She stoops to conquer me.

A random two-fer this week. One is a 1992 ep that for some reason felt more like a mini-album, and a 2016 full length that left me wanting even more. 

**Please do not reveal artists in comments!**

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The Violets - Athens, GA 1988-1992 (2020, Crooked Beat)

Another year, another Record Store Day (This year being the fifteenth), and to one extent or another I've probably attended a good twelve or thirteen of these increasingly pricey and populated events. As was the case in previous years, I've decided to showcase an album/single released on a prior RSD.  I don't think I encountered The Violets prior to this collection that was anthologized for 500 lucky purchasers in 2020. As it's title capably implies the era this Athens quartet occupied falls right within the realm this site so often articulates. The following blurb wasn't penned by myself but capably addresses the gist of the band's proverbial fifteen minutes of fame:

The Violets were a punk/indie band from Athens, GA, mainly active from 1988-1992. The band was best known for their song 'I Hate The Grateful Dead,” which briefly charted on the College CMJ charts in 1991. That original 7" record is a big collectors item these days and the song has remained quite popular, even among Grateful Dead purists, who view the song as a humorous poke at the obsessive fan culture that still surrounds the Dead. Back in the 1990s Grateful Dead -based merchandise shops were even known to carry the record.

...except the band in question had a lot more going for them than a perceived (and I suppose justifiably so) novelty song. There's certainly a discernible undercurrent of humor to some of the ten songs in this collection, yet the Violets were serious and ostensibly ambitious enough to bring a bevy of thoroughly structured and considered tunes to the table. Sonically I'm hearing plenty of early-ish Soul Asylum pizzazz amidst "Dew Drop Inn," "Corrosion," and "Evolution."  And one of the band's champions was none other then David Barbe (who eventually comprised 1/3 of Sugar), a fellow Georgian whose '80s outfit Mercyland coincidentally or not seemed to inform the Violets overarching bent. The record (my rip, BTW) contains both sides of the "Grateful Dead" 7", tracks from scarce demo tapes, and previously unreleased ditties, making a representative argument that the Violets legacy was more than a fleeting, inside joke. While most of what's here veers towards earnest, Minneapolis-informed punk-pop, the concluding "Forsyth" is a slow, bluesy lament about the reputation that said Georgia County earned for itself in the Jim Crow-south.

01. Dew Drop Inn
02. Corrosion
03. Big Wheel
04. Streetlight Sky
05. David Close
06. Evolution
07. Basement
08. I Hate the Grateful Dead
09. Motorman
10. Forsyth

Hear

I’m trapped inside the body of a 45-year old kid.

From 2010. Smart, assertive and sometimes melancholy indie guitar rock built on a solid singer/songwriter bedrock.

**Please do not reveal artist in comments!**

Statues - "We're Disparate" 7" (2009, House Party/P. Trash)

Ontario's Statues seemingly didn't make significant inroads outside of Canada, which is a crying shame considering every morsel I've heard this trio was nothing less than flawless. Subscribing to a similar aesthetic as roided-up mod punks the Marked Men and The Briefs, Statues were a trifle less rigid and all the better for it, because being a little rough around the edges can go a very long. In short, there's plenty of rawness but it's contained inside reasonable parameters, and yeah, these guys were capable of carrying something resembling a tune. I've read of comparisons to Wire and The Fall, but I'm not hearing an alignment with either. If you dig this there are other Statues singles, and thankfully, full  lengths to be had. 

A. We're Disparate
B1. To the Top
B2. Young Enough

Hear

The Love Wolves - demo (1991)

Tape time. Been awhile since I shared any reels, this one procured from the consistently rewarding Graham's Records in Erie, PA, just a hop, skip and a jump off the I-90 doncha know?  The Lone Wolves were a NYC garage combo with a driving, punky underbite, reminiscent of many a fine Get Hip Records act (say, The Cynics) who also strike me as early adopters of Mudhoney. Lots of gooey fuzz and reverb here with "Demon Child" and the Heartbreakers-ish "Two Sisters" bumping and grinding their way into my sensibilities the most. "Ain't That Fine' is a Ray Charles tune, if that helps give you an idea of where the Wolves were emanating from. Evidently, this cassette may have led to a record deal with the Italian Helter Skelter imprint for a 1993 LP, Eat Ya!

01. Lone Wolf
02. Demon Child
03. Ain't That Fine
04. Out of Time
05. Two Sisters

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Reviews you can use: Deadlights, Richard James Simpson, Lannie Flowers & Spygenius.

I always thought interventions led to a twelve-step program. That being said, don't take Deadlights' Eleven Step Intervention as a half measure.  Back with their second album in as many years, Deadlights is the brainchild of Jeff Shelton, whose more prolific outfit The Well Wishers was/is responsible for a steady volley of crunch-laden power pop albums with nary a bum tune in earshot. Deadlights, on the other hand, occupy a more insular space wherein Shelton indulges his jones for more austere Anglophile-informed rock, loosely resembling the likes of Catherine Wheel and the Chameleons UK - just don't expect anything derivative. Eleven Step... with it's chiming and negligibly echoing guitars is a nuanced and often subdued beast, flirting with post-punk, and perhaps less so, dream-pop textures. Not everything leaps off the page here, but when Deadlights bust-out in sonic full bloom on the "The Great Unknown" "Out of Step With the Modern World," and the uber-melodic "Just Let Go" Shelton strikes me as almost limitless in his capabilities. As for a surprise rendition of Pink Floyd's Meddle-era deep cut, "Fearless," the overarching construct of the song is left intact, but is gracefully filtered through Deadlights modus operandi, blending in seamlessly with this record's ten originals. And speaking of numbers, if you're looking for that proverbial twelfth-step, I'm pretty sure what that directive might entail, specifically buying this album on Bandcamp or Amazon.  

Well goddamn.  Back in the '90s this is what some folks would refer to as "wtf music," which believe it of not was a less belittling term-of-art than such lazy, generic nomenclatures as "experimental" or even "avant garde." Richard James Simpson has been hovering around intermittently all the way back in the '80s with the left-field indie venture Invisible Chains, and a bit later in the alterna-grungy Teardrain. Now up to his third solo record, Sugar the Pill, the gentleman in question has unfurled a concaved and occasionally unwieldy flag where sonic abstractions aren't tantamount to the journey so much as the outright destination. It's very hard to toss out generalizations here, but Sugar's oblique, alien and often downright unsettling vistas recall such artistes as Zoviet France and Negativland, minus the creative samples and sound-bytes of the latter. I'm not gonna lie, RJS' vibe is difficult if not impossible to convey in the written word. And despite a near-total lack of pop acumen on Sugar, there are at the very least some more structured pieces that invite a repeat listen or two. "Starry Hope" and "We're in the Wolf's Mouth" are dirty, power-chordish romps that could pass for Jack Endino productions circa 1989, "Love Becomes a Stranger" is a relatively straightforward piece where discernible guitars mesh with orchestral elements, and dare i say "Take it Back" could pass for a bona fide piano ballad. In the for-what-it's-worth department, The Germs Don Bolles contributes percussion on a few songs here. You can sample Sugar... on Soundcloud, or better yet obtain a physical or digital variation to have and hold via Amazon.

When is a new Lannie Flowers album not a new Lannie Flowers album?  Enter, Flavor of the Month - The Remixed March to Home Singles, the latest installment in his catalog which is actually a compilation of a a dozen or so digital tracks that made their way into the virtual slipstream between 2018-19. If you stick exclusively to music portals like Spotify, or if you opt for the paid download route having these songs on a physical medium may not be a priority, but as for myself, I tend to overlook digital releases, sometimes even by my favorite artists. 

I've dedicated no small amount of space to Mr. Flowers previous endeavors, all the way back to his earliest in rumblings in the Pengwins, a band that can claim their origins back to the '70s.  Lannie's plaintive, power pop delivery system has been informed by everyone from the Plimsouls to Tom Petty and Jeff Lynne, not to mention many dots on the map in between. If you're new to the man in general it's not easy to determine where you should start exploring his ever-growing body of work, but Flavor of the Month could very well be the ideal jumping off point, especially for fans of classicist singer-songwriter guitar pop who crave not only hooks but a smidgen of bite to boot. A deluxe vinyl edition of Flavor is set to drop later this year, but CDs are available now from Spyderpop/Big Stir Records and Amazon.  

Going into a covers record where you're ignorant to many/most/all of the titles is akin to attending a foreign film without speaking the language. In both cases you might luck out and get something sweet out of the experience, but an awful lot is going to get lost in the translation. Occasionally, there are bands possessing enough refined taste and competence to transcend such a scenario, and to our benefit we have that in the guise of Spygenius' Blow Their Covers.   

Not only are most of the compositions here unknown quantities, Spygenius was equally so for yours truly. From what I've been able to glean their original material takes it's cues from the most hallowed of the hallowed (Beatles, Beach Boys, etc). Following up five proper albums, Spygenius' Blow My Covers doesn't consistently excavate material from under-the-radar types (though there is some of that going on - Kelly's Heels anyone?) but also relatively deep album cuts and singles from numerous renown names - Squeeze, The Monkees, Gene Clark, Traffic and Buffalo Springfield - just don't get your hopes up for reveling in renditions of any old familiar favorites from the aforementioned.  This album's slowly revealing cavalcade of surprises is the reason why it succeeds to the extent that it does - not to mention Spygenius' well honed capabilities, especially when they get around to taking on a tune very near and dear to my heart, the Soft Boys' Byrd-sian classic "Queen of Eyes."  BTW, The Beatles aren't represented here, but strangely enough Lennon and McCartney are, by virtue of "Step Inside Love," a tune they penned for the late Brit crooner Cilla Black. You can preview, and for that matter, preferably buy Blow Their Covers over at Bandcamp, and direct from Big Stir Records.

Put the lampshade on...

A collection of this band's earliest, and possibly most inviting recordings. 

**Please do not reveal artist in comments!**

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Crystalized Movements - Dog...Tree...Satellite Seers (1987, Forced Exposure)

The album I'm presenting tonight is a gem. A jewel. A gold nugget. And it's the glorious byproduct of a band I made the grave misfortune of neglecting no only for most of my life, but even for the better part of my operation of this humble blog. The Crystalized Movements were something of a mainstay in their home state of Connecticut, and even though the word did in fact get out regarding this quartet, both in the States and abroad, they were the provenance of the indie and hipster cognoscenti of their day and never transcended their cult status. 

Much was made about the band's psych and garage rock bona fides, but the Movements weren't content to wallow in that echo chamber, and furthermore, seemingly possessed a keen awareness of what was transpiring in locales like Minneapolis and Athens, GA, not to mention on indie imprints such as SST. Sonically overpowering the majority of the Paisley Underground hopefuls of their day, the band incorporated equal parts aggression and melody without any overt "trippy" maneuvers, yielding jangly, driving, and strikingly memorable numbers like this album's "Up Falling Down," "Spinning Around," and "In Other Words." In fact there are portions of Dog...Tree... that could constitute some of the finest songs that were quite frankly left-off-the-dial to the detriment of thousands of potential fans. The converts they were able to make inroads with, alongside many gob-smacked record critics managed to keep the Movements tucked in their back pocket, and that's largely where they stayed until the band's ostensible dissolution in the mid-90s. But don't take my word for it. Hear these gents for yourself and them move back/forwards through their catalog, because it's a downright rewarding one at that.  BTW, this is not the original album jacket, rather a slapdash cut and paste job that Forced Exposure Records saw fit to package the 1988 reissue of the album in.

01. There's No More
02. It's All Gone Black
03. Up Falling Down
04. She Don't Care
05. Wondering Where
06. Spinning Around
07. Down to Reach You
08. Don and Nancy's Trip
09. In Other Words
10. Death Rats/Overture
11. The Final Squeal

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Why don't you say goodbye? You know you never try.

One stop shopping for these legendary, L.A. power-pop mavens.

**Please do not reveal artist in comments!**

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the terrible parade - ed mcmahon says 7'' (1991, Presto!)

Looks like I went a whole decade plus without a follow-up to my original Terrible Parade entry from 2009. No, unfortunately it's not another full length (they only made one, 1990's Where Were You When the Light Went Out), but they did follow it up with a single containing two entirely new songs. Sonically, they lightened their attack for the ace A-side, the acoustic "Ed McMahon Says" that ponders what it would be like to be handed a check for a cool million from the man in question. The flip, "Telephone Man" mines a strikingly similar vein (thematically  anyway) to New Edition's "Mr. Telephone Man," though Terrible Parade's take on this often doleful topic is in the form of a wholly unique tune with smarter lyrics. 

a. ed mcmahon says
b. telephone man

hear

The Difference - Sign of the Times ep (1983, Sugar Maple)

The opening title, "P.M.T," on The Difference's lone ep, Sign of the Times, commences with a deliciously echoing, post-punk guitar line that gradually segues into something more pedestrian, albeit in an inviting way.  The remainder of the record skews in the direction of mainstream-ish '80s pop/rock that might have also persuaded a few left-of-the-dial types as well.  In fact. "If Not For Love"is downright sprite and bouncy - "pop" without an overdoes of the "power" quotient. There's no shortage of potential on Sign of the Times, but this appears to be the only recorded evidence The Difference furnished us with.

01. P.M.T. (Pre Menstrual Tension)
02. Sign of the Times
03. If Not For Love
04. When Tomorrow Comes

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My hero's my burden, and my burden is me.

From 1988. At the peak of their powers this band fused together the finest elements of the Who, Bruce Springsteen and U2. Interesting back story on these guys which you can read via a link included in the folder.

**Please do not reveal artist in comments!**

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Golden City - s/t mLP (2009, Magic Bullet)

Sorry I wasn't able to offer you more this week, but for what's it's worth this one is pretty excellent. You've probably never heard of Golden City. Fair enough, but you may be familiar with frontman Eric Richter's relatively more visible mid-90s proposition, Christie Front Drive, who were regarded as one of the flag-bearers of the rekindled emo movement of that decade, alongside contemporaries Boys Life, Mineral, and most famously, Sunny Day Real Estate. CFD split after an album and several short form releases, with Richter going on to helm The 101 in the aughts.  Golden City was the band that followed shortly after that, with Richter again leading the charge and Jeremy Jones also making the migration over from 101. To the handful of you that have heard G/C's lone album (with some people technically referring to it as an ep) you know there's not much separating it from The 101 (whom I might try to cover in a Mystery Monday at some point). Loud, chiming guitars with just-right distortion plied to relentless melody lines, and driving, up-tempo arrangements. Golden City is love-at-first-listen caliber indie rock with nods to latter era Promise Ring and lesser known greats Muler, minus any dramatic entanglements.  This one is available digitally from Bandcamp, and possibly Spotify, so I won't be leaving this up for long.  If you enjoy what you hear I encourage you to support the band!  Enjoy. 

01. Gray
02. Diamond Suits
03. Cars in Space
04. Ragdoll
05. Big Country
06. Cavalry
07. Stars
08. Hit the Ground

Hear

I was never a part of it.

This album turns forty this year. Enjoy. 

**Please do not reveal artist in comments!**

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Apollo Landing - Kleptomania 7'' (1993)

Here's another new-to-me find. Apollo Landing were a Boston five-piece, described as "feminist indie rock" per the archival page linked above, though the band featured only one member with double-x chromosomes, vocalist Jenny Kuhla. Though more than an album's worth of material was recorded over their tenure, only two short-form releases were made available for public consumption including this presumably self-released 45. Two slices of relatively manicured indie pop here, not far removed from the likes of Helium and Belly, with the more distortion-heavy "Marianne" winning me over the most. Based on what I'm hearing, Kuhla was a natural on the mic, and had Apollo caught a genuine break they could have been fairly major contenders in the alt-rock sweepstakes. According to my online sources (all one of them) the band was supposed to have released a posthumous collection in 2018 dubbed, Hysteria, though there doesn't seem to have been much follow-up on it. Guitarist Tony Striker has released a handful of albums under his own name.   

A. Kleptomania
B. Marianne

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Units - New Way to Move ep (1983, Epic)

The Units 1980 debut Digital Stimulation, has been regarded as an underground electro/pop classic for four decades and counting. Arriving on 415 Records prior to the label's affiliation with CBS Records, the coed San Fran wunderkinds demonstrated a pop awareness on Stimulation, but clung to avant ideals. A second album, Animals They Dream About, produced by Bill Nelson of Be Bop Deluxe renown was shelved for a good three decades and change. If that wasn't enough the band's third album, also with Nelson working the boards never made it to market either. However, a handful of songs from those third LP sessions were part and parcel of New Way to Move, the Units lone major label outing. Adopting a slightly catchier (not to mention dancier) m.o, the ep's two lead-off numbers, "The Right Man" and "A Girl Like You" are effective stabs at mainstream-ish wave/pop with just enough left-field affectations baked into the cake to keep things interesting. The remainder of the record, isn't as consistent, but say for example a band like Oingo Boingo got their hands on "Your Face," and we might have a real monstrosity on our hands. New Way to Move would be the band's last recorded effort until a collection of remixes, Connections sprouted in 2011.

01. The Right Man
02. A Girl Like You
03. New Way to Move
04. Your Face
05. More Alike
06. More More Alike

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Reviews you can use: Bye Bye Blackbirds, The Loud Family & Anton Barbeau, Hoodoo Gurus

In 2020, I admitted my naivety when I momentarily mistook The Bye Bye Blackbirds then most recent album, Boxer at Rest for their debut, when in actuality it had been preceded by three full lengths.  Chalk that up to Boxer being my first exposure to the band, as well as prime-mover Bradley Skaught, who seemingly wound up on everyone's radar overnight. Most notably, Skaught's plaintive songwriting chops belie an almost startling adeptness for arranging and honing songs, with equal measures of grit and polish, topped off with gallons of class, sans the sass. Rounded out to a six-piece for August Lightning Complex, the Blackbirds aren't ones for extremes. You won't find any full fledged "bangers" or even ballads amidst August's ten songs, nor are they wont to reign this affair in at a static or even keel. However, there are a few things here that pounce out at me like a savage, ravenous lion, namely "Mechanics," and "Favorite Stars," both par excellence, richly crafted bullseyes, situated in the vicinity of power pop, but not necessarily rooted there.  Also consider the more subdued "Something From the Old World" and the harmony-laced "We Got Lost" affording the band more flexibility. My only objection on August, is the meandering "Marching," which winds on for nine-plus minutes, and would be equally effective if edited to half that length.  

I'm tempted to say that Skaught and Co. are prodigiously enlightened...but who might those prodigies be?  It's immensely hard to quantify these things, but here goes. Tom Petty?  In all probability. Wilco?  Likely a coincidence.  Sloan?  Well, just refer to the aforementioned. "Mechanics," and "Favorite Stars." And much like Sloan, this combo play the 'meticulous' card to a fault without conveying themselves as the least bit forced. Not an easy task to pull off, yet it's wholly evident the Blackbirds are masters of this very tact. August... is one of those records where simplicity merges with sincerity, and begets a wellspring of rewards in the process. Grab a strike of the Lightning at Bandcamp or Amazon. 

If you were more or a casual Loud Family fan (admittedly like yours truly) this next one may have slipped past your radar. The Loud Family of course was the long running band fronted by the late Scott Miller, formally of seminal pop auteurs Game Theory, who I may have brought up once or twice on these pages. 2006 saw the release of What if It Works?, a collaboration between Miller and  singer/songwriter Anton Barbeau, which is being reissued by Omnivore next week with practically an album's worth of supplemental tracks. While the album itself was a one-off effort, the duo's association with each other dates back to a couple decades prior when Anton was introduced to Scott at a latter-era Game Theory gig in 1988. In the ensuing years the two hung out and performed at coffee house gigs around UC Davis and Sacramento, and eventually, the then-budding Anton presented a tape of songs to Scott he had been working on. Over the next fifteen years both Scott and Anton pursued their respective meal-tickets, the former with the Loud Family and Anton as a solo act, not to mention the proprietorship of his own label, Idiot Records. Nonetheless, Scott was tuned into what his soon-to-be partner was doing, and by the early '90s they dabbled in producing songs together, but the two weren't officially a "band," per se.

Scott had disbanded the Loud Family around 2000 and had largely walked away from pursuing music. At some point in the '00s, Scott's wife Kristine remarked about how well he and Anton sounded together, and that largely sparked the idea to make a record. Towing along former Loud Family alum Kenny Kessel and Jozef Becker, the combo went about recording What if it Works?  What was initially slated to be an EP snowballed into a full length, and not merely a footnote either. Scott is the slightly dominant songwriter here with both trading off on vocals. While the Loud Family dealt in elaborate and challenging arrangements, the Miller/Anton collaboration boasted a looser and more casual bent. In fact, What If's opening salvo is their interpretation of the Stones "Rocks Off," and a raging one at that.  It's immediately followed up by "Song About "Rocks Off," which ironically isn't as much of a response to the tune in question as it's title suggests. It's a great song in it's own right, and is one of the most effective things Miller penned since his tenure in Game Theory.  Following this is Anton's own excellent "Pop Song 99" which bears the unmistakable gait and tincture of early Game Theory, circa Blaze of Glory.  Scott's trademark lyrical charms and melodic agility on "Total Mass Destruction" and "Mavis of Maybelline Towers," are compelling as ever. Hard to believe he was semi-retired from music at the time! Anton's "Flow Thee Water" and the album's uptempo title track are equally satisfying and showcase his ongoing progression as a slightly off-center pop scribe, akin to Scott Miller himself.  Along the way they also indulge in a cover of Cat Steven's "I Think I See the Light."

As mentioned before, there's a huge clutch of bonus swag on this reissue, including a couple of fine Anton-penned outtakes, "Third Eye" and "Little Daisy," along with early prototypes of roughly half of the record. And don't get me started on Anton's gritty, Stooges-esque "I Wanna Make You Come Just By Looking at Your Eye."  What if It Works? will be available March 25 direct from Omnivore, Amazon, and hopefully your local music vendors.

What can I say?  With a tenure of over forty years, The Hoodoo Gurus simply will not die. Granted, they've been together intermittently of late, with their last album Purity of Essence having dropped in 2010, but not only are they still in existence, they've retained 75% percent of their original 1981 lineup (Dave Faulkner: vox/guitars, Brad Shepherd: guitars, Richard Grossman: bass)!  Purloining elements of garage rock and punk, with neither of those genres ever quite dominating, these Aussie vets are virulent rockers to the core who've never lost their ethos or sardonic bite. Their latest, Chariot of the Gods, their tenth studio effort overall, is for better or worse not a return to their nascent sonic forte, the kind that engendered global fandom with records like Stoneage Romeos, Mars Needs Guitars, etc... Heck, at times Chariot barely resembles 1991's Kinky.  That said they're back with 13 or 16 fresh songs (quantity dependent on your format of choice) and if your an established customer it's time to break out your Mastercard.

There are some honest to goodness corkers here - "World of Pain," "Hang With the Girls," and "Don't Try to Save My Soul," all of which are plenty taut and potent, still bearing much of their eminently powerful sound of yore without resorting to a outright throwback. Conversely there's a slew of linear, yet relatively uncharacteristic numbers hitching a ride on this Chariot. "Get Out of Dodge" "Settle Down" and "Carry On" skew close to power pop, but the comparatively tranquil "Was I Supposed to Care" and the Lou Reed-indebted "Got to Get You Out of My Life," suggest what a Dave Faulkner solo record might culminate in. Chariot of the Gods is one of the most varied albums in the Guru's voluminous canon, and while not necessarily representative of past triumphs, it's a testament to their sheer longevity not to mention capabilities. If you're brand new to these guys, a good jumping off point might be a best-of collection, or better yet, Blow Your Cool or Mars Needs Guitars, before sinking your teeth full bore into Chariot. The vinyl variant of the album features three bonus tunes, and is available from their website. Finally, the band is touring Australia in early April, and are playing two shows in the States later in the month in Nashville and Philadelphia!

 Watch this space for additional record critiques to come this weekend.

Make the most of a million times no.

From 1983. Quite possibly the only album I really enjoyed by this band.

**Please do not reveal artist in comments!**

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Late Rivals - Casting Shadows (198?, Crown)

Another blind purchase, sealed no less.  Not turning up much pertinentn info about Late Rivals, who may have been denizens of Tennessee, albeit their isn't a single southern accident to be identified amongst this album's eight tunes. Definitely a collegiate edge to much of Casting Shadows, particularly "Ghostown" and "My Marcelle," both of which illicit some tasteful R.E.M. jangle.  A thoroughly listenable, and occasionally rewarding record, just don't expect much in the way of mystique. BTW, no copyright date was provided anywhere on the graphics, but it's pretty safe to say this dates from the mid/late 1980s. 

01. Wilderness
02. Ghostown
03. All Mixed Up
04. Stars
05. Her Tie's Bind
06. My Marcelle
07. Slow Down
08. When You're Gone

Hear

...but this is hopeless, i'm handing in my notice...giving my four days.

Four ep's from four disparate artists, each coincidentally, representing a different decade.

**Please do not reveal artist in comments!**

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Ceedees - s/t ep (1986, Freedom)

The Ceedees' 1980 debut, Hit the Ditch, certainly had it's charms, not to mention quirks. In fact, I extolled on these bygone Canucks in a piece I did surrounding said record about five years prior. They took their sweet time with a follow-up considering this ep arrived over half a decade later, but it was worth the wait considering the Curtis Drieder-helmed trio sounded genuinely improved, with a stash of smart, memorable tunes, often topical in nature, and sonically, packing a much tighter wallop. I'm picking up on some XTC-isms throughout this one, albeit the Ceedee's have a singular mouthpiece in Drieder, bearing no likeness to Andy Partridge. As for highlights, "I Wanna Be Somebody" sports a sprite, Let's Active-esque power-pop gait, and "Hook in Me" is sung from the vantage point of a fish who's experiencing anything but a pleasant day. According to the album insert, at the time of Ceedees release a book was available from the band featuring lyrics to no less than 40 compositions, leading one to wonder if that plentiful batch of tunes was actually committed to tape. Check out a nice essay regarding this album over at Vinyl Burn blog. 

01. Eskimo Lullabye
02. I Wanna Be Somebody
03. France
04. Hook in Me
05. I Worry About My Baby

Hear

Citrus Groove - Hit the Ground/Beautiful Thing 7" (1991, Honeychain)

Here's one of my lengthiest belated follow-ups ever. I posted the closest thing these guys had to an album, the Sunswayed mini-LP all the way back in 2009. I knew there were a couple of singles surrounding that release and the one presented here is their first. Not quite hopping all the way onto the shoegaze caboose, but still several light years from any of the prevailing mainstream trends of their day, Citrus Groove's indie pop aesthetic was organic and bejeweled with oodles of melodic moxie. Recommended for fans of their contemporaries Fudge, and a good dollop of Slumberland Record's early roster.    

A. Hit the Ground
AA. Beautiful Thing

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Ask me again, I’ll tell you the same way...

In 1996, the disk I’m featuring this week was the best thing this side of a new Archers of Loaf album (and we even managed to get one of those too).

**Please do not reveal artist in comments!**

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A note on re-ups/dead links.

Alright, finally time to stare down the elephant in the room.  Roughly 80% to 90% of the download links on this site have EXPIRED.  Some five or more years ago.  My apologies for this. For a good six seven years I've been using Zippyshare as my file hoster. While they've been reliable on a short term basis, several of you have complained about dodging adware and porn links in order to get to what you're really after, the music. In a nutshell, Zippyshare links remain active until a file hasn't been accessed in over thirty days.  For years now I've been playing an endless cat and mouse game of responding to your requests by way of comments that I'm often very tardy in reading. There's such a backlog of dead links and perfectly well intentioned and reasonable requests that I simply don't have time to realistically address. In short, I need a more permanent solution, even if it means going with a paid file hosting option that will retain the links I upload provided I pay an annual or semi-annual fee.

By and large, the out-of-pocket expenditure is not an immediate concern (so long as I'm employed). One option appears to be MediaFire.  Their site claims to guarantee up to 1 TB of file hosting for what seems like a reasonable fee (about USD $50 for the first year), but can anyone attest to how reliable they are with hosting data (i.e. MP3s) that may be copyrighted (even if is completely out of print)?  If you're a fellow blogger who has used MediaFire, have you ever had anything scrubbed from their servers, particularly without warning?  Ideally I wish to make all previous links on Wilfully Obscure active again, provided that the content hasn't been made commercially available since I originally shared the files. I just want to ensure the next file hoster I opt to go with is copacetic with my overarching objective.  Any input would be helpful.  I will try to attend to some of your more recent requests in the near future. Thanks.  

Eternal Triangle - Touch and Let Go (1984, Situation 2)

Bargain bin find here, and a slightly above average one at that. Hailing from the UK and containing a guy from Fischer-Z (Steve Skolnik) the co-ed Eternal Triangle entangled their new romantic pastiche with a dash of this and that, with the finest results yielding themselves on the chilly "Small Town" which smacks of the same austere poise that made the early Comsat Angels such a pleasure. The quartet's ambitions, writ large are commercially ambitious by comparison, and even if the title track, issued as a single, is less than thrilling, E/T compensate with the uptempo, extroverted "I Need You," and "Nothing But a Friend." There's a couple more highlights lurking among these grooves - "Stay With You" and "Only In the Night," but Touch and Let Go ends on a rather inglorious note, with the sappy, naval-gazing soliloquy "It's a Story" playing this affair out. 

01. Touch and Let Go
02. I Need You
03. Small Town
04. Nothing But a Friend
05. Can't Blame Me
06. Stay With You
07. Same Mistakes
08. Only in the Night
09. Won't Work
10. It's a Story

Hear