“Songs For Singles” comes in a sealed love letter styled white envelope. Sure you could resist the temptation of opening it for collectors value but you’d be a dick if you did. So we cut into it with some Asian blade P likes to keep around (just in case) to find a nice piece of heavy white wax and a bunch of lipstick kisses from our favorite metal power trio. Sorry no download code.

Here’s the thing. I thought this was gonna be a goof and a spoof of a mini album. Three or so months ago Hydra Head put out a free sampler. And on this sampler was the track UFO off “Songs For Singles”. And it was the band doing their best David Lee Roth set to their signature brand of stoner metal. It was bizarre to say the least. But apparently between then and now they remixed the track with actual lyrics sans the Dr. Rockso Lee Roth fanfare. But I like ‘em both along with all the other new cuts. Get this album, ka ka ka ka ka pleeeeze.

P’s Take: Torche. Yah. They are kinda hard to describe. Kind of like Archers of Loaf. Or Morphine, remember them? Torche is kinda of like those bands in that they are the only ones who do what they do.

Torche’s E.P. “Songs For Singles” is different from what’s come before, less metalish more… again I dunno, more Torche-ish. They dropped a guitarist and are now a “power trio” and power is really the word. Lemme see how I can describe this business.

Remember Megaman? This is Megaman music. I don’t mean that this album consists of the soundtrack to Megaman games, I mean this is the music Megaman would listen to, you know, inside that massive-ass helmet as he fought…uhhh, the Chinese. That’s who Megaman was fighting through all those boards, right?

This E.P. is serious, loud and powerful. Perfect for a Sunday afternoon as you slap on your helmet and do battle with Megaman’s traditional folk-enemy, the nation of China. Also the albums sleeve is done up like a Valentine from 3 fat hairy dudes, Megaman’s traditional allies. The end.

We show up to Vintage Vinyl (Fords, NJ) this year earlier than last and this time the place is a good 80 nerds deep already. Sweet Jesus, some of these champions were so socially backwards as to make me and T look like Arthur Fonzarellis. And Fonzies we are not. This crush of geeks made for some pandemonium once they finally opened up the doors. Luckily for me I only had a swift twenty dollars to blow, so I didn’t have much to look for seeing as I couldn’t pay for much. I picked up a Black Keys 12″ single and a 7″ of an Elvis Costello and the Attractions concert in LA from way back in the day. Uncle T, being Uncle T, got a a lot of good shit. I kicked it out front after making my purchases and debated the finer points of direct drive turntables with a pony-tailed gentleman. It was that kind of crowd.

We then beat it back to Uncle T and Aunt Michele’s and proceeded to drink 3/4  case of beer, eat sandwiches and listen to music. For fucking 12 hours. I am not gonna get into what all we listened to because I am lazy. The high points for me though were the Elvis Costello live 7″ inch, that was fucking great. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs joint was really good. The Ergs was awesome too. What else? Titus Andronicus surprised me with how good they are. Oh yeah and Fear. I am never unhappy to listen to Fear.

So really objectively, we didn’t get much done. We drank beer and listened to records. But that is what Record Store Day is about, taking one day out your busy life to focus on A) getting vinyl B) listening to that vinyl and C) talking about vinyl. While D) drinking bottle after bottle of Belgian beer. You could waste a Saturday on a lot worse, chucklehead.

T’s Take: I think P hit the nail on the Head. Record Store Day is the one day of the year where you gather with fellow vinyl collecting oddballs and feel slightly less odd. Then you spend the rest of the day doing what you do best, listening to records, bullshitting about records, and avoiding anything that’s even mildly productive. So here is… to the best of my memory… in some sort of vague chronological order what we listened to yesterday. Assume that everything we spoke about during the 2010 RSD Listening Party that I don’t mention was deep and profound. It wasn’t. Just assume it was.

Daytrotter Sessions (mp3s) – Aimee Mann, Titus Andronicus, Dan Sartain, Ian Mccculloch, David Bazan, Stephen Malkmus, Justin Townes Earle, Matt Pryor, Meat Puppets, Black Lips, Joe Jack Talcum.  (If you don’t know Daytrotter check them out. They’re a studio that has a bunch of great bands come in and record with them then they post it all for free on the intertubes. I threw my Ipod in the car and set it to Daytrotter shuffle on the way to Vintage Vinyl.  P was blown away with both how good Dan Sartain is as well as how there’s a Twitter war currently going on between Aimee Mann and Ice-T. The FSS is pulling for Ice on this one.)

Once we got Back to my place we threw on the following…

Justin Townes Earle – midnight at the movies 12″ (only listened to side a… not because it was bad… but we had a shitload of stuff to listen to and after his cover of “Can’t Hardly Wait” by the Replacements we figured it best to go out on a high note)

Black Keys - this is a twelve inch single 12″ (2 songs exclusive to RSD… alright)

Elvis Costello – live at hollywood high 7″ (a good work friend once lent me an original copy of this 7″ from way way back in her heyday… I don’t remember it sounding this good)

Queens of the Stone Age – feel good hit of the summer 10″ picture disc (the liner notes say Rob Halford sings backup on the title track… I guess that makes up for the horrendous horrendous Kinks cover also on this 10″)

Ted Leo and the Pharmacists – the oldest house 7″ (ted’s from NJ like us so this was a no brainer)

Bouncing Souls – jersey pride 7″ (also from Jersey… the Souls printed a really sweet send up of the Garden State Parkway logo on side A of the picture disc… P made me skip Airport Security but he laughed enough at Bad Ass to make up for it)

Fucked Up - daytrotter 7″ (i’m telling you this Daytrotter is on to something)

Yeah Yeah Yeahs – skeletons 7″ (once we got the correct speed on the turntable this sounded unbelievable)

The Ergs – thrash compacter 7″ (awesome new 7″ by now defunct Jersey band on Grave Mistake Records… this is all short fast punk songs, not to be confused with their poppier output… all the songs fit on Side A so Side B was left blank…better that than not releasing this at all)

The Get Up Kids – simple science 12″ (I saw some kid on a message board complaining that instead of putting out a full length the GUKs were putting out 3 12″ singles. apparently kids today have no idea why 3 12″s are better than one LP any day of the week)

Adam and the Ants – meet the ants 12″ (we only listened to side a because I was trying to explain that Adam Ant is a racist as is evidenced by the track “Puerto Rican”… I just bought this last week and will probably never listen to it again. thanks adam… you rascist cocksucker)

Fear paradise studio 1978 demo (only listned to part of side a before putting on…)

Fear more beer cd (track 6 onward… P keeps trying to convince me this is a good album… I dunno… I love love love “The Record”… but this one doesn’t even rate for me)

Give Up the Ghost love american cd (Track 3 only… we’ve been following the Onion AV Club’s Undercover Sessions lately and a couple weeks back The Alkaline Trio covered “Web In Front” by FSS favorites The Archers of Loaf… as good as that cover ended up being I think Give Up The Ghost’s “You And Me” cover is a little better)

Dum Dum Girls i will be 12″ (side a only… not bad… just we thought this would be more Garage Rock and less Lush-sounding… the clear marble maroon vinyl is the tits though)

Blacklisted eccentrichine 7″ (why do hipsters love Fucked Up and not Blacklisted? we couldn’t come up with an answer. Blacklisted are probably better off though.)

Rocket from the Crypt sympathy 666 7″ (we love RFTC. saw them at Maxwell’s wayyyyy the hell back when)

Rocket from the Crypt pigeon eater 7″ (one side is 33 RPM the other is 45 RPM… messing with record collectors is hilarious)

Rocket from the Crypt all systems go cd (tracks 17-19, press darlings, killy kill again, chantilly face… we put this one on because I recently found out that “press darlings” is an Adam Ant cover during my internet research into him being rascist… we left the last two tracks on because… well?… they’re fucking awesome)

Rocket from the Crypt rip dvd (we kept the rocket love going and watched the dvd of their last show… P lost his shit during “ditch digger”… can you blame him? also ND kicks some kid in the nuts at one point on the video. miss these guys.)

While I drove P back to his place we listened to…
Titus Andronicus the monitor mp3s (this one keeps getting better and better for me with every listen and I was glad to have introduced it to P)

Long live record store day!

P’s Take: So one Saturday morning me and Uncle T sat down to listen to Agnostic Front’s reissues of “Victim In Pain” and “United Blood” on vinyl on my fathers system. It has been 25 years since “Victim In Pain” came out and a lot has changed. The NYHC has more or less died. New York itself is no longer what it was, it’s more like a city sound-stage designed by Disney. On the Lower East Side it is now a lot easier to find a pumpkin nutmeg latte than a bag of angel dust, you know, not that I’m looking. The circumstances that helped create AF just don’t exist anymore.

That being said, both these albums still stand up. They are both full of macho posturing and Hardcore cliché but you have to remember that when these albums were cut, there was no Hardcore cliché yet, it was still too new. The topics they touch on; crime, scene bullshit, violence, “realness”, all this stuff that sounds to us now like more of the same was then accurate reporting. And exactly none of it sounds hokey, they mean every word. AF, for better or worse was the architect of NYHC and what it became and these albums represent the best of the scene at the time.

Both these albums are nostalgia; there is no way around it. It was strange to listen to these sounds on my dad’s expensive set up, you don’t need and shouldn’t use audiophile shit to listen to Stigma’s guitar work, your amplifier becomes retarded. Whenever I hear United and Strong I remember brown-bag 40 drinking on St. Mark’s, me and the crew and a couple hundred other skins that used to line both sides of St. Mark’s Place from one corner to another every Friday and Saturday night. Now that area is a good place to hit if you need to go to The Gap or are in the mood for Afghani food, whatever that might be. Times change people and places but both these albums still make you wanna run into somebody. So there’s always that.

T’s Take: When you think about it, it’s kinda unbelievable that Stigma, Roger Miret, and Ray Beez can all be found together on the same 7”. These are the founding fathers of NYHC (as it’s commonly known) for chrissakes. If you grew up in NY or NJ or anywhere on the East Coast you know Agnostic Front. You grew up with them. You yelled “why am I going insane, why am I the one to blame” along with them. If you consider yourself a fan of Hardcore or any of its substrata but not of Agnostic Front, it’s probably not AF’s fault. You see like with all scenes, eventually things get out of hand and become a parody of what they once where. Kids get behind a mic and a guitar and sing about something or other because they think they’re supposed to. Unity this, backstabbers that…oi oi oi, something about the streets or respect or respecting the streets. You know what I’m saying and you know that these bands that do this are bullshit. But let’s not hold that against AF.

If you consider yourself a fan of Hardcore, particularly of NYHC you should own these albums. And thanks to the folks at Bridge Nine you can readily find them again in all their vinyl glory. You’ll be surprised when the records start how much of them you already know. United Blood is filled… FILLED… with classics. From the opening chords of No One Rules, to the chorus of Last Warning, all 73 seconds of United Blood you’ll remember all that was once great about Hardcore music. I think only two songs between both of these records break the two-minute mark; most hover between 25 seconds and just over a minute. If you read our review of “You Weren’t There” about the Chicago Punk scene and how they never quite formulated a true Chicago sound then you’ll be even more amazed that AF helped create and popularize a New York sound with about 6 minutes worth of music that people still remember and hold dear over 25 years later.

Stigma!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!(insert guitar solo here)

T’s Take: “You Weren’t There” is a well-informed, often funny, rather interesting look at a scene that was never quite able to get its shit together. It wasn’t for a lack of trying or even necessarily due to a lack of talent. The problem was that the Chicago punk scene was a mess of in-fighting and back-stabbery from 1977 to 1984 and on towards the filming of this documentary some 25 years later. But let me back up a bit.

The documentary starts with the death of disco and the birth of something new. Namely faggots and Devo. You see as punks were starting to build in mass in seedy gay clubs that didn’t mind giving them a couple nights a week to let their own freak flags fly. At the same time legions of homophobic REO Speedwagon fans were busy hurling abuse at them in the form of “faggot” and “hey Devo… Whip it!”. This confused many of the punks. You would think that metal heads would at least be tolerant of it, but like Chicago’s cops and mayor they were anything but. So like all punk scenes, early Chicago punks were persecuted and ridiculed and even had some of their clubs burn down while local fireman stood and watched without lifting a hose.

I don’t want to spoil the rest of the story but things end in “You Weren’t There” pretty much where they ended in “American Hardcore”…at the bottom.  Unlike “American Hardcore” though, as a documentary, “You Weren’t There” excels at being able to focus on one specific scene leaving few stones unturned. It gives a great amount of time to early fanzines like The Coolest Retard, record stores like Wax Trax, clubs like Le Mere Vipere, Obanions, and Oz, and bands like Naked Raygun (originally Negro Commando), The Effigies, Strike Under, Articles of Faith, Big Black, Rights of the Accused and Negative Element. By contrast “American Hardcore” flew through the national scene missing much of the story and much of the heart.

The arc punk took in Chicago was from utterly stupid bands like Tutu and the Pirates singing about toilet humor (I Want To Be A Janitor) to bands like The Effigies getting harder faster shorter and more serious (Body Bag) to bands like Negative Element keeping the speed and intensity but reverting back to the utterly stupid (Anti-Pac Man). Few of these bands got signed, put out albums or got national press. Most of these bands ripped off styles from other cities doing their best Huntington Beach strut like they were the guy from the damn Circle Jerks logo. There was a movement or at least the idea of “forging a Chicago sound” early on but ultimately the only sound they forged was that of their own bickering. In fact a good majority of this documentary is devoted to Vic Bondi (Articles of Faith) talking shit about John Kezdy (The Effigies) being right wing, Kezdy talking shit about AOF in various zines outside of Chicago, Steve Albini comparing members of AOF to Santana and Stuart Copeland of the Police (a surely Punk diss if there ever was one), old punks hating young punks, serious punks hating not so serious punks, childish punks hating avante garde punks, and fucking everyone hating Albini (including Brother P… wait for it…. wait for it…).

Playing as more reality television at times than a documentary “You Weren’t There” is nevertheless entertaining from start to finish. The DVD was even expertly packaged along with a White 12” Vinyl copy of the soundtrack which includes almost every band covered in the doc except The Effigies who were oddly excluded given the amount of time their music was given in the film. Filmmakers Joe Losurdo and Christina Tillman deserve a ton of credit for shedding light on a scene that otherwise would have continued to go unnoticed by everyone who “wasn’t there”.

P’s Take: (…..So, Steve Albini, If you’re out there…) “You Weren’t There” basically tells the same tale of the beginnings of American Punk Rock as anywhere in America. Goes like this: Bored and odd kids try to entertain themselves in conservative Catholic Chicago by dressing funny, going to gay bars and listening to imported Punk Rock and New Wave records and dancing badly. Then these kids start their own bands and suddenly there is a scene. Bands like Naked Raygun help to form a “ Chicago Sound” that doesn’t really get known anywhere outside of Chicago. Bands like The Effigies and Articles Of Faith split the unity ‘cuz of scene politics and accuse each other of different shit despite sounding more or less the same. Punk changes to Hardcore with kid bands coming up like Rights of The Accused and Negative Element. Just like everywhere else, the old guard hate the hardcore kids ‘cuz they aren’t pretentious douchebags and the hardcore kids hate the old guard ‘cuz they are. Then in 1985 shit gets a little too violent and everybody leaves. Somewhere in there, unfortunately, Steve Albini appears, all lookin’ like Gollum.

That would make this movie only kind of interesting. What is more interesting though, and I think should be studied further, is how fucking ugly everyone is in this documentary. All of them. Steve Albini, a hideous, hideous asshole of a creature, is the average in this thing. There were a couple people who I swear I thought were wearing masks. And listen, anyone can tell you, I am not a handsome man myself. I’m barely everyday looking for round my way. But goddamn it, folk are fucked up looking in Chicago evidently. Isn’t the Chicago river full of mercury, didn’t I hear that back in the day? Doesn’t mercury beat people something ferocious with the ugly stick? Like that Eastern European president who got poisoned… remember? He got all fucked up looking after the poisoning . All the people in this documentary look like they might be Eastern European presidents who got poisoned.

Returning to my point, “You Weren’t There” recounts basically the same story that was written everywhere in the U.S. and I guess round the world at the same time, only in a far more ugly way. Outsiders gather together and build something and that thing gets big and others want in. Then the outsiders want the other outsiders kept out or something. And at the end of the film, like all of these films, and like every old school punk veteran I ever spoke to, all the old fucks say that punk ended with them and everybody else is lame and doing it wrong. But like Uncle Brother T said, every 7 years there is a new generation saying it to the next in line. So fuck them, and Steve Albini. Speaking of Albini, at one point Albini is challenged to a fistfight by the (ugly) singer of Articles of Faith for some old Chicago reason. If it ever went down half the Midwest would die of ugly. So it should be encouraged.

T’s Take: It’s a Friday night in November 1994 and it’s cold as fuck out in Manhattan. As usual P and I aren’t dressed for the weather. We head into Generation Records with a clear mission and leave successful, both with a copy of The Bouncing Souls’ “The Good, The Bad, and The Argyle”. Like every record I’ve ever purchased I studied the hell out of the liner notes, cover, etc. Bottom left hand corner of the back of the jewel case says BYO Records. Fast-forward to the spring of ’95 and a friend picks up “Someone Got Their Head Kicked In”. Wrecking Crew is now the soundtrack to everything that would happen for the rest of 1995. Again, there’s this BYO Records logo, this time the words spelled out Better Youth Organization. Where do I sign up to join? Another friend picks up “Happy Hour” by Youth Brigade around this time. Again, BYO Records. The band is wearing ski masks and surrounded by molotov cocktails. The photo on the back of the album is pure chaos. Thirty or so kids on stage with the band as they play. It looks like a riot scene. I want to see them live. Immediately. Cut to LA summer of 2000 P and I are taking classes at USC and we head to the Troubadour to see the mighty Youth Brigade (I think I’d seen them twice before this in NYC), it was a highlight of an otherwise miserable summer. BYO has been a big part of the punk rock for me. And although I never signed anything I’d like to think I’m as much a part of their “organization” as the next guy.

If you’re like me and have a ton of records lying around with BYO written somewhere on them, this box set is a no-brainer. If you’re a fledgling punker looking for some direction, again… a no-brainer. I’d seriously recommend this set to anyone even vaguely interested in punk. The DVD that comes with it contains the documentary “Let Them Know”. It’s as good as if not better than “American Hardcore” (at least it has a happier ending). I think what makes it better though is that it’s focused on one label and primarily on one band. Youth Brigade. So there’s a ton of info, anecdotes, etc. And even where the documentary is lacking, the coffee table book makes up for it with even greater back-story of a true punk rock original. I’m not going to tell you their story. You’ll have to get this yourself. But it’s funny, inspiring, heartfelt, and filled with some great interviews from the likes of Ian MacKaye, Fat Mike, The Bouncing Souls, 7 Seconds, and the Stern Brothers themselves. In true Jersey fashion The Souls spend most of the time making fun of the Stern Brothers. What can I say it’s how we show affection in Jersey.

The tribute CD/LPs that accompany the set are take ‘em or leave ‘em. There’s some songs butchered. Some songs faithfully reproduced. And a few songs actually end up having new life breathed into them. Some of the standouts include, NOFX covering Battalion of Saints, Leatherface covering Dillinger Four, Bouncing Souls covering 7 Seconds, and my favorite track has to be The Ignorant covering Keep On by Hepcat and turning it from ska to punk. If anything the tribute CD is proof of how much BYO means to so many people. And rightfully so.

P’s Take: This is a pretty bad tribute, musically. Everybody has heard these songs, grew up with them, so I guess they belong to everybody equally. I just didn’t dig people’s takes on the old Youth Brigade classics. Leatherface’s cut was pretty good. But for the most part, I wanted to hear Youth Brigade do Youth Brigade. Their songs remind me of tooling around in our friend’s mom’s stolen car through the vast wasteland of New Jersey at odd hours of the morning. Good times. Sort of.

When Brother T said there was a documentary that went with it I was disgusted enough with the double LP that I wasn’t interested much in checking it out. I said I’d give it half an hour and ended up watching the whole fucking thing. It was good, moving.

I’m not gonna get into scene nostalgia. But it was genuinely interesting to watch how the Stern brothers worked together to form a movement, a band, and a label. It was good to have the old message reaffirmed, you know? You don’t have to win all the time. You don’t even have to win half. But you fucking absolutely have to let them know.

P’s Take:  “Shock Troops” was a good album. Almost (almost) every song had that spirit that made you want to break something. It was very very Oi! type stuff so it was damn far from clever but it was good and Colin’s odd voice was enough to set it apart from the pack kind of.

Now fast-forward 25 years to “Here We Stand”. The album cover is virtually the same as “Shock Troops” only this time they are old, massively out of shape and skinheads. This album lacks any kind of spirit, it didn’t make me wanna break anything so much as it made me wanna lie down for a little bit. Also the song Suicide Girls almost spoiled my appetite for Suicide Girls. Almost.

Just get “Shock Troops”. It was when Cock Sparrer found it easy to make a Cock Sparrer album.

T’s Take: I’ll start with the good. This was originally released by Captain Oi in 2007 and is being re-released now in 2009 by Pirate’s Press Records. And as always Pirate’s Press did an unbelievable job putting this together. Each LP comes with the CD copy and a Making-Of DVD. The vinyl itself comes in a bunch of different colored varieties. The copy we had was West Ham Tricolor to appease all their soccer hooligan fans. The folks at Pirates Press even threw in two coasters made up of cutouts from the vinyl. You really can’t ask for much more in terms of production value. And if you can get past all the bad this will definitely look nice in your collection.

P and I got together on Labor Day weekend in hopes of listening to some new working class anthems by one of the most beloved of 80s Oi! Bands. I had low expectations going in but when P read on the back sleeve that the album was mixed by Lars Frederiksen I got excited, as I thought he did a hell of a job with The Business’s “The Truth The Whole Truth and Nothing But the Truth” and countless others. However as P noted, “Shock Troops” this wasn’t. And look, it’s tough to even say this because they seem like a real nice bunch of guys as well as a real close-knit group of friends. But I think the above quote by Colin goes to the core of the problem with this album. Cock Sparrer is trying too hard to emulate their past, instead of just moving on and putting out an album that speaks for themselves in the here and now. I commend them on not cashing in on a greatest hits reunion tour and actually trying to do something new. But the problem is it’s not new at all. It’s sorta stale. Not to bring them up again, but at least when The Business came back around in the nineties Micky Fitz embraced what was going on in Hardcore and Street Punk at the time. I don’t even want to go on much more than this because I have too much reverence for this band and what they represent. So I’ll stop right here. But if you’re looking to buy a Cock Sparrer album this probably isn’t it.

Fugazi - In On The Kill Taker (Vinyl Reissue)

Dischord is reworking and re-issuing their catalogue on vinyl. We at the FSS had to get in on that, so we decided to make “In On The Kill Taker”, Fugazi’s 3rd, and in our opinion, best, album our second listening session review.

This time we listened at P’s place. Whereas Brother T’s house smells like good coffee and order, P’s smells unkempt and of toddler urine. But that’s more punk rock. We chose this time to record our conversation as we listened to the album. The beer was Ommegang (unremarkable), the pizza was thin crust, the children filthy and out of control. Below is a transcript of the session.

Tape starts

T: (Neil Young voice) Track one. Track two.
P: Hello Shit?
(Needle is dropped on the first track.)
P (con’t): Sure you don’t want a beer?
T: I’ll get one in a minute.
P: I think this pre-amp is only slightly more powerful than the one built into the table.
T: Yeah it sounded kinda ass when it started out. CDs sound ridiculous on this T-amp though.
P: This is only ¾ power let’s see …
(Turns volume up, Ian is screaming Facet Squared, voices get real unintelligible.)
T: I was checking In On the Kill out on Amazon and like 90 percent of the people who reviewed say it’s their favorite Fugazi album.
P: For real?
T: That doesn’t mean 90 percent of hardcore Fugazi fans feel like that, but I think the ones that do are just passionate enough to type it on Amazon.
P: What do you think, you think this album is accessible?
T: “13 songs” is probably a little more poppy.
(Public Witness Program bangs on in the background.)
P: Remember back in the day when we used to hang around with the Long Island kids? One of them once said that if you mention Fugazi probably they are gonna start singing Waiting Room.
T: They were playing it on K -Rock for a period of time.
P: That’s fuckin nuts…This whole place smells like piss.
T: Yeah I was just thinking that.
P: This is no good.
(P’s father enters room.)
P’s Father:  That’s it I’m off duty. I’m tired. The girls are coming down.
(Returning the Screw starts up.)
P: Fucking hell. What were we saying now?
T: Something about piss.
(You hear a door open P’s daughters thunder around in the background.)
P: Did this come out in Sophomore year? Junior?
T: I don’t remember. I remember you having it on tape.
Kid: Pizza. You have to hold it and chew it. Teeeee heeeee.
(P motions to Brother T’s new Tat.)
P: How is that healing?
T: Good. It’s itchy as hell.
(Kids are making huge noise in the background.)
P: Listen you gotta be quiet, we’re working on the website.
Kid: You have a WEBSITE?
(Smallpox Champion. A bunch of laughing.)
T: (about Guy Picciotto) Is it Guy or Geee?
P: I think it’s Geee.
T: (referring to the sleeve photo) Damn it’s look like these guys hit a 4 for 1 black sweater sale before they took this photo.
P: Yeah, they do look European as hell. I tell you my brother met Ian Mackaye at a sandwich shop in New York?
T: (laughing) No.
P: He goes “ You Ian Mckay?” He says (imitating Ian’s voice) “ MackEYE yeah.” And they chatted about sandwiches for a minute.
(Laughter.)
T: You know what my favorite part of this song is?
P: The “cha cha cha champion”?
T: The “you’ll get yours…OoooooooOoooooooOoooooooo”.
(Laughter.)
T (con’t): I like the idea of telling someone their gonna get theirs then squealing Ooooooo.
(Guy is squealing Ooooooo in the background. Laughter.)
Kid: I’m doing a baby dance.
P: So…
Kid: A dance of babies.
(Rend It plays.)
P:Please go in the kitchen.
T: They’ve grown like 5 inches since I last seen  them.
P: Yeah they’re gonna be tall. Taller than me.
T: Everyones taller than you.
P: Not 4th graders… Sickly 4th graders.
(The music keeps playing. We shut up for a bit.)
T: When I first started working my job I used to play this album a lot…
(Kids flip out, a lot of baby yelling…23 Beats Off…)
T (con’t): …and my boss was this Southern woman. She would get visibly irritated during this record and start pacing back and forth. By the time the feedback reached a pitch and the screaming started she would rush over and slam off the CD player.  I used to play it a lot for that reason.
(Laughs.)
T (con’t) I remember thinking back in the day Fugazi were foreign as hell.
P: Me too.
T: It’s weird because this album is so D.C.
(Sweet and Low begins.)
T (con’t): This is the song I imagined the video for…
(Editor’s Note:  Both of us had the common hallucination that Fugazi made a video for this album, and that we had seen it, consisting of just a slowly scrolling shot of the album’s cover art. P thought it was for Returning The Screw, T thought it was for Sweet and Low. We’re both pretty sure no such video ever existed.)
T (con’t): …and I can clearly remember being at Pete’s house and asking you if you saw the Fugazi video and you saying yes and describing the same video.
P: I know man. It’s fucking odd.
Kid: Poop shoot. It’s a poop shoot.
P: What is she talking about?T: It’s your kid, man.
(Cassavettes. T and P chant “riot,riot” where appropriate. Kids dance and sing and make a racket.)
P: Did they ever make a 33 1/3 book about this album?
T: Some one wanted to.  It didn’t get picked.
P: I’m sure there are some stories behind these songs.
T: I read that Walken’s Syndrome comes from that Christopher Walken scene in that Woody Allen movie “Annie Hall” where he talks about swerving into oncoming traffic.
P: Yeah I read that. “Annie Hall” sucked.
(Great Cop.)
T: That line, “you’d make a great cop”. In a lot of circles, that’d be a compliment.  You tell one of us we’d make a great cop and it’s a huge fucking offense though.
(Laughter. We sit and listen… Walken’s Syndrome… Some shoebox drumming by one of the kids… Instrument echoes in the room.)
T (con’t): Man I think you maybe better throw this couch out.
P: I really should never be left in charge of anything.
(Last Chance For a Slow Dance. The kid’s are whining sleepily.)
Kid: Whahhh.
P: Whaaaa.
Kid: Is this the last song?
P: Yeah.
T: More beer?
P: Yeah. Please

End of tape.

Aren’t you glad you read all this?

Live at Canterbury House, 1968

Part of the recently released Neil Young Archives, and produced by Neil Himself, “Sugar Mountain” comes with a 24 bit 96 kHz DVD, which is 256 times the resolution of a standard CD.  This may seem like overkill for a simple 2-channel recording but it also seemed like the perfect choice for our first in the FSS Listening Party Series as Neil pays close attention to the audio quality of his albums.  Recorded in Ann Arbor, MI in November of 1968, ten years before we were born, “Sugar Mountain” showcases Neil after his split with Buffalo Springfield where he went from large stages to small clubs.

The FSS Listening Party Series hopes to rekindle the age-old act of simply getting together with friends to listen to music together.  As a good friend at work pointed out to me recently, it was pretty common in the 60s and 70s to call up a friend and invite them over to listen to a record together.  So with a few Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stouts on deck that’s exactly what we did.  Below is a recount of our thoughts as we sat in T’s living room for the 70 minutes it took Neil to do his thing.  All quotes are from Neil.

T: As the audio starts an image of a very young Neil comes up on the screen to serve as a screen saver.  So far I admire the shit out of his sideburns.

P:  There’s a lot of tape hiss, but it’s crystal fucking clear. Voice one channel, guitar other. Did Neil just say he was pushing a Bentley in ’68?

T:  Neil sings “I love you. Can you feel it now.”  It sounds like he’s in the room so I guess I can.  Neil’s a funny guy. When he’s not singing, he sounds like a fucking Muppet.

P:  Mr. Soul took 5 minutes to write and is utter gibberish.  Do we have to look at Neil’s mutton chopped face for this whole album?  Neil says he’s a radio station, a microphone sometimes. Are you ever a microphone sometimes?

T:  Maybe he’s a little stoned right now.

P:  “All this is being recorded for recording purposes.” He’s probably a cool guy in person.

T:  Yeah, he’s stoned.

P:  Those chops are fuckin’ intense.  He looks a bit like my sister, minus the sideburns.

T:  Man this is the longest song ever.  P asked me to pause it cause he’s concerned I like it and he doesn’t.  He has nothing to be concerned about.  I want this Neil Young dream/allegory run-on-sentence over as much as he does.  Guy does have a mean falsetto though.  Neil.  Not P.

P:  You can hear the pick on the strings.  The song is gibberish too though.  Hippy incense and peppermint bullshit.

T:  I’m not even sure Neil is in the room with us anymore.  We’re tuning him out and waxing philosophical about how much we admire the fuck out of him and how he’s had so many different phases to his career and can just leave shit behind and move on.  I’m telling P that I recently heard the 1971 Neil Young Archives release and it’s amazing how little of the 1968 material he even does.  We’re also both pretty sure now that our parents went to the same Crosby Stills Nash & Young show in their heyday.

P:  “Working on a palm tree for 87 years.”? No.

T:  Neil is asking if there are any cops in the audience so he can talk about getting fired from a bookstore for being on pills.

P:  Damn, speeding in a bookstore must be a nightmare.

T:  P is snickering at Neil’s snickering.  I think I might be drunk and get up to put some coffee on without telling P.

P:  Did T only buy four beers?

T:  At this point we’re cold making fun of his ass.  Still admiring him though.  Making fun of him in the same way we do each other.  Fuck, did we just become friends with Neil Young?

P:  Neil’s a good guitarist.  Birds proves his influence on other bands.  It could have been a Mazzy Star song.  Out of My Mind is pretty good too.  If I Could Have Her Tonight is a horrible horrible song.  Boring.  “Does she wanna go look at those eyes?”  What the fuck is he talking about?

T:  I’m actually digging the folk side of Neil.  He’s got a lot of vulnerability in these songs.  When he says “Out of my mind and I just can’t take it anymore.” And “I’ve been looking for a woman to save my life.” I believe him.  I bring in coffee instead of more beer.

P:  No more beer.  Neil’s a real good guitarist.  Snatch of Like a Rolling Stone.  Sugar Mountain is a pretty song.  More gibberish, but pretty.  Chords are similar to another song. I forget the name, but a better song than this one.  About growing up?

T:  Neil’s talking again now.  Something about writing the next song on a napkin, “in true folk tradition”.  I’m writing notes in an old notebook as I listen and a 1 cent stamp and piece of a brown paper bag fall out.  I have an old note too.

P:  How long is this album?

T:  P’s laughing again and I’m thinking that this guitar jam would sound about a thousand times better if Neil was plugged in.

P:  Jesus, this has to end.

T:  Neil is closing out the evening with his last song.  He’s singing about the trappings of being in a big band and just wanting to be Neil.  I think that if anything that’s the one thing he’s always been best at.  I like the 1971 archive set better but it blows my mind that he was out there in 1968 doing his thing and that in 2009 he still is.

P:  He’s a down to earth dude at least.  But Jesus, how much did T pay for this?