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1988 – Buyer’s & Seller’s Remorse

May 30, 2014 by A.S. Van Dorston

When I started buying CDs in the summer of ’88, it brought a new consideration to my music buying decisions. At $10 to $16 a pop new, it was not a small investment, especially when I was making only $5 an hour at my two summer jobs. My plan was to continue buying used tapes and checking out stuff via my college radio station library, and only buy CDs of albums I’d want to keep for life. My first purchases of Joy Division’s Substance, the Dukes of Stratosphear Chips of the Chocolate Fireball collection (XTC’s psychedelic alter-ego) the 80+ minute Mission of Burma collection and PixiesCome On Pilgrim/Surfer Rosa combo set a high standard. The new releases that fall by Dinosaur Jr., Sonic Youth, Naked Raygun, Eleventh Dream Day and The Feelies seemed sufficiently epic to justify the cost too.

I got a little excited and optimistic based on those albums, and thought there was even more instant classics around the corner. I ended up with a small pile of slow growers that disappointed me so much at the time that I sold them within a couple months. I taped them before I did so, and  over the years ended up wearing out or losing the tapes, and spent the following decades hunting down the same albums all over again. Looking back they are all pretty much underrated now, and overdue for critical reassessment and in most cases, reissues.

Game Theory - Two Steps From The Middle Ages (Enigma, 1988)Game Theory – Two Steps From The Middle Ages (Enigma)
I’d heard cuts from early stuff like Blaze Of Glory (1981), Pointed Accounts of People You Know EP (1983), Distortion EP (1984) and Real Nighttime (1985) while listening to KUNI in high school. Their lightly psychedelic jangle pop was distinguished from others like Let’s Active and R.E.M. with Scott Miller’s unique vocal melodies and bookish lyrics that gave them a distinct sound, despite sharing producer Mitch Easter. Big Shot Chronicles (1986) remains my favorite, but Lolita Nation (1987) got a lot of attention for being an ambitious double album that measured up well against the ones that year from The Cure and Hüsker Dü. Their final album, Two Steps From the Middle Ages, disappointed some because it didn’t quite reach the heights of the double, or the consistency of Big Shot. But in retrospect, it was a great album that rewards deep listening. Miller went on to make several albums the following decades with Loud Family, and I’m guilty of neglecting those too. Sadly, he died last year, and never got to enjoy the fruits of a nicely curated reissue program. A label like Secretly Canadian, who reissued the full double album version of the Jacobites‘ Robespierre’s Velvet Basement (1985) or Captured Tracks (box sets of Cleaners From Venus and The Bats) would do the music world a great service in reissuing the long out of print Game Theory albums. YouTube sometimes has full versions of out of print albums. I can’t find Two Steps but here’s Lolita Nation.

The Jazz Butcher - Fishcotheque (Creation, 1988)The Jazz Butcher – Fishcotheque (Creation)
This band was probably much better known in the UK, but due to poor distribution and a sort of limited appeal to indie cognoscenti, The Jazz Butcher never made an impact in the U.S. I read about them in Trouser Press Guide and heard tracks from albums like In Bath Of Bacon (1983), A Scandal In Bohemia (1984) and my favorite, Sex And Travel (1985). Bauhaus’ David J. even joined the band, but Oxford-educated Pat Fish’s witty songs were perhaps a bit too self-consciously literate and quirky to connect with the Love And Rockets audience. Fishcotheque seemed like a half-step down from their mid-80s peak, but in retrospect it still retains all the charm of those albums which I often found missing in their 90s work. Sometimes jangly, sometimes swinging, other times kind of rockin in a chugging Feelies kind of way, they probably would appeal more to fans of Lloyd Cole & the Commotions. Like Game Theory, all the 80s albums are pretty much impossible to find now, and are in great need of reissue or a box set. A couple random early albums and compilations are available on Spotify.

The Mighty Lemon Drops – World Without End (Sire, 1988)The Mighty Lemon Drops – World Without End (Sire)
Their debut Happy Head (1986) sounded like a lost Echo & the Bunnymen album from, well, 1986. Not an unwelcome thing, since the Bunnies were MIA for three years after Ocean Rain (1984). But after the original band came back with Echo & The Bunnymen (1987), I figured the Lemon Drops would move on to new influences. Instead it was more of the same. In hindsight, that part hadn’t changed, but it’s even better than their debut, and better than the Bunnymen’s last album.  They would soon evolve their sound on Laughter (1989) and ended up sounding more like The Stone Roses, which to my ears was unfortunate. But World Without End still sounds like a perfect moment in British post-punk guitar pop, frozen in amber perhaps, but perfect just the same. Wounded Bird reissued this in 2008 with extra tracks. | Buy

The Woodentops – Wooden Foot Cops On A Highway (Rough Trade/Cherry Red, 1988)The Woodentops – Wooden Foot Cops On A Highway (Rough Trade/Cherry Red)
I think I got The Woodentop’s Giant (1986) before discovering The Feelies, and it scratched an itch I never knew I had for their relentlessly propulsive, kinetic rhythm. I played the hell out of that tape, and was excited when their next album came out. For the most part, the band left their signature style behind in an effort to experiment, and I was disgusted. The experiments turned out to be pretty cool though, including a collaboration with legendary dub/reggae producer Lee “Scratch” Perry. When the band reformed decades later, their new recordings more closely resembled their first album, though if I ever get to see them live I hope they’ll touch at least some on Wooden Foot Cops. The 2001 Cherry Red reissue is out of print, but AIS put all the songs on the Before During After collection in 2013. | Buy | Spotify

Band Of Susans - Hope Against Hope (Further, 1988)Band Of Susans – Hope Against Hope (Further)
Graduates of Rhys Chatham’s guitar orchestra ensemble, Band Of Susans were the link between arty New York noise rock that spawned Swans and Sonic Youth, and shoegaze, with guitars, piled on guitars upon more guitars.  Their debut was an impressive wall of sound that may have inspired My Bloody Valentine to get even louder, but it got a bit more droney than I was used to at the time. Now they sound practically pop, but still rewarding upon revisiting. The CD is out of print but Amazon made the MP3s available in 2012. | Buy | Spotify

The Godfathers - Birth, School, Work, Death (Epic, 1988)The Godfathers – Birth, School, Work, Death (Epic)
On their debut Hit By Hit (1986), The Godfathers took the current garage rock revival (has there ever not been garage rock?) and added a touch of post-punk and hard-hitting blues, not unlike the Screaming Blue Messiahs. Somebody saw commercial potential in the band and had them polish up their sound a bit for Birth, School, Work, Death. A fairly common practice in the 80s, that kind of production used to piss me off to no end. Compared to most albums though, they still sound fairly tough and raw, and have a lot of great songs. I’m not sure how much commercial success they had, but they did keep trucking until 2001, then reunited for more tours in 2008, so they certainly secured a loyal following. This was reissued in 2011. | Buy

Hunters & Collectors – Fate (IRS)
The Lime Spiders – Volatile (Caroline)
That Petrol Emotion – End Of The Millennium Psychosis Blues (Virgin)

These last few albums I probably wouldn’t recommend to everyone. The go-to album for Hunters & Collectors is Human Frailty (1986), a perfect representation of the tension between their Aussie-style masculinity and romantic yearning. There’s just no way they could top that, and they didn’t. Fate, which is a reissue of the Austrialian-released What’s A Few Men? (1987) plus some new tracks, loses its balance toward the side of slower ballads, and probably only of interest to hardcore fans. The Lime Spiders was part of the thriving Australian psych and garage rock scene that included Hoodoo Gurus. The Cave Comes Alive (1987) was the best representation of their style, while Volatile suffers again from that shitty 80s gated drum sound among other things. Nevertheless a handful of good songs survive. That Petrol Emotion were formed in 1984 by The Undertones‘ O’Neill brothers. Some swear by Manic Pop Thrill (1986) which I never got on board with, but Babble (1987) was pretty special, diverse and fiery. Except for their single “Big Decision” which had the most cringe-worthy rap in the history of indie rock — “Whatcha gotta do in this day and age / You gotta agitate educate and organize.” Sweet jeezus. The next album added more dance and funk to the mix than I preferred at the time, and is all over the place. However, it beats the hell out of what Shriekback did that same year, and is pretty interesting.

I never got to see any of these bands live, despite the fact that it seems like every band has reunited and toured. The Godfathers did tour a while back but I missed them. The Jazz Butcher still sporadically records, but hasn’t been in the U.S. that I know of. Hopefully The Woodentops will cross over the ocean to tour sometime.

Between the Chili Peppers, Jane’s Addiction, Soundgarden, R.E.M. and Soul Asylum, I kind of thought alternative rock had already entered the mainstream in 1988, and many more were striving hard to get there. It seems like some view the late 80s as a murky dark age before Nirvana and others blew up, but there’s always, always much more lurking beneath the surface and worth rediscovering. Or hear for the first time. Sometimes it took me another decade or so to find some of the great albums from 1988 by Talk Talk, The House Of Love, And Also The Trees, Candlemass and Ambitious Lovers. Maybe there’s even more I’ll discover in the future. If nothing else, check out Game Theory and The Jazz Butcher!

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