V.A. Last Call: Vancouver Independant Music 1977-1988

Hey! Please come check out the ten great videos of the early Vancouver   scene over at The Big Takeover!

While Last Call suffers a bit from vaulting ambition - forty-eight songs is a tall order -  this 1991 musical history of Vancouver music, punk and beyond, from Zulu Records (ZULU 5-2) is stellar document of a place and time. As a historical document, however, it is stunning. Note how the compilers cover so many of the different facets of the Vancouver Underground (punk, art-noise, garage-rock, alternative, power-pop, cow-punk and even CanCon radio stars 54-40! So while it's not the sort of collection most people will listen to straight through, the pickings here are rich and you will be rewarded with something new and shining each time you comb through it.





I've noted where further music is available elsewhere (including other blogs). If I cold ask for some crowd-sourcing here it would be to ask if you have any rips and scans of out-of-print releases by other bands here that you'd like to contribute let us know in the COMMENTS section. Alternately, if you know where any out-of-print releases by the bands herein are avaialble on other blogs also tell us that in the COMMENTS.

1.01     Furies–     What Do You Want Me To Be        
1.02     Skulls –     Fucked Up Baby        
1.03     D.O.A. –     Disco Sucks       (More HERE)
1.04     Stiffs –     Fuck You        
1.05     Generators  –     I Wanna Be A Girl        
1.06     Dishrags –     I Don't Love You        (more to come?)
1.07     Active Dog –    Nothing Holding You  (more HERE)  
1.08     Biz –     I Don't Give A Shit        
1.09     Shades –     New Clientele        
1.10     Pointed Sticks –     Real Thing    (more to come)       
1.11     Private School –     Science Fiction        
1.12     Subhumans –     Slave To My Dick  (much more to come)         
1.13     Young Canadians –     Hawaii
1.14     Female Hands –     Divided By Three        
1.15     UJ3RK5 –     Eisenhower And The Hippies        
1.16     Modernettes –     Barbra        
1.17     Insex –     Off The Deep End        
1.18     AKA –     634 Dog        
1.19     Secret V's –     Waiting For The Drugs To Take Hold        
1.20     Tim Ray –     Seen A Fight        
1.21     Corsage –     Shame I Feel        
1.22     Popular Front –     Synchronized Swimming        
1.23     54-40 –     Yank        
1.24     Scissors  –     Mystery Movie        
1.25     Los Popularos –     Can't Come Back    (more to come)    
1.26     Moral Lepers –     Music Is Your Body        
1.27     Enigmas –     Teenage Barnacle         (more HERE)
1.28     Actionauts –     Party Dog        
2.01     Family Plot –     The Crush        
2.02     Nomeansno –     Self Pity         (more HERE)
2.03     Work Party–     Work Song        
2.04     Bolero Lava –     Inevitable        
2.05     I, Braineater –     Edge        
2.06     Go Four 3 –     Just Another Day     (more HERE)   
2.07     Animal Slaves –     Learning To Live        
2.08     Brilliant Orange –     Happy Man         (more HERE)
2.09     Slow –     Have Not Been The Same    (more HERE)    
2.10     Shanghai Dog –     American Desert        
2.11     No Fun –     Be Like Us         (more to come)
2.12     Cannon Heath Down –     Bone Of Contention        
2.13     Lost Durangos –     Evil Town         (more HERE)
2.14     Herald Nix –     Dirty Ol' Town        
2.15     Poisoned –     To Tell The Truth         (more HERE)
2.16     Bob's Your Uncle –     Talk To The Birds        
2.17     Rhythm Mission –     King Blood        
2.18     Scramblers –     Solitary Man        
2.19     Oversoul Seven –     1 + 1 Is 3     (more HERE)   
2.20     Hip Type –     Darker Than This

To get the exhaustive liner notes go HERE

Let us know what you think of these diverse Vancouver bands in the COMMENTS section (which is where you'll find the linkS for Last Call).

Slow: I Broke The Circle 7" (1995)

Slow's (more HERE) 1st single was released on Zulu Records (ULUZ 2) in 1985.

Tracklist
A I Broke The Circle        
B Black Is Black        

From the Sleeve:
=================
Engineering expertise provided by Howard Fitzgerald at Aragon Sound.
Tammy, Dee, and Ian sang backup vocals.
Artwork by Chris
Shane Broke the Glass


Reactions to the mightiness of Slow may be left in the COMMENTS section (which is where you'll find the I Broke the Circle 7").

Slow: Against the Glass (1986)

The theory goes that Vancouver's Slow invented Grunge. The authors of a six-hundred page book on The Canadian Underground of 1985-1995 [!], argue that when Slow brought their anguished but hooky psych-garage-punk-metal sound, all wrapped up in flannel, down south they lit some kind of inextinguishable subterranean coal fire. While there is definitely some truth to this theory, it's too tied to this erroneous single-band-who-invented-a-genre kind of thinking. First off, it's pretty clear that the endlessly-dissected grunge phenomenon had numerous for-bearers both ancient and contemporary. Secondly, who wants to be known as the inventor of 'grunge' and go around arguing 'If it wasn't for me there'd never have been a Candlebox or even a Nickleback"? Yes, yes here during the 20th anniversary of Nirvana's Nevermind we're only supposed to talk about the the more vital aspects of grunge but since the garbage utterly outweighed the gold, let's give Slow credit for more than just being a foundational influence in a dead-end genre.





"Have Not Been the Same" is a total head-fuck. That compellingly repellant guitar riff hypnotizes, while those whoo-hoo-hooo backing vocals pull the listener, like sirens of yore towards the rocky coast of self-disgust ("It seems like lately I just can't keep myself in line) only to deliver you to a possibly glorious horizon in the forum of that ferociously buoyant chorus - "Have not been - have not been - have not been the SAME!

Is there anything else that matches that odyssey on this mini-album? No. But then I'd trade this single song for 99% of all albums labelled 'grunge'.

So what do you make of Slow and their legacy? Let us know in the COMMENTS section (which is where you'll find the Against the Glass link).


Update: Roy Pearl said...
If anyone's interested, I put up a Slow family tree here: