Unlike his last effort “Living With The Living”, “Brutalist Bricks” leaves me wanting more after each listen. It’s not that “Living” was bad but it was pretty long and the vinyl version came with a bunch of bonus tracks called “Mo Living” that made it even longer. Some of the best punk albums know how to use brevity to their advantage, and knocking a good half hour off their running time served Leo and crew well this time round. The Rx have never sounded better either. Between Chris Wilson’s drumming and Leo’s guitar work there’s some really great jams on here to freak out to. Leo’s the type of guy that really only needs a guitar and mic to do his thing but the Rx fill out his sound nicely this time round and prove invaluable. Highly recommended listening. And worth picking up on wax too as it sounded fantastic on the ‘ol hi-fi and still came with a download code so I could throw it on the iPod for morning commutes.

We here at The FSS receive a quarter dozen, sometimes up to half a dozen different free DVDs to review per 2 year basis. Such is the groundswell of support for the Sound System. Yeah. And one of the DVDs we got recently was a copy of “Blank Generation”, a mock documentary starring Richard Hell, some beautiful French actress, a couple assholes and a very creepy and brief Andy Warhol.

Holy shit this movie sucked. It was directed by a German named Ulli Lommel. I’m not saying that made it suck, but it did not help. The story is cliché, the acting sucks (man, Richard Hell is playing a cat who is basically himself and does a bad job), and it is non-stop pretentious, lots of camera holding and bullshit. As a story, this thing fails. I should know. I took 3.5 credits of screenwriting in California. And mostly passed. So fuck you.

Where it doesn’t fail though is as serving as a kind of time capsule. New York back in 1980 was New York, not Disney New York as it is now. It was cool to see CBGB’s and the Bowery without the Whole Foods Markets and Starbucks all leaning round it. Also it was interesting to see the old-guard of NYC punk walking off into the distance, because by 1980, their time was up, them and all their books. The bands that were coming up, the scene that was just starting to be born was not gonna have any interest in French Symbolist Poetry. A movie about Harley Flanagan would not likely include a cameo by Andy Warhol, although that would be an interesting juxtaposition of characters. I told you I studied film, suckas.

So, yeah, if you have an hour and a half to kill, check out “Blank Generation”,if only for the nostalgia of it, if only for the Voidoid performances, they’re pretty good too. If your looking for a plot and acting, hit up the porn. May I suggest anything by the good people at My First Sex Teacher. They do good work.

“This Malkmus idiot is a complete songwriting genius.”
-Gary Young (original Pavement drummer, and singer of Plantman)-

“These guys should try harder.”
-Butthead (Beavis and Butthead)-

There’s a couple things you should know about Pavement. They are THE preeminent indie darlings. Don’t believe me? Check out any of their reviews on Pitchfork. Ask any hipster walking around Brooklyn at 4am. Dig out your old VHS tapes of 120 Minutes. Or you know, just take Uncle T’s word for it. You shouldn’t be reading Pitchfork anyhow.

I fucking hate indie darlings. Vampire Weekend can suck it. TV On The Radio can bite it. And Animal Collective can lick it. If you were mentioned on Pitchfork’s Best of the Year don’t come near me. Cept you Karen O. I like your style. Pavement however??? Well let me start here. It’s the summer of 1994. I am in “fuck everything mode”. I go in and out of this mode from time to time even in my 30s but here I am a teenager in my parents hot ass attic and I’m locked into this mode for a good 5 years straight. So I’m sitting sweating my ass off watching 120 minutes and the video for Range Life by Pavement comes on. Fuck these guys. The music is too slackery for me. In fact, fuck everybody. Where’s my Black Flag cassettes? And yet I wonder…if the music is so slow, if the vibe is so slack, then why does the slo-mo live footage of the band look like they’re rocking the fuck out on stage? Nevermind I don’t care. Fuck everybody.

So I’m in a mall a couple few years back and Sam Goody is going out of business. I am taking great pleasure in this. I hold a personal grudge against these guys for running my favorite record store of all time (Pier’s Platters, Hoboken, NJ) off the block. I hate their $18 CD lowest common denominator catering asses. So I say to my lady… “let’s go in Sam Goody and pick their bones”. Like a circling vulture with a shit eating grin I go in and buy a bunch of CDs marked down 80% to prove a point. What point? That, this is they only way they’ll get my money. So I’m sifting though the bones and I come across the expanded edition of Pavement’s “Slanted & Enchanted”. My brain goes back to the band rocking out in slo-mo and I think “alright here’s your fucking chance Pavement”. From the minute I threw that album on I felt like an idiot. “Fuck everybody mode”, you failed me again! Pavement are phenomenal. I don’t use that word lightly. And I hate that I’m in agreement with Pitchfork on this fact, but it’s a fact. They’re fucking great with a capital Tony The Tiger “G”.

In their time as a band, they pissed off people like Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins and Michael Stipe of REM. (Both songs that pissed these dudes off make an appearance on “Quarantine the Past.”) They stayed indie and kept with Matador Records when they probably had many an opportunity to jump to a major label. They have two drummers (at the same time). They appeared on the Tonight Show sure, but they were drugged out of their heads when they did it. Their lyrics are second to none. And for as much low-fi slackitude they put out they also put out some pretty punk rock tunes as well.

But let’s face it, “Best Of” Albums are a mixed bag. They can be good if you’re not sure if you want to make the commitment to getting into a new band. They can be good if you’re huge into a band and are looking for remastered tracks, unreleased B-sides or rare live versions of songs you love. But they can be a waste of time if you already own all the songs on it. And they are usually greatly inferior to the actual albums that the songs came off of in the first place. I was thinking about this earlier in the week when I was listening to the best of the Violent Femmes. So is “Quarantine The Past” worth your money if you are a longtime fan or newcomer to the band? Yes and yes. Newcomers will know were they stand on the band by Side 3 and longtime fans will definitely dig the double LP, the gatefold packaging, the remastered sound (both drums sound unbelievably awesome), the new artwork, and the near perfect track order (my only gripe is that Fillmore Jive doesn’t close the collection or even make an appearance). Track order is specifically something about Pavements albums that make them what they are. If “Wowee Zowee” were ordered any different it would be less brilliant than it is.  The same goes for this collection.

Thinking about the Violent Femmes again my mind is settling on their song American Music. If you don’t know it, it’s a song with a simple premise, which is that American music is the best music. Like the Femmes, Pavement is a great example of this point. Music critics have long compared Pavement to the British band The Fall. I own a Fall album. It’s garbage. With a few exceptions most music from the other side of the pond is when you compare it to American music. If you want to argue me on this point think about Apollo Creed dressed as Uncle Sam dancing to James Brown in Rocky IV. Changed your mind. Didn’t I?

So check out this album when it comes out this Tuesday. And if you’re a superfan check out the alternate version coming out on Record Store Day (April 17th) with different tracks and a different track order. And be sure to also check Pavement out live if they make it to your neck of the woods. I’ll be seeing them this September in Central Park. And I’ll be excited as shit when they play Range Life as it’s ironically now one of my favorite songs of theirs or anyones.

Fuck everybody.

Bo Diddley was Rock and Roll, simply put. Born in Mississippi and transplanted to Chicago’s Southside, Bo took the sound of Delta blues, the West African rhythms from church and added swagger, built his own fucking guitar when he couldn’t find any bad enough to suit him and straight birfed Rock. Love Me Tender your mom’s ass.

I’m gonna take one song as an example, for a few reasons. One, because this song is perfect in design, form and content. And secondly because I am busy right now. Who Do You Love? is THE song. Recorded in 1956, Who Do You Love? has all the elements required for a proper rebel song: sex, violence and death. This song, like many of Diddley’s songs, was a three minute hardcore boast. For this song to even be recorded in the mid 1950’s by a cat as black as Ellas Bates was dangerous, for it to be played for white audiences (snow bunnies) is nothing short of amazingly brave.

Diddley recorded a lot of music, not all of it awesome, but the importance, the sheer heaviness of the good outweighs the corn. If we can ignore Lou Reed’s slipup’s (pretty much everything since Velvet Underground) we can ignore Diddley’s. Bo Diddley, Mona, Who Do You Love?, Pills, Roadrunner… these are the songs we should be beaming into space to show how bad our planet is. May Bo Diddley Rest In Peace. He wore a cobra snake for a necktie. You know, metaphorically.

P’s Take: So, ostensibly, this is a review of a rare shitty G.G. Allin 7 inch we downloaded from a blog called bloodjunkies, a righteous website by the way… Basically the 7 inch consists of 3 horribly recorded songs from 3 distinct facets of G.G.´s career. The first is the title song, done with the his band the Jabbers in like ´82. It is some standard silly-ass politico punk, I think he took the name from some artsy 60´s radicals who used to rule the Lower East Side long before heroin and Skins. G.G. sounds like a punk rock Jack Tripper on this joint. This is even less complimentary than it sounds. The next song is a countrified acoustic guitar piece done in 1988. It´s about drinking and a-fightin on the road. Definitely shows his worship of Hank Williams on this one, but he still sounds like Jack Tripper. Its fuckin weird. The last one is with one of his later bands The Southern Baptists and he’s yelling about shit and suck and sounds the way we are all familiar with. It is all pretty dumb.

Back in the day Uncle T and me stayed out on Strong Island for a weekend with some very upper middle class jewish punk rockers. Yeah. And while we were out there we watched Hated, the documentary of G.G.´s life and death. I remember my reaction was fucking instant: I wanted this motherfucker dead. The throwing the empty bottles at hookers outside the Holland Tunnel (even Dee Dee Ramone couldn´t hang with it), piss drinking and stage shitting and woman beating fuckin’ absolutely disgusted me. I was punk rock, yeah, in a 15 year old way, but this…this shit was too far. This shit was twisted. I thought.

But I´m 16 years older now and it occurs to me, G.G. Allin, or somebody like him, is always necessary. To freak you the fuck out, to smack the fuck out of you if you’re getting comfortable. To eat your proverbial shit. Now, don’t get it twisted, I am still by no means a G.G. champion. I think his music was fuckin ridiculous. But, if nothing else he was down and mentally ill for Rock and Roll in a fucking literal way. Somebody has to be.

T’s Take: I’ve had this conversation before and I’m sure I’ll have it again. But is there any art to be found in G.G. Allin’s work? Is there any tragedgy to be found in G.G. Allin’s death? Is there any reason to listen to G.G. Allin’s music? Short answer…no, no, and maybe.

When I think of ‘ol G.G. I think of the scene in “Hated” where brother Merle Allin (who single handedly tried to bring back Hitler’s mustache as a relevant facial hair style) pays a hooker to piss on G.G. for his birthday. G.G. lays down as this chick squats over his head and proceeds to both drink her piss as well as his own vomit. Happy birthday you crazy mother fucker. But I think this speaks more to my point about G.G. and considering his body of work as art than anything else. And my point is this. G.G. wasn’t an artist. People will argue that smearing shit over your naked body, cutting yourself on stage, and violently attacking audience members is some sort of confrontational performance art. People will argue that G.G. was pushing the limits of good taste and audience expectation in the name of art, which in turn constitutes art. But here’s the thing, for one the audience already expected his actions and for two he wasn’t just doing these things on stage and in public, as is evidenced by drinking hooker piss in the privacy of his own home. Now granted an argument can be made that it wasn’t in the privacy of his own home because there was a camera rolling. And an argument can also be made that he was such an artist that his art worked its way into how he lived the entirety of his 36 years on this planet. But I still disagree. That mother was no artist. He was just entirely a batshit crazy asshole. I’m not upset he OD’d and I don’t think it was some final grand artistic statement either. In the twilight of his years he was a pathetic junkie and that’s usually how these stories end.

Okay, aside however from my feelings on G.G. I’m still willing to admit that I was pleasantly surprised by the music on this 7” (due no doubt to extremely low expectations I’m sure). All three songs are from different stages of G.G.’s “career” as P noted and each one has something different about.  As much as I wanted to straight hate on it, it wasn’t  all that horrible. The live stage banter in between tracks where G.G. implores fat female audience members to sell him their panties for $5 is mildly amusing as is him talking about how small his dick is. You won’t find this in stores as they only pressed 83 of them…in Canada…17 years ago. And the 83 people that actually own them are probably some Canadians you’d never want to have the pleasure of meeting in real life. But thanks to some German dude at FSS favorite bookmark “bloodjunkies”, you can download it for free and see if you disagree.

Kim Coletta: Jonathan Cohen, the music booking person for Jimmy Fallon, is a friend and fan. Jonathan used to work for Billboard Magazine (he still freelances there I believe) so we’ve known him for a while. He got wind that Sweetheart was going to be re-released and decided to contact us. I have to say that my first impulse was to say no to the offer, but the band started discussing it and we finally decided it was a fun and unique opportunity.

FSS: Where you surprised to see Carrie Brownstein (Sleater Kinney) and Fred Armisen (Saturday Night Live) in the crowd?

KC: Definitely not surprised to see Fred as we’re old friends with him. Fred was in a great Chicago band called Trenchmouth and we did lots of touring together. Fred is a great musician in addition to being a very smart and funny guy. I met Carrie for the first time that day and we got to chat for a few minutes which was cool. I’ve always admired her music.

FSS: What kind of reaction did you feel the performance got?

KC: I believe it got a pretty good reaction! The Fallon studio is a lovely, small space with great sound. Much of the audience was there to see us play so there was a good, positive, nostalgic vibe in the air.
I need to say too that Jimmy Fallon was completely gracious and seemed to genuinely enjoy our performance. All the Fallon people were super cool and it was also a treat to meet Jimmy’s house band, The Roots. Amazing band.

FSS: If given the chance would you do it again?

KC: Absolutely!

FSS: What have you been up to since the band broke up?

KC: I still run my label, DeSoto Records, although it’s more catalog maintenance at this point. My son Nick was born in 2001 and 2002 I got a master’s in library science. I’ve done some work in libraries and have also taught in an all boys’ middle school.

FSS: How did DeSoto Records go about getting the rights back to For Your Own Special Sweetheart?

KC: A great lawyer named Bryan Christner worked his magic on Atlantic. Really, I have no idea what he said or did to bring it about, but I got the rights to the Atlantic records back. Cost $10,000 for both records, but worth every penny.

FSS: How did you go about hooking up with Dischord again for the re-release?

KC: This is an easy one; they came and asked us if we’d like to do it. They’ve been re-releasing a lot of records. It wasn’t on our minds at all, but I’m glad they had the idea. It’s a DeSoto imprint, but Dischord did all the manufacturing and distro.

FSS: What was the process for remastering the album like? Is there a difference in sound between the vinyl and the cd? Where you happy with how it came out?

KC: We really just left the remastering to the great Bob Weston. He emailed us the files for approval and we definitely approved. Sweetheart finally has the low end that it lacked in the original. The mastering was different for the vinyl and the CD to make it the best it could be for each format.

FSS: Who’s responsible for the new artwork?

KC: Jason Farrell (Swiz, Bluetip, Retisonic) did the artwork. He did a fantastic job; I’m really happy with the updated look that still pays tribute to the original art.

FSS: Did you ever imagine a day where vinyl would make such a comeback?

KC: I really didn’t! I know it’s not cool to say this, but I don’t love vinyl. It’s cumbersome and big and a pain to flip the sides. I much prefer to plug in my iPod and go. I’m not such an audiophile that I notice the extra warmth in vinyl. I guess I really don’t care about format as long as I can access great music.

FSS: Now that FYOSS is back out on record shelves where it belongs and now that the Fallon show has aired, what’s next for Jawbox?

KC: We would like to do something together as Jawbox again in the future, but we haven’t really figured out yet what that something is. Sorry to be cryptic, but it’s true! Personally, I would love to write some new Jawbox songs, but that is contingent on finding the time.

Related Articles: Jawbox on Fallon, FYOSS Reissue, FSS Best of 2009

P’s Take: It was a fine weekend for Rock and Roll, beards, and aggressive females. The FSS saw the Murder City Devils 3 times in two days. So suck it.

Friday – Philadelphia is fuckin’ far away. From everywhere. But sister Michele, Uncle T and I drove straight from work all the way out to see the Devils on the coldest ass night of the year. We got there just in time for their first set and the place went fuckin’ bananas. I gotta say Philadelphia was down for some drinking and flailing that night. Also there were more beards being rocked there than at a Taliban conference. I’m just saying. The Devils were awesome and louder than hell. They even debuted a new song, something about the 7 deadly sins or something.  At 10:30 we were shooed out of the club so they could set up for the second set to begin at midnight. We got some food at the coldest bar and grill on earth and watched a catfight on the street corner to pass the time till the second set. It was awesome. The catfight was, the food was aight.

The Devils second set of the night, it must be said, was pretty much exactly the same as the first, just drunker and beardier. They played great definitely, but by this time I am exhausted and sober. A fight broke out toward the end of the show and contrary to form , I decided to break it up. It was between some drunk dude, his drunk girl and some guy who looked like John The Baptist. So I go in and take drunk guy off the Baptist and then drunk guy’s girl flanks me and starts going to town on Johnny, fists flying. So then I go to grab drunk girl and drunk guy starts lacing into the Baptist. Finally they are all dragged away from each other by the crowd and the whole time drunk girl is pointing to her eyes, giving the John the Baptist the finger with both hands, and then pointing at him. Eye fuck you, get it? Aint that clever? Awesome.

Saturday – So Fridays MCD marathon was in a dive, like it’s s’posed to be, Saturday’s was at the Nokia Theatre in New York. It looks like it’s from the future, beer cost like 10 dollars and the place just generally sucks ass. Also, whereas the Philly crowd were bearded (the women too) and rowdy the New York crowd were posing. I’m from round the way, so I don’t like to bash the home people but there was really a lot of too-cool-for-school posing motherfuckers there. I’m just saying.

The performance was awesome though, again. The Murder City Devils believe in Rock like some believe in the Jesus, and it shows. I dropped 2 bills in two days to see this band and if they played next month I’d do it again. They have never let me down.

Now back to catfights. So I’m standing there watching the show and right in front of me some drunk guy bumbles into this girl who in turn fucking FLOORS him and starts wailing on him while he’s on the ground. Again, I go in to help for some reason, and the girl starts explaining to me why this cat deserves the beating, evidently cause he “touched my bag”. But she didn’t need to explain, I was with her completely. Some people were born to Rock and Roll.

T’s Take: Remember that Mike Ness line about dreaming all week of a rock and roll weekend? That’s pretty much how this week went down. Three shows..two nights…following a work week and a blizzard??? Fuck yes, bring on the rock and roll. Went down like this…

Jet outta work, pick up P from the Passaic train station, fight parkway traffic to get to the little lady and head straight down to Philly. We literally walked into the venue 2 minutes before the Devils took the stage. Look I’m getting old. I’m not in the business much of flailing about at shows like I did fifteen years ago. I’m not saying I never dance anymore, just that it’s gotta be the right amount of rock and roll to get me out there. The Murder City Devils are such a band that I lose my shit any time I’m listening to them and live even more so. Within seconds I’m rushing the front, fist in the air, screaming at the top of my fucking lungs. The Philly crowd (unlike last years Seattle crowd) were no slouches. We all waited a long time for this. If you check the video we posted of the show someone yells out to the band before they began “you guys better not fuckin’ suck”. Like there was a chance.

During the first set I had no idea where anybody was nor did i care.  I looked for P a few times but his beard didn’t help.  As P was breaking up fights, I was making strange friends… err friends strangely.  Seriously if you’re reading this and you’re the “guy” hit me with an email and I’ll send you an FSS shirt gratis. Basically I clashed with some dude in the pit at one point and… man, if I tell you this you won’t fucking believe it… but I swear it’s true. Some fellow Murder City fan and I slammed into each other so hard and at such an odd angle that our key carabiners locked together and we were fused to each other at the waist like some sort of fucked up dancing rock and roll Siamese twin. We had to move to the side of the action for a good minute or two to figure out how in the fuck to cut each other loose. Fucking odd indeed. In between sets we hit up a nearby bar for some food and beer and then it was back to the venue for the midnight show. Spencer joked that they weren’t going to play Midnight Service at the Mutter Museum because it would have been too hokey (the Mutter Museum resides in Philly after all), but they played it later anyway.  Both Philly crowds were great as always but the first edged out the second for the mere fact that during the second set myself, my wife, and some dude with a Bukowski gravestone tattoo had to constantly and unsuccessfully ward off some drunk asshole that deserved the having the boot put to him hard style.  If you’re reading this and you’re the dude with the Buk tattoo… again… hit me with an email and you’ll have a shirt coming.

The following night we headed into Times Square, NYC for the last of the three shows. It was a little surreal seeing the enormous led billboard outside the Nokia with the crowned skull and crossed switchblade logo and all kinds of video of the band. But it was the punkest thing Times Square probably ever had on display, so as surreal as it was it was pretty fucking boss too. Saw a couple familiar faces from the Philly show. I had a feeling we weren’t the only ones going to all of them. Before Murder City took the stage I listened in on a conversation between a dude from Denmark and a dude from Connecticut. People had come far and wide for this one. I was a little drunk at this point but I’m pretty sure Connecticut was speaking as if he came just as far as Denmark.  If you’re reading this and you’re the dude from Connecticut stay there, don’t email me and forget the free shirt.  The Nokia held a shit load more people than the Philly venue and it was packed. The second the band started all hell broke loose. It was easily my favorite show of the three. I’m not sure that it was any better… performance wise they were all fucking great… but I went more apeshit at this one than the other two and that’s saying a lot so by default it was my favorite. My voice will be gone for the next couple days and I’m a little sore to be honest but man the Devils made my weekend.  Like P said if they came back again next weekend we’d be there.  They’re probably the only band around in the past couple decades that did the rock and roll they way it should be done.  If you don’t know, now you know.

Highlights from the shows included: Press Gang, Broken Glass, Rum To Whiskey, Johnny Thunders, 18 Wheels, Dancehall Music, I Want A Lot Now, Idle Hands, I Drink The Wine, Fields of Fire, and Bear Away.

T’s Take: Rip Torn is a punk rocker. Don’t believe me? Think about it like this… he’s got a name akin to the likes of Lux Interior, Pat Smear, and Rat Scabies. He been know to get drunk and rob banks when he’s not acting. And in “Freddy Got Fingered” he straight hates everything and everyone around him like he was trying out for Born Against. That all sounds pretty punk rock to me. And I gotta think after re-watching “Freddy Got Fingered” this weekend with Brother P, I’m pretty sure his badassery in the film wasn’t an act. So for this reason alone “Freddy Got Fingered” is a punk rock movie. Granted there are other things about it that you can make a case for punk status. The soundtrack has bands like The New York Dolls, and The Ramones on it. And like Punk, the movie itself is vehemently hated by most and only loved by a devoted small few that are fucked up enough to see its greatness. But really at the end of the day, it’s Punk Rock Rip Torn that makes this movie worthy of your time.

Rip Torn can call someone a “retard” like no one else. He fucking hates everyone in this movie to an extent that hate isn’t even strong enough a word. He throws Tom Green around as if he’s actually trying to kill him. He destroys everything in his path that pisses him off (so everything) including a bone protruding from Harland Williams’ broken leg, fancy restaurants, and his neighbors kids face. And all the while is goddamn hilarious. You almost forget the movie is about Tom Green because Rip steals every scene he’s in.

Now I know Tom Green’s shtick wore thin for many people (including myself). But the very fact that some studio gave him the money and manpower to make this horrible movie is something commendable. Plus he’s still pretty funny in it. I mean funny if your idea of funny is animal masturbation, cheese sandwiches, biting through umbilical cords, caning your crippled girlfriend for sexual purposes, drawing bananas trying to get jobs as tv repairmen, accusing your father of fingering your brother, and hitting women in the face with large salamis. I personally find this shit hilarious so there you go. The only thing that could have possibly made this movie better would have been if Glen Humplick was in it so Rip Torn could have kicked his ass as well.

You should probably know going in that this movie has a 3.9 out of 10.0 on the imdb, was given two vehement thumbs down by Ebert and Roeper (see video below), and is generally regarded as one of the worst movies of all time. You’ll be hard pressed to find many people who dig it. Up until I convinced Brother P to watch it for FSS movie week I thought I was the only one.  But if you know going in that it’s not “The Godfather” and you just want to have a good time I think you might be pleasantly surprised.

P’s Take: Uncle Brother T has been at me for years to see “Freddy Got Fingered”, and this past Sunday I checked it out on his massive flat screen. Holy, holy God. What a bizarre miserable piece of shit. There was no plot, there was no nudity, cept for Rip Torn’s white ass, there were no jokes, and despite all that it had me laughing so hard I nearly choked on several occasions. Oh, and there were two instances of Tom Green jerking animals off. One horse and one elephant if you’re keeping track.

This week is all about punk movies and this one counts for two reasons. The first and less important is that some punk shows up on the soundtrack; Pistols, Dead Kennedy’s. The vastly more important second reason is that the whole movie is a massive fuck you. A fuck you to the motion picture industry, good taste, survivors of molestation, the movie-going public, animals, and children everywhere. Uncle T is right, it is amazing this thing ever got made. But I don’t wanna talk about the movie. I wanna talk about Rip Torn.

Rip plays Tom Green’s Dad in this movie, and this is the one stroke of brilliance about this film. I have it on good authority (no I don’t) that Rip was never given a script. According to my sources (I have no sources) Mr. Torn was not aware he was shooting a movie. All the dialogue and every action that Rip Torn takes throughout FGF was purely how Rip Torn rolls on the day-to-day. When he fires Tom Green through a glass shower enclosure and berates Green for wearing his scuba gear, it is because Rip Torn hates it when you rock his scuba gear without asking. When he tosses Drew Barrymore’s shit across a waiting room, it is because that rehab lovin’ bitch got in Rip Torn’s way. Why is he angry in Pakistan and then mollified lying next to Green covered in elephant spoo? Cause Torn hates Pakistan but is calmed by elephant sperm. That’s why. Rip Torn runs the American shadow government and set the sun to spinning. Rip Torn knows that the answer to every question is violence and gibberish. For your viewing pleasure, the video below is what earned Rip Torn his role in the experiment that was “Freddy Got Fingered”. (No it didn’t).

“Forget Springsteen. Wesley Willis is the alter ego of America.”
Jello Biafra

T’s Take: I own one Wesley Willis album. It’s one of his Greatest Hits that Alternative Tentacles put out. I have about 20,000 songs on my iPod but no matter we are as long as my wife is with me a Willis song will come on shuffle. Only when my wife is with me. I’ve tested it out with other people and by myself. What does this mean? Nothing, but that my wife is convinced I have his entire discography with me at all times and not just 50 or so songs (20 of which are about sucking various animals dicks). I don’t think I ever put him on purposely but he’s always welcome when he pops in there on his own accord. You can’t deny this man had a knack for catchy songs. Like most good commercial jingles they get stuck in your head, which is probably why he ends each one with a line from an actual commercial. Prior to watching this documentary I thought Willis was just a funny dude that liked headbutting people. Turns out there was a lot more to it than that.

“Wesley Willis’s Joy Rides” is both enthralling and at times difficult to watch. Difficult in the way that Willis’s schizophrenia and self-dubbed “hell rides” are depressing to witness even if only through the lens of a camera. Probably what makes them have such an impact on the viewer is that Willis is such a likeable character. He’s a genius of a man that rose above his circumstances and hustled his art and music 24/7 to garner a modicum of success many musicians and artists would envy. Tragically in 2003 he would die early at the age of 40. In his life Willis over came an absent father, an abusive stepfather, having his family broken up by social services, and a box cutter to the face, but sadly was no match for leukemia. His story shouldn’t be remembered for starting and ending on a down note though, because during his 40 short years Willis in many ways fought his way into becoming the embodiment of the American Dream.

What “Joy Rides” showcases best is the lives Willis’s overwhelming charisma touched. From his old professors to band mates to roommates and so forth, everyone in this documentary is overjoyed to talk about his impact on their lives (and foreheads). And I can’t help but think that anyone who watches this film will be impacted by Willis as well. Any time you want to sit there and bitch that you can’t are unable to do something think about Willis. Here’s a guy who literally came from nothing, I mean just started at the very bottom and before you know it he’s being showcased as an artist in local papers and interviewed on Mtv News. To just look at him sitting in a Kinko’s or McDonald’s you’d assume he was homeless and not all there, but in fact many times he would roll with ten to twenty thousand in cash from selling his own CDs after shows in far off places like London. Armed with a bic pen, folding chair, and art boards he would draw some of the most amazing Chicago cityscapes you’ll ever see. Armed with a notepad of lyrics and keyboard he was a self-proclaimed rock and roll god. He didn’t need much to create something larger than life.

Whether you’re a fan of Willis or have never heard of the guy I’d still highly recommend “Joy Rides”. Rock over London. Rock on Chicago. Beef. It’s what’s for dinner.

P’s Take: Awright, Wesley Willis’s music sucked, let us be clear. With the Fiasco, without, any which whatever way. Don’t even front. Yeah it is kind of funny, but briefly. To say otherwise, if you actually claim yer kicking back by yourself having some beverages maybe, and you’re putting on Wesley Willis, you’re fucking bullshitting.

Me and Uncle T sat round watching this documentary “Wesley Willis’s Joy Rides” this past Sunday. I gotta say, I was kind of hung-over and the thing just bummed me out for reasons I couldn’t quite explain to myself until it hit me later. I sat down expecting to laugh a bit at this cat’s life and the fucking movie went and humanized the man. And that took most (but not all) of the ha ha out of it. I couldn’t just be like “look at the retard, tee hee.” So, in that way, the director did his job.

So let me give you my revised impression of Wesley Willis: He was punker than you. And me too. The product of South Chicago foster care, which I can only imagine is worse than normal foster care, huge as hell and krazy with a capital KR. Wesley liked to draw, and in that he had enough talent to make up for the complete absence of it musically. But drawing wasn’t cutting it, so he decided he’d be a Rock Star. And fucking did it. Despite sucking absolute ass.

See, I think Wesley knew the effect he had on folks, and I think he knew people either listened to him out of pity or nastiness. But they paid either way. So who’s laughing? You got your drunken kicks laughing at such gems as “ I Whooped Batman’s Ass” but who was walking off with 20 grand in bills, portable cd player a-swinging bout the neck? Not you. Not me neither. Krazzy don’t necessarily mean stupid, evidently.

And I guess that is the lesson of Wesley Willis life; take what you need. So raise a glass to that ugly, bonkers, self-proclaimed Daddy Of Rock n Roll, may he rest in peace. He took a bad, bad hand and made it win on a bluff.

Take one listen to their Live at Lupos bootleg and answer the question, “Was Hardcore dead in 1986?”. You’d be wrong if you said it was. Here’s a band at the top of their game. Singer Dave Smalley (ex DYS and future All) sure doesn’t sound dead to me. Brian Baker (ex Minor Threat and future Bad Religion) doesn’t sound dead either. Is this the best bootleg you’ll ever hear? No. There’s a great deal of tape hiss present and if you don’t turn the volume way up you won’t even hear the band backing Smalley, just his yelling. But bootleg sound quality aside the band is giving it their all, the songs are some of their best, and they prove a crucial point about Hardcore in particular and Punk in general. That is, that it never really died. Some people would have you believe it died in ’77, others ’86, still some ’95. The truth though is even if it wanes in popularity, even if regional scenes come and go, even if styles progress and later regress, even if bands quit and reform, it all never really goes away. It’s always there for the next bunch of kids coming up that need it to be there even if their predecessors are already tired of it. And it’s bands like Dag Nasty that did it during the lean years that matter the most. They kept the torch burning when it wasn’t popular or profitable.  They held it down in spite of everything.  They’re the ones that made it so that you’re reading this now and still giving a shit.

The band would go through numerous lineup changes through the years (this one with Smalley wasn’t their first either), but I think this bootleg represents Dag Nasty at their best, which is why in many circles this is considered their classic lineup. You can download this show and others for free on their website, but you should also make it a point to pick up “Can I Say” as it’s every bit as important as an album like “Out of Step” even if it’s not as widely available. I think they couldn’t have put it better in their closing song Justification.

Take a look at what you’re doing
And tell me I’m too late.
You say we’re walking backwards
Well, that dead horse sure can run.
It sure can run!