Record Reviews November 1994
Archived
Headshake
Inside
Laughing Budda Records
Headshake are a local band with enough good sense to send a review copy to SLUG and sign on for distribution with Happy Little Man. Made up of Dale Garrad, black guitar; Mark Orndorf, black bass; Nigel Redd, black drums and Pete Weiland, black guitar. Black is big with Headshake and their music is dark and funky.
Inside is an album for the slow grind. They can play fast, as they demonstrate with short bursts of thrash in “Buddha” and the closer, “Laytex.” The funk approaches ska when the album leaches “Andrea.” “You led me to the altar and you cut me with your knife,” are the lyrics that pretty much tell the tale. Headshake wants Andrea and they want her bad if their numerous repetitions of the chorus “We want Andrea,” are to be believed.
“Bily” sounds like a rewrite of Aerosmith‘s “Walk This Way,” buy the album and decide for yourself. “Carnival Of Souls” is more of the ska influenced monster-sound they love down in Utah County. “Nightmare” reveals another side of the band – the Bauhaus/goth side. They mention both Bela and the Bauhaus in “Andrea” which makes my job of coming up with references easier.
Headshake are a local band who aren’t content to stick-with one style for an entire album. Funk, punk, goth and ska are all mixed together on Inside. I prefer the slower, darker, funkier things if only because… that is the realm I live in. This album is far preferable to some of the more popular local recordings I’ve heard lately. Names aren’t necessary, just think back about 12 years and hit rewind.
Face To Face
Over It
Victory Records
Face To Face is a four member pop band from Southern California’s high deserts. They’ve toured with Green Day, D.I., the Adolescents, Pennywise and the Offspring. Over It is a 7 song EP which reissues four of their singles for Fat Wreck Chords and re-mixed versions of three songs from their first Fat Wreck Chords album, Don’t Turn Away. Face To Face take the pop the British sent back to us around 1975, mix in the thrash the Californians added in 1980 and churn out their lively ’90s version.
Guttermouth won’t make the “Buzz Clip” group. As their name suggests, they are a foul-mouthed bunch. Their attitudes are far worse than those of Face To Face and their version of punk rock is not as polished. Mark “Nature” Adkins does a good Biafra impression when he introduces “P.C.” – a song which sounds like the Marketts on speed with their ode to the Batman theme.
Tongue-in-cheek sarcasm fills each and every number while Adkins’ emits profanities at a dizzying clip. A little ska and a little surf, guitar solos fill this far too short compact disc. They play 13 songs in 22 minutes. In case you missed the attitudes, they close their album with “Summer’s Over” and “Asshole.” Everyone’s an asshole to Guttermouth, including themselves. They have a long list of things they hate and as Guttermouth says, “We hate these things, we hate you too, go fuck a monkey in the zoo.”
Face To Face will be here to open for NOFX on November 2 at DV8. Guttermouth will probably pass through in their van sooner or later.
Deadeye Dick
A Different Story
Ichiban Records
Royal Hunt
Land Of Broken Hearts
Rondal Records
OK, here we go. It’s time to offend someone. Both of these albums are played on radio stations. I heard both of them years ago. I don’t have a problem with using influences from the past as long as it’s done well. Neither of these bands do it well. Deadeye Dick perfectly describe their music with the opening song, “New Age Girl.” Is this Joe Jackson, Elvis Costello or an early incarnation of Huey Lewis and the News? On the X station it’s a big hit, but if you’ve been through it before the sound is dated. Deadeye Dick have copied virtually every record from the past “new wave” genre. Blues doesn’t sell big unless it’s homogenized for the white audience. What a stroke of brilliance, a label devoted entirely to black music releases a “new wave” hit of ’94. They fashionably designed a record for the “modern” white crowd and are laughing all the way to the bank with profits they can devote to black blues. Deadeye Dick are lacking in creativity and musical talent. Can we move on?
Royal Hunt are big in Japan with over 55,000 “units” sold in the first four weeks the album was available. The leader, Andre Anderson, is a native of Russia. He wrote, arranged and produced the album in Denmark where he lives with his fellow band-mates. What a hideous writing, arranging and production job he did. He has successfully reproduced the sound of dinosaurs walking the earth. In Russia it apparently takes some time for American music to infiltrate. Royal Hunt sounds exactly like the late ‘70s and early ‘80s—corporate rock ruled the stadiums and the airwaves. God save us.
It is without a doubt the most nauseating recording I’ve heard since the last time I sat down with the Journey and Kansas box sets. Both of these albums are complete trash. If you have purchased either one I have a question for you. Why are you reading this magazine?
Little Bat Man
Spin Ball
Lennie Line
Mo Bama
Myths Of The Near Future
Extreme
If the year were 1983, Little Bat Man would receive heavy exposure from the disc jockey down at Twelve Oaks. It’s dance music from the past, and I don’t mean synth-pop or euro-disco. I place it in an experimental or avant-garde dance category. Little Bat Man is Lenny Bove with Bill Lackey engineering and Nick Blakey adding drums to one cut. It opens with a hot number titled “Gun.” The song’s lyrics and sound bites deal with incest. A little deeper into the disc comes “Spank Her.” “Spank Her” is close enough to a re-mixed, updated “Psycho Killer,” with new lyrics to almost rate a lawsuit from Mr. Byrne. If the girl misbehaves, “spank her and send her home.”
“Night Vision” precedes “Spank Her” and it again recalls Talking Heads – dance period Talking Heads. The title song remains in the Talking Heads playing field while bringing Michael Shrieve or Philip Glass on to substitute. Tape loops are easy when you have a computer to generate them. If it went on for 30 or more minutes we’d have a “new age” hit. The album has snippets that almost sound like an Adrian Sherwood production from On-U-Sound, heavy Talking Heads references and enough of the irritating avant-garde to maintain interest. One of those little one-off jobs you’ll never find in a store-and only run across by accident. The best experimental work I’ve heard from the Bay area since Mo Dark sent his album.
Mo Bama is a group of three experimentalists. The world of the experimental musician is largely forgotten in the ‘90s. Early experimental works are now passed off to meditating suburbanites as “new age” and many stores have eliminated the electronic music section altogether. Mo Bama is without a category in the modern world. Is it world, new age, jazz or classical? The closest category, which is usually lumped in with “new age” trash, is ambient. The album is named after a collection of short stories by J.G. Ballard. The opening cut, “Food Of The Gods,” is also the title of a book by Terrance McKenna.
The music contained on the disc combines the sounds of world instruments with synthesizer washes, bowed and plucked bass, and field recordings of nature and voices from Africa. It is an ethereal recording with enough rhythm to attract the world music enthusiast while maintaining the ambience necessary for deep introspection. Sadly, the only Utah residents with minds open enough to enjoy the music are reading this weird little magazine.
Veruca Salt
American Salt
Minty Fresh
Does this album belong in SLUG? The “modern alternative” crowd is all over it. As a general rule I hate most of what they like. The run down on the band is; they are from Chicago, with two girls on guitars who also do the vocals, the rhythm section is male. This album is on the Minty Fresh label the next will be on DGC.
“Seether” is the hit single. It sounds like the Kinks. “All Day and All Of The Night” to me. “Forystha” is the song that could be the next single. Veruca Salt copped a few licks from Joe Jackson in his Look Sharp days. Have you listened to “Is She Really Going Out With Him” lately? “Alternative” is in a recycling process now with the early ‘80s sound very big.
Veruca Salt isn’t recycling, they’ll throw a little dash of new wave guitar and girl group vocals (Go Go’s) in with their claimed Pixies, My Bloody Valentine, and Big Star influences to come up with a minty fresh song “Number One Blind.” They do “quiet noise” well as, “25” demonstrates. Big dirty guitars, drums and bass open the song then quiet down to let the pretty girls sing only to return for the finish. The album is good, it’s too bad Hole canceled Salt Lake City for a Saturday Night Live gig or you could see Veruca Salt open for Courtney and form your own opinions.