MUSTARD RELICS

The Underlings – Edgy CD

admin — Thu, 10 May 2012 21:15:23 +0000

My old bro and bandmate Ed came through big time with this one…perfect timing as I got the Walking Dead Compendium (issues 1-48 of the comic book) on the same day. My needs were definitely satisfied. This, the newest release from Eugene Oregon’s The Underlings, as Mork from Ork would say, is THE SHAZBOT! I listened to it twice in one sitting and could not find a bad moment in it. It’s all over the place with this one, they hardly leave a genre unturned…rock, hard rock, garage, punk, hardcore and maybe even a little power pop. I had Ed do a little write up for me to give you the band in the band’s own words…

The Underlings have been operating with the current line-up since late 2006. I met Bryant at work and Dave responded to a craigslist ad I posted for a bass player influenced by Television / Minutmen. Bryant was in a bunch of Seattle-area bands including Hai Karate and the Putters and other bands in Ellensberg before that. Dave was in a hardcore band in Memphis back in the 1980s. I’ve been in a few bands, including Garden Weasel and my own Ed Cole and the College Girls of Tora Bora, which was a very self-centered songwriter-type band, but I was determined to make a real BAND band when I set about starting the Underlings. I appreciate the steady nature of the Underlings’ rhythm section dudes. We seldom miss a gig, we practice weekly most of the time and we try to have a good work ethic about what we do. I envision us punching in every time we play a show. We are in it for music, friends and food. We all dig MC5, New York Dolls, Hendrix, X and the Wipers and 70s rock as well as metal and punk and garage, but we really are not any of those kinds of music – I always think we are just plain old Rock and Roll with Punk leanings. We recorded this album – “Edgy” – on tape at a legendary Portland studio called Smegma. The engineer is Mike Lastra (assisted by Mark Ellsworth). Mike has a long history of recorded music in Portland – many of the best groups ever, such as Poison Idea, Turbonegro and the Need as well as our bros the Pass Out Kings all have recorded there. The picture on the center fold of the CD is of the St. Johns Bridge, which is what we viewed out the window while we were recording. After we recorded and mixed our CD, we played a ton of gigs, saved all of the proceeds and released the CD with no fuss and no official label or BS. I think the funnest thing about making a CD – or any band endeavor – is that it is really fun to actually finish something you start, especially if you are working as a team, and I think that really happened this time around. We intend to keep gigging, even though I recently moved to Portland and the other members live 2 hours away in Eugene. We have upcoming gigs at Slabtown in Portland on June 16 and then we are playing again at our favorite Eugene bar Luckeys on June 22. We haven’t booked any other gigs lately, but stay tuned to Underlingsrockandroll.com for shows and news and shit. If people want to download our music and give us $$$ please check out theunderlings.bandcamp.com . We will soon have our physical CD for sale at cdbaby.com/Artist/TheUnderlings PEACE.

Seriously, if you are some kind of purist and can only handle a genre or two, this is bound to have at least something to satisfy that for you. I think they’ve improved upon their previous CD Operational Excellence but I really liked that CD too. As I said before these guys are no bullshit green amateurs to creating music and there is a sophisticated tightness through out. They are fucking around or dabbling, this is the real deal, Northwest Rock and Roll. Go and get this thing, you will not be disappointed. I had a hard time picking tunes for your sampling pleasure, they are all good in their own way so here’s just the first three tunes as they appear on the CD (I’m going to go listen to it again)…

Not Like You

Speedway

Edgy

Comments?

admin — Thu, 10 May 2012 01:29:57 +0000

Got several comments from my regulars in tribute to MCA, but as it is sometimes , it has been quiet around here. It has come to my attention though that there are a few guys/gals I know that read/listen to what’s going on here (God knows why), but are just silent partners, so to speak. In the last 4 1/2 years the Relics has amassed 236119 unique visitors (granted, half of those were spammers and spam bots). So, once again I am pathetically pleading with you, drop me a comment, tell me I suck, tell me you have a foot fetish. Now is the time, I’d like 20 comments on this one.

Made the local paper again through work. Represented are 4 of the 6 XYs in a place dominated by XXs (the guy on the far right is the secretary’s wife, so he doesn’t count). In an XY world it, it doesn’t bother me to have an XX workplace, it just gets interesting and confusing at the same time.

Was in my car rolling a cigarette in front of the local convenience store. This Mom brings out pop (that’s soda for people in the midwest) to her kids who have been waiting patiently in the car. One of ‘em says he wanted diet pop so the Mom says, “you’re gonna take what you got or your not gonna get anything at all.” Wiser words have not been said by philosophers since the time of Socrates.

A while back I expressed my liking in a post for a certain zombie soap opera entitled the Walking Dead. I’ve watched it from the beginning and haven’t missed an episode. And then one of the guys who stops by here once in a while, Nazz, mentioned that the show was nothing compared to the comic book. Well of course, no show/movie ever lives up to the book, but a comic book. So, trusting his opinion, you can read it at Bleedin’ Out (I do all the time), I searched high and low for this fabled comic book. Well with the TV series, most of the comic books are pretty spendy so I thought my best bet was to get the Compendium which compiles the 1sr 48 issues. The best price I could find for this 5 pound 1000 page monster was used for $30 and I am a cheap broke bastard. Finally gave in though, the new show doesn’t start until next Fall so WTF and FTW. Well sure as shit Nazz was right as rain, the comic shreds. The art is gory and well done, and the story is more brutal than the show. I don’t want to blow it for you in case you take my word for it, but there’s tons more people and tons more killing, a real contradiction to the pacifist in me. Finished that bad boy off in a few days, a now the Compendium 2 isn’t due out until next Fall and who knows how long I’ll have to wait for a “cheap” used copy to turn up. Check it out.

Can’t have a post without music, it just doesn’t fly with me, and besides you have to have something to comment on besides my inanity. This tune was originally by the legendary early 80s Swedish hardcore band Unter Den Linden, you can find the original at my buddy Peter’s Killed By Death blog and covered by Pilleemandjoonks (PDJ), who share at least one member (Bjorn, where I got the tune) with UDL. This is live from 2005…

Pilleemandjoonks – Little boys

…a translation of the lyrics so’s you don’t think it’s some kind of pederast song,

I’m tired of living like a bomb
I want to detonate before theirs
I’m tired so tired
And I longing for the D-day
In one thousand and one night we will explode
You ain’t got a chance
We are four billions of bombs
And you are demolished
In one thousand and one night we going to lead a hell of a life
Try to sleep……
Sleep well!
Never trust a bomb
Was it not fireworks you wanted?
Little Boys, Fat Boys !

COMING SOON: The Underlings new CD review in all it’s glory.

RIP Adam MCA Yauch

admin — Sat, 05 May 2012 00:56:50 +0000

Thanx for 30+ years of tearing shit up, you will be missed.

Disguised As Birds – Black Circles CD EP

admin — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 00:27:33 +0000

Brand spanking new stuff up for review again and this is the fourth release I’ve done from the almighty Phratry Records. We share a kinship as we are both midwest outfits, but that’s such a vague and broad location, as the north midwest is worlds a part from where I’m at in the mid-midwest. This time we have a band that goes by the name of Disguised as Birds, a name I really dig, thoughtful and interesting you know what I mean? It’s refreshing to hear a band in the here and now play good old fashioned no bullshit rock and roll. Not young people regurgitating something from days gone by and not senior citizens trying to recapture a moment 40 years past, this is good clean, fresh rock and roll, without the distraction of things like heavy metal, punk, hardcore, glam or any other sub-genre you can think of. There’s a lot of leeway within that solid rock and roll base, and DBB explore that world quite well with a mixture of harder and softer tunes. Once again a band that’s no stranger to their instruments, they obviously didn’t just pick them up the other day. Phratry hasn’t let me down yet. Here’s the press release I got:

DISGUISED AS BIRDS was born in 2004 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Their
new double EP is the band’s fourth release and the thirty-first from
Phratry Records (Cincinnati, Ohio). It is available as an 8-song
vinyl record with a 10-song download. It features the brand-new
“Black Circles” EP as well as a re-release of the 2009 “New Demons”
EP.
RECOMMENDED IF YOU LIKE: Shiner, Jawbox, Fugazi, Thin Lizzy.
Although the band possesses a dreamy, shimmering quality, Disguised
As Birds have built their sound on a foundation of explosively heavy
rock with frequent comparisons to Shiner, Regulator Watts, Jawbox,
Shipping News and Juno. And despite their artsy leanings, Disguised
As Birds unquestionably has the vibe of a classic rock band. In
spirit, if not in incessant riffing, they pack a great deal of soul
into every measure of every tune. The band has been touring off and
on throughout the MidWest for years. Influenced by all things rock
and roll, art, and the often cold and bleak environment in which they
live, this is a band that can pummel, sprint and soar.
PRESS QUOTES
“pledging allegiance to ’90s noise rock and post-punk”
– The Onion AV Club
“this Milwaukee-based group’s sound is aggressive while lyrically
introspective; a truly difficult musical feat to master.”
– Music Examiner
STREAM: http://disguisedasbirds.bandcamp.com
MORE INFO AND VIDEO

http://phratryrecords.com/bands/detail/disguised_as_birds

CONTACT
Jerry Dirr, Phratry Records: press@phratryrecords.com
PHRATRY RECORDS, LLC
P.O. Box 14267 : Cincinnati, Ohio 45250
www.phratryrecords.com : phratry@phratryrecords.com
distributed by STICKFIGURE
P.O. Box 55462 : Atlanta, GA 30308
www.stickfiguredistro.com : info@stickfiguredistro.com

I’d like to post all the tunes as this thing rocks from beginning to end but that leaves yall without a mystery and some kind of motivation to go out and get this bad boy. The first song I have up for you, for some reason, upon first listen, the thing that came to mind was the band New Model Army…maybe it’s the vocals…(there’s even an old U2 vibe on some of the tunes, but if you’re not a U2 fan don’t let that distract you, give these guys a listen)…

Black Circles

Glad Hands

The promo copy I got just has the “Black Circles” EP but you can get that and their “New Demons” EP from 2009. together on one 12″…my favorite tune from that older EP…

Cigarette Ghost

A live tune from a very underpopulated club (what happens around here unless you can play country or 80′s rock covers)…

Motocaster – The Buddha 7″

admin — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 15:52:02 +0000

I was talking to an old buddy of mine the other day and it really hit me how sophisticated he is spirtually. Not a complicated kind of sophistication or a dogmatic kind of organized religion type of thing, more of connection to the world around him. I’ve struggled with that all my life, a feeling of disconnectedness. As I’ve gotten older I think things make more sense and I’ve found my niche, but as Charles Manson said, “maybe I haven’t done enough”. I have this uneasy feeling about where I stand in the world and with the world being what it is maybe I don’t want any part of it. I go through the motions with my rituals for experiencing the sacred, but sometimes, the temple comes crashing down. Lots of little things become big things and then I end up despising the human race of which I am inescapably a part of. What can bring me back down to earth is thoughts of the almost infinite vastness of the universe, and this world is just a speck. And on this planet of over 6 billion people I, and everyone else individually, are just specks on that speck. What goes on is really meaningless, unless I’m dead, I will still get up in the morning, inhale and exhale, and go on about my day. Mustard Relics is my sanity, my ritual, my way of feeling connected.

The Addams Family, one of my all time favorite shows as a kid…had a huge crush on Morticia Addams (Carolyn Jones who was married to that idiot Aaron Spelling back in the 50′s). About the time that the show was wrapping up in ’66, one of the greatest songs ever written came out. The Stones did not fuck around when they wrote this one…
The Rolling Stones – Paint It Black (Ready Steady Go – May 27, 1966)
…and sure as shit everybody and his brother has covered it. Not sure if anyone ever came close to the original and some versions really suck balls, but these guys did something insane with it…
The Animals – Paint It Black
…this live version would have been incredible to see as so many of the acts at the Monterey Pop Festival would have been…
Eric Burdon and the Animals – Paint It Black (Monterey 1967)
…Eric Burdon must have really loved the tune, this is a 14 minute jam done with WAR…
Eric Burdon and War – Paint It Black
…the definitive female punk rock version, maybe my favorite…
The Avengers – Paint It Black
…the Las Vegas version…
Chris Farlowe- Paint It Black
…in French…
Marie Laforet – Paint It Black
…in Italian (very beautiful)…
Caterina Caselli – Paint it Black
…what do you want, I like Ministry ever since they had Gibby from the Butthole Surfers do a song, they do good putting their spin on the tune…
Ministry – Paint It Black
…I’m not a Marilyn Manson fan, but this is interesting (from “Repo the Genetic Opera”, a flick I wanted to see but the wife vetoed)…
Marilyn Manson – Paint It Black
…you go Blackie Lawless…
W.A.S.P. – Paint it Black

From 1993, outta Raliegh, NC where my boy is living, the first release from this short lived, under appreciated band. The first tune just blows me away, a perfect song from begining to end, but unfortunately that’s it. The second one is a karaoke cover, too much like the original to be interesting and the third is a free love jam that is as uninteresting as the cover…a waste of vinyl really. But that first tune, DAMN!

The Buddha

Green Tambourine

Motorolla Greens

If you can try to find their only full length “Stay Loaded” it’s supposed to be more of the kickass variety of sameness. Couldn’t find that for download when I did a quick search, but for some related stuff, including this 7″ check out Wilfully Obscure. Here’s the vid for the tune off the “Stay Loaded” LP (they were big enough to have made the MTV cut…