Jim Shepard & Charles Cicirella 'The Dispossessed'

This entire session was recorded as you hear it - no planning or disgusting egos intervening. I came in from Cleveland, Jim already had music laid down (except for typewriter, acoustic guitar, violin, and aerosol can which were all laid down live and this includes dead traffic you hear throughout recording). I listened through headphones while reading poetry that in a large part was written either that day or previous afternoon. This CD is released as an honest & quite sublime testament to Jim's diverse artistic nature/temperament & how when the chemistry is good & stinking, like an over satiated sun, anything can and does occur. Jim and I were and still very much are caterpillar astronauts and I'll miss being his friend and foil FOREVER… ONWARD FORWARD INFINITE
Charles Eric Cicirella

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Tree Of Snakes 'Beheaded' + "I Am A Lion"

'nuf said! (except that this file also includes th four songs from th "i am a lion" 45!)

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Frostiva 'Ochnomos'

my first encounter with frostiva was when they were already broken up but some of 'em were called rabbit and they got a song on an alive comp, so forgive me if i completely missed th boat. this disc knows what it's doing and clocks in at th perfect 26 minutes, tho' with six songs ya gotta wonder what th ladies are doin' rilly, i mean 15 songs/26 mins, sure, one song/26 mins, sure, but six/26? hm. well i can tell ya what they're doin' in fact is darkly jammin' around with some smooth and sinister harold faltermeyer synths they hint at with th first tune ("la magia verde") but there they are knee-deep in track three ("zero hour") after begging ya to notice in track two ("paramount impostor"). kind of a siouxsie-without-a-budgie vibe in some ways, or a magneta-lane-without-th-pop-songcraft. fourth tune ("eros") is straight in with a throwing muses approximation that almost immediately gives way to something that coulda been on th fourth or fifth lush lp. certainly a post-shoegaze vibe that carries over into th fifth track ("pathos") but th kind of shoegaze vibe that's aware that lush covered zounds on a single, and isn't afeared of borderline prog/math arrangements and that kristen hersh warble. this sounds more cle that col's even down to th post-industrialisms (lestat, i mean) of th final number ("suspiria" - complete with those goblin synth-swathes). more than anything tho' i'm thinking they were a VERY indie heartthrobs which makes sense i guess i mean they shoulda had a tune in th end credits of th l-word too. i think they're pretty much back together or at least were as behind you with knives (possibly th best kitchen reference band name ever).

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Human Boys

human boys have a lot in common with ipps for sounding exactly dick like them: they play shows slim-to-no times a year; their tapes, tho' killer, pale extremely seriously in th face of those rare live shows; and they're in th tippity-topmost percentile of insanely great bands to ever aimlessly wander col's streets. th first of th two cassettes here compiled finds h.b. in a similar setup across th tracks, with one of 'em on drums, one of 'em on vocals (predominantly positively SPAT across whatever room they were in), and one' of em (i should mention there's only two of 'em) on grinding, distorted keyboards; th second tape obfuscates this arrangement (if indeed it's employed) with jackhammered samples and an even-more boombox-esque recording quality, but weaving thru th bilge is some of th most aggressively inventive aand necessary musick this side of th suicide, throbbing gristle, & this heat records that it belongs in league with.

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Superstar Rookie // Early Empire

roughly 150,000 years ago i was talking to kevin from 84 nash and he mentioned that they (of consistent drummer woes up to that time) were almost positive they were gonna hire this dude dan i'd never met and would i like to go "check out" his band even though he played guitar in it? yeah, sure, ok, sez i, so we go to th then-newly-reopened northberg tavern (aka basement of donato's) and see superstar rookie play. i left afterward pretty jazzed aboot it cuz they were doing a sort of jawbreaker thing that was a lotta fun and (i know it seems impossible to believe) no one else was mining th same territory, so (for that as well as myriad musical reasons) it seemed damned fresh. after meeting those dudes my old band (don't ask) played with them many a time and they at one point dragged me to this funky, failing bar/grill they said they were gonna turn into a rock club by badgering th weirdo old dude there who would nuke you a hotdog for 75¢ (which they did, that place is our beloved bobo) and then of course after awhile they broke up like everybody does. dan (bandman) did indeed play with and eventually quit 84 nash and started the handshake and is now back drumming in kyle sowashes and for awhile a coupla th other rookie guys (travis & cop) had a band called early empire (with another handshake guy - joel walter, who also plays with kyle sowash now, but in his other band, animal cubes - as it happens), whose ep i am so nice as to include in this file here available as well. listening to th 'problem with words' disc after digging it out from oblivion a few months ago, i was pleased as PUNCH to note how well it's holdin' up. i ended up playing it three times at th bar that nite and no one bitched.

early empire are maybe a bit more "serious" - with some uncomfortable nods (probably inadvertent) toward th crummy butt-rock side of 'emotion' so prevalent in th late '90s (and still) - but it's good to hear th dudes let go on some of th mid-song passages and fast bits. their love for intertwine-y treepeople guitar figures really shines on "january one" - probably th most rookie-like of th songs on their disc - and their abiility to write sunny day-style stuff without completely ripping them off quite maybe inspired a little jealousy from th rookie's recordist jon chinn. (file includes th aforementioned 'the problem with words' cd & early empire ep - 'resolutions and a gun' - as well as superstar rookie's way-great debut 45 on diaphragm.)

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16 Bitch Pile-Up

sarah bernat was in town last last wknd (at least) & talkin' to her briefly at th bar reminded me that i'd found a few instances of their tapes &c being available to dl but hadn't mentioned that on this here blarg yet. as with all (sure) groops that get lumped in with their peers, 16 bitch are about as different from sword heaven as they are from rc mob, but their recordings are of such a consistently high quality that i wouldn't hesitate to mention them in th same breath with not only s.h. but mb, pengo, sightings, &c. if you actually downloaded th magician killer record (if not well DO IT NOW), dug it, & haven't heard these ladies, fucking pucker up. they released appr. 7000 records; here's four. thanks to not noise music and the static fanatic for these.

b.f.f.
lord hall
make like a fetus and abort (with mike shiflet)
ADAD

Tom Foolery & The Mistakes

before there was them kyle sowashes there was tom foolery and the mistakes and if you like th latter you'll like th former and fer shirley vice-a versa. once i seen em open for duvall in dayton. like you care.

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The Bygones 'Circles'

the bygones' first proper album-length release here, and tho' i prefer th two sessions prior (one released on cdr with a sleeve photo depicting much desk clutter and milwaukee's best and th other - th debut of "burgundy eyes" - simply a lost demo; i have since lost my copies of both of these), that doesn't mean this isn't a fuckin spectacular disc. every song on here is a classic and if anybody gave two sh*ts aboot th first wallflowers record i'd say this one deserves to be right up there alongside it. as it is, it is - but in th $3 bin (great things come from there). sigh.

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Dirty Mouth

dirty mouth is in a lotta ways easily th best band in col's right now (even if it's simply because i can't think of one other band that's actually any fun*). their songs are all super good, they don't get bogged down in their politics, and they even have a good time scorching th shit out of a nirvana cover. all you Serious Punx™ take note: this is how it's done.

new demo

first demo for free on bandcamp

*except hookers made out of cocaine, who are also fucking amazing.

Gut Piston 45

same time i grabbed th recently-posted gut piston demo from '92 i got this 45 on eardrop from '95 - kind of a banner year in col's rock'n'scuzz and this here seven-incher belongs right up there on th short list of th era's TOP HITZ.

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The Embarrassment Vinyl & Tapes

well mebbe this'll be aboot as far-out - distance-wise - as we'll ever get here at mtf, but who knows. we can of course do WHATEVER WE WANT. but in any case for a whole messa reasons an embos post isn't th most insane thing for a mostly-col's, ohio blog: they was good friends (and after-th-fact labelmates) with our own great plains, a coupla th songs on their 'retrospective' cassette were taped in oh (at mr. brown's and the jockey club, tho' i've heard some o' that liner info is errant), and th ass ponys, bein' giganto fans, even covered their way-perfect "two week vacation" (a song that inspired me to declare th embos my numero uno fave-rave heroes even tho' it was YEARS before i even managed to track down another track. erm.), for three. plusly nobody ever seems to look at our sister-(non-oh)-blog terminal '75 anyhow, so i figure in th interest of anyone at all seein' this i oughta put it here.

lest ye think me/us completely without purpose allow me to explain th very grand purposefulality of this here post. so, despite th fact that th embos are TH BEST BAND OF EVERTIMES, their recorded history has been documented, actually. (i know. quelle surprise!) BUT, this documentation (thankful as i am for it) hasn't been without its flaws. chief among these over/undersights is th fact that their big ol' double-disc history lesson ('heyday'), apart from being allowed to lapse out of print (shame!), was saddled with th crispest, leanest, wackiest remixing/remastering ever to grace th hallowed halls of my late and so sorely not-missed old portable cd player. but since th first disc of that set is made up basically of 94.3% of th material off their originally-released-on-vinyl output, here i've made a file of those original needle-drops*. however, where they inserted th KILLER "two cars" (also available on th 'retro' tape, wait for it) i've included instead th never-ever available otherwise studio version of "pushin' too hard" from th first 'battle of the garages' comp.

second file here is my original transfer of th 'retrospective' cassette, plus "sound of wasps" directly from th subpop 7 cassette. lotsa these tunes ended up on 'heyday' (and some were even these versions. i think.), but in my not-so-humble opinion this one squash them like grape. you know.

should th citizens of yon blogosphere rattle their prison chains loudly enough (and th embos camp don' protest) perhaps i could be conned into posting some of th next-level rarities i have around and/or a smattering of live sets (and even mebbe disc two of 'heyday' and th 'blister pop' comp).

vinyl
tapes

*first single ripped from 2011 test press edition (small hole) reissue on last laugh; 'embarrassment ep' ripped from first side of 1987 issue 'embarrassment lp'.

UPDATE!! from mr. adam smith of columbus discount recording and many fab combos (necropolis, unholy 2) around these parts comes - esp for an embos geek of my, uh, high order - nothing short of a total revelation via donewaiting:

I did the restoration work on the master tapes for the sex drive reissue that came out on last laugh. I'm currently doing the restoration on the master for the S/T ep. The masters for these records sound fantastic. Tons of bass. So, that got me thinking about the bad sound quality on the heyday stuff, the "crispest, leanest, wackiest remixing/remastering ever to grace th hallowed halls of my late and so sorely not-missed old portable cd player" You're totally right, that stuff sounds like garbage. The difference between the half track masters and the heyday cd is just too drastic for a bad mastering job to make sense. I've got to think that no mastering engineer in his right mind would mess up a track that bad. So, my current hypothesis on the bad master on heyday is that it wasn't a bad master at all, instead, the master tape to digital transfer was done incorrectly. All of the embos masters that were done at Fort Apache, even the live in studio stuff, was mixed through a Dolby A noise reduction unit. Those Dolby A units were about $2000 per stereo unit in their day, so they aren't all that easy to come by now. It took me a couple of weeks to track one down to do the Sex Drive job. I suspect that when the transfers from the master tapes were done for heyday, they weren't decoded using a Dolby A unit, instead they were just put on a 1/4" tape deck and run into whatever digital unit the transfer guy had. To experiment, I threw the S/T E.P. masters on my MCI 1/4" deck, set it up to the tones on the tape and didn't decode the playback w/ Dolby A. Bam!, all thin and crispy. Dolby A in, a beautiful mix that kinda sounds like a Thin Lizzy record.

so there ya have it, a doublemajor mystery solved!!

them guys boardin' again?

thought i'd better get a photo of this rad mark heintzman reish on assault skates before i wear th ohio completely off th ketchup bottle. mark won th nsa amateur championship held at th ohio state fair th year i moved back here (still th only contest i've ever attended). they even had it on th news (with "you're beat" by m.o.d. playing in th background! who pulled that one off??). his part in th g&s vid 'footage' rips and th last thing he does is hit a ledge (now unskatable due to a buncha stupid crap being glued to it to deter shreddage) in downtown col's. this board rules and so does mark. cheers.

GbV 'Crying Yr Knife Away' REMASTER

so th incredible (and incredibly driven) (no pun intended) mr. analog loyalist over at the power of independent trucking blog has applied his usual whupass remastering service to this classic-era-defining live set. not a thing needs to be said to recommend that you download this asap but lemme say two things: i remember (barely) walking from bela's to stache's that day (rolling rock in hand) as detailed in th liner notes and th guy you hear constantly yelling "bobby!" from th audience is th one & only travis f., who th gbv dudes just fucking couldn't get enough of. i'll have travis's phony phone call tape from around this time posted here shortly…

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Black Horse and Other Strange Stories, Jason A. Wyckoff

so i run into pat dull at th laughing ogre (turns out he has a conan fixation) th other day an' while shooting yon proverbial SHIZ he mentions that jake from clay & flipping hades wrote a book and that while he bought it cuz hey he knows th guy when he started reading it he found it very quickly to be VERY FUCKING GOOD and in fact he was carrying it around right there that very day. so i sez hey i think i heard Q (manytime bandmate of jake's) say something aboot that th other nite, i'll check it out. an' i did, ordered it just that very week from jake himself and while it wasn't cheap (only 300 printed, top quality, in th UK no less) it turns out that it is REALLY FUCKING GOOD, i mean stellar, in my top five short stories books (an' i fucking LOVE short stories books) with a bullet (

TOP FIVE BOOKS OF SHORT STORIES

• Honeymoon and Other Stories, Kevin Canty
• Magic For Beginners, Kelly Link
• Wall Of The Sky/Wall Of The Eye, Jonathan Lethem
• Strange Wine, Harlan Ellison
• this here tome of which we speak

) fer shirley! if yr wondering what makes this one tick well yr first three guesses (autobio, jokes, rock) would be way off th (proverbial, again) mark since jake has crafted a creepy compendium (that's alliteration, babe) of - you guessed it - strange tales, which would be not out of place converted to comic form in th pages of a (hurry up an' do it) revamped 'weird fantasy' book. jake's gotta little lovecraft an' a little king to his step, without sounding at all like either, an' if he indeed made a list of all th' stock tales (sasquatch, vampires, death-ballads-come-true, &c.) he could turn on their fucking heads beforehand, i wouldn't be surprised, tho' right from th ease-em-in start he's treading territory entirely his own. i can't recommend this book highly enuff (ok mebbe i can) - nevermind th price tag, you will not be anything but blown away.

available from jake (best for US orders)

available from his publisher (best for UK orders)

Greenlawn Abbey

there's a line in a gaunt song that goes "i just want to listen to the shoes" and i can tell ya for a fact that jerry wasn't lying when he said that but methinks perhaps our friends in greenlawn abbey took that one step farther and ONLY listened to the shoes. tony's voice is a dead ringer for a murphy brother and the same pre-cars powerpop sensibilities are there, tho' greenlawn out-rocks shoes about 5-to-1 here with some serious cheap trick-isms all over these two discs. savvy listeners will also no doubt recognize - despite all attempts at anachronism on th part of th band - that this is music written post-"everything flows"; above th wham/bam recording approach and th one-two-and-we're-off-again arrangements, compositionally these tunes are on a par with the posies and are most probably better than anything velvet crush ever eked out (tho' as a hearty not-fan, i haven't listened to them in many a season) - and in all honesty th disregard for perfection (esp. on their first disc) lays bare an action-rock aesthetic that a lotta powerpoopers sadly eschew in favor of dullsville late-zombies perfectionism. greenlawn also have a fucking ace-in-the-hole in bassplayer matt davey and his rare-yet-always-wicked minor key good-sebadoh-meets-evil-treepeople ravers.

these days th three original dudes sometimes show up backing chris burney as dead indians, but are evidently completely tired of playing their own tunes anymore.

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