: Davey Crockett (Gabba Hay!)
Enjoy!

Poison Idea - Taken By Surprise

Sub Pop Singles Club - November 1990. I picked this up used for $6 somewhere- there's a hand written sticker still on it. About twice what a Sub Pop Singles Club Single would normally cost if you had the subscription, but totally worth it.

First of all, these guys give TAD a run for their money when it comes to ugly bands. Jesus. I included both the cartoon front cover version and the back cover, which shows that the artist wasn't too far off in his less than flattering portrayal of the band.

"Taken By Surprise" is a stomping, shouting sort of thing. It's fine, but it's not the main attraction. This is another 7" with a far more well-known B-side. It's a raucous treatment of the Go-Go's "We Got The Beat". The singer's voice is sort of reminiscent of The Meatmen's Tesco Vee , which just adds to the enjoyment of this treatment of early 80's girl-pop.

A: Taken By Surprise
B: We got The Beat
Enjoy!

Skewbald/Grand Union

Yet another side-project for Ian MacKaye and Jeff Nelson at a time when they thought Minor Threat was all done. It sounds like an even more pissed-off Minor Threat, if that's even possible to conceive of. This Minor Threat break-up was short lived, so this little project disbanded quickly, leaving behind some unreleased tapes. Recorded in 1981, it stayed on some shelf until it was released in 1990.

As for the name, there was a disagreement over whether the new band should be called Grand Union (grocery chain), or Skewbald (coloring pattern on a horse). Since they disbanded without ever releasing anything while together, it really didn't matter anyway. The songs aren't even titled, but people have given them the names below simply because you've got to call them something.

Once of the cooler pieces of vinyl in the collection. It's completely transparent. No label even, as that stuff is just etched right into the clear vinyl. And there's only one side. I'm borrowing someone else's photo below.Yet another Dischord mail order purchase.

A: Sorry/Change For The Same, You're Not Fooling Me
Enjoy!

Volcano Suns - Blue Rib

One of my favorite bands from Boston. From anywhere, really. I got into them right around 1987, as a cook at the Grog (I was a dishwasher) mentioned them to me. Apparently the record-exec judges walked out on them at the WBCN Rock n' Roll rumble the year before. This was at the height of big hair, so that was instant credibility. The Rumble redeemed themselves a couple of years later with sludge-rock gods The Bags winning. Get your hands on a copy of The Bags' Rock Starved if you can.

Anyway, the Suns' Mission of Burma connection (Peter Prescott played drums in both, and sings in the Suns) helped pushed me into buying Farced via mail order from SST and I was hooked. Just a thunderously loud band. The drums, the shouted vocals, everything. Loud. 

This was near the end of the line for the Suns. "Blue Rib" is from Career in Rock, their final LP (recorded by Steve Albini. It's all inter-related here). I have most of the LPs in vinyl, but also bought them on CD later, so I'm not about to rip them. No clue where I got this, though I'm pretty sure I bought this right when it came out. It's on flawless bright red vinyl. No pops, skips...nothing. If only all of these 7" were this good. The most pristine recording I've had so far. Just clean loud noise.

Prescott is back behind the drums with Mission of Burma again after a stint as frontman/guitarist for Kustomized, and bassist Bob Weston now plays with Albini in Shellac (and also works as studio engineer with Albini). Weston also fills in for Martin Swope in the re-formed Burma lineup. They played a Volcano Suns reunion show some time ago, which I missed, sadly. I'd probably spend the show standing there like Dorothy on the album cover, but it'd still be fun to see it.

A: Blue Rib
B: Openings
Enjoy!

Hole - Retard Girl

Another early Hole single. Very politically incorrect and very noisy, too.

I think my ex-GF was living in Greenough at UMass and we walked into town to buy this single (not this exact one, I had to replace the Hole singles from her collection...) at Al Bum's, along with a few others. We had no clue what this was going to sound like. Her roommate had a turntable, which worked out well. 

A: Retard Girl
B: The Phone Bill Song, Johnnies In The Bathroom
Enjoy!

Sister Ray - The King

Among the first batch of Singles Club stuff I managed to find in Newbury Comics. I'd heard about the Singles Club, and was surprised to find some for sale. Throw in that these guys obviously named themselves for the VU  song, and it seemed like a no-brainer.

I have to say, it didn't disappoint. The King sounds a bit like some Hate Your Friends era Lemonheads, which was fine with me. Legends in Ohio, they didn't seem to catch on much beyond there.

A: The King
B: Push Me
Enjoy!

Forced Down - Stifle

I'm a sucker for packaging. Anything well-printed on a nice cardstock will draw some interest from me, regardless of what it contains. This is a great example of that. I bought this double 7" EP based entirely on the interesting rubber stamps and the Albrecht Durer-esque engraved angel printed on a nice vellum.

And the guts of this thing had these nicely printed and well-designed duotone green lyric sheets with photos and stuff. I had no clue what the band would sound like, and since they were a San Diego act, no one in the store did either. Pretty sure I got this on Newbury St.

They would have fit in quite well on Dischord. Melodic post-hardcore, a little tougher sounding than Holy Rollers, but not as intense as Fugazi. The songs get slower, mellower, and generally better as you work your way through them. For a random selection, it was OK. Not great, but could have been far worse.

A: Thread, Tap & Die
B: Time Without
C: A Cry For Truth
D: Escape, Exit
Enjoy!

Mark Arm - The Freewheelin' Mark Arm

Mudhoney's Mark Arm takes on Dylan's "Masters of War", and even steals Dylan's album cover, putting him in a gas mask.

This was released during Gulf War part 1, and wasn't exactly a topic about to be covered by Mudhoney, who were as apolitical as any band could be. Arm doesn't exactly have the best voice for folky stuff, but then again, neither did Dylan, so why not?

The B-side is a goofy Bo Diddley-esque thing (he even gets partial songwriting credit) about rickets, Amsterdam, and getting beat up.

A: Masters Of War
B: My Life With Rickets
Enjoy!

Beat Happening - Red Head Walking

The pile of done stuff is starting to approach the size of the pile of stuff yet to be done. Almost, but not quite halfway. It's been fun so far, not sure what to do when there is no more pile of "to-dos" left, except to find some vinyl to buy I suppose.

Another influential Pacific NW band. Beat Happening were a minimalist, Lo-Fi trio with a male and a female "singer" neither of whom really seemed to sing.

They founded the successful DIY label K Records so that they could record and distribute their stuff, and through K helped launch all sort of other acts out of Olympia, such as Courtney Love (the band...) and a lot of the Riot Grrrl bands.

Despite their running K Records, they maintained a relationship with Sub Pop, and this is one of a few things that Sub Pop put out for them. As Sub Pop was taking off at the time, this was probably a smart business move by the band.

Calvin handles the vocals on both tracks. His voice is so deep and low, it sounds like he smoked and drank quite a bit the night before.

Not sure where or when I got this. Probably picked it up because I'd heard of them, but hadn't heard anything by them, and it was on Sub Pop. Interesting enough, but not really my thing at the time. Not bad though.

A: Red Head Walking
B: Secret Picnic Spot
Enjoy!

Mudhoney - You're Gone

Another Mudhoney single. These are from the Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge time period. "You're Gone" was only released as a single, but "Thorn" was on the album.

The final song, "You Make Me Die", introduced me to English garage rock king Billy Childish. It's his song, and he's singing it with Mudhoney backing him up. He released an album on Sub Pop around this time, with Eightball's Dan Clowes doing the art. His stuff all sounds the same, but at least you know what you're getting from him. I grabbed the Sub Pop Singles Club record he did, which came out around this time too.

A: You're Gone
B: Thorn, You Make Me Die
Enjoy!

Reverend Horton Heat - Psychobilly Freakout

I picked this up at a Newbury Comics. You could find some of the Singles Club stuff there, and this was the Singles Club record for December 1990. This single was what convinced me to finally sign up. These guys already had a great reputation as a live act, but I hadn't heard anything from them yet. I thought this lived up to the hype. Rockabilly inspired, but fast and furious.

The Reverend is still out there playing, 21 years later. This is one of the few acts in this collection that is still going strong. Just caught him at House of Blues in Boston this summer, and he'll be back again this May.

This track also wound up in Guitar Hero II, giving the Rev. some more exposure and some new fans.

A: Psychobilly Freakout
B: Baby You Know Who
Enjoy!

Melvins - With Yo' Heart, Not Yo' Hands

The Sub Pop Single that never was. Apparently, they had a deal with Sub Pop, but after they recorded this, Sub Pop wouldn't pay them the agreed upon amount. They took the recordings to Sympathy For The Record Industry instead.

The title track is a cover, originally performed by obscure Seattle band Malfunkshun.I'm not sure what the original sounds like, but it sounds all Melvins here to me. The Melvins were already pretty well established as the Pacific Northwest's answer to Black Sabbath by the early 90's, and you can hear it on this single. "Four Letter Woman" continues the slow but driving Sabbath-esque sound. The last track, "Anal Satan" is out there. I've found that any time there's more than one track on the B-side, the last one will pretty strange. The Melvins take on dance music? This was recorded later, and they managed to throw the names of some Sub Pop folks into here, calling them pricks.

No clue where I got this. Apparently this is some rare version with no songs listed on the label, just the SFTRI stylized S. 

A: With Yo' Heart, Not Yo' Hands
B: Four Letter Woman, Anal Satan
Enjoy!

Cows - Slap Back

As mentioned earlier, one of the more polarizing bands, that people are into or they just aren't. Not a lot of gray area. Someone mentioned to me that the vocals might have been part of that. That's quite possible. Everything comes out sounding kind of forced out, and he's a bit high pitched. They were also experimental to the point of being near unlistenable, at least early on.

This single isn't quite that far out there. The A-side is straight up and straighforward noise rock, a mess of distorted bass, trebly guitars and a heavy echo effect (a slapback) on the barely comprehensible vocals. Classic AmRep noise rock.

One O'Clock High is a wordy number with a fast-paced 1-2-fuck-you beat about a guy picking up his hot stripper girlfriend at work. A little weak on the vocals. The rest is fun and noisy.

A: Slap Back
B: One O'Clock High
Enjoy!

William S. Burroughs & Gus Van Sant - Millions of Images

This one seemed just too interesting to pass up. Naked Lunch meets Drugstore Cowboy on vinyl. Sure, why not? Burroughs reads bits of his own work in his dry death-crackle over Van Sant's artsy background music and looping effects.

Burroughs' readings are great, as you would hope they would be. There's a Talking Heads feel to parts of the first track. It's not quite as dynamic or as funky as they could be, but I think that's because the intention was for Burroughs to have center stage. The B-side uses a lot of loops, maybe a few too many, really. But again, it's a great reading, and sure enough, Burroughs supplies some good images of what a Hipster Be-bop Junkie is.

These tracks originally appeared on a 1985 12", long before Van Sant was famous for his films, entitled "The Elvis Of Letters". Seems that someone had the idea of re-releasing some of this material once Van Sant made a name for himself. Apparently, these two tracks make up the B-side. Produced by Tim Kerr, (not of the Monkeywrench, but the Portland label). I got this at a Newbury Comics as well. $3.99. A steal.

A: Millions Of Images
B: The Hipster Be-bop Junkie
Enjoy!

Rollins Band - I Know You

Ah, Hank. What to say about him? There's something I really like about this guy, and how could you not? Being huge, tattooed, outspoken and the vocalist on Black Flag's Damaged gives you some pretty good punk rock street cred. At the same time, he could write some pretty insipid crap at times. He was always smart enough to have an interesting band behind him though, both in the later era punk rock meets jazz fusion Black Flag, and then the slow and heavy steamrolling, ass-kicking machine that was the Rollins Band.

There's this ongoing debate on this music website about the merits of  Black Flag's "My War" LP, and one post in particular sums up my take on Rollins.

"This is a totally ridiculous album. Rollins' screaming baby thing (as aptly described by BER) is utterly over the top... The vinyl might be one of the worst sounding lp pressings ever. The second side is turgid, overblown and slow. The lyrics are juvenile. The production is terrible. I love this record. Love it."

This was a Sub Pop Singles Club release from July 1990. That's before I joined, though I scooped it up at a Newbury Comics. I managed to find a fair amount of the 1990 stuff in the bins at the time. It's on very cool bubblegum pink vinyl. The A-side is a spoken word piece, where Hank tells us that he knows we're all a bunch of losers and misfits, because he's one of us. Uh, OK. We all know that people drawn to this stuff back in the day were a little different. It's not exactly a stretch. But the B-side! The glorious B-side! The Rollins Band takes on Cheech and Chong's 1974 hit "Earache My Eye", part of a comedy sketch that made fun of glam rock. It was also later used in the film "Up In Smoke", in the battle of the bands scene*. This version is slow, heavy, and fantastic.One of my favorite things in this entire collection, and one I really wanted to get into a digital format.

A: I Know You
B: Earache My Eye
Enjoy!

* Recurring theme alert: The Germs auditioned to appear in this scene, but were thrown off the set for starting a food fight.

Butthole Surfers - Hurdy Gurdy Man

Just as my youngest son's choice of yesterday's 7" summarized him in a way, my oldest son's choice of this single is indicative of his personality too. This news will terrify my wife if she ever heard this, so I won't announce that around the house. It's not the music, of course; the boy has a knack for cutting through all extraneous crap and getting to the heart of the matter. Somehow, he chose the first 7" record I bought. I'm not sure there'd be any reason for this exercise if I hadn't bought this thing, as it started me down the path of buying these little records. How or why he picked this after flipping through them all, I'll never know. It's not like the cover art (experiments in early photoshop) is all that appealing. Then again, it's possible that he chose it because it has the word "butthole" written on it. I think that's the last time I ask the kids to get involved.

As I mentioned earlier, Sub-Pop started to change the 7" landscape among the indie labels around this time, and this single was a clear sign that the others were feeling the pressure. I remember this being remarkably well-publicized for a single release by a small label (Rough Trade), and it was supposedly a limited release, on "Mellow-Yellow vinyl", because Donovan, who wrote/performed the original Hurdy Gurdy Man, also...aw fuck it. If I have to explain... So, being a sucker for that kind of thing, I went right out and bought one, immediately. Of course, I loved these guys, and have fond memories of driving to high school each morning with my friend Marc blasting his Locust Abortion Technician cassette the whole way there. So I would have eventually gotten my hands on this. After all, these did wind up on the CD release of their next full length album, Pioughed, but you're better off with just the single, really.

As for the music, it's a great cover. They do what you want a good band to do with a cover song; put their stamp on it, but keep the original recognizable. They take Donovan's warbly voice and totally overdo it with Gibby's effects, which mocks the original to some degree, but still works as a good vocal performance in the world of the Surfers' music. I've always liked Paul Leary's razor sharp psychedelic guitar work. He's what really makes this song go. For these guys at this time, this was remarkably accessible, radio friendly, even. Unlike the B-side. Oh boy. Like Locust Abortion Technician, this is not to be listened to right before bed. Jesus. Trust me on this one.

A: Hurdy Gurdy Man
B: Barking Dogs
Enjoy!