A) the Wedding Present – George Best Plus
The Wedding Present named their first LP after famous Irish/English football player George Best, bringing to mind fellow English football enthusiasts, Iron Maiden, with whom they have absolutely no other stylistic connection to, and the Housemartins, with whom they do share a rather significant stylistic connection. This CD is a re-issue of that LP with the "Plus" being two early EP’s inserted curiously mid-way through the original sequence of the George Best album. This collection initially seems to fit into the overly long category. Upon repeated listening though this is an incredibly great collection of sappy, jangle-pop songs.
The Wedding Present are always remarked upon for their hyper-fast, frenetic pacing. Anything written about them invariably includes this fact and rock scribes are always careful to point out that their initial success revolved around audiences desire to see if they indeed could play as fast live as they did on record. Many songs on this album are indeed played at an incredible, almost unbelievable, often dissonant speed. In particular “All This and More” and stand-out song “Shatner” are amazing songs played at an uncanny velocity. But there is so much more to the Wedding Present than a band performing fast songs.
With a sound akin to their English predecessors, the Smiths, the Buzzcocks, Joy Division, the Fall and Pink Flag era Wire, the Wedding Present fit nicely into a post-punk mold but came up a little too late to actually be part of that scene. Instead they exist in some grey area between the 80’s/90’s college art rock of Sonic Youth and the Pixies, and a more poppy post-hardcore sound (shades of Shudder to Think, and early Pavement, maybe … maybe). They are definitely punk in their own way, but they are, much more so, a pop group writing really smart hook laden songs about true sadness, heartbreak, romance, betrayal and disappointment.
The perfect soundtrack for all of those moments of heartbreak.
“Every time a car drives past I think it's you
Every time somebody laughs I think it's you
You changed your number and my phonebook's such a mess
But I can't bear to cross your name out yet
Each time the doorbell rings it might be you
Each letter the postman brings might be from you.”
- I’m Not Always So Stupid
listen to the Wedding Present - Shatner & I'm not always so stupid on Gone Vs. Gone's "Mild Anxiety" podcast
at http://mildanxiety.podOmatic.com
B) Mission of Burma – The Obliterati
25 years ago Mission of Burma were touted as one of the most important bands of their day. Their only full length album of that era Vs. is definitely one of the best post-punk albums ever - next only to the Fall’s early singles and Wire’s Pink Flag LP (the latter of which is an oft cited influence on Mission of Burma’s song-writing). Mission of Burma were unquestionably the leaders of the post-punk movement in the US. In Steven Blush’s American Hardcore, Mission of Burma are attributed the credit of being one of a new wave of “arty punk bands” who were instrumental in creating hardcore. The brutal, semi-metal hardcore of fellow Boston bands like SS Decontrol, DYS, the Freeze and Negative FX were (supposedly) a reactionary response to the subjugation of punk rock by art-house acts like Gang of Four and Burma.
This is surprisingly only their 3rd full length release, the 2nd after a hiatus of over 20 years, and it sounds as raw (perhaps rawer) and as inspired as they sounded 25 years ago. The presence of Bob Weston (Volcano Suns, Shellac) as engineer and resident tape manipulator brings a low-end rumble to the songs that they never managed to get on any of their early career recordings.
The opening track, “2wice”, comes on strong with a neo-Zeppelin Bonham-esque ultra simple beat. When the guitar and bass jump in, you’re hit in the face with the sheer power of this band. Aside from the highly superior production values this could be the band that fell off the face of the map 20+ years ago.
The second track, “Donna Summeria”, seems to be a winking nod to contemporary “post-punk” bands that cop disco dance beats and angular guitars as their own new thing. Although this may be a presumptuous statement on my part, as Mission of Burma has been producing this kind of weird angular noise since I was a toddler. I would venture to guess that the name of the song and the seemingly Bee Gees inspired falsetto harmonies come across as some kind of in-joke for a reason, and it doesn’t seem entirely improbable that Burma would make this kind of commentary, whether it be an overt or covert commentary is up to the individual to discern. The dissonant improv segment of this song is particularly inspired.
Every few years Sonic Youth comes out with a new album that is held up as an actually good album. The idea seems to be that if a new Sonic Youth album isn’t entirely boring then, “Hey, Sonic Youth released another album that doesn’t completely suck!”. On a track mid-way through the album entitled “1001 Pleasant Dreams”, Mission of Burma create a rumbling, neo-primitive dirge, that quickly and succinctly encapsulates Sonic Youth’s entire career output since Daydream Nation.
The following track, “Good Not Great”, rocks openly, noisily and concisely (at just over 2 minutes), again proving that Mission of Burma can and have in just 3 albums outdone the entire output of an entire sub-genre of college indie “punk” bands – from the aforementioned Youth, to mid-90’s indie icons like the Grifters, Guided by Voices, Versus, and Fugazi.
Next comes another slow dirge, this time a subtle, beautiful song with stringed accompaniment, simply entitled “13”. Semi-tribal drumming from Peter Prescott, sweet jangle from Roger Miller’s guitar, and thick low end from Clint Connely’s bass, mix with Bob Weston’s intuitive tape manipulations to create a heartbreaking song that once again puts to shame every other band attempting to recreate the sound that Burma has made so distinctly their own, whether they are doing it consciously or unconsciously.
I am not one who jumps onboard with every seminal band that reunites long after their career has passed away. The idea of seeing a Dead Kennedy’s reunion (with or without Jello Biafra) seems entirely unappealing. I was sorely disappointed with the Stooges reunion a few years back at Pine Knob in Clarkston Michigan (which is nowhere near Detroit). I did go see Mission of Burma perform at Irving Plaza, on the first public appearance of their first reunion tour, and it was great. Really great! The band rocked. The crowd was more into the show than damn near any crowd at any show I had seen before. The band themselves were absolutely beaming (although Clint Connely was wearing some strangely disquieting leather pants). You could tell that they knew that they were on it.
Despite the success of that show and the not-quite-as-good show I saw them play with Easy Action (ex-Negative Approach singer, Jon Brannon’s new band) at Detroit’s Saint Andrew’s Hall. I was pretty cynical about their new material. Some things are best left in a state a premature death. Perhaps legendary things only remain so when they are not allowed to rise and either destroy everything they ever built, or contradict everything they ever stood for. If Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin or Jimi Hendrix were still rockin’ today they would be as lame and dried up as Alice Cooper (who’s “Hey Stupid” is truly an abomination of contemporary rock) or any other band who may grace the main stage of your regional State fair. Suffice it to say Mission of Burma will never be performing at your neighborhood fair ground and, if this album is any indication, they will remain a band that all others strive to catch up with (20 years after the fact). Despite my initial apprehensions, or perhaps because of them, I keep on listening to this album while many others have come and gone. I’m now very curious to hear what their previous release, OnoffOn, sounds like.
listen to Mission of Burma - Good, Not Great and 13 at Gone Vs. Gone "Mild Anxiety" podcast
at http://mildanxiety.podOmatic.com
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