Judging by the relative popularity of the Donner Party's two CD anthology I shared almost ten years (and the number of requests I've garnered over that span of time to refresh the download links) I thought it might make sense to post this bootleg seeing as there are few, if any, D/P live shows in circulation. For the uninitiated, San Fran trio in question played whimsical, not to mention sonically humble pop with a bevy of themes often encompassing wives tales, ironically morbid scenarios, character vignettes, and several benign, offhand references to Satan. Drummer Melanie Clarin would occasionally sing lead vocals and had a penchant for harmonizing with frontman Sam Coones. Post-Donner Party, Coones would achieve some renown via the considerably more visible Quasi in the '90s.
The set presented here is an audience recording of a gig at a college coffee house in the university town of Davis, CA. While you'll encounter selections from D/P's two self-titled records that surfaced in 1987 & '88 there's also an emphasis on then-unreleased material that would have comprised the band's third album. It would be another eleven years for the world at large to finally hear these shelved songs (specifically in studio from) when they were finally presented as part of the aforementioned anthology. This set is a nice companion piece to the regular albums, but it may not be the most ideal introduction to the band. Enjoy (or not)
01 Godlike Porpoise Head of Blue-Eyed Mary
02 Sickness
03 Spiders
04 The Ghost
05 Harold Payne
06 Everyone is a Girl
07 Your Mother
08 Nutty Booty
09 Friendly
10 Kore Cosmu
11 Unfriendly
12 Trepanned
13 The Nixie
14 Birthday Suit
15 Treepig
16 King Chico
17 Irene Goodnight (encore)
1 comment:
Thank you for posting this! I had no idea any bootlegs besides the one that made it to the Complete Recordings album existed. If you have any more Donner Party tracks or live albums, could you please upload (or email!) them? Or if you have any rare stuff from the other SF bands of the time (Cat Heads, X-tal, The Ophelias...) I'd love to hear those too!
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