Paleontology for Dullards: Poor Investment Edition

"Paleontology for Dullards" rates records I've found in used LP bins by assigning them a cash value. For further explanation, please see my original post here.

Various Artists Diamond Hidden in the Mouth of a Corpse
This compilation album was released by Giorno Poetry Systems, an organization that people who've gone to art school are much more qualified to discuss than me. I've been told that this disc fetches some high prices on eBay, mainly because of the Keith Harring sleeve and interior art. My main attraction to the album was the otherwise unreleased Hüsker Dü cut "Won't Change," an outtake from Metal Circus. Also included is Sonic Youth's awesome "Halloween" though it's easily available elsewhere. However, most of the album is hodgepodge documenting experimental approaches to rock music that were novel and cutting edge in the 80s but haven't aged particularly well. There's some post-disco dance rock amalgams, industrial from the likes of Coil (an instrumental that's actually one of the record's highlights) and Cabaret Voltaire (not half as compelling as "Nag Nag Nag") and an I-don't-know-what-you'd-want-to-call-it a cappella piece from Diamanda Galas. The album also features a pair spoken word cuts from Giorno staple William Burroughs (remarkable for taking place in front of an audience and getting laughs to boot) and Swans frontman Michael Gira (trying to transgressive and creepy and succeeding more in the latter than former but mostly just coming off as pretentious.) There are some enjoyable moments to be had here but for the most part this is work of conceptualists, not music fan. At the very least, Diamond Hidden in the Mouth of a Corpse is a reminder of a time when there was a dominant culture and existing outside of it actually meant something, a notion that's pretty much lost in the post-internet diaspora.
Price Paid: $10 Rating: 70%

B People Petrified Conditions 1979-81
I generally like skronky no-wave. I almost universally adore LA's post-Dangerhouse post-punk scene. Then why is this record so dull? There's a distinct whiff of art-house pretension and music-theory stuffiness here that might have something to do with it. B People's music is so densely layered that it feels as though there's no space where the listener could find entry. "Challenging" doesn't necessarily have to be an antonym for "listenable." It's no surprise that "Weather to Worry," the record's most unequivocally punky moment, is also its best.
Price Paid: $7 Rating: 28%

Love Child Okay?
This is what NYC hipsters were listening to 20 years ago. In some ways, this album (recorded in February of 1990) feels like the tipping point between the scuzz-loving, punk irreverence of 80s independent rock and the slacker-centric 90s, a sentiment clearly expressed the in refrain of "Can't get out of bed" in Side 1's closer, "Slow Me Down." Most of Okay? is dominated by willfully dissonant songs from Alan Licht and Will Baum, most of which seem to dollop on the noise whenever they get in danger of becoming catchy. They both have their moments but it's actually Rebecca Odes' more straightforward pop-like songs that are the standouts: "He's So Sensitive," "Cigarette Ash" and (who could forget) "Church of Satan." Okay? is an aesthetically similar record to Sebadoh III though none of the members of Love Child have the songwriting chops of Lou Barlow or Jason Lowenstein nor the adventurousness of Eric Gaffney, which makes Okay? altogether less than memorable.
Price Paid: $8 Rating: 37.5%

Pezband s/t
I don't think one could have lived in the Midwest in the late 70s without tripping over a power pop band. It was probably the success of regional heroes Cheap Trick that served as the catalyst for this trend. A handful of these were worthy but Chicago's Pezband weren't exactly the creme de la creme. Passable at best, most of Pezband's songs fade from memory as soon as they end. This may be a byproduct of the disposable 60s bubblegum pop they were obviously emulating but it doesn't make for engrossing listening. If you're going to be a purveyor of cotton candy, your product should really stick to one's teeth.
Price Paid: $2 Rating: 50%

Paleontology for Dullards: Super Brevity Vindictive Edition

(Come on feel the nice)

So I've been ruining this "Paleontology for Dullards" feature, where I rate records I've found in used LP bins by assigning them a cash value, for a while now. No one cares, and I'm okay with that. However, I check out Chunklet Magazine's website yesterday and see they've posted something called The Under $7 Seventy, wherein they list 70 albums worth a listen that are readily available in used bins for seven dollars or under. Then I see a similar thread on the Terminal Boredom Message Board. Neither would bother me so much except:

A) Both have more comments than I've had for anything I've ever posted.

B) I'm still peeved at Chunklet for including, in their latest print issue, a bunch of jokes I made in their comments section without giving me any credit. (Though to be fair, it's really more about the glory than the credit.)

C) These guys are are just listing records. I'm writing full reviews here. Granted, they're reviews all of my dozen or so readers complain are too long and dense but I'm making an effort, dammit!

Thus, I've decided to one up them. Instead of just listing album titles or trying to string together coherent thoughts into paragraph, I've chosen the perfect middle ground: one sentence record reviews.

I think this method should work out well since no one really cares to read more than a sentence at a time in this day and age anyway. I'll readily admit some of the sentences are run-ons but no one cares about grammar anymore either.

(Oh, and please don't mention that I swiped this whole idea from Tim Midgett's $2.99 Wax Necessities in the first place. It's not online anymore and therefore you can't prove anything.)

The Damned Strawberries
First-gen punks show depth and don't suck at it as they later would.
Price Paid: $7 Rating: 85.7%

The Bee Gees Odessa
A very listenable double LP that doesn't quite live up to "lost classic" status but the red felt cover feels mighty nice.
Price Paid: $7 Rating: 100%

Stiff Little Fingers Go For It!
This album could be proof that the members of Rancid listen to bands other than the Clash.
Price Paid: $8 Rating: 75%

Dead Fingers Talk Storm the Reality Studios
Old dudes pose as punks with more credible results than the Police but not quite as exciting as those first two Stranglers albums.
Price Paid: $7 Rating: 71.4%

Melanie Candles in the Rain
The hippy-dippy anthem "Lay Down (Candles in the Rain)" is a pretty incredible song though I still prefer Strapping Fieldhands' version.
Price Paid: $3 Rating: 66.7%

Neil Young and Crazy Horse Re⋅ac⋅tor
Sludgy, long songs from Neil and the Horse that's far from his best work though "Shots" is an absolute killer.
Price Paid: $2 Rating: 100%

Celibate Rifles Mina Mina Mina
Yet further evidence that Australia is the second most rockin' continent in the world.
Price Paid: $3 Rating: 100%

To Damascus Come to Your Senses
Listening to the musical advice of Joe Carducci is not always a good idea.
Price Paid: $2 Rating: 50%

Green on Red s/t
Green on Red made this awesome EP for their debut then, like almost every other Paisley Underground band, had more or less negligible remainder of their recorded career (except for the Dream Syndicate, who made a full album before becoming negligible).
Price Paid: $8 Rating: 100%

Chris D/Divine Horsemen Time Stands Still
Knitters Poor Little Critter on the Road
Danny and Dusty The Lost Weekend
L.A. post-punks go Americana with varying results.
Chris D Price Paid: $3 Rating: 100%
Knitters Price Paid: $5 Rating: 80%
Danny and Dusty Price Paid: $5 Rating: 40%

Holly and the Italians The Right to Be Italian
Of all the albums I've purchased featuring artists who had a song on Rhino's DIY series, this is probably the least essential, and please note I own a Human Sexual Response album.
Price Paid: $5 Rating: 20%

Loudon Wainwright III Attempted Mustache
Within about ten seconds of the first cut it becomes evident that this guy is waaaaay better than his super annoying son.
Price Paid: $3 Rating: 100%

Midnight Oil Diesel and Dust
Commercial rock in the late 80s that's not totally toothless and is therefore commendable though being Australian helps.
Price Paid: $4 Rating: 50%

The Inhalants s/t
U.S. 90s garage punk that's extra dirty, extra simple, extra stupid and, therefore, extra tasty.
Price Paid: $2 Rating: 100%

Adult Net The Honey Tangle
It seems as though someone convinced Mark E Smith's ex-wife she's a member of the Bangles, which actually turned out to be a pretty good idea.
Price Paid: $3 Rating: 100%

Alan Vega Saturn Strip
The former member of Suicide, Ric Ocasek and Al Jourgensen (credited here as Alain) team up for an effort that's less than the sum of it's parts, though one could make the case that the Ministry association counts negatively towards the total.
Price Paid: $4 Rating: 50%

Big Dipper Slam
Major label debut that's much-maligned (and not included on the recent Supercluster collection) but sounds decent to my ears.
Price Paid: $2 Rating: 100%

Townes Van Zandt For the Sake of the Song
This just sold for 70 bucks on eBay and which means my investments are turning out better than most of the country's.
Price Paid: $8 Rating: 100%

Paleontology for Dullards: A Consumer's Guide

"Paleontology for Dullards" rates records I've found in used LP bins by assigning them a cash value. For further explanation, please see my original post here.

Drunks With Guns s/t
Many years ago I was lucky enough to stumble upon a copy of Drunks With Guns' Second Verses LP. Though I enjoyed it thoroughly, I was told that despite containing the awesome Alter Human Industrial Fetishisms 7" in its entirety, the LP did not actually represent the band at their finest. The self-titled LP, a comp of their first two 7 inches plus an extra track, was the pukka DWG. And after listening to this, I find it hard to disagree.

For those who've never experienced the glory, try to imagine punk band just as powerful as Minor Threat but sort of their aesthetic opposite. Instead of taut and speedy, Drunks With Guns were sloppy and plodding. And instead espousing a generally positive philosophy of mental acuteness, they were about a negative and nihilistic as they come. You can practically smell the cigarette butts and stale beer wafting from the grooves. (Or maybe I just get that impression from the cover shot.) Singer Myk Doskocil doesn't so much sing or even scream as much as he vomits up total contempt for humanity as the band churns away behind him. Many since have tried to emulate Drunks With Guns mixture of misanthropy and primitive rock action (Pissed Jeans is recent example) but few have matched their potency. And the preceding isn't enough to pique your interest, then song titles like "Dick in One Hand" and "Punched in the Head" probably won't either.

I must stress that this is not the original Archvillian/Chopper 1987 pressing but the 1999 Demolition Derby/Nitro! reissue. I still paid $15 for it. It was still worth every fucking penny.

(Caveat emptor: Not the most comradely bunch, Drunks with Guns split up and members formed two separate bands, both called Drunks With Guns. Records from this era should be avoided.)
Price Paid: $15 Rating: 100%

The Jam In the City
I've never been as much of a Jamophile as some but I like most of their records just fine. Paul Weller was an undeniably skilled pop tunesmith even if his reach sometimes exceeded his grasp and the soul affectations got to be too much after a while. Here, on the Jam's debut, Weller's skills were still in nascent form and the band simply bashes away at appropriated sixties mod at punk tempos. The energy level never seems to drop below blinding fury and the band's chops are up to the task but considering what they would later accomplish, the Jam's lack of ambition is somewhat startling. They seem content to reenact a bygone era rather offer new ideas. It doesn't seem probable that they would become one of the most important British groups of their era. Clearly, their best work was ahead of them.

Still, In the City succeeds on it's own modest terms. The title track is an absolute monster and fully deserving of it's classic status. None of the other cuts come close to equaling it, but most ("Away From the Numbers" and "Takin' My Love," for example) are high-energy fun. The album is far from the greatest artifact of class of '77 Britpunk, but it's a good one.
Price Paid: $10 Rating: 60%

The Smiths The Queen is Dead
This is the first Smiths album I've ever owned. Yeah, really. Morrissey, Marr and co. never really did it for me except as a singles band, maybe. The Smiths are enjoyable in short bursts but Mozz's schtick really grates on my nerves in larger does. And I wasn't going to drop money in the amount of double digit figures for Rough Trade imports to possibly have my mind changed. Though when I saw The Queen is Dead available for under 5 bucks, I figured I'd give it a listen. Have I changed my opinion? Slightly, perhaps. I was able to get through the entire record without really grimacing but that may have been because the band put the best songs on Side 2, which is about 80% brilliant. ("Vicar in a Tutu" is okay though if I could never hear it again for the rest of my life I wouldn't lose any sleep.) Or maybe it's because Mozz is in a more playful mood than usual. Or maybe it's just the talent of Johnny Marr shining through. Whatever. I still like the Go-Betweens better.
Price Paid: $3 Rating: 100%

The Move Looking On
This is first album on which you can hear the path crackpot/genius Roy Wood took for more or less the rest of his career: saving concise poppy statements for singles and using albums to stretch out with his more ambitious ideas. The LP features seven(!) songs, none of which you think were by the same band that recorded "(Here We Go Round) The Lemon Tree." This is also the first Move album to feature Jeff Lynne and one can certainly hear the embryo of ELO. This is art rock, through and through, though to their credit the Move never lose slight of the "rock" part of that equation and never let wankery get in the way of melody. On paper, the album's blend of highfalutin prog and hard boogie may appear to be a recipe for disaster. However, so gifted were Wood and Lynne as arrangers and composers that it rarely sounds pompous or lumpy in practice. Emerson, Lake and Palmer couldn't dream of such vitality. Wood has done more enjoyable work before (and after) but in it's own way Looking On is an example of "rock as art" on the level of Sgt Pepper or Tommy. Do keep in mind I'm not particularly fond of either of those records.
Price Paid: $7 Rating: 85.7%

Paleontology for Dullards: Special All Creep Edition!

"Paleontology for Dullards" rates records I've found in used LP bins by assigning them a cash value. For further explanation, please see my original post here.

KISS Double Platinum
Let's forget for a moment everything imminently abhorrent about KISS, namely the grandiosely stupid spectacle, the unsurpassed greed and sleaziness of Mr Chaim Witz, and their influence on a generation of misguided cock-rockers. (You didn't think the Poisons and Warrants of the world were really into Sabbath, did you?) The music of KISS in their prime is basically a dumbed down variation of the dumber branch of British glam i.e. Slade, Sweet, et al. This isn't an entirely bad thing as the group could spit out worthy bits of hard rock from time to time. Enough to justify a 30 plus year career? Not really. Enough to justify this double LP sampler of their glory years? Almost. You would think a band with legions of devoted (for reasons that continue to bemuse me) fans could distill their first six(!) albums into an all-killer, no-filler collection. Songs like "Deuce," the Faces-sound-a-like "Hard Luck Woman" and even the "disco" remake of "Strutter" pack genuine wallop but too often KISS grins when they should growl. Case in point, title-track from Hotter Than Hell starts with a nasty riff but moves into a total limp-dick chorus lacking any impact whatsoever. I know the music is only part of the KISS experience but Alice Cooper managed to have the theatrics and the tunes. Double Platinum is probably as much KISS music as I, or anyone else with a degree of taste, will ever need. Wait... no "Plaster Caster?" Dammit!
Price paid: $8 Rating: 37.5%

David Crosby If I Could Only Remember My Name
1971 debut solo album from the crack-smoking, menage-a-trios-endorsing, Crazy-Horse-hating, gun-toting, Roseanne-guest-starring, liver-stealing, sperm-donating, beautifully-harmonizing former Byrd and CSNY member. Crosby is backed by what seems like the entire state of California circa 1970 including members of Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead as well as Nash and Young. (No Stills though.) Man, the drugs at this session must've been good. The ambiance is that of doing enough coke to keep the jams going all night long but smoking enough grass to keep the vibe sufficiently mellow. It almost feels Skip Spence's Oar except played by pros instead of a crackpot. Songs like "Laughing" are engrossing darkly mellow psych and others like "Traction in the Rain" succeed on the strengths of Crosby's vocal and compositional skills. There are times when the vapid hippie sentiment is a bit stomach-turning ("Music Is Love?" Whatever you say, David) but mostly the music and particularly the harmonies and strong enough to power through it. And nothing here is quite as egregious as "Mind Gardens."
Price paid: $8 Rating: 62.5%

Graham Parker and the Rumor Squeezing Out Sparks
Not so much an creep as a crabby jerk, I've always found Graham Parker to have a conservative streak when compared to his pub-rock-gone-new-wave contemporaries. While other members of the new wave pushed boundaries, Parker is happy to offer traditionalist R&B-based rock. There's nothing on Squeezing Out Sparks that would sound particularly out of place on a Springsteen album. While that isn't exactly as formally exciting as say, Desperate Bicycles, it's hard to complain when Parker writes a set of songs as potent as this. Capably backed by pub rock vets the Rumor, Parker rocks out with abandon on the first three cuts, delivering hooks that are catchy and memorable without blunting his sardonic edge. After that is what might be Parker's most controversial song, the abortion ballad "You Can't Be Too Strong." While it deals with the personal rather than political, it's unlikely to be a big favorite with the pro-choice crowd. Still, it's inarguably affecting. Side 1 is capped with the forceful "Passion is No Ordinary Word" and while side 2 doesn't scale the heights of the first half it's still a solid set of tunes. If only he didn't wear those stupid sunglasses. Nothing worse than a square that's trying too hard.
Price paid: $0.70 Rating: 100%

Paleontology for Dullards: A Consumer's Guide

"Paleontology for Dullards" rates records I've found in used LP bins by assigning them a cash value. For further explanation, please see my original post here.

Secret Affair Glory Boys
You know what's funny about the mod revival of the late 70s? (Besides the clothes and haircuts, I mean.) Aside from the Jam, who actually predated and catalyzed the movement, I can't think of worthy band the genre produced. Weller and co. may have infused punk recklessness with 60s pop hooks but I'm hard pressed to think of another band that did the same as well, if at all. Case in point: Secret Affair. Probably the movement's second biggest act, SA exhibit none of The Jam's songwriting or playing chops and certainly have nothing on the Who, Small Faces, or Creation. Much of Glory Boys sounds like the most overblown moments of Quadrophenia married to awkward interpretations of 60's soul but without much, you know, soul. Their cover of the Miracles' "Going to a Go Go" might be the whitest thing I've ever heard. Some tunes like "Time for Action" and "Don't Look Down" display a certain bubblegum catchiness but the arrangements, particularly the flatulent horns and ubiquitous bombastic drum sound, undercut any chance of rock n roll fun. And since the disc was produced by the band themselves it's hard to assign blame elsewhere. Misguided and flaccid, Glory Boys is about as explosive as wet match. May have anticipated Dexy's Midnight Runners but that's no huge compliment.
Price paid: $5 Rating: 10%

David Bowie Low
Sometimes life is good. The other day I was looking through my David Bowie LPs, satisfied that I had nearly all of the man's essential work, i.e. pretty much everything from The Man Who Sold the World through Scary Monsters. One record I was missing though was Low. I stumbled across it in used LP bins a few times before but balked at the price, usually in the $15-$20 range. This same day I decided to head over the Staten Island's favorite cult-run cafe/second hand shop, mainly because my home computer was kaput and I could check my e-mail on their computer for the price of a dollar every ten minutes. I decided to take a look through their used LP bin which tends to contain Lionel Richie and Barbara Streisand records. They also price their records using the Goldmine price guide so on the rare occasion that they do have anything worth buying it's usually overpriced. Anyway, yes, they had a copy of Low in their "To be priced" bin. The cute hippie girl behind the counter let me have for three bucks. I didn't get her number or anything but I figured that was enough good luck for one day.

And how is the album anyway? Well, it's quite good. I don't know if it's the best record of the 1970s (actually that's not true, I'm sure it isn't) but if you told me it was Bowie's best album after Hunky Dory, I probably wouldn't debate you.

I also found a copy of Mick Farren's book The Feelies for $3 at the thrift store the same day. I haven't read it yet but if it's half as good as "Let's Loot the Supermarket Again Like We Did Last Summer" it will be well worth the price.
Price paid: $3 Rating: 100%

Pearls Before Swine One Nation Underground
Psych-folk from the legendary ESP-Disk label and apparently their biggest seller. Pearls Before Swine were not as provocative as their labelmates the Fugs or the Godz but where still legitimately an underground outfit. There's no mistaking them for hippie exploitation pop ala Strawberry Alarm Clock. To my ears, they most recall Moby Grape or Hackmore Brick, offering many druggy-sounding, acoustic-based songs but also rocking out on occasion. The quieter tunes are just a bit prosaic for my tastes though are objectively quite lovely. Things do get nicely weird on their rock songs though which sound at times like they're channeling the Thirteenth Floor Elevators. They even offer up Silver Apples-esque skewed keyboards on a few cuts. One Nation Underground is a neat little artyfact from the psychedelic sixties. Lyrics like "Did you follow the Crystal Swan?/Did you see yourself/Deep inside the Velvet Pond?" may be vapid flower-power nonsense but, believe me, I've heard worse.
Price paid: $5 Rating: 80%

Classic Ruins Lassie Eats Chickens
A bar band in the best sense of the word, I first heard the Classic Ruins via the Boston scene volume of Rhino's DIY series (a seminal influence on my taste in music during my teen years.) Their song on that comp "1+1<2" was taken from a 1980 single on the Ace of Hearts label and has long been a favorite in this household. For whatever reason, the Classic Ruins didn't get around to recording their debut album until 6 years later, this time for Chuck Warner's Throbbing Lobster label. Nothing here matches the brilliance of that early single but Lassie Eats Chickens is a lot of fun regardless. Classic Ruins recall other Boston fixtures like the Lyres (who covered the Ruins' "Geraldine, I Need Money"), the Real Kids (whose Billy Borgioli guests of 5 of the 9 songs here) or even the Cars, albeit with a raunchier, rawer version of their sound. Or perhaps they sound like what the E Street Band would sound like if they had a sense of humor instead of bombast. I can't imagine the Boss singing a song with a title like "I Can't Spell Romance." Or if he were to write a song about an alcoholic Canadian mountie like the Ruins did in "Labatt's," it would probably be a portrait of working class struggles and wouldn't contain lines like "He changes his shirt about once a year to take the empties into town." Unpretentious rock n roll played with a knowing smirk, Lassie Eats Chickens will get more than a few spins on my turntable. And I think Chuck might still have a few copies left if you want to pick up one for yourself.
Price paid: $5 Rating: 100%

Paleontology for Dullards: Special Edition!!!

"Paleontology for Dullards" (usually) rates records I've found in used LP bins by assigning them a cash value. For further explanation, please see my original post here. This time though, instead simply reviewing the record I'm giving the entire LP for free download!



Fuzzbox We've Got a Fuzzbox and We're Gonna Use It!
Introduced to the world on the legendary C86 cassette, the all-female, most teen aged quartet known as We've Got a Fuzzbox and We're Gonna Use It truncated their name to simply Fuzzbox for their debut album. There's something that's very paradoxical about this record. Perhaps it's the band's amateurish but enthusiastic musicianship attempting to be wed to 80s pop expectations. Or maybe it's their legitimate independent spirit ("Pay less attention to the packaging and listen to the voice!" they instruct in "Preconceptions") paired with an image that seems to present them as punky teenage tarts. It all comes off like Kleenex trying to be Spice Girls. If that sounds appealing to you (and why wouldn't it?) and you can stomach their deconstruction of "Spirit in the Sky" (which is awful in a very cheeky way but still kind of awful) you'll definitely enjoy this platter. Songs like "Jackie," "You Got Me" and "Rules and Regulations" pop with punkish energy and bright harmonies, anticipating the sound of several Riot Grrrl outfits and even post-indie popsters like Love Is All. And, yes they do use that fuzzbox.
Price paid: $5 Rating: 100%

Download Fuzzbox We've Got a Fuzzbox and We're Gonna Use It!

Paleontology for Dullards: A Consumer's Guide

"Paleontology for Dullards" rates records I've found in used LP bins by assigning them a cash value. For further explanation, please see my original post here.

John Felice and the Lowdowns Nothing Pretty
As some of you may know, John Felice was a member of a very early incarnation of the Modern Lovers and subsequently the leader of the Real Kids who released some rather wonderful records in the late 70s and early 80s. Like Jonathan Richman, Felice has both a love early rock and a romantic streak which informs his songwriting though with a nastier edge than his former bandmate. Felice does not share JoJo's world view of innocence and puritanism. (It's been acknowledged that Felice was the "Hippie Johnny" of "I'm Straight.") While Richman's post-Modern Lovers records display a cloying naiveté that turned off many of the admirers of his first album's raw RnR, Real Kids fans will likely really dig Felice's first solo outing. Nothing Pretty was released in the late 80s on legendary Boston label Ace of Hearts (home to Mission of Burma and the Lyres) after Felice had disappeared from the scene for a while. While not the classic that the Real Kids self-titled long player was, Nothing Pretty more than satisfies as another dose of Felice's exuberant, straight-up rock n roll and world-weary, heart-on-his-sleeve sentimentality. Songs like "Perfect Love" and "Dreams" revel in trashy rock n roll fun but others like "Nowadaze Kids" and "I'll Never Sing That Song Again" (which quotes the Real Kids classic "All Kindsa Girls") exhibit a cynicism that evoke genuine sadness and disappointment. Most stunning of all is the album's title track which sounds like the best ballad the Replacements never wrote. The chorus of "There's nothing pretty in my life anymore" might look like self-pitying mopery on paper but when Felice sings it the effect is heartbreaking. His lack of pretension leaves no doubt to his sincerity. Hard to find for years, Nothing Pretty was reissued by the fine folks at Norton Records not too long ago. I was lucky enough to stumble across this treasure but now that it's readily available I highly recommend you plunk down your cash for this one. That is, of course, unless you don't already own the first Real Kids album.
Price paid: $6 Rating: 100%

Scritti Politti Cupid and Psyche 85
I really like those early Scritti Politti records. Even "The Sweetest Girl" single, their first move towards pop, sounded pretty swell to my ears. But this? I swear to Christ this sounds like Jermaine Stewart or something.

Price paid: $3 Rating: 16.7%

The Skids Scared to Dance
When I first dropped the needle on this 1979 disc and "The Saints are Coming" blasted from my stereo my first thought was "Wow, this sounds like the missing link between the Clash and U2." This notion was only strengthened when I found a fairly terrible collaborative cover of the tune by the very Clash-sounding Green Day and even more U2-sounding U2 mentioned in an Onion AV Club entry about overblown charity songs. If you've ever wondered how the new wave transmorphed into the "big sound" of 80s modern rock ala U2, Echo and the Bunnymen and Big Country (founded by Skids guitarist Stuart Adamson) this as good a place as any to start. At times this mix of punk bluster and stadium bombast is effective such as in the aforementioned cut and "Into the Valley," a top 10 single in the UK. Mostly though, it comes off as very stiff and static, missing the immediacy of most of their new wave contemporaries and not really having the chops to hang with the laser light show contingent. It's not terrible though. Not as good as the Stranglers. Better than the Boomtown Rats. Please enjoy this clip of the Skids miming to "Into the Valley" where singer Richard Jobson moves the mic from his mouth before completion of the lyric for every single line of the song.



Price paid: $4 Rating: 50%

David Peel and the Lower East Side Have a Marijuana
Have you ever thought that the best part about the MC5 was not their incendiary music but their 60s counterculture "rock n roll, dope and fucking in the streets" lyrics? You haven't? Yeah, me neither. But on the off-chance that you're curious as to what their lyrical content might sound like in the context of poorly played folk music, you should check out David Peel. Released on Eletrka in 1968, the same label that put out the earliest LPs by the MC5 and the Stooges, Peel's debut LP in not without it's charm, if you want to call it that. He embraces the role of thorn in the side of the establishment so fervently it almost sounds quaint 40 years later. For all the furor caused by the MC5's use of "motherfucker" in the intro to "Kick Out the Jams," Peel's repeated use of the 12-letter expletive in the chorus of "Up Against the Wall" must have seemed like a vehement act of confrontation and subversion. Today it and other hippe rallying calls like "I Like Marijuana" and "Show Me the Way to Get High" sound rather silly but kind of fun in a hanging out with a bunch of mischievous but ultimately harmless burnouts kind of way. At the very least Peel never encourages you to put flowers in your hair. Note: Rocket From The Crypt seem to have lifted the "Everybody smoke pot" chant from "The Alphabet Song" for the coda of "Take That" from the Circa: Now album. Also note: After stints on Elektra and Apple (at John Lennon's behest) Peel formed his own label, Orange Records, which released some of the early works of Mr GG Allin. How's that for lasting influence?
Price paid: $0.70 Rating: 100%

Bob Marley and the Wailers Catch a Fire
Speaking of marijuana...

I kind of hate Bob Marley. Let me restate that. What I really hate is the sort of jackass who buys a copy of Legend, grows white boy dreads and tries to separate himself from his privileged suburban upbringing by smoking lots of grass, vapidly philosophizing about Rastaman vibrations and generally acting like a douchebag. Meanwhile, the only other thing in their music collection that resembles reggae is probably a Sublime CD. Go choke on a hackysack, you mindless, annoying, petruli-reeking, waste-of-DNA fuckheads!

Anyway, the proliferation of this poor example of humanity is hardly Marley's fault. In fact, his music is not nearly as mellow and/or passive as one might expect. Quite the contrary actually as the first three cuts on Catch a Fire, "Concrete Jungle," "Slave Driver" and the Peter Tosh-sung "400 Years," practically seethe with barely suppressed rage and aggression. It might be hard to hear a song like "Stir It Up" divorced from any sort of cultural context but it you can you'll hear what is undeniably an extremely talented group of musicians creating an potent groove. I'm admittedly a Jamaican music dilettante but stating the Wailers were as good as or better at doing what they did as anyone else seems like a plausible claim. It's definitely good stuff. I'm still not entirely enthralled enough to consider myself a Marley fan but I'm impressed enough to want to listen to more of his work with an open mind.

If case you're wondering my copy isn't the original zippo lighter cover pressing. Now that would've been a find.
Price paid: $0.70 Rating: 100%

Paleontology for Dullards: A Consumer's Guide

"Paleontology for Dullards" rates records I've found in used LP bins by assigning them a cash value. For further explanation, please see my original post here.

Pere Ubu Cloudland
I can say without hyperbole that the early recordings of Cleveland's Pere Ubu (that would be their first few singles and the Modern Dance and Dub Housing albums) are some of the greatest in rock history. There were some precedents for certain aspects on Ubu's sound: the feral wallop of the Stooges, the mind-expanding swirls of Syd's Pink Floyd, the rhythmic inventions of Can, the surrealism of Captain Beefheart, Eno's synth experiments with Roxy Music, the omnipresent influence of the Velvets. However, the whole was more than the sum of its parts, a singular vision of primal thump and dark, foreboding atmosphere that's probably the closest any rock band has come to the irreverent transcendence of Dada. The band half-jokingly called their challenging take on rock music "Avant Garage." In hindsight some have labeled them as post-punk but that's a bit of a misnomer as the band's earliest singles predate the punk explosion. Rather, the band served as a guiding light for those inspired by punk but not content to replicate Ramones-esque down stroke and bash. Ubu's near total disregard for the conventions of rock pointed the way for Mission of Burma, Wire, the New York no wave movement and almost the entirety of Rough Trade's early roster. Unfortunately, by their 3rd album singer David Thomas had reverted to his parents' religion of Jehovah's Witness and the band stopped staring into the void, sacrificing their majestic peculiarity for being just plain weird. Their next few releases were interesting but hardly necessary and the band eventually called it quits.

A few years later Pere Ubu reformed with most of the original members returning and the truly bizarre (for them anyway) notion of making pop music. It's hard to say why exactly but Ubu's muse has always defied easy exegesis. For Cloudland, the 2nd album by Ubu Mk. 2, the group enlisted Pet Shop Boys/New Order producer Stephen Hague to smooth out their rough edges. Hague gave Ubu's batch of pop tunes a bright and inviting sound and buried Allen Ravenstine's amelodic synthesizers, a signature part of the Ubu sound, deep in the mix as to be barely audible. Long time fans cried sell-out and it's easy to hear why. At first listen Pere Ubu's new sound would seem to be a far cry from the dark beauty of their early records. Songs like "Bus Called Happiness" and the single "Waiting For Mary" sound like a deliberate attempt to score some kind of modern rock hit, approaching something like a cross between Talking Heads and the Pixies. However, the band's idiosyncrasies could not be completely obscured and their unique flavor precludes any of these songs from being bland. Some, like "Cry," were truly wonderful, sounding like sunnier variations on previous themes. Cloudland is far from Pere Ubu's most memorable work but it certainly sounds great while it's playing. If a new band without Ubu's history and reputation had put out Cloudland they probably would have been hailed as bold fractured pop geniuses.

Whatever Pere Ubu's intentions fame and fortune were not forthcoming and the band eventually reverted to the noisier sounds of their early days. I'm not going to go as far as to say that it's a shame the band didn't stick with the Cloudland sound but the album is an intriguing artifact of an experiment in retaining individuality in the commercial marketplace. The group may have failed but the result is still a captivating listen.
Price paid: $5 Rating: 100%

Sic F*cks s/t
The Sic F*cks (asterisk theirs, not mine) were a semi-infamous New York party band during the post-punk era, featuring an vaudevillian stage show which sort of played something like an lower east side B52s or a Rocky Horror Picture Show for downtown new wavers. Years ago I came across some brief live footage of the band from "Paul Tschinkel's Inner-Tube," an old Manhattan cable access show. The image of frontman Russell Wolinsky with whipped cream all over his face (at least I hope it was whipped cream) stuck with me but I'd never heard the band again until I happened on this 5-song 12-inch EP, their only vinyl. The first side of the EP is one song, "(Take Me to) The Bridge," an embarrassing and borderline unlistenable stab at James Brown-style funk (though honestly it's no worse than "The Crunge.") Side 2 really cooks though. It features 4 songs which maximize the party vibe by bringing the girl group influence implicit in many of the original CBGBs bands to the forefront. These songs, only one of which stretches past the 2 minute mark, revel in a certain joyous tastelessness though they're not nearly as profane as one might infer from the band's name or song titles like "Chop Up Your Mother." They're just trashy fun, sort of like the aural equivalent of a Troma movie. I can easily believe the Sic F*cks were an absolute blast to see live. If this EP only hints at that... well, it's better than nothing, I suppose. Note: The aforementioned Russell Wolinsky looks exactly like a cross between Julian Casablancas and Eugene Mirman except possibly slimmer than either.
Price paid: $8 Rating: 50%

Roy Loney and the Phantom Movers Out After Dark
Mr Loney was the vocalist and songwriter for the fantastic Flamin Groovies during their pre-"Shake Some Action" days. While the Groovies altered their sound to Byrdsian chiming guitars after his departure, it's not surprising that Loney retained the Sun Records-influenced sound of their early releases. As I'm a bigger fan of their earlier releases, this LP, his solo debut, was a pleasure to my ears. No, it's not quite Flamingo or Teenage Head but it's certainly in the same sonic vein as those two classic albums and only a notch or two below in terms of overall quality. In his time Loney was considered hopelessly stuck in the past but 30 years after the fact his work has aged remarkably well. His musical influences may have ended at the time Elvis joined the army but Loney never settles for mere Stray Cats-like imitation in crafting his own brand of down and dirty rock n roll fun. And fun it is, with much of the album stomping like Little Richard and shuffling like Johnny Cash. Point of interest: I'm pretty certain the Reigning Sound swiped the riff for "I Don't Believe" from Loney's "Scum City." I aint hatin', I'm just sayin".
Price paid: $6 Rating: 83%

Gram Parsons Grievous Angel
The hipster deification of Gram Parsons: I don't get it. Parsons' brand of California cocaine country rock is not exactly what the hipster masses usually reverie. Nobody's outside of middle aged members of Rolling Stone's editorial staff is going on about the genius of Poco or the Eagles. Yet they love Parsons. I've even had one dolt tell me that he thought Sweetheart of the Rodeo was the best Byrds album which is a statement of such extreme cluelessness that it made me distrust all future opinions emanating from his mouth.

I think comes to three factors. The first is that his records didn't sell particularly well which is a dubious reason for credibility but it's not surprising to find wanna-be obscurists overpraising could'ves instead of dids.

Secondly, Parsons died young and beautiful. Let's take a look at Gene Clark, who I'll use as an example because like Parsons he's both a former Byrd and blender of rock and country who also released a bunch of poorly selling solo albums. Clark had it all over Parsons in the tunes department. Just listen to some of demos included as bonus tracks of the reissue of his solo debut, Gene Clark with the Gosdin Brothers, and tell me even Clark's throwaways don't hold their own against Parsons' most lauded songs. Plus, Clark is an undeniably superior vocalist, one of the best in rock history. However, Gene Clark died drunk, haggard and middle aged while Parsons left a beautiful corpse. Yes, the juvenile dead rock star cliche that forces some members of society take the poetry of James Morrison seriously also applies to underground types.

Finally, like many members of the hipster cognoscenti, Parsons was a trust fund kid pursuing a bohemian fantasy. He may have aped the authentic but in reality Parsons had about as much in common with Buck Owens as Julian Casablancas does with Johnny Thunders. His untimely death begs the question: what was Parsons more interested in, making music or getting wasted with the Rolling Stones?

And how is the music he made anyway? Well, it's fine. I give Parsons full credit for certainly being better than the Eagles, Poco, et al. Songs like "Return of the Grievous Angel" and "Las Vegas" are as affecting as they are affected. The covers are a bit more problematic. Can anyone hear any version of "Love Hurts" in 2008 and not cringe? Look, I realize that authenticity is not necessarily an essential ingredient in creating terrific music. Creedence Clearwater Revival weren't really from the backwoods of Louisiana, were they? Whatever Parsons' roots it's his skills as a songwriter, interpreter and performer that are his legacy. And while he certainly displayed talent the results don't live up to the hosannas posthumously showered upon him.

Cosmic? Come on, guys.
Price paid: $7 Rating: 57%

Paleontology for Dullards: A Consumer's Guide

This feature is for you, the consumer, to use when rummaging through used LP bins. Some of you may find a record by an artist with whom you are unfamiliar and think "I've heard of these guys. Are they any good?" or "How do I know this isn't their one dud album and a terrible entry point to their body of work?" or, most importantly, "Is this really worth $3.99?" This guide is for you, least your home become filled with nonessential vinyl and your significant other begins giving you the evil eye whenever that damn Radio Shack commercial comes on. Not only will I review a plethora of used LPs amassed from many a used bin but I will assign them actual cash value. In other words, you, the consumer, may rummage with confidence knowing full well whether or not the piece of vinyl in your hand is worth the same as a value meal at Arby's.

Ratings are based on the percentage of the authentic value of an LP in ratio to what I actually paid for it. For example, if I paid $5 for an LP but it's only worth $4 the LP will receive a rating of 80%. If I paid $3 and the LP is worth $1 the rating is 33.3% and so on. Please note: scarcity is a factor in determining value. Black Sabbath LPs are much easier to find than Go-Betweens LP so while they both groups may be of equal musical value the rating of the latter will be inherently higher. This is not snobbery, it is simply the economic principle that mass production degrades value. You should never pay more than $2 for a Buckingham/Nicks-era Fleetwood Mac LP (if it's Tusk). Also note: when records receive maximum ratings of 100% it is not necessarily the top dollar amount you might want to pay for that particular LP. You may want to pay more if you wish. A top-of-the-food-chain, life-affirming album for which I happened to pay $7 may be worth picking up for $8. Or even $15 or $20. Or not.

Feedback on ratings will likely be erroneous but is welcome and will amuse me. And finally, no, I will not tell you where I found these LPs. Frankly, if you're blowing up my spot and finding all the bargains, this feature will become expendable. And we couldn't have that.

(Ed. Note: this feature was inspired by "$2.99 Wax Necessities" by Tim Midgett (formerly of the excellent Silkworm, currently of the similarly excellent Bottomless Pit and well respected rock crit) wherein Mr Midgett gave you a host of LPs worth purchasing for $2.99. I would link this but it seems to have disappeared from the world of the Internet. Nonetheless, I tip my hat to Mr Midgett and note that while his writing may have the edge in insight and general scribe skills I make up for it in hubris.)

Roger C Reale and Rue Morgue Radioactive
In my younger days I had a bit of an infatuation with Killed By Death/Bloodstains-type compilations. If you have no idea what I'm talking about... that probably means you're a well-adjusted human being with no need for such folly. However, if you're curious...

Killed by Death and Bloodstains were two series of bootlegs compiling very rare (usually a couple of hundred copies pressed) late 70s/early 80s punk records. These collections were assembled for the type of punk rock fan/collector for whom records by the Damned or the Dead Boys were easy to find as sand at the beach. KBD and Bloodstains were the most commonly used monikers (being bootlegs no one compiler had rights to the name of a series so other enterprising bootleggers quickly co-opted the titles as their own) but there were other series (Teenage Treats, Break the Rules) and a ton of one offs (Cheap and Nasty, Deep in the Throat of Texas). My first exposure to this phenomenon came from some of the earliest comps (Killed By Death 1, Bloodstains Across the Midwest and the all Australian Murder Punk) and I was totally floored. They were simply fantastic: all killer and no filler. I dove headfirst into this "scene" and started snatching up every comp I could find. This was no easy task as these comps were often as rare as the records they compiled and few were legitimate releases. Many were excellent but the law of diminishing returns eventually set in. There were only so many impossibly rare punk 45s to compile and only so many of those are worth repeated listens. Soon most comps were nothing more than one or two cuts worth of collector bait (the original singles sometimes go for hundreds of dollars. Search "KBD" on eBay and see what I mean) and mediocre at best filler. Soon the excitement of buying a comp and possibly hearing some previously unheard classic punk scorcher was replaced with inevitable disappointment until I swore off buying new comps altogether.

What does this have to do with Roger C Reale you ask? Well Reale had one of his songs, "Kill Me," on of one of the volumes of esteemed German collector Peter P's Break the Rules series, one of the few legitimately released series of its kind and because Mr P has exclusive rights and could exercise some quality control also one of the more consistent. (Remind me to tell you the mildly amusing anecdote of the time I met Peter. I'd recount it here but requires both visuals and onomatopoeia.) "Kill Me" is a slammer: just a minute plus of over the top aggression. When I saw Radioactive in a used bin containing "Kill Me" and with a sticker price of $2 I thought I stuck gold. My first clue that this was not the case was that guitarist for the Rue Morgue was G.E. Smith. Surely not that G.E. Smith? Yeah, that one, the former Hall and Oates sideman and SNL band leader. Needless to say, this is not the work of teenagers picking up instruments for the first time for the sake of anarchy and giggles. No, this is pros playing "regular dude" rock reminiscent at times of Tom Petty or Bruce Springsteen but with lesser songs and more explicitly punkish leanings than either. The unintentionally hilarious notes on the back cover by one "Doc Cavalier" try and make the case Reale as a bold blender of genres but that's hyperbolic malarkey. I can easily believe the Roger and co. rocked the house as a bar band but other than "Kill Me" and a sort of neat take on the Troggs' "I Can't Control Myself" there's little here that's rewarding. I'm probably destroying any chance I have of reselling this for some decent scratch to some gullible punk collector but that's the kind of integrity you deal with when you're dealing with me, people.
Price paid: $2 Rating: 100%

Ed Kuepper Everybody's Got To
Anybody familiar with my all time musical favorites knows that I am a huge fan of the Austrailian punk combo the Saints, or at least a huge fan of their output when guitarist Ed Kuepper was still in the band. (What I've heard of singer Chris Bailey's led post-Kuepper Saints hasn't thrilled me much.) Despite my obvious assumption that Kuepper was the real talent behind the group, I've heard very little of his post-Saints work, either solo or with his band Laughing Clowns. It's not that I wasn't curious, it might be more that I had little time to devote to tracking down Australian imports. Everybody's Got To, however, was one of Kuepper few (only?) albums to come out in US with major label (Capitol) distribution so I suppose I was likely to come across it eventually and I'm glad I did. While it displays little of the raw, high energy, frothing-at-the-mouth, jumping-off-the-rails punk of the Saints, it does seem like a logical progression from his later work with the group, even with my 10-year-long ignorance gap of his work in between. Think of "Memories are Made of This" from Eternally Yours as a starting point and you're about halfway there. Kuepper reveals himself to be an exceptional songwriter of elegant, stately rock n roll not too far removed from contemporary Aussie modern rockers like the Go-Betweens or the Church but with a touch more raw punk rock bluster, as you might expect. Every cut is strong and some ("Too Many Clues," "Nothing Changes in My House") are outstanding. My only complaint is that the production is a bit too 80s-fantastic for my taste. While some of these flourishes benefit the songs (Rebecca Hancock's backing vocals are a particularly nice touch), some sound rather dated (snare drum WAY too high in the mix, horns that sound more like synthesizer than actual brass). Kuepper actually produced the album himself so it's hard to assign blame elsewhere. Still, aside from that small caveat, Everybody's Got To effortlessly demonstrates why many of Kuepper's devoted following insist his career does not begin and end with the Saints. A minor classic? Perhaps.
Price paid: $4 Rating: 100%

The Yachts s/t
This is a neat slice of keyboard heavy new wave pop in the vein of the Cars or very early XTC. The Yachts self-titled debut, often erroneously referred to as S.O.S. (mainly because of the giant red letters spelling out "S.O.S." on the cover), was produced by Richard Gottehrer, co-founder of Sire Records with Seymour Stein and making waves at the time for his work on Blondie's early releases. I have to wonder why this thing wasn't any kind of hit even in the group's homeland of the UK. Gotteherer's production was state of the art for the time and well suited for the band. Plus the Yachts actually have the tunes to back it up. The singles ("Yachting Types, "Look Back in Love," and "Suffice to Say") are the best things here but the songs are consistently catchy (if a bit samey) throughout, featuring strong melodies and solid hooks. I've gotta believe these guys must have been really physically unattractive to meet such indifference from the pop buying public. Yachts is not a masterpiece but new wave and power pop aficionados will probably eat this up. For everyone else, it's worth a listen for a few bucks.
Price paid: $4 Rating: 100%

The Necros Tangled Up
My first exposure to the Necros came via Sebadoh's cover of "Reject" on the b-side of the "Soul and Fire" 45. Even if Sebadoh's verison is superior, it's easily the best song on the Necros' 1981 9-song I.Q. 32 EP, which otherwise featured nothing but substandard Minor Threat-imitating hardcore. "Reject" slowed down the tempo and featured lyrics that displayed some uncommon sensitivity for a hardcore band: "You've lost compassion is that so?/Well I stopped caring so long ago." The first emo song, maybe? Like many of their hardcore brethren during Reagan's second term, the Necros evolved into a kind of punk/metal hybrid. I'm not exactly sure what the reason is for this phenomenon. Were the bands owning up to the all the Ted Nugent and Aerosmith they dug in their pre-punk days? Did they realize that metal was where the bucks were and aggressively tried to sell out? Both perhaps? Whatever the reason, most of it hasn't aged particularly well and Tangled Up is no exception. The opening cut, "Gun," is convincing thrash but the album goes downhill quickly from there. For example, the title track, noted as a superlative example of punk evolution by respected rock critic Chuck Eddy, sounds like little more than Mötely Crüe played at Bad Brains tempos. Shockingly, after 10 songs worth of mosh pit machismo, the band ends the album with an austere piano and synths instrumental. Seriously guys, what the fuck? You're not Hüsker Dü and this isn't side 3 of Zen Arcade.
Price paid: $3 Rating: 33.3%

Yung Wu Shore Leave
Further proof Hoboken's Feelies were one of the greatest bands ever: they could cover both Brian Eno and Neil Young without batting an eye and absorb the unique stylistic qualities of each equally into their sound. Yung Wu is essentially the Feelies circa The Good Earth except percussionist Dave Weckerman steps to the forefront, singing and writing most of the songs with the rest of the band backing him up. Feelies guitarists Glen Mercer and Bill Million not only produced the LP but provide their patented guitar interplay as well. If that didn't perk up your ears, it really should have. On the Feelies 1980 debut Crazy Rhythms, Mercer and Million scaled heights of rarefied twin guitar bliss equal to Reed/Morrison or Verlaine/Lloyd. No easy feat, I assure you. Shore Leave is not at the level of greatness achieved by their debut (what did you expect?) but it holds up more or less as well as any of the Feelies less transcendent but still thoroughly listenable mid-80s to early 90s work. Weckerman isn't much of a singer but a handful of his songs are sublime ("The Empty Pool," the title track) and the aforementioned covers (Young's "Powderfinger" and the Eno/Phil Manzanera collaboration "Big Day") are fine and distinctive takes on the material. If the rest is fairly typical 80s indie strum and jangle at least it's of the distinguished sort. Collector's note: apparently less than 5,000 total copies pressed.
Price paid: $2 Rating: 100%

Various Artists The 20th Anniversary of the Summer of Love
This 1987 compilation was the inaugural release from the Shimmy Disc label, owned and operated by the musician/producer known as Kramer. (No, not the "Seinfeld" character portrayed by race-baiting failed comedian, Michael Richards. This one.) Shimmy Disc was label that brought the world King Missile, Ween and GWAR which should give you a pretty decent idea of their modus operandi. This album doesn't have any overt "joke rock" but rather provides a snapshot of the "downtown scene" in NYC circa the mid 80s. The beat generation/dirty hippie vibes are still present but you can tell they're trying to get on board with this whole punk thing. It's probably the same impulse that led David Peel to put out G.G. Allin's records. Much of the first side of this record consists of folks possibly well into their 30s trying to emulate (parody?) hardcore but not really having the conviction or raging hormones to pull it off. The highlights here are a Half Japanese song, Fred Firth making an effort to be catchier than Henry Cow and the spoken intro to Shockabilly's live cut: "If any music critics have arrived late, could you help me tune my guitar?" After some nonsense from Bongwater and Tuli Kupferberg of the Fugs not even bothering to disguise a big sour grapes fuck you to Bill Graham as poetry, side two actually settles into 5 or 6 cuts of some pretty convincing avant rock before Allen Ginsberg chimes in to remind you why you hated that long-haired English professor you had freshman year. Still, as uneven as it is The 20th Anniversary of the Summer of Love is a fascinating document. The wheat is pretty good stuff and the chaff is so contrarian to the ideals of Reagan's America you almost of have to admire it just for that. Almost.
Price paid: $5 Rating: 60%

Paleontology for Dullards: A Consumer's Guide

This feature is for you, the consumer, to use when rummaging through used LP bins. Some of you may find a record by an artist with whom you are unfamiliar and think "I've heard of these guys. Are they any good?" or "How do I know this isn't their one dud album and a terrible entry point to their body of work?" or, most importantly, "Is this really worth $3.99?" This guide is for you, least your home become filled with nonessential vinyl and your significant other begins giving you the evil eye whenever that damn Radio Shack commercial comes on. Not only will I review a plethora of used LPs amassed from many a used bin but I will assign them actual cash value. In other words, you, the consumer, may rummage with confidence knowing full well whether or not the piece of vinyl in your hand is worth the same as a value meal at Arby's.

Ratings are based on the percentage of the authentic value of an LP in ratio to what I actually paid for it. For example, if I paid $5 for an LP but it's only worth $4 the LP will receive a rating of 80%. If I paid $3 and the LP is worth $1 the rating is 33.3% and so on. Please note: scarcity is a factor in determining value. Black Sabbath LPs are much easier to find than Go-Betweens LP so while they both groups may be of equal musical value the rating of the latter will be inherently higher. This is not snobbery, it is simply the economic principle that mass production degrades value. You should never pay more than $2 for a Buckingham/Nicks-era Fleetwood Mac LP (if it's Tusk). Also note: when records receive maximum ratings of 100% it is not necessarily the top dollar amount you might want to pay for that particular LP. You may want to pay more if you wish. A top-of-the-food-chain, life-affirming album for which I happened to pay $7 may be worth picking up for $8. Or even $15 or $20. Or not.

Feedback on ratings will likely be erroneous but is welcome and will amuse me. And finally, no, I will not tell you where I found these LPs. Frankly, if you're blowing up my spot and finding all the bargains, this feature will become expendable. And we couldn't have that.

(Ed. Note: this feature was inspired by "$2.99 Wax Necessities" by Tim Midgett (formerly of the excellent Silkworm, currently of the similarly excellent Bottomless Pit and well respected rock crit) wherein Mr Midgett gave you a host of LPs worth purchasing for $2.99. I would link this but it seems to have disappeared from the world of the Internet. Nonetheless, I tip my hat to Mr Midgett and note that while his writing may have the edge in insight and general scribe skills I make up for it in hubris.)

Penetration Moving Targets
Pentration is probably best known for their fine class of 77 single "Don't Dictate," a neat little proto-riot grrl number that seems to be included on nearly every 70s Brit-punk compilation. It's not on this however, their 1978 debut long player, which is too bad because Moving Targets could really use a shot of life. The album is far from terrible but as a UK punk artifact it's not exactly Germfree Adolescents or Crossing the Red Sea with the Adverts. Despite Jon Savage's waxing poetically on the band in England's Dreaming there's not too much of note going on here with the best cut being a cover of contemporaries The Buzzcocks' "Nostalgia." A nice curio of the era perhaps, but not much else.
Price paid: $5 Rating: 60%

Great Plains Naked at the Buy Sell and Trade
I'm a bit ashamed to say that this is the first record I have ever owned from Ohio's Great Plains. This is despite a) my total adoration of singer Ron House's post-GP project Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments, b) their fantastic ode to/mockery of the 80s underground "Letter to a Fanzine" (heard by yours truly via Homestead Records' excellent Wailing Ultimate comp) has graced many a mixtape of mine and c) an easily available double CD compilation of the lion's share of the their material came out a few years ago. After listening to Naked at the Buy Sell Trade I can only conclude that I am a fool for depriving myself for so long. "Letter to a Fanzine" isn't even the best thing here. A less aggressive affair than TJSA, Great Plains were nonetheless an equally perfect vechile for Mr House. House may not exactly have a classic voice-as-instrument (his nasal whine is reminiscent of Jad Fair) but I can say with no reluctance that he's a fantastic singer. His melodies are genuinely inventive and his lyrics are frequently hilarious. House displays the sharp, self-effacing wit of someone who's seen enough to be skeptical about everything yet never falls in love with his own cleverness or gets bogged down in negativity. Quite the opposite actually, as this record is a joy to listen to from start to finish. I've been walking around singing "Hey hey the dream's gone away/I'm living in the hall of shame" ("Hall of Shame) and "Don Howland has to take a piss/ Real bad!" ("Real Bad") for days. Great Plains make as good a case for unpretentious punk rock played by a bunch of "regular dudes" as the Minutemen did and that's just about the highest compliment I can give.
Price paid: $5 Rating: 100%

Teenage Head Frantic City
Often referred to as the the "Canadian Ramones" which I suppose is an adequate description if you think "Canadian" is synonymous with "bland and inoffensive" and you confuse the Ramones with the Stray Cats. For a bunch of rock n roll revivalists Teenage Head's songs sure lacked punch which is absolutely necessary if you're making a point of how derivative your sound is. Even the covers of "Wild One," "C'mon Everybody" and "Brand New Cadillac" fall totally flat. They supposedly had an incendiary live show but from the evidence here I have a hard time believing it. You would think a band named after a Flamin Groovies song would know a thing or two about making a good rock n roll album but you'd be sadly mistaken.
Price paid: $2 Rating: 25%

Marianne Faithfull Broken English
For those who don't know, Marianne Faithful was an icon of 60s swinging London known more for her beauty than talent as a singer whose career and personal life hit the skids in the 70s before she released this as her comeback album in 1979. You can file this one under "baby boomers respond to new wave" along with Rust Never Sleeps, Tusk and Linda Ronstant's Mad Love. While it's not on par with Rust Never Sleeps nor is it a fascinating mess like Tusk, Broken English does work and has it's share of great moments. (I can't compare it to the Ronstant album as, having some taste and dignity, I've never heard it.) Chief among those moments are the title cut, which opens the album, and it's closer, the trenchant "Why d'Ya Do It?" The title track is a nice piece of chilly atmosphere ala Bowie circa his Berlin era warmed up by Faithfull's all too human vocals. "Why d'Ya Do It?" is the real stunner though, one of the best spurned lover songs ever. Over a repeating slinky riff, Faithfull sings frank (and, frankly, filthy) lyrics about a relationship gone very sour made all the more effective by the profanity strewn throughout. Lines like "Why'd ya do it, she said, why'd you spit on my snatch?/Are we out of love now or is this just a bad patch?" are absolutely gut-wrenching. Give Faithfull some credit for doing this sort of thing when Liz Phair was still tooling around on her big wheel. As for all the songs in between those two peaks, they're all solid to good if a bit on the adult-contemporary side though Faithfull's voice and the new wave leanings of the arrangements keep things from getting too smooth. (I know the version of "Working Class Here" on here is much celebrated but honestly its no better than Tin Machine's.) All the songs though convey the feeling that Faithful has seen it all and she's done taking shit from anyone, including you. It's been a pleasure being told off by you, Ms Faithfull. Thank you very much.
Price paid: $4 Rating: 100%

Nick Heyward North of a Miracle
The Rock Snob's Dictionary called the debut solo offering from ex-Haircut 100 frontman Nick Heyward a "lost masterpiece of jangle-pop." After listening to said album, I can't help but think the authors were being facetious. North of a Miracle isn't a masterpiece by anyone's standards nor is it exactly jangle pop. It is, however, an affable bit of pseudo-sophisticated fluff, something that might perk up the ears of your average Britpop fan. The album's best moments evoke what a much slicker, more trival Go-Betweens might sound like. Its lesser songs are occasionally overblown but mostly pleasantly vapid though none are as puerile (or as catchy) as "Love Plus One." It's not exactly the stuff of legend but if you like your pop dainty and inconsequential it might be worth a listen.
Price paid: $3 Rating: 67%

Lou Reed Berlin
Sometimes said to be the most depressing album ever made. I don't know about that but I definitely wouldn't play it at parties.
Price paid: $4 Rating: 75%

Golliwogs Pre-Creedence
As you might have guessed from the title, the Golliwogs was the moniker of Creedence Clearwater Revival before they changed their name for their debut album. In this embryonic stage the group released 7 45s all of which are collected here. Sequenced chronologically, it's a treat to hear the band evolve. Early cuts are C+ garage rock typically aping the popular styles of the time. "Brown Eyed Girl" is not the Van Morrision tune but is so derivative of Them's "Gloria" they might as well have given him a writing credit anyway. There are some good tunes from this stage though like the much comped "Fight Fire" and the bluesy "You Can't Be True," which wouldn't sound out of place on first Pretty Things LP. By the end of the LP the classic Creedence sound is pretty much in place with the final two A-sides, "Walking on the Water" and "Porterville," winding up on CCR's debut. "Porterville" is the same version as the one on the debut but "Walking on the Water" was rerecorded and the version here is more of a garage stomper than the LP version. I wouldn't say it's superior to the album version but hearing it in its more primitive form definitely brought a smile to my face. I can't recommend the Golliwogs LP across the board but Creedence fans will probably find this more satisfying than Centerfield.
Price paid: $5 Rating: 80%

The Rubinoos s/t
In my post from a few weeks ago about Avril Lavigne's theft of their signature tune I called the Rubinoos "a band that in some ways, for better and worse, epitomized the power pop movement of the late 70s." Not to pat myself on the back, that's pretty on the nose. The Rubinoos' debut long player is almost relentlessly upbeat with really sappy teeny-bop boy-meets-girl lyrics for almost every cut. Personally, I prefer my pop with a little pathos. I was with them for the first couple of songs, including their cover of "I Think We're Alone Now" (about 10 years before Tiffany) and the buoyant blue-eyed soul original "Hard to Get," but by the time they around to their goofy cover of the Cadallics' "Peek-A-Boo" I was pretty much done. There are some excellent bands who are generally recognized as power pop of whom I'm quite fond mainly because they either transcend the genre's limitations (i.e. Big Star, The dBs, Tommy Keene) or their songwriting prowess is so strong that the efficacy of their pop asipirations is undeniable (i.e The Records, The Nerves, Cheap Trick). The Rubinoos, however, don't have the ambitons of the former or the chops of the latter. This LP has the effect of eating an entire meal of cotton candy. It's a tasty treat for the first couple of bites but by the end you'll have a toothache. Not to mention the lack of nutritional value.
Price paid: $2 Rating: 100% (but don't pay more than 2 bucks, seriously)

Paleontology for Dullards: A Consumer's Guide

This feature is for you, the consumer, to use when rummaging through used LP bins. Some of you may find a record by an artist with whom you are unfamiliar and think "I've heard of these guys. Are they any good?" or "How do I know this isn't their one dud album and a terrible entry point to their body of work?" or, most importantly, "Is this really worth $3.99?" This guide is for you, least your home become filled with nonessential vinyl and your significant other begins giving you the evil eye whenever that damn Radio Shack commercial comes on. Not only will I review a plethora of used LPs amassed from many a used bin but I will assign them actual cash value. In other words, you, the consumer, may rummage with confidence knowing full well whether or not the piece of vinyl in your hand is worth the same as a value meal at Arby's.

Ratings are based on the percentage of the authentic value of an LP in ratio to what I actually paid for it. For example, if I paid $5 for an LP but it's only worth $4 the LP will receive a rating of 80%. If I paid $3 and the LP is worth $1 the rating is 33.3% and so on. Please note: scarcity is a factor in determining value. Black Sabbath LPs are much easier to find than Go-Betweens LP so while they both groups may be of equal musical value the rating of the latter will be inherently higher. This is not snobbery, it is simply the economic principle that mass production degrades value. You should never pay more than $2 for a Buckingham/Nicks-era Fleetwood Mac LP (if it's Tusk). Also note: when records receive maximum ratings of 100% it is not necessarily the top dollar amount you might want to pay for that particular LP. You may want to pay more if you wish. A top-of-the-food-chain, life-affirming album for which I happened to pay $7 may be worth picking up for $8. Or even $15 or $20. Or not.

Feedback on ratings will likely be erroneous but is welcome and will amuse me. And finally, no, I will not tell you where I found these LPs. Frankly, if you're blowing up my spot and finding all the bargains, this feature will become expendable. And we couldn't have that.

(Ed. Note: this feature was inspired by "$2.99 Wax Necessities" by Tim Midgett (formerly of the excellent Silkworm, currently of the similarly excellent Bottomless Pit and well respected rock crit) wherein Mr Midgett gave you a host of LPs worth purchasing for $2.99. I would link this but it seems to have disappeared from the world of the Internet. Nonetheless, I tip my hat to Mr Midgett and note that while his writing may have the edge in insight and general scribe skills I make up for it in hubris.)


Antietam Burgoo and Everywhere Outside
Antietam was a band that, for one reason or another, I just never got into. This is despite the fact that they've been associated with some bands I absolutely adore (Yo La Tengo, Eleventh Dream Day) and that I quite enjoyed the album they recorded as the Babylon Dance Band (a prior early 80s incarnation that recorded a reunion album for Matador in the early 90s). For whatever reason, they were on my radar but I never made the plunge into their recorded work. So when I saw a few of their albums in a used bin for a couple of bucks each I thought it a good an excuse as any to explore their repertoire. What's the verdict? They aint bad but to my ears these albums are far from transcendent masterworks. Tara Key certainly has some significant chops as a guitarist but as a singer she isn't much. I actually much prefer Babylon Dance Band singer Chip Nold's David Thomas-like bleatings. To my mind these albums recall Yo La Tengo's very early work (read: Ride the Tiger) before they found their voice. There is some worthwhile stuff here and perhaps repeated listenings will reveal why Antietam were revered by the early 90s indie rock intelligentsia but in my book they don't quite scream out "essential purchase."
Price paid: Burgoo $6 Everywhere Outside $5 Rating: 50% and 60% respectively

The Monroes s/t
The Monroes are best known for their song "What Do All the People Know?" a somewhat obscure but insanely catchy slice of new wave bliss that surely rates amongst the top songs of the era. I picked up this 5-song mini-LP figured that if the 4 other songs were half as good as their most famous cut it would be a worthwhile purchase. No dice. The other songs are only remarkable for being unremarkable: simple, utterly disposable pop-rock confections with new wave overtones, probably most comparable to bands like the Hooters or the J, Geils Band except those bands' songs tended to have hooks. Still, "What Do All the People Know?" is a song of such eminence is nearly makes this worth owning. The LP tends to be somewhat pricey because of it's rarity but realistically is only worth the green light if you find it for the price of a 45.
Price paid: $8 Rating: 37.5%

The Embarrassment God Help Us
The Embarrassment were truly of the finest bands to ever walk God's earth. You probably knew that already. Or maybe you didn't. In any case, the records the Wichita, KS four-piece made during their late 70s/early 80s heyday (which, coincidentally, were collected in near entirety in an indispensable double CD collection of the same name) were idiosyncratic indie-punk of the highest order. (I hesitate to use the term "post-punk" for fear that the less enlightened among you might mistake them for Gang-of-Four-alikes.) The sound they made during that time was just as unique and individual as that of The Fall or Mission of Burma's during the same era, similarly jagged and off-kilter if somewhat less concerned with ear drum splitting. Like with many of America's musical national treasures, the public was indifferent and the group split with drummer Brent Giessmann joining the Del Fuegoes and guitarist Bill Goffrier making many wonderful records with Big Dipper. Then, for whatever reason, the group reunited in 1990 to make God Help Us, their first legitimate full length. Does it recreate the glory of their golden days? Well... almost but the Embos at 75% their standard are still better than most bands on their best day. This album, while not as essential as their prime work, is at least as enjoyable as Goffrier's records with Big Dipper, which is to say that it's a delight. Several songs date from the group's prior incarnation though most of these seem to have been unreleased at the time. A notable exception is a totally unnecessary rerecording of their first single "Sex Drive" here in truncated and significantly glossier form. Maybe they thought they could score a Dead Milkmen-esque college radio hit. Aside from that very minor blemish God Help Us is first rate with cuts like "Horror of the Fire" blowing away other then-ubiquitous jangle and self-consciously "quirky" tripe on every perceivable level. But what else would you expect from a national treasure?
Price paid: $2 Rating: 100%


The Kinks The Great Lost Kinks Album
This was quite a find. In 1973 Reprise issued this LP shorty after the Kinks had ended their contact with the label and signed with RCA, probably to capitalize on the success of the previous year's The Kink Kronikles collection. From what I can tell it mainly consists of outtakes from The Kinks are the Village Green Preservation Society (indeed a large chunk of the songs on this LP are now available on the Village Green 3-CD set from Sanctuary) though a few seem to be from the Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire) sessions or come from some single-only releases. Most of these cuts are now included as CD bonus tracks for the respective album sessions that birthed them or have been made available elsewhere. (The brilliant "I'm Not Like Everybody Else" in particular now seems to be on every Kinks compilation currently commercially available). However, a few remain exclusive to this comp which is too bad as it's never been officially reissued although it has been bootlegged several times over. If it doesn't quite live up to it's title it's only because "greatness" is relative and the Kinks were a band who released some of the finest rock records ever. This collection is no Face to Face but it might be as good as or better than Muswell Hillbillies. It's mainly genteel music hall-influenced tunes not unlike the material on Village Green or Arthur and if it's not quite as strong it's still certainly worthwhile with the "Lincoln County" B-side "There's No Life Without Love" and "Where Did My Spring Go?" being particularly excellent and "When I Turn Off the Living Room Light" showcasing Ray Davies' snarky yet playful sense of humor. Any Kinks fan who happens upon this should do the right thing. One day I'm going to break down and buy some of the albums the Kinks recorded for Arista during their arena-rock era that constantly call out to me from the used bins of the world. How bad can they be? Er, perhaps I'll let you know in a future installment.
Price paid: $5 Rating: 100%

Robyn Hitchcock I Often Dream of Trains
I Often Dream of Trains is often cited as Robyn Hitchock's return to form after the by all accounts disastrous Groovy Decay and some consider it the best album of his post-Soft Boys career. In all honestly, I found this solo vocals/acoustic guitar/piano platter to be somewhat lackluster and flat especially when compared to his Soft Boys work and even the stuff he did later in the decade with the Egyptians backing him up. However, it's still Hitchcock, a songwriter of extreme talent, so for a few bucks it's worth your time but in my opinion his much more easily available major label discs from the late 80s are probably better listens and shouldn't run you more than a couple of bucks a pop. Of course, I'm writing this under the assumption that you already own the Soft Boys' Underwater Moonlight and if you don't then why they hell are you reading this?
Price paid: $8 Rating: 62.5%

O-Positive Only Breathing EP
Bland, unengaging college pop pap. Recalls R.E.M. if they had never heard a punk record thus anticipating 90s "adult" alt rock pablum like Toad the Wet Sprocket, Hootie, et al. Why did I buy this? Oh, because it came out of Chuck Warner's Throbbing Lobster label. Chuck, you've done a lot for the cause over the years, more than most people, but this one was a mistake. That's okay though. That Homosexuals compilation more than made up for it.
Price paid: $3 Rating: 16.7%

Devo Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo!!
Hey, this has Side 1 labels on both sides of the disc. Is this some impossibly rare pressing variation? Can I sell it and consider retirement? As for the the music, it's Devo's first album. It was produced by Eno. It's awesome. No, "Whip It" isn't on this one.
Price paid: $5 Rating: 100%

Spherical Objects Further Ellipses
I bought this thinking it was the first Spherical Objects first album Past and Parcel. That's what the cover read, at least. I get home and pulled out the disc to find that what was actually encased inside the sleeve was their third album Further Ellipses. Oh, the perils of record collecting!! (Or, more accurately, the perils of being too stupid check what you buy before purchasing it.) I thought I would check these guys out after reading SST employee Joe Carducci's book "Rock and the Pop Narcotic" wherein he said of the Spherical Objects: "you had to be a really good to be an English band in the late 70s and get ignored by (USA) anglophiles." (Joe didn't think much of the Jam, as you might suspect.) Here the band is clunky and amateurish if relatively ambitious (check out that sax on the opening cut!) with an appallingly atonal singer in Steve Solamar. All of this is part of their charm, natch. The goofy falsetto Solamar employs during the chorus of "Don't Worry About Me" in particular is sure to bring smiles to faces. Spherical Objects my not be the best group the British DIY movement produced but from what I hear on this platter, they were worthy enough. Notable for being one of the few UK DIY groups to release (several!!) LPs rather than 7"s or cassettes. Anyone have a copy of Past and Parcel encased in a Further Elipses sleeve they want to send me?
Price paid: $5 Rating: 80%