Wednesday, November 28, 2012

The Misstakes - National Pastime (1982, Parallel)

I was clued into The Misstakes by virtue of comparisons made between them and hometown contemporaries Fools Face.  Being the F/F aficionado that I am I took the bait on this presumably long defunct Springfield, MO quartet, and ponied up for a relatively expensive copy of National Pastime, which from what I gather still goes for a bit on Ebay.  The Misstakes certainly honed their pop chops in the same wheelhouse as Fools Face, but they fall a little short of the caliber of that band's magnum opus, Tell America.  They're sprite and enthusiastic in the manner of the Rubinoos (albeit packing a little more bite) with faint shades of Cheap Trick and Shoes occasionally filtering through.  In a nutshell, National Pastime is a solid, competent power pop album, just not quite as critical as the efforts of any of the aforementioned.

01. To Pretend (Is the Advantage)
02. Broken Hearts
03. National Pastime
04. She'll Never Hear (the Things I Have to Say)
05. She's Mine
06. He's Not, She's Not
07. I Can Be
08. Someone Else's Mind

Hear

5 comments:

Unknown said...

So glad I just stumbled onto your blog doing some research on the old Springfield, “music scene dude”.
And Man I love your Wilfully Obscure post on the Misstakes, I was always a male FF groupie. However to me, the two things that made the MISSTAKES unique was the tremendous guitar of Billy Brown (and early on i thought he over did it, Keith Richards already had the perfect git lick, don't change it) and that incredible persona that Steve Clingan acquired as a true front man, playing no instrument. But having gone to junior high and high school with 3/5ths of FF and did some early "dumbshittin" for them prior FF. Dumbshittin was Wirt's term for hauling the equipment, we always considered it a pretty good trade for free beer and free-, well I'll just say free beer.I always thought FF was pure genius. Wirt was, is a master of masters. Dale and Jimmy seemed like they could play any instrument too, and with the chemistry band, incredible vocals and harmony, Brian’s incredible voice, style, superior guitar style, Those FF kids were the best we have ever had in this here part of the country according to me and those in my universe. Keep me posted on your blog, as I was just sending some stuff to a local musician friend of mine showing him, what I could find on FF, The Stones and Mick, Jim Wunderle and trying to find a clip of Steve Clingan. Which by the way, as I said, I definitely had FF loyalty but over the years developed a great respect for the Misstakes and also found each of them to be some of the nicest, greatest guys in town. Just like FF, except for Wirt and he was and still is a big skinny COOLJERK, and is doing great at Wirt Music with is wonderful wife Claire Wiman Wirt . Get in touch terryponder@hotmail.com or on FB. “I am only here to observe”.

spavid said...

The link has been updated.

Superbillie1 said...

Ola Spavid, is it possible to re-up the link for the fantastic ''The Misstakes National Pastime'' album? You would make an old man a little bit happier :-).
Keep up the good work with your fine blog. It's always fun to come here and take a look around. I wish you a nice weekend
Greetings
Frank

Unknown said...

Can you update the link or email it to me at Tobin.grinder@gmail.com

ohwellmonkey said...

I second this can this get reposted? Or sent over jkurschner@yahoo.com