The Slits - Typical Girls

This is them live in the early eighties in San Francisco and, of all places, Cincinnati (reprazent!). About 90% of this is fantastic, especially their cover of "Heard It Through The Grapevine" which you may listen to below.



The other 10% is, I think, Neneh Cherry doing guest vocals and sounding like a kitten with its paw in a meat grinder.

But what are you going to do?

I was lucky to see them a couple of years ago and the show was fantastic. After one song, Ari Up said, "That one was tight. Like my boom boom!" And then she patted her boom boom.

Oh Ari! You silly!

Here's the track list:
1. New Town
2. Walkabout
3. Man Next Door
4. Life On Earth
5. Heard It Through The Grapevine
6. Typical Girls
7. Fade Away
8. In The Beginning
9. Or What Was It

Enjoy!

Mix Tape #7 - Funk (Not The Good Kind)

I don't know if it's the onset of winter or the holidays or what, but I have been in the foulest of tempers for a while now. I've never quite understood why that leads me to listen to bleak and mournful music, but I do find it comforting during these short, cold days.

I wonder if watching a video featuring Black Box Recorder's ultra-hottie Sarah Nixey will help.

Huh. It kinda did!

Anyway. Here's my bad mood mix.

Side A
1. Swans - Failure
2. The Waterboys - Be My Enemy
3. Songs: Ohia - Love Leaves Its Abusers
4. Heartless Bastards - Done Got Old
5. Big Star - Nightime
6. Blatz - California
7. Fastbacks - Call it what you want
8. Morphine - I'm Free Now
9. Robert Pete Williams - I've Grown So Ugly
10. Love Battery - Damaged
11. The Kinks - Predictable
12. Cringer - Signals


Side B
1. Scrawl - Sad
2. Flipper - The Way of the World
3. Palace - Stablemate
4. Thee Headcoats - Don't Like The Man I Am
5. Proton Energy Pills - Nothing
6. Pussy Galore - Kill Yourself
7. Sebadoh - Hoppin' Up And Down
8. Black Box Recorder - Child Psychology
9. Honor Role - Purgatory
10. Hayden - Bad As They Seem
11. Panda & Angel - Dangerous
12. Bettie Serveert - Healthy Sick
13. Kristin Hersh - Listerine

Here.

Sanford Clark - Shades

Excellent twang. Recommended if you like Lee Hazlewood. Because he wrote some of the songs. Like the one I am posting via this cute little internet thingy below.



I think this might still be commercially available in Germany, so I feel bad about posting it. But, then again, there was that whole Hitler thing...

Enjoy!

X Ray Spex - Spermfree Geriatric

I guess these are Rough Trade demos and Peel Sessions. And as such they're really raw. I don't know, though...I think some of these songs should be rawer. A good example is "I Can't Do Anything." The studio version of that sounds all Brady Bunch and sunshine handclaps. The version here will poke your eye out.

I was so happy to find this in the late 80's because Germfree was out of print and this was the only way I could listen to these songs. You damn kids with your damn internet.

This is my vinyl rip, so you know it'll be extra shitty. And there's a big old skip on "Plastic Bag." And I didn't break it into tracks. Punk rock!

Side A
1. Oh Bondage Up Yours
2. Obsessed With You
3. Identity
4. Let's Submerge
5. Plastic Bag
6. I Live Off You
7. I Am A Cliche
8. I Can't Do Anything
9. The Day The World Turned Dayglo

Side B
1. Genetic Engineering
2. Identity
3. I Am A Poseur
4. Genetic Engineering
5. Germ Free Adolescents
6. Age
7. Warrior In Woolworths
8. Artificial

Enjoy!

Mix Tape #6 - Words Not Allowed On Art Of The Mix 1 - Char!

I really like Art of the Mix. The people there are intelligent and good looking and it's a great place to find interesting music.

I'm not sure why I'm compelled to post playlists there, but I do. The sad thing is some dumbasses started uploading malicious code to the site, and now certain words are not allowed when you post. Which can lead to a really frustrating scavenger hunt.

One of the prohibited words is 'char' and, just for fun, I searched my files for those letters to see what would pop out. Surprisingly, a fun and listenable mix. Whee!

It includes Ray Charles singing "It's Not Easy Being Green." Which I've always loved. Just because I want to say, "Someone please tell him he's not green!"

Here's a youtube of it. I think the person who made it videotaped his or her tv.

Anyway. Here's the list:

Side A

1. Richard Hell & The Voidoids - Love Comes In Spurts
2. The Charms - Carry Go Bring Come
3. Jorge Ben - Take It Easy My Brother Charles
4. Bored - Sweet Charity
5. Charles Wright and the Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band - Express Yourself
6. Richard Maltby - Man With The Golden Arm
7. DJ Scud - In The Charts Again
8. Seam - Port of Charleston
9. Charles Leonard - Funky Driver on a Funky Bus Pt. 1
10. Stereo Total - Sweet Charlotte
11. Scrawl - Charles
12. Charles Bernstein - Laying the Trap
13. Guided By Voices - (I Wanna Be A) Dumbcharger
14. The Clash - Charlie Don't Surf

Side B
1. Bill Medley - Swing Low Sweet Chariot
2. Hüsker Dü - Charity, Chastity, Prudence, And Hope
3. Rod & The MSR Singers - Richard Nixon
4. Magic Sam - Mr. Charlie
5. DI - Richard Hung Himself
6. Charlie Hunter Quartet - Teabaggin'
7. Hope Sandoval & The Warm Inventions - Charlotte
8. Redd Kross - Charlie
9. Ray Charles - It's Not Easy Being Green
10. Nick Charles - The Three Dogwoods
11. Richard Johnston - Coal Black Mattie
12. Charlie Rich - Life Has Its Little Ups And Downs
13. Killdozer - Richard

Here.

Mix Tape #5 - Zombies Don't Surf

I have a deep and consuming love for zombie movies but, paradoxically, I only love three. I mean, 28 Days Later is ok. So is the remake of Dawn of the Dead (except for that gratuitous and completely idiotic birth scene). But I think having fully ambulatory zombies who can run is cheating. It's a lot harder to terrify the audience with a slow moving horde, and it's also a lot of fun to watch the resulting hubris that causes the living to fail.

The only three I love are Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, and Return of the Living Dead. I like how the first two combine the nightmare with social commentary. And I like how the third chooses instead to pit the zombies against a car load of 80's stereotypes.

Here's a nice scene from that movie where Rick James and two white guys chat with a torso they've chopped in half.

Return of the Living Dead has a fantastic soundtrack, too. And this week's entry kicks off with a song from that. There are other songs about zombies, including the odd "Night of the Living Dead Trading Cards" by Black Spot. They're a fun band. It's the lead singer of Rifle Sport who, apparently, wished he were actually singing for Ratt.

Anyway. Here it is.

Side A
1. Cramps - Surfin Dead
2. Air Miami - I Hate Milk
3. Bert Kaempfert - Mambo Mania
4. Blind Lemon Jefferson - See That My Grave Is Kept Clean
5. Dead Moon - Dead Moon Night
6. Jeffrey Lewis - If you Shoot the Head You Kill the Ghoul
7. African Head Charge - Beriberi
8. Marie Laforet - Marie Douceur, Marie Colere
9. Flesh Eaters - We'll Never Die
10. The Mob - Give It To Me
11. Whale - Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe
12. Hank Ray & Thee Executioneers - Outlaw Kill
13. Beat Happening - Zombie Limbo Time

Side B
1. Mekons - Big Zombie
2. Amazombies - Walked Away
3. Eugene McDaniels - Supermarket Blues
4. Bonde Do Role - Geremia
5. Q-Tip - Vivrant Thing
6. Roky Erickson - I Walked With A Zombie
7. The Gossip - Drunken Maria
8. Pretty Things - S.F. Sorrow Is Born
9. Tex and the Horseheads - Oh Mother
10. Chrome - Zombie Warfare
11. Retribution Gospel Choir - Breaker
12. The Zombie Surfers - Surfin' Zombie
13. Black Spot - Night of the Living Dead Trading Cards
14. Unknown - The Gonk

Here.

Prolapse - When Space Invaders Were Big b/w Anthrax

I got this because it sounded like a great idea. No one else should touch Gang of Four's "Anthrax," really. Not Jesus. Not Led Zeppelin. It is a perfect song. Think of it as the Jesus cup in Indiana Jones 3 and then think of Prolapse as Indiana Jones. Or don't. I know it's a shitty metaphor.

Anyway. How I love them. How I'd give every penny in my bindle to fly out to Scotland or wherever they're from to see a reunion show. But this will never happen. Because I think one of them's an archaeologist or some shit now.

Oh. Wait. So it was an apt metaphor.

The surprise here for me is that the A side's the true killer, totally bringing their signature cacophony/call & response/brogue vs. siren call mayhem. Joy is here for the taking.

I am posting below a different song by them from the absolutely perfect album The Italian Flag.



And here is the rest.