The Dog End of a Band Gone By
I was born in 72, which means that my musical tastes were formed by the 80's. From the first glimmers of my discriminating ear (I bought "The Tide Is High" 45 for my sister's 11th birthday. This was my first musical purchase of any kind) through the pivotal high school years, the 80's are the guideposts to my musical identity. Alas, I found out recently that some of those guideposts lead to some amazingly bad music.
I was, and am, somewhat of a loner. In high school I developed a small coterie of friends, far from even the periphery of popularity. Luckily, there were plenty of bands catering to my outsider status, and my nerdy sense of cool. I had Morrissey and Robert Smith to comfort me, I had Flesh For Lulu and Gene Loves Jezebel to get me dancing. I had Some Kind of Wonderful. I had an in with the coolest of cool; I had Love and Rockets.
Love and Rockets - the band that was the heart (if not the voice and mind) of Bauhaus, the band named for the greatest comic book of the 80's, the band with Daniel Ash and Daniel Ash's hair. I started the L & R ride with Earth. Sun. Moon, and it's Alterna-folk anthem "No New Tale To Tell". I arrived a bit late - a month or two before "So Alive" and their peak of popularity - and "So Alive" was redemption. A band I liked, a band appealing to freaks like me, Love and Rockets were on Top 40 radio. This was huge. There was and is no alternative radio in the area I grew up in - there was no HFS, no KCRW to redeem the airwaves. We had classic rock, where the 80's were not to be found; we had a Top 40 all-white cheese-metal extravaganza; we had country. Love and Rockets had broken through.
Into college I had a weakness for the music of Mr. Haskins, Mr. Ash and Mr. J - even the solo efforts (I still believe "I'll Be Your Chauffeur" isn't half bad). Yet somewhere in the midst of Nirvana and Sonic Youth, of the Happy Mondays and the Clean, of Steven Jesse Bernstein and Meat Beat Manifesto, Love and Rockets disappeared. I never updated any of their albums to CD; I didn't pick up later efforts like Lift or Hot Trip to Heaven. Yet this spring they crept back into the periphery of my mind, and I decided to find out where they had been. I looked and found out a greatest hits album would be released June 3.
So, June 3 arrives, and I traipse down to my local independent record store (keep them alive!) and bought the only copy they ordered. They were surprised anyone was looking for it, and the clerk tilted his head to the side and looked at me, puzzled. Love and Rockets' Loaded, and a used copy of the special edition Singin' In The Rain DVD. One brilliant, a classic; one very much less than that.
I didn't realize just how bad this band was! My sister always hated that I put "Haunted When The Minutes Drag" on multiple mixes for her - she said it was so long that she just stopped the tape then and there and decided that was the end of that side. I'm sorry. I never understood, and I hope you believe me. It's crap. And so is most of this album. "It Could Be Sunshine" could be, but I tend to think it's just more crap, with bad music and bad lyrics. "Yin and Yang (The Flowerpot Man)" - the title is the best part. Don't let yourself get suckered by that opening riff - it's just "Haunted When The Minutes Drag" played at an appropriate speed.
The songs from the period of time when everyone thought they were dead (otherwise known as the 90's) are just as bad. "Holy Fool" even taints the mediocre legacy of Luscious Jackson with their background vocal contributions. Yet "Holy Fool" is the Holy Grail compared to David J's lyrics to the "record companies don't appreciate artists" diatribe that is the piece of shit otherwise known as "Shelf Life":
To wrap this up (I was going somewhere with this, I think), some guideposts and signs of the past are just that; indicators of where you've been, stops on a dotted line like the travel sequences of old movie serials. Some are safe havens, places you can return to for comfort and succor. Others, like Love and Rockets, are reminiscent of the unknown places on the maps of the ancient mariners; "Here there be Monsters." Or giant piles of shit.
I was, and am, somewhat of a loner. In high school I developed a small coterie of friends, far from even the periphery of popularity. Luckily, there were plenty of bands catering to my outsider status, and my nerdy sense of cool. I had Morrissey and Robert Smith to comfort me, I had Flesh For Lulu and Gene Loves Jezebel to get me dancing. I had Some Kind of Wonderful. I had an in with the coolest of cool; I had Love and Rockets.
Love and Rockets - the band that was the heart (if not the voice and mind) of Bauhaus, the band named for the greatest comic book of the 80's, the band with Daniel Ash and Daniel Ash's hair. I started the L & R ride with Earth. Sun. Moon, and it's Alterna-folk anthem "No New Tale To Tell". I arrived a bit late - a month or two before "So Alive" and their peak of popularity - and "So Alive" was redemption. A band I liked, a band appealing to freaks like me, Love and Rockets were on Top 40 radio. This was huge. There was and is no alternative radio in the area I grew up in - there was no HFS, no KCRW to redeem the airwaves. We had classic rock, where the 80's were not to be found; we had a Top 40 all-white cheese-metal extravaganza; we had country. Love and Rockets had broken through.
Into college I had a weakness for the music of Mr. Haskins, Mr. Ash and Mr. J - even the solo efforts (I still believe "I'll Be Your Chauffeur" isn't half bad). Yet somewhere in the midst of Nirvana and Sonic Youth, of the Happy Mondays and the Clean, of Steven Jesse Bernstein and Meat Beat Manifesto, Love and Rockets disappeared. I never updated any of their albums to CD; I didn't pick up later efforts like Lift or Hot Trip to Heaven. Yet this spring they crept back into the periphery of my mind, and I decided to find out where they had been. I looked and found out a greatest hits album would be released June 3.
So, June 3 arrives, and I traipse down to my local independent record store (keep them alive!) and bought the only copy they ordered. They were surprised anyone was looking for it, and the clerk tilted his head to the side and looked at me, puzzled. Love and Rockets' Loaded, and a used copy of the special edition Singin' In The Rain DVD. One brilliant, a classic; one very much less than that.
I didn't realize just how bad this band was! My sister always hated that I put "Haunted When The Minutes Drag" on multiple mixes for her - she said it was so long that she just stopped the tape then and there and decided that was the end of that side. I'm sorry. I never understood, and I hope you believe me. It's crap. And so is most of this album. "It Could Be Sunshine" could be, but I tend to think it's just more crap, with bad music and bad lyrics. "Yin and Yang (The Flowerpot Man)" - the title is the best part. Don't let yourself get suckered by that opening riff - it's just "Haunted When The Minutes Drag" played at an appropriate speed.
The songs from the period of time when everyone thought they were dead (otherwise known as the 90's) are just as bad. "Holy Fool" even taints the mediocre legacy of Luscious Jackson with their background vocal contributions. Yet "Holy Fool" is the Holy Grail compared to David J's lyrics to the "record companies don't appreciate artists" diatribe that is the piece of shit otherwise known as "Shelf Life":
How many A&R men does it take to change a light bulb?That's the opening, and I'm surprised I got that much typed before I thought I would puke. So where did I go wrong? They were good once, right? I still think a CD EP of "No New tale To Tell," "So Alive," "No Big Deal" and "Ball of Confusion" wouldn't be too bad. Maybe not classic, but worth three or four bucks.
I'll get back to you on that
How many spells and dollars does it take to make the magic
of pulling legends from a hat
Well we'll take another sucker for another sell
Regarding them with compliments and muskatelle
A honeymoon in Vegas in a plush hotel
For that's a sad time in the morning light
To wrap this up (I was going somewhere with this, I think), some guideposts and signs of the past are just that; indicators of where you've been, stops on a dotted line like the travel sequences of old movie serials. Some are safe havens, places you can return to for comfort and succor. Others, like Love and Rockets, are reminiscent of the unknown places on the maps of the ancient mariners; "Here there be Monsters." Or giant piles of shit.
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