"Johnny was a joker..." (Bird Dog demo(?))

...popped in my old CD of Sex Pistols' "Never Mind the Bollocks..." It's funny how something that was so controversial at the time it was released now sounds like classic rock. Speaking of, the first time I heard anything by this band was on a radio station that usually played oldies/rock. I still remember having to explain to my mom (at age 14 or so) that part of the reason the band was called "the Sex Pistols" was to perplex and outrage people like her! "Well, it got your attention, didn't it?" Yeah, I don't think going into the details about Malcolm McLaren/Vivienne Westwood's little shop would've helped my cause any, either. I still like this album... keepin' it.

OK, I promised some more unknown-type stuff, so here goes. These songs come from a tape entitled "Bird Dog 3 Song," Bird Dog seems to be the name of the band. There was a folded-up piece of paper with a name and address on it for Bill Santen, from Portland, Oregon. Could be the artist, could've just been left in the tape case by someone else. No dates on the tape, but it's on a TDK C-60 that looks to be from the early-to-mid '90s. Enjoy, and comment if you d/l.

Update! Did some searchin' and found a coupla archived pages about this group! While the record label seems to be defunct now, I was able to determine that Bill Santen was indeed the main artist behind this tape. Oddly, it's not listed on the discography.

"I'm a lazy sod"

I can't believe it's partway through August already. It really seems like time passes more quickly the older you get. As the years go by do you decide to give up on your dreams, or do you keep putting them off until one day you wake up and realize you're out of time, too old, whatever?

I've got more tapes and stuff to post here, coming up. Thank goodness I don't write for a living, I'd be out on my ass.

If anyone is interested, the CassetteCulture forums are up. If you like these "underground" tapes that people are posting on their blogs, you might want to join up there. It's not just for the musicians or bands that were involved, and if everyone that knows about a little bit of the "scene" adds the info they know, eventually we'll all be able to say more than just "hey, this is a band from such-and-such, or at least that's the address on the tape." Even though these tapes were traded for free back in the 80s-90s, the people that were involved probably would like some credit, especially if we want this music to live on past the life of the tapes!

dusting more crap off...

The GF is at work, so I can actually get away with listening to Led Zeppelin without hearing her bitch about it. I haven't actually heard anything from them for a while, since while she likes to listen to the radio in the car, she'll switch the station as soon as she recognizes a snippet of one of their songs.

Led Zeppelin III. I bought the CD of this back in high school. After re-listening, I've discovered that there are two good reasons to keep this. Firstly, Immigrant Song! This was why I picked it up in the first place, and I still love that song. The second reason, which you purists should appreciate, is to learn Atlantic Records' preferred alignment of the spinning part of the vinyl version. The black star should be just slightly off-center in the top hole next to the zeppelin's tail fins. Yes, I'm enough of a dork that I just did that to my copy.

Led Zeppelin IV. One of the first tapes I ever had was a cassette of this album that I'd found back when I was 11 or 12 at a rummage sale. I listened to it constantly on my Walkman. Eventually the tape broke, but I got the CD later on. Listening to it now, I realize that an awful lot of people have sampled the beats from the intro to "When The Levee Breaks"... I knew that sounded familiar.

Notes of interest? Both these discs are the first remasters... got 'em cheap when the so-called "digital remasters" came out in the '90s. They sound fine to my tin ears.

Foetus - Limb

Just got this the other day. This is a good example of how to do packaging right. If you're a fan of J.G. Thirlwell's red, white, gray and black artwork, you get a slipcase and booklet full of it. Some of the music on this CD was previously released, but that doesn't bother me since I only had one of the songs already from the bonus record that came with my copy of Hole. The liner notes go into great detail about the songs and how they were created, which is something else I enjoy in CDs. Sick of buying CDs that are only half-full of music? There's a 20-minute Mp3 as a bonus, bringing the total time to 71 minutes and some change! There's also a DVD with a documentary on it (will edit here once I've watched it).

Granted, all this good content comes with a price - but it's a reasonable price when you consider that most major record labels would have you fork over that much just for a DVD of a band. Besides, this way the money actually goes to the artist. I've bought the last few Foetus/Manorexia/Steroid Maximus discs from foetus.org and have been extremely happy with the service, shipping time and cost, packaging, etc.

Hear some of Limb here.

The "words" part of this blog .

I've mentioned "books" on here a few times, but never really wrote anything about them. While I haven't visited a music store in a while, I find myself irresistably drawn to second-hand book shops and the local Goodwill. The thrill I used to get by spending an hour or so looking up and down the shelves of used CDs and records, I now only seem to experience in the book stores.

I think part of the problem is that I've already bought most of the music I wanted that was available commercially. Too many instances of "Cool, I'd buy that... if I didn't already own it." It seems as if that'll never happen with books, though. For me, part of the fun is finding something unusual or hard-to-find mixed in with "the usual suspects." Despite knowing that many of these books are available at the local libraries, I still insist on owning them. I'm a quick reader, so you'd think I'd continue getting stacks of books at the library, as I did when I was younger, and have them all done days before the due date... but instead I spend my money on "my own copies"... even though my existing books are stacked two deep and my shelves are bowed.

Goodwill appeals to me the most, since I can "trade in" the books I don't want to keep (that I couldn't sell anywhere else) for a discount coupon and bring home another bagful for close to what one new book would cost.

So, today I took a break from listing books on half.com and listing some of my grandmother's vintage cookbooks on Etsy to take another bag full of stuff to Goodwill. I returned with another bag of books. Already, I can hear my significant other groaning: "Why'd you buy more books?"
But there were some great finds today! A copy of Harlan Ellison's Angry Candy, which I hadn't read since I'd checked a copy out of the library when I was younger! A paperback by one J.D. Ratcliff that proved that Chuck Palahniuk wasn't making up that bit from Fight Club about the Reader's Digest stories that were narrated by human organs! (The title is I am Joe's Body, in case you were curious.) Two more John D. MacDonald novels I haven't read (Slam the Big Door and Nothing Can Go Wrong)! A copy of Isaac Asimov's Murder At The ABA (which, according to Wikipedia, has a protagonist inspired by the aforementioned Mr. Ellison. At any rate, the book is dedicated to him.) The list goes on...

Mudhoney - "Mudbath" 3/20/89 Manchester England

Mudhoney is one of the bands I've always loved ever since I first heard them. I've made it a point to buy all their albums, even the deluxe re-re-release of Superfuzz Bigmuff that Sub-Pop put out last year. This is the only bootleg I was able to find, back in the late 90s when used CD stores had tons of them for fairly cheap. I paid $5 used for this, you get it for free. I have a clean conscience posting this since it's not an official recording, and the packaging listed an incorrect date (3/3/89) and setlist which I was able to fix thanks to this very informative Mudhoney website. The back cover lists 8 songs, the disc itself lists 10, but there's actually 12! Sorry Aussie bootleg guys, having great artwork on your CD packaging doesn't make up for wrong date/only half a tracklist! Sound quality is very good, IMO.

Mudhoney - "Mudbath"

Packrat tendencies finally paying off...

Sold some stuff I really had no use for anymore, made a decent profit on the extra John D. Macdonald books I was keeping, made a few people happy with some CDs I'd been holding on to but didn't really like much anymore.

Some quick reviews of same:

Television/Marquee Moon
I picked this up in high school after reading some books on "the origins of punk rock" that I found at the library. At the time, I liked it, but as I got into other types of music, I pretty much forgot about this one. When I revisited this disc a month or so ago, I wasn't exactly blown away. While I didn't think "This sucks," I really had no reason to hold onto it.

X-Ray Spex/Germfree Adolescents
Another band I'd heard of but never had the chance to hear until recently. The main thing I remembered reading about them was that singer Poly Styrene wore braces and was an example of how punk rock was rebelling against the 'traditional' roles of women in music. As great as it is that women no longer have to fit into the molds of slick, choreographed 'girl group' or as 'sexy band ornament that plays the tambourine while the men in the group write all the songs,' that doesn't change the fact that to my ears, Ms. Styrene's voice sounds shrill and annoying.

Godspeed You Black Emperor!,A Silver Mt. Zion/Everything
Again, more music I listened to a lot back when I first got it, but haven't played for years. Better to try to sell these to someone who'll appreciate and enjoy them than to hold on to them just in the offhand chance I might decide to dust 'em off and give them another spin. Money triumphs over any attempts at coolness, every time. I have no music snob friends to impress, and nobody reads this anyway!

Captain Crawl is mysteriously down again, so instead of looking for more downloads, I'm gonna try to burn the stuff I have already.

Suggested listening: Living Legends - Artsy
MC Frontalot - Indier Than Thou