40. No Problem – And Now This (Deranged)

Every year’s best-of list needs an obligatory Canadian punk record, and the appropriately named No Problem dutifully provide, with a no-nonsense burst of heavily ‘Flag-influenced mid-fi hardcore, hitting all the bases you might expect with applaudable vigour.

The band have a sloppy, forward-charging momentum reminiscent of Keith Morris era ‘Flag or early Adolescents (NO SOLOS), but for better or worse their vocalist leans heavy on the Rollins impersonation – altogether too heavily at times, and to be honest I nearly deep-sixed this one straight after he threw in a ‘that’s right!’, an ‘UGH!’, a staged coughing fit and an ‘I…can’t…BREATH’, all in the space of the 1:50 opening track.

Thankfully, subsequent numbers reveal No Problem to be a somewhat more interesting proposition than such po-faced silliness might suggest, adding a welcome dose of self-reflexive humour that makes me suspect that such macho exhortations are at least partly intended as self-parody (cf: the album title), especially once songs like ‘Ghost Car’ and the terrific ‘Spoiled Little Brat’ veer off message into the realms of full-on KBD zaniness. The band’s sound also becomes more opne-minded here and there, incorporating some unexpected touches like the odd four-note lead guitar line thing that glides over the top of ‘Most Days’, that vary the hue of their musclebound attack slightly, giving some tracks a feel akin to Fucked Up circa ‘Hidden World’, an invigorating mixture of raw violence, good ideas and relentless enthusiasm. Not that there’s anything wrong with just plain sounding like Black Flag of course – an ambition they continue to court with at least a certain level of success. After all, anybody coming to a party like this in search of open-minded self-expression is setting themselves up for a letdown.

It’s punk. It’s good. It’ll do. UGH!

Soundcloud > Spoiled Little Brat



39. The Advisory Circle – As The Crow Flies (Ghost Box)

By this point, the ‘hauntology’ aesthetic that Ghostbox helped define should really have jumped the shark - named and defined and discussed and picked over in Cultural Studies journals, we should be sick of this shit – fed up with the easy nostalgic cues, recycled webs of imagery and hints of pagan otherness lurking ‘neath the covers of second hand Penguins.

By rights, the label’s artists should be moving on before things get silly – expanding their operations into less thoroughly explored realms, or else pulling apart the threads of electronic/occult coziness that underlie their work in search of deeper mystery beneath. Or at the very least, dropping the aura of lounge/library politeness and writing some fucking good tunes.

Ironic then that ‘As The Crow Flies’ should find Jon Brooks aka The Advisory Circle digging his heels in, sticking stubbornly to the familiar, and emerging with one of the most enjoyable records on the label to date. From the nod to ‘The Owl Service’ opening titles on the cover art to the well-worn patterns within, this is Ghostbox by numbers really, but served up on this occasion with a solid musical heft and major key melodic inventiveness that makes it hard to resist sinking once again into the familiar idyll of a ‘70s that never was.

Opening – how else? – with BBC news pips and a faux-Orwellian public service announcement, ‘The End of the Beginning’ kicks things off with a convincingly stately fantasia of ‘motivational’ synth lines and hypnotic percussion, reminiscent of Neu!’s ‘Isi’, before the faux-radiophonic nature docu music of ‘Here! In The Wychwoods’ shimmers with a kaleidoscopic grandeur last seen on the best of Boards of Canada’s ‘Geogaddi’. Stranger idylls follow, such as the rolling pastoral love theme of ‘Innocence Elsewhere’, the mildly menacing action movie electro of ‘Modern Through Movement’ (which evolves into something like John Carpenter scoring a new theme for ‘Rainbow’), and the beguiling school hall dance therapy banishing ritual of ‘We Cleanse This Space’.

So far, so ‘YEAH, THAT’S KIND OF EXACTLY WHAT I EXPECTED’, but by this point you’re already hooked on another journey down the Ghostbox rabbithole, and let the zeitgeist shift as it may – the strength of this record makes a good case for this being a consistently rewarding place to be. There are a few missteps along the way – an overreliance of cutesy synth-bliss here and there (a touch more creep in the mix please!), and a misguided step toward vocodered indie-dance-pop falls rather flat on the closing ‘Lonely Signalman’, but by and large ‘As The Crow Flies’ is less the redundant retread we might have feared, instead playing out as a painstakingly realised perfection of this particular form.

Soundcloud> Learning Owl Reappears



38. Fergus & Geronimo – Unlearn (Hardly Art)

Not so much a ‘disappointment’ as a sudden, unexpected left turn, Fergus & Geronimo’s debut LP singularly fails to deliver on the kind of exultant, high energy soul-pop that their superb run of singles had promised, instead shanghaiing us for a trip to altogether choppier, more conceptual musical waters. Fusing disconnected genre pastiche to a series of cynical lyrical diatribes, invigorated by an occasional outburst of salty passion, ‘Unlearn’ is a curious record indeed – weird and offputting to the extent that when the duo do fall back on their talent for Awesome Pop suss, its use seems more assaultive than earnest – killer hooks and heart-on-sleeve vocal delivery used to rub salt into the wound, like hints of the fun we won’t be getting whilst these guys are still pissed off about something.

All of which can be taken as a compliment… kinda. Regardless of what it might not be, ‘Unlearn’ is certainly a pretty intriguing prospect, assembled with a kind of skewed, malign intellect reminiscent of Sparks or John Cale. Branching out in all directions from a straight-forward garage-psych base-camp, ‘Girls With English Accents’ plays as an eerily dead-eyed recreation of ‘Aftermath’-era ‘Stones, whilst vicious anti-music critic rant ‘Wanna Know What I Would Do?’ is one the most evilly catchy tunes you’ll have heard this year, it’s sing-song flute-led melody aimed at staying lodged in your head for weeks, even as the uncompromising venom of the song’s message lunges audaciously toward career suicide. Anti-boomer screed ‘Baby Boomer / Could You Deliver’ and slightly more obtuse anti-yuppie screed ‘Where the Walls are Made of Grass’ both benefit from elaborate baroque-psyche breakdowns that seem to exemplify ‘Unlearn’s focus on detourning traditionally upbeat musical gestures with negative lyrical snark – a tactic that’s in danger of turning terminally sour by the time ‘Forced Aloha’s indie-rock-album-closer sunset drift takes time out to announce that “your life is nothing / but an ugly beach-house fuck”.

This overriding tone of scatter-gun discontent is hammered home to such an extent that reprises of rousing singles cuts ‘Powerful Lovin’’ and ‘Baby Don’t You Cry’ start to sound lost amid the bile – like hugs from someone you suspect is about to switchblade you. Everything comes together nicely though on ‘The World Never Stops’ – an infectious, darkly funny love song, the protagonist reflecting on the inevitable cycle of life & death as he ogles girls – just about the best Sparks hit that Sparks never wrote.

That Fergus & Geronimo have the potential to knock out any number of smart, soulful garage-pop smash hits is clear. That they seem so sick of the contemporary world that they just want to fuck us up instead is kinda understandable. Outsider status firmly established and fair-weather fans dismissed, it’ll be interesting to hear where they head next.

Soundcloud > Wanna Know What I Would Do?



37. Swamp Witch – Gnosis tape (Gay Scientist Recordings)

Oof! Crashing in with the most suffocatingly heavy doom metal tone I’ve heard this year, Swamp Witch are a band whose name say it all really – a blackened, humid haze of grave soil and stagnant bong water, turned pungent and nasty in the Southern heat, like choking to death on Spanish moss. Fun times! Densely atmospheric whilst never losing their foundations as vicious, recognisable heavy rock songs, the three tracks on the A side here pull in all the best bits of extreme doom stalwarts like Moss and Burning Witch, pressing them down into a relatively economical twenty minutes of trudging terror - a thick, psychedelic mix allows for screeds of feedback, distant, mysterious screams and the vocalist’s coruscating black metal roar, but, crucially, the band never let it slide fully into stoned abstraction, keeping the riffs coming, keeping the heads banging in greasy slo-mo. Praise be. Vinnum Sabbathi!

And as if that wasn’t enough clinically depressed heaviosity for you, side B actually calls in one of those ‘Chopped & Skrewed’ stoner hip-hop DJ guys in to rework the same material, further slowing the pace to a sickening, medicated crawl, cranking the bass and swathing the whole deal in digital echo – basically exaggerating all the excesses of this genre to a level of skull-crushing fuckedness - the sound of being hit on the back of the head with a shovel and buried alive in the Everglades. So if you’re the kind of person who needs that in their life right now, you know where to look. YOU WILL NEVER WASH YOUR HAIR AGAIN.

Great sample from Al Adamson’s ‘Satan’s Sadists’ utilised on both sides too. Never gets old.

Soundcloud > Novem



36. Expo 70 – Death Voyage (Dead Pilot)

I’ve checked in from time to time with Justin Wright’s work as Expo 70 over the years, and whilst I’ve always found the music therein to be a pretty enjoyable tribute to the ‘70s heyday of Kosmische/experimental rock, it’s never really managed to make much of an impression on me beyond the level of a well-executed period dress-up. A nice surprise then to cop a listen to ‘Death Voyage’ and discover that Expo 70 has been forging on ahead into some darker, murkier and altogether more compelling territory of late, here presenting a series of lengthy, drone-based tracks (I know, who’da thought it?) that immediately put me in mind of a soundtrack to some non-existent cosmic horror movie about an experimental submarine expedition, voyaging to uncharted depths in a pitch-black oceanic trough, uncovering vast chthonic ruins of unknown origin and… who knows what else, lurking out in the darkness?

But maybe that’s just me.

I wouldn’t count on it though, as ‘Death Voyage’ is certainly a carefully sequenced record, swinging about as close to establishing a ‘narrative arc’ as an instrumental drone-rock album conceivably can, creating a dense, atmospherically consistent cycle of tracks that builds in intensity throughout.

Second track ‘Silent Watcher’ is particularly good, with rampantly phased synths sounding out like malfunctioning sonars, working an uneasy stand-off with sketchy, post-rock style guitar aggrepios to establish a mood of oppressive, monolithic dread that sets the tone for everything that follows. ‘Metensomatosis’ and ‘Travelling Circular Labyrinths’ up the ante, working with layers of tape-mangled Frippertronic doom guitar, gradually building to an eviscerating celestial din the recalls the work of Birchville Cat Motel’s Campbell Kneale (no small boast). By this point all bets for survival are off, allowing the record to boil over into the epic brownout of ‘Summoning Recapitulation Upon The Pyramid Temple’, as the lights goes out, water floods the hold and human life seems a very long way away indeed.

A brilliantly effective, reassuringly crushing take on the ‘one man drone-rock odyssey’ formula, ‘Death Voyage’ completely flips my take on Wright’s work. Awesome in the sense that it instigates awe, it sees him confidently stepping into the gnarly shoes of his inspirations rather than just paying gentle homage from afar.

Soundcloud > Silent Watcher

Labels: best of 2011, Expo 70, Fergus and Geronimo, No Problem, Swamp Witch, The Advisory Circle

…Or Does That Even Sound That Cool to You?




Fergus & Geronimo – Wanna Know What I Would Do

Listen in awe as Fergus & Geronimo spend track #2 on their debut album systematically destroying their chances of attracting positive critical attention.

Even if the points they're making about bad/irresponsible music criticism are arguably pretty justified, their attack is so startlingly vicious, so scatter-gun in its approach, that it’s difficult for anyone who writes stuff about records not to feel at least a bit defensive.

That said, it’s a really great tune that’s been echoing around my head for weeks, and the album as a whole is great too – not quite the non-stop soul-pop explosion I was expecting, but a lot more varied and thought-provoking than their singles might have suggested. Uh.. how’s that for a review guys?

Labels: Fergus and Geronimo, Songs

One Last Batch of Singles Before the Year-End, Part # 1


Cyanide Pills – Suicide Bomber (Damaged Goods)

The second single from inexplicably ignored Leeds power-pop-punk upstarts Cyanide Pills is also the first of two a-sides on this batch of singles to take a queasily misguided shot at…. well I hesitate to say “contemporary relevance”, as that doesn’t seem quite what they had in mind for a song that begins with “my girlfriend she’s so fine / she lives in Palestine” and proceeds to a bridge of “that girl she’s dynamite!”. It’s just goofy, stupid fun of course – small beer next to the routine nastiness of KBD era punk. What’s a far greater sin is that it’s a slightly lesser tune that either of the songs on their excellent first single. B-side “Black Lightning” is better – it’s a great Chuck Berry derived car chase number about getting wasted and crashing your car into a train, if you can believe that! Utterly daft good fun on electric blue vinyl, and even at their worst these guys are still hitting way above par as regards making gleeful, catchy rampaging rock n’ roll. Make the other single a priority if for some ludicrous reason you’ve gotta choose between the two, but if you like this kinda thing (that being Adverts/Damned/Buzzcocks/Undertones amped up via The Exlpoding Hearts), do the decent thing and get both for chrissakes.

http://www.myspace.com/thecyanidepills
http://www.damagedgoods.co.uk/

Drink Up Buttercup – Mr. Pie Eyes (More Than)

I bought this one blind for the cool artwork, low price and promising title. Lord, I wish I hadn’t. Sounds as if some recent graduates heard The Move, decided LET’S DO THAT (it worked for Elephant 6) and proceeded to rampage way across the line into the no man’s land of total quirkiness, with subtlety and good taste rendered forgotten, ancient tongues as they drown in a slobbering mess of clod-hopping nursery rhyme melodies, faux-operatic shrieking, charmless, convoluted thudding and ghastly sub-muso wank. Yes, they wrote a song called ‘Mr. Pie Eyes’, the chorus to which goes “this is the story of Mr. Pie Eyes, Mr. Pie Eyes, Mr. Pie Eyes”. Then it goes “yah yah yah-ya-yah yah yah yah, yah yah yah yah-ya-yah yah yah yah”. I don’t think they ever get around to the story, but never mind, it was probably a shit one anyway. You know what was great about all those whimsical old ‘60s bands? The fact they matched their eccentricities with ideas and talent and didn’t come across like obnoxious dickheads shoving half-formed juvenilia in our faces, more often than not. I should have known: much as I love patronising their shop of a weekend, Rough Trade are canny counters of pounds, and if they put a 7” on for £1.99, there’s probably a reason.

http://www.myspace.com/drinkupbuttercupband
http://www.myspace.com/makemine

Fergus & Geronimo – Blind Muslim Girl b/w Powerful Lovin' (Tic Tac Totally)

Fergus & Geronimo’s huge-hearted, speaker-busting Sam Cooke-meets-Nobunny soul-punk is a beautiful thing that makes me very happy indeed, although I still know next to nothing about these guys, so seeing how they approach a tune entitled “Blind Muslim Girl” could prove a dealbreaker re: revealing their true intentions. As it turns out, it’s neither a bad taste goof nor some earnest politicising (god, how unthinkable would THAT be in this day n’ age?), just a straightforward, lightweight pop number in which F&G sing of their affection for a blind muslim girl. They want to take her hand and around the world, and they don’t care that she can’t see. If you can bring yourself to believe they’re playing it straight-faced, it’s all quite weird and sweet, with almost a Jad Fair sort of vibe. B-side “Powerful Lovin’” helps us believe they’re fighting the good fight by virtue of just being plain fucking fantastic – one of their best, most exultantly wrecked homages to ‘60s soul to date. And frankly, I could happily believe in flat earth theorists and guys who make a fuss about fluoride in the water if they were able to bust out tunes this mighty on their Vox organs and second hand drum kits of an evening. Fergus & Geronimo are ALRIGHT. What I wouldn’t give to be in Texas next month to see them play with Greg Ashley.

http://www.myspace.com/fergusgeronimo
http://www.myspace.com/tictactotally

Frankie Rose – Thee Only One (Slumberland)

Behold – the immaculately presented debut solo release from Ms Rose, former/current sticks-woman with Vivian Girls, Dum Dum Girls and Crystal Stilts (two out of three ain’t bad), and composer of one of the finest songs of recently years, ‘Where Do you Run To’. It’s funny how I still think Crystal Stilts are one of the most dreadful rock bands of the modern era, but here, backing up Frankie on her own songs, their personnel sound plain beautiful, shimmering like the ethereal Velvet Underground back alley sprites they wish they were. “Thee Only One” is a perfectly realised, reverb-heavy girl group stomper that probably sounds exactly the way you’d expect it to. That’s because it’s the way it SHOULD sound, and you’d be a fool to change the recipe at this stage. B-Side “Hollow Life” slows things down to a halt for an absolutely exquisite snapshot of a Bout de Souffle bedroom scene eternal now, vast faux-cathedral organ tones and distant guitar-drift making a bed for Frankie’s oh-so-delicate voice. Like “I’ll Be Your Mirror” medicated to the point of total bliss-out, it’s exactly the sound I want to hear last thing before I go to sleep, gently rising to a Cocteaus-y grandeur in, like, ninety seconds, then falling away to nothing. I see a tick next to “leave them wanting more” on a rose-scented to-do list. A flawless first record – I’m inclined to think that if Frankie Rose disappeared off the planet tomorrow, she’d have a healthy cult following twenty years from now, just on the basis of these three and a half minutes.

http://www.myspace.com/saintoftherose
http://www.slumberlandrecords.com

Labels: Cyanide Pills, Drink Up Buttercup, Fergus and Geronimo, Frankie Rose, singles reviews

I Like All This Stuff! Part # 3

The Barbaras

Some geeky lookin’ guys, all rejoicing in those endearingly whiny voices that as a non-American I thought only belonged to comic relief characters in teen movies, The Barbaras are possessed of a singular vision of homemade pure pop Or rather, a not at all singular vision, since heavy elements of such are creeping in all over the map, particularly with groups like Smith Westerns etc…. but I think it’s The Barbaras who are perhaps tking this notion furthest and doing it best. What notion, you ask? Well “Budget Spectorisms” proclaims their myspace headline, and that’s hard to beat as a two word descriptor. For yes, unlike scary uncle Phil’s productions, there is usually a rock band heart still beating behind The Barbaras songs, but beyond that they sound like they’re way into some wonderful and strange ‘studio as instrument’ perfectionism… only without the studio. It’s a fine sound they’ve got going, sounding psychedelic by accident rather than by intention, with just enough bubblegum rock n’ roll backing to keep things solid, but balanced out by vocal harmonies, overdriven xylophones and bouncing, lurching, cosmic sugar. Mini pop symphonies hewn from the same sonic infatuation experiments that Spector and Brian Wilson used to define the sound of ‘60s pop, but without all the sleaze, egomania and cynicism that followed, all sounding like it’s being worked out with just a tape recorder, some outboard effects and the contents of a school music room. It’s terrific songs like ‘Flow’, ‘Topsy Turvy Magic’ and ‘Heaven Hangs’ that really seal the deal though – beautiful, straight-faced, innocent odes to the joys of looking at yr girl’s hair and visiting her house, with real world creepiness left over the hills and far away. So well do these guys capture a 21st century geeky boy equivalent of The Crystals and Ronettes Wagnerian teen-romance universality, it’s hard to imagine them ever getting wrecked or cracking dirty jokes or hanging around with Jay Reatard or any of the other stuff that 21st century geeky boys in bands like this presumably do. Lovely, lovely stuff from a simpler, happier world that you’ll want to file next to Bob B. Soxx & The Blue Jeans instead of Psychedelic Horseshit.

http://www.myspace.com/thebarbaras


Fergus & Geronimo

More atavistic ‘60s purity reasserting itself here I think – Ruan of ‘Nick Thinks’ recommended these guys in the comments after my last post, and good grief, I nearly fell off my seat when I got back from the pub and hit the link. Fergus & Geronimo are, I’m assuming, a kind of vocalist & keyboard/instruments duo from Denton, Texas, and OMG, they’re AMAZING! Everything about their sound communicates a love of early ‘60s soul, but rather than the tedious, gurning, horrid pastiche that you’d fear might result from the meeting of soul homage and lo-fi white boy capers, this music sounds fresh as the breeze – foot-stomping, up-with-people love songs carrying that same unquestionable FUCK YEAH spirit as vintage Sam Cooke and Otis Redding. So ok, maybe some random kid from Texas stretching his voice to hit the high notes doesn’t equal the greats, and some guy with a casio and a tambourine doesn’t equal Tamla Motown, but they’ve got the feeling and they’re putting in the fucking effort to make it work when no one else is even daring to try, and that’s what counts – an out-of-time blast of jump blues, gospel honesty, pop melody, and now with added punk rock, as righteous as a true love’s kiss.

http://www.myspace.com/fergusgeronimo


Pens

For a thoroughly scrappy DIY trio who started playing out in London scarcely more than a year ago, Pens have gone pretty far pretty quick – a US tour, an album forthcoming album on LA label De Stijl, name dropped in all the right places… we could be seeing the crest of another tedious Vivian Girls / Wavves style hype washout here, but let’s not dwell on such things. Pens absolutely killed when I saw them at that Upset The Rhythm thing on the Old Kent Road a few months back – definitely the best band I saw there, although I never would have expected record labels and tastemakers start agreeing with me about stuff like that, y’know? With one foot in the same deconstructionism and 100% rejection of book-learned male musical orthodoxy as The Corey Orbison and Ethical Debating Society, Pens are a thoroughly self-taught, self-sufficient proposition, banging it out with a raw, organically developed thunk, shaved of the artificial barriers of chops and reference points for some direct anger/noise/fun/listener/hit/face connection, if you will. Added to that, they’ve got a big, fuck-off metal-derived noise of distortion pedal casio and viciously fuzzed guitar to fall back on, and a really winning pop sensibility that becomes clear on repeated listens, from Troggs/Monks style love chants to fascinating densely-packed, ambiguous urban chaos laments – that’s CONTENT by any other name, chaps. At their best, Pens is like the kind of The Fall that every forty-five year old bloke ever bangs on about, only it’s a three-headed girl and it’s happening now. We’ll see what transpires, but world-beating, potentially. Did I really just say “urban chaos laments”? – urgh, I need a holiday.

http://www.myspace.com/penspenspenis


Mazes


Also currently turning up on all the right rackety bills and picking up a fair amount of UK press, it’s nice to discover that unassuming home-recording trio Mazes are actually pretty good. Guided By Voices and The Clean are the self-acknowledged chief reference points here, and whilst obviously Mazes aren’t remotely as revelatory as either of those groups, theirs is a straight up blend of roaring, rough-hewn subterranean power-pop that hits all the right buttons. At worst, file under “thoroughly satisfactory”, and at best, songs like "Bethesda" are f-ing superb; strong song-writing, goofy immediacy and a killer sound that recalls GBV’s ‘Propeller’; crashing drums, churning guitars, clear vocals and EQ-pushing skree – the kind of totally efficient blare that makes you wonder why any self-respecting guitar/bass/drums band would feel the need to venture beyond the 4-track or do overdubs. But then of course, you just need to listen to any number of crappy, unlistenable 4-track bands out there to remind yourself that, oh yeah, that’s what studios are for. Mazes are just getting it right, that’s all, and god bless ‘em for that.

http://www.myspace.com/mazesmazesmazes



The Sock Puppets

I’ll admit there’s maybe a little bit of self-interest here, as The Give It Ups are playing with these guys in Copenhagen next week, but heck, that aside, I really like ‘em! Full of enthusiasm, and coming from the punkier end of European indie-pop (my favoured end), they remind me of a rougher, lo-fi Those Dancing Days, with swearing and shouting and metronomic drums. Thumbs up to all that, needless to say! It occurs to me I don’t actually know much Danish music… hopefully our forthcoming holiday can help rectify that.

http://www.myspace.com/socksandpuppets



The Traditional Fools

Ah, The Traditional Fools! You know what you’re getting with a name like that. Idiocy with a pedigree. Looking back over these posts, I guess I’ve been heavily hinting at the notion that all this stuff is kinda modern day garage rock, perhaps to the point of tedium. The great thing is, this is not so much through direct imitation and pastiche, ala the ‘80s Garage Revival (who always tended to be overproduced and have 3 minute+ songs anyway), but simply because it’s just coming from the same place and speaking the same language as all those legendary teenage cavemen. Listening to the second volume of Pebbles the other way, it suddenly struck me that cuts like ‘Feathered Fish’ by the Sons of Adam and ‘You Rub Me The Wrong Way’ by The Roads, (along with any other punk-ass ‘60s relics that happen to be free of the usual period tells like harmony backing vox, wiggy organ etc.), could just as easily have been made in 2008 as 1968, but probably NOT at any point in between. Surely this forty year disjuncture is unprecedented. I mean sure, people go about reviving moribund musical styles ‘till they’re blue in the face, and that’s great… but for a whole generation to end up sounding *exactly* like their grandparents, without even particularly trying to? That’s just weird. Further evidence can be gained from the fact that if you’d told me that The Traditional Fools’ killer version of Love’s ‘Flash On You’ was taken from a long lost ’65 bootleg of Arthur Lee and co, I’d probably have taken you on your word, been flabbergasted by it’s noise and ferocity, and begged you for a copy on bended knees. But I don’t have to beg, because The Traditional Fools (featuring current it-dude Ty Seagull) are here, and they’re drinking beer and growing beards, and making funny skateboarding based videos, and probably playing the beach party near you, if you live where they live. Alright! Isn’t this so much more fun than when everybody was trying to be like Shellac? And it’s easier too – nobody needed the second-string Albinis, but every town should have some Traditional Fools.

http://www.myspace.com/thetraditionalfools

Labels: Fergus and Geronimo, garage, I like, Mazes, Pens, punk, soul, The Barbaras, The Sock Puppets, The Traditional Fools