Monthly Archives: February 2021

Feb 24 2021
Leave a comment
CD, reissue, Skratchdisc, vinyl

Bonnie Hayes with the Wild Combo • Good Clean Fun [LP]

The following review first appeared in my old music blog, Skratchdisc, some years ago. To preface this repost, BONNIE HAYES with the WILD COMBO’s Good Clean Fun has been reissued by Blixa Sounds in an expanded CD package with the original album, a 6-song EP, an early Hayes group’s single and some great new notes by Bonnie herself. The mastering job is nice ’n’ peppy, allowing this poppy early ’80s new wave classic to shine on into the 2020s. Here’s what I said a few years ago when I found a used copy in my local vinyl emporium.

Once again, on one of my weekly “just lookin’” ventures, I found a couple of great deals. The first one was a Mobile Fidelity half-speed master of a VERY PROMINENT ’70S ROCK ALBUM (name withheld to protect me from those who might make fun), which had a real used cover but the record was PERFECT. And it was only 99¢! The second was what this review’s about, Bonnie Hayes with the Wild Combo’s 1982 new wave gem, Good Clean Fun.

I first ran into this record during my rookie year as a college radio DJ at Seattle’s legendary KCMU. (It is now the world-renowned KEXP, but don’t get me started…!) My freshman year at the University of Washington, 1981/82 was a year that was beyond compare for yours truly. During the summer of ’81 a friend told me about this low-watt radio station where they played all kinds of “weird new wave”—this is where I first heard The B-52’s, XTC, Devo, you name it. I tuned in the station whenever it would come in (at that time it was only 10 watts), and upon my first week of school at the UW, I promptly went to the station to find out what it was all about. It was then that I learned that almost anyone could get a show, and met a slew of like minded students (like my buds Mike Fuller and Andy Taylor, for two) who enjoyed DJing and playing whatever records you wanted. I got my first show in November (a Friday night from 11 pm to 2 am), and eventually this puny little station became a major part of my life. I discovered more great music in the initial years of DJing there than I have in all the years since! Sometime in 1982 Slash Records, the Los Angeles-based punk rock label, put out Bonnie Hayes’s LP, and we played the hell out of it. Sure, some of the jocks thought it was pretty lightweight, and if you have no history with the girl groups of the ’60s, you might, too, but this record really was good clean fun. And this from the label that had already put out X’s first two albums, The Dream Syndicate and The Gun Club! Slash had punk cred like no one else.

Well, anyway, this is about as pure an ’80s new wave record as you can get, with percolating organs and crunchy guitars and a nice female voice singing of “Shelly’s Boyfriend,” “Girls Like Me,” and “Raylene.” And to think I went decades without this record, yesterday I found it in the 99¢ bin! Sleeve in good shape, record looked good. And like the record mentioned way above, it turned out to be in great shape. So, here’s to Bonnie Hayes and her Wild Combo allowing me to relive some memories nearly 30 years old. I’ll have to check out what she’s up to now... – Marsh Gooch

4/5 (Blixa Sounds ETA 859, 2020) (bonniehayes.com)

 

Tagged
Feb 21 2021
Leave a comment
CD, compilation

Edgar Jones • The Way It Is: 25 Years of Solo Adventures [3CD]

You may not know who EDGAR JONES is. You may not know him by the most well-known of his pseudonyms, Edgar Summertyme, either. Hell, you might not even know him from his superb early ’90s UK garage trio, The Stairs. So three CDs of a guy you don’t even know might seem like way more than you’d want to sit through just to figure him out. But Jones – a multi-instrumentalist who tends to play bass guitar when playing for people like Paul Weller, Johnny Marr or The La’s – has so many sides to him that The Way It Is only begins to give you an accurate picture of this unique musician.

Starting back from where most of us know him, Jones/Summertyme was the bassist and lead singer of The Stairs, who came along from Liverpool about the same time as The La’s. Both bands were signed to a hip indie label called Go! Discs (that also featured Billy Bragg, The Housemartins and Paul Weller on its roster). The Stairs was a real compelling throwback to UK psychedelia, using fuzzed-out guitars, loud amps and amped up arrangements that gave songs like “Weed Bus” and “Right in the Back of Your Mind” just enough of a modern twist that the youngsters of the ’90s probably had no idea that Summertyme and his mates were both paying tribute to and parodying the great indie rock of 25 years earlier. Jones/Summertyme sang in a growlly, animated voice that sounded just exaggerated enough to keep some people from taking his band seriously. Yet, if you had a deep enough knowledge of Sixties rock (see how I patted myself on the back there?) you “got it,” and The Stairs’ supreme and supremely overlooked Mexican R’n’B was as overplayed as “that’s what she said.” (Forget about the fact that the UK version of that compact disc had four or five more songs on it than the US one.*)

After The Stairs wound down, Jones went on to dip his fingers into all kinds of different concoctions. Whether he was fronting a soul/R&B combo, another garage unit or a smooth pop group (even a jump blues thang!), he brought a distinct Edgar vibe to his music. The Way It Is tries to distill all of this into a three disc anthology that at once does a great job and at the same time comes up short. How? Well, this set features 70 tracks! It’s near impossible to digest it all in one go, especially when you consider there are so many genres of rock represented that you can’t possibly keep track of where it starts, where it gets to, and where it ends up. That being said, if you like The Stairs, there’s a fair bunch of tracks to keep you goin’, especially those by his groups The Big Kids, The Joneses and The Edgar Jones Free Peace Thing, which grabbed that ’60s garage thing and added some trippy soul a la “Grazing in the Grass” (either Hugh Masakela’s or Friends Of Distinction’s arrangements). Noel Gallagher liked them so much he had them open for Oasis on their 2009 European tour. The tracks that originally appeared under Jones’ own name are more soul- or pop-inspired and may not float your boat, but then again: You can put on The Way It Is, any disc you like, and it’ll feel like you stumbled upon some free-form radio station from another decade where the DJ’s really killin’ it. I mean, killin’ it! – Marsh Gooch

3.5/5 (Cherry Red CDTRED805, 2021)

(* Cherry Red put out a 3CD reissue a couple years ago that is essential for Stairs fans. How I didn’t get around to reviewing it, I still can’t recall…)

Tagged ,
Feb 07 2021
1 Comment
CD, reissue

Pop-O-Pies • The White EP – Deluxe Edition [CD]

These days you gotta expect that anything being shipped to you is gonna take extra time to show up. In fact, it might not make it to you at all. Such was the case for our review copy of POP-O-PIES’ very first reissue CD, a reissue of The White EP, the band’s debut recording from 1982. First released on San Francisco indie label 415 Records, the new reissue label Liberation Hall has taken the original 6-song vinyl and put it out on compact disc with an additional seven songs. The kindly promo people guaranteed NuDisc a copy when I sent a salivating email requesting one, promising a sure positive review because “I played the shit out of it on my college radio station,” and I meant that. Then it didn’t show up. I enquired. They sent another one. No show. (It was around the holidays…) I enquired again and THIS TIME, lo-and-behold, it did – along with another 415 reissue CD.

Well, it was pretty much worth the wait and heartache. Okay, there wasn’t really any heartache involved. You see, I still have my original vinyl copy – in fact, I celebrate the entire Pop-O-Pies catalog – and I pretty much know it by heart. I wish I could say that this CD is as absolutely effin’ awesome as I hoped it would be, but I can’t. BUT… it’s close! Pop-O-Pies was/is the brainchild of Joe (Callahan) Pop-O-Pie, a smart ass from the Bay Area who came up with the idea of taking the Grateful Dead’s “Truckin’” and re-styling it as a hardcore punk song. The further gimmick was that that cover version would be the only song the Pop-O-Pies would play. Supposedly that was so, at least for awhile. But eventually Joe & Co. came up with some originals, including the slow, pseudo-’60s ballad “The Catholics Are Attacking,“ all about that church and its hypocrisy, and further punkers like “Anna Ripped Me Off” and “Timothy Leary Lives,” which I love for its “guitar solo” that is actually just someone (Joe?) singing “neer nuh neer nuh neer” as if he’s the guitar. Genius! My 19-year old brain couldn’t get enough of this thing when it first came out, and I played it so much on KCMU that I’m sure our station music director must have passed a note to me about maybe giving some other artists some attention. Anyway, 415 put out a 12″ EP of the band’s stuff (which featured TWO versions of “Truckin’,” including a rap version that is quite funny [still]). The band went on to do a few more foot-long EPs, though on other labels, and eventually they spun out as some of the members had also been playing with other bands that became much more popular (Faith No More, Mr. Bungle). And so the Pies were done.

I said earlier that this Pop-O-Pies CD was “pretty much worth the wait,” and that’s because it’s lacking the kind of bonus tracks and packaging that I’d expect after nearly 40 years! Yes, there are seven extra tracks here but four of them sound identical to tracks that appeared on the band’s sophomore release (Joe’s Second Record, 1984, which had only six songs). The others are pretty good, including “Slow & Ignorant” (recorded in ’93) and a trippy thing called “Lenny in Wonderland.” The final bonus, “A Political Song (The Hip Version),” is short and unremarkable. Packaging-wise, it’s your standard CD that comes in a jewel case with a typical insert, lacking lots of info (like: ARE those four songs from Joe’s Second Record actually the same recordings that are on Joe’s second record?), no unpublished photos, and a tag on the front cover noting “featuring members of” bands that takes up almost as much room as the Pop-O-Pies logo itself. I mean: Does the record label think they’ll move more of these CDs by touting other bands, when, let’s face it, your run-of-the-mill Cars or Tubes fan is probably not gonna take a chance on this release unless they already know what it is? I’d doubt it.

Yet: Pop-O-Pies finally makes it to the 21st Century! I feel tingly all over, like a tomato. – Marsh Gooch

3/5 (for the reissue), 5/5 (for the White EP itself) (Liberation Hall LIB-5027, 2021)

Tagged
Feb 04 2021
Leave a comment
CD, digital download

Al Bloch • It Was All Once Bright Jewels, Protest Songs [CD, DD]

It’s kinda nice when you’re a rock critic and someone sends you an email, out of the blue, asking if they can send you so-and-so’s new release and you reply, “Yeah, sure,” and you hope it’s gonna be good but experience tells you that it probably won’t be and then it is. Good. At this point I should probably mention that it was Green Monkey Records who recently sent NuDisc.net an email asking if they could send us copies of AL BLOCH’s latest two releases, It Was All Once Bright Jewels and Protest Songs. (I should also note that yours truly was once in a band that released a CD on that label.*)

Okay then… So, Al Bloch is who? He’s a bass player and songwriter who was once in the ’90s L.A. band, Wool. He’s Kurt Bloch’s – of Fastbacks and Young Fresh Fellows, most notably – big brother, so he grew up in Seattle. He’s a funny guy who, when propositioned to write some songs again after a coupla decades not writing, took up the challenge and quickly wrote an album’s worth of stuff good enough to record and release. That album, last May’s It Was All Once Bright Jewels, is packed with smart-assed, pithy tunes like “Unemployment Office” and “Cahuenga Pass,” which I can relate to. (If you’ve ever lived in L.A. and had to cross over from Hollywood to “the Valley” then you’ll understand the reference and the dread of such an undertaking.) (Although, in my case, I lived in “the Valley” and usually went in the opposite direction; all the shows were in Hollywood. But then, of course, you did have to come back home [eventually] and so you’d have to leave Hollywood to go back to “the Valley.”) Bloch’s lyrics definitely look at things from a slightly bothered yet resigned viewpoint. I mean, we all have a friend or acquaintance whom “Stay Away from Steve” could be about. Or “Dude, What Were You Thinking?”, which is a funny one about a guy who doesn’t know when to leave well enough alone and ruins everything for everybody. These songs are set among pretty hooky, punk-rocky arrangements of guitar, bass and drums – my favorite! – provided by the Brothers Bloch and drummer Kevin Fitzgerald, and they’re quite catchy ’n’ fun to hear more than once.

The fun continues on Protest Songs, which came out a month or so ago, and is even better. It’s like, all that Al needed was a nudge to start writing again and then the floodgates burst open. Indeed, it is not an album of your typical protest songs – it’s more like the kind of protesting that he voices in the songs mentioned above. I mean, “Bass Solo” isn’t actually a bass solo (like you’d find on a live album, for instance) but a song bitching about how you go to a live show, hear a real crummy bassist playing on stage, then just silently think to yourself “Dear God/Satan/Deity-of-Your-Choice, PLEASE don’t let that guy take a solo!” “You Gotta Have a Plan” opens the CD with sage advice and it’s followed by the 1-2 punch of “Too Nervous” and the chuckler “One Chord Baby,” which includes the couplet: “Mary Lincoln used to say to Abraham/ You can’t save the world but this one chord can!” In fact, that song has a number of good lines in it – as do most of the songs here. (I don’t count the killer UFO cover “This Kid’s,” which earns Al bonus points for not doing the obvious “Doctor, Doctor” or “Rock Bottom”!)

Al Bloch’s not really what you would call a lead singer. He’s more of a guy who writes sharp, short ditties that probably wouldn’t be near as entertaining if someone else sang ’em. As for the production, well, these two albums were both produced by brother Kurt and sound nice ’n’ crisp, which is how scrappy little punk rock releases should sound. So, kudos to Green Monkey for lighting a fire under Al’s ass to get It Was All Once Bright Jewels and Protest Songs written and recorded, to Kurt for his crackling production (and his hotshot guitar playing), and to Al himself for figuring, “Why not?!” – Marsh Gooch

3/5 (Green Monkey GM1068, GM1075, 2020)  * Look up Ladies & Gentlemen, Your King County Queens, Green Monkey GM1018, 2013)

Tagged
%d bloggers like this: