Adventures In Stereo - Brand New Day

(Bobsled, 1997)

Jim Beattie from early Primal Scream heads up this group, but I don't hear any connection beyond the obsessive need to strip-mine the r'n'r past for the benefit of the indie present. Which can certainly work at times, this being one of them. Chick-vox and melodica dominate the title track, with the other three taking a slightly more danceable (both slow and fast), beat-conscious approach, and always the spectre of Spector (oh good gracious that is RICH! Give me a RAISE!) hangin' over everything. It's all simple Stereolab loop-grooviness plus Lolita girl-group vocal stylings; catchy, sunshiney mid-tempo material. Scenester sass and calculated charm with the classic good-gal/bad-gal dynamic in full effect. Sha-doobie-doo.

Ad Astra Per Aspera - An Introduction To

(Big Brown Shark, 2003)

I saw these guys play in an Omaha basement on a fine 2003 eve, and after a summer of one-note hardcore bands (most of whom were good live, but, you know, you seen one you seen 'em etc.), I was mighty impressed by the notable DIFFERENCES I eyeballed here. It was a weird combo of HC throat-shred, mathiness, and classic prog, with rilly competent girl-played keys. Bloody and sweaty, but also a little complex and unpredictable. The 7" does a decent job of transferring the whole thing to vinyl, though the combined loss of HOT BASEMENT and LOUSY P.A. is a serious knock against. There should be more STINK than THINK on records like this, and I'm not sure that this tempo-shiftin', chorus-screamin', ivory-ticklin' disc comes down on the right side of the fence. Some good and appropriate aggression here, but there's just not enough FACE gotten into when all's sung and done. A later album on Sonic Unyon strays even further from the path of what I thought made 'em champs that starry (was it?) Nebraska night, so approach that one with caution after you give this 7" a twice-over.

Hey, here's a question: Why do bands with great live keyboard sounds tend to get such a CHEEZY keysound on their recordings?? Really! Almost every time! Including this time! Instead of some in-the-red speaker-spew, we get... a ballpark organ?? C'mon; just get it right!

Acid - Never, Ever

(Bomp/Tangible, 1993)

"Never, Ever" was released as part of the scuzz-psych "Tangible Box," a 6x7" SF sub-scene document that had #1 Brian Jonestown Massacre cheez Anton Newcombe's fingerprints all over it. If not the entire BJM recording under a different name, Acid is at the very least Newcombe singing and (probably) playing guitar. 1993 was early in the game; none of the snottiness or modstomp for which the band is best known shows up here, nor does the My Bloody Valentine-worship of the Methodrone album appear. Trebly and percussion-free, "Never, Ever" -- later re-recorded minus the comma as a BJM single -- is repetitive, lo-fi nod-off music with the type of hypnotic, echo-y guitar loveliness that was all over early Spiritualized. "Thoughts of You" exists along the same lines, though with a bit more energy and aural meat...instead of a Lazer Guided Melodies demo, it's a Taking Drugs To Make Music To Take Drugs To track ("track" ...HA!!). Though clearly the labor of amateurs, there's at least enough close study of the relevant blissed-out forebears in evidence to make the whole thing work. Warning for your needle ("needle" ...HA!!), friend: both sides seem to start with silent lockgrooves. Sneaky sneaky, boys.

Aberdeen - Sink or Float

(Tremolo Arm Users Club, 2001)

When did I buy this? Where did I buy this? Why did I buy this? Did I buy this?? I HAVE NO IDEA. Given that I definitely did not run down to my local shoppe for the specific purpose of buying the hot new Aberdeen 7" at any point in the last six years, there are three possibilities here, each as uninteresting as the last: ONE. This was part of a large lot purchased on eBay. TWO. This was a throw-in freebie in some mail-order shipment. THREE. This was part of the big discount 7" lot I bought from that Microindie guy a few years ago. It's safe to say that I won't sleep tonight as I try to solve this incredible riddle. Time to put on my riddle-solvin' hat, my floor-pacin' shoes, and my chin-strokin' forefinger.

The music? Oh! Right! It's like early-90s, mixed-gender, American indiepop all growed up and all uninteresting. Melodic, sure, and the female vocals are super-sugary-AOK, but it's totally boring and predictable genre-hell, both sonically and thematically ("I feel as if I've never had a crush before" ...argh!). Someone like, I dunno, Velocity Girl (why not?) would have performed these songs weirder and better 15 years ago. The last minute of "Sink or Float" is the record's high point, as a piano is plink-plinked atop some relatively noisy and driving guitar. As for the rest, it's just a pleasant time-waster. Inoffensive, see.

7% Solution - Lullaby

(Hidden Agenda, 1998)

Late-night psychedelic mood-music, comparable in feel to one of the quieter, more meandering tracks on, say, Atom Heart Mother. Which is probably the exact comparison these guys would've wanted from a review, so let's offer the caveats (not gonna play into NO ONE'S hands! Nope! Yeehaw!) that the nasal vocals do not at all help this spaceship achieve liftoff, and while the whole thing is definitely PRETTY, "Lullaby" isn't nearly as melodically strong as those Pink Floyd records. It feels like it should be much longer; I would have been happy to hear the song drift 'n' glide along for another five minutes instead of lurching into the abrupt-sounding ending. Is the problem the run-time limitations of the 7" format, or is the song just under-developed?? A mystery! A clean-sounding cover of Can's "Oh Yeah" picks up the tempo on the flip, with the drummer handling himself quite nicely. Whoosh-y sound effects boost the psych-out factor.

Parasol.com has marked these things down to fifty cents, and any geek who gets a kick out of similar '90s goodies like Asteroid #4 or even Flying Saucer Attack should be happy to lay out that kind of dough. I was. And am.

The 6ths - Heaven in a Black Leather Jacket

(Merge, 1993)

Never was a Stephin Merritt fan. It’s always been about disinterest rather than dislike, even when my earholes were force-fed 69 Love Songs for a few college years. That record’s witticisms and (I’m told) sophisticated bent just didn’t get my motor chooglin’; I far prefer dum-dum to clever when the music’s cutesy. But hey! This 6ths single mostly rights those wrongs. Robert Scott from the Bats (sez the insert; who dat?) sings about kissin’ on a Hollywood girl/guy in the strummy, Scot-pop soundalike title track with the kind of awkward, guileless innocence of bands like the Pastels. Do I make that comparison just because he has an accent? Do I find the whole thing appetizing just because it isn't Stephen M vocalizing? MAYBE. And yet…!

Brisk, squelchy electronic drums give the B-side a goofy appeal, even as Merritt waxes pessimistic about the entertainment biz and – ho ho! – sorta responds to the disc’s A-side, droning on about not finding love in L.A. and how he’s watchin’ it all “rot in the sun.” Two short, simple songs – one sunny, one bleak – both of ’em musically peppy and charming, even if not AT ALL memorable. Total candy!

!!! - The Dis-ease

(Hopscotch, 1998)

While !!! didn’t really pull it all together until the lengthy dub freakout on its side of the Out Hud split 12” a year or so later, it had the whole f/punk formula figured out well enough on this first single. What the band was doing back then was a lot more exciting than the zillion-selling (I think?), chart-busting (right?), stadium-filling (I'm pretty sure?) music it released on Touch & Go and Warp a few years down the road: these songs are more basement than disco, with a much looser, rawer feel than on later records. The rhythm section is definitely locked in, dance-wise – especially on catchy B-side keeper “The Funky Branca” – but there’s an overarching, appealing messiness in the brass blats, stereo-panned guitar squiggles, and mini drum breakdowns.

The lyrics and vocals have always been iffy (particularly live, with the added embarrassment of the less and less bearable frontman/MC antics), and the sophomoric ruminations on scene phonies in “The Dis-ease” are indeed purty bad: “Well what about U / Y do U do what U do / R U fabricated R U fake or made up / Come on let’s tell the truth.” Still, the mix emphasizes the music enough to successfully marginalize the singer’s yowlings, and the aforementioned POETRY wouldn’t be intelligible without the assistance of the lyric sheet.

Sure, this one's not a must-have, but it's successful partytime stuff that’s toe-tappy enough on its own, and tons o’ fun next to the comparatively sleek and lyrically “confrontational” (yawn) product the band has put out since joining the ranks of the bigs. If you manage to find both this and the rump-kickin' split-12" on GSL, quit while you're ahead.