Shonen Knife: Oska Ramones (2011)

"OH, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet" said Rudyard Kipling but then If old Rudyard had ever heard these three Japanese women ripping through the songbook of one of America's greatest bands he would probably would've scurried into the Jungle as fast as Rikki-Tikki.

Shonen Knife (more HERE) have always worn their Ramones love on their matching sleeves, as evidenced by their recent track, "Ramones Forever", but perhaps their latest tribute might make East and West a little claustrophobic. It's not that the individual tracks like "The KKK Took My Baby Away" aren't charmingly accented pop-punk knock-offs but the sheer number of obvious choices ("Blitzkreig Bop", "Rockaway Beach", Sheena is a Punk Rocker") and the lack of any one element added to the songs themselves (the obvious aside) make this a less than earth-shaking way to mark Shonen Knife's 30th anniversary.

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The Mr. T Experience: Road To Ruin (1998)

Here at MRML we've discussed Berkley's The Mr. T Experience (see HERE), their leader, Dr. Frank (see HERE) and we've discussed Ramones clones (HERE and THERE). Today, we've decided to re-visit another one of our not-quite classic obscurities in the form of MTX's 1998 cover of the entire fourth Ramones album, 1978's Road to Ruin.

In previous discussions of this album, I've claimed that this recording "takes an inherently limited opportunity and makes a fist of it," but further listening will revel even more than that. Whether it's the electrification of "Questioningly" (with backing vocals by Penelope Houston of The Avengers), turning "Gone Mental" into an acoustic track or just the way Dr. Frank's very un-Joey-like phrasing subtly changes every song, the trio create something more worthy than it's limited edition run of 1,700 LP's suggests.

M1 I Just Want To Have Something To Do
M2 I Wanted Everything
M3 Don't Come Close
M4 I Don't Need You
M5 Needles And Pins
M6 I'm Against It
T1 I Wanna Be Sedated
T2 Go Mental
T3 Questioningly
T4 She's The One
T5 Bad Brain
T6 It's A Long Way Back

Let us know what you think of this one in the COMMENTS section (which is where you'll find the Road to Ruin link).

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The Rämouns: Rockaway Beach Boys

The best $1.00 album I ever bought? Though I've bought a lot of dollar albums (Rockaway Beach Boys came from the discard stack in a political-metal store named War On Music) this one by The Rämouns was a glorious surprise. It's a surprise because I had aLready listened to the album over at Ratboy69's site and given it a meh. My initial reaction (mirrored in a lot of badly-written on-line reviews) was based on the fact that it was more Beach Boys than Ramones. Now, upon holding the things in my hand, I hear the strength of playing it 66.6% Beach Boys and 33.4%% Ramones.

On songs like "I Get Around" the band use a Ramones-like instrumental foundation and then over-lay it with a surprisingly assured vocal performance. Unlike so many novelty bands (and I'm not denying the novelty appeal here), this isn't based on mashing up two wildly disparate elements but rather amping up the connection between two things that are already somewhat linked. The glorious surprise is in how deftly this German band pulls off the hybridization.

The album is available from Amazon but for $25.71, which for truth-in-advertising's sake I must warn you is almost a dollar a minute and that's a lot pricier than my copy.

Snuff: Live 7" E.P. (1990)

For more Snuff go HERE.




Let us know what you think of this one in the COMMENTS section (which is where you'll find the link for the Live E.P.)


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Snuff: That's Fine (Smile) E.P. (1992)

So while the version of the minimally-worded song, "That's Fine" is the same as the K Records 7" version from 1991, the three B-sides on this 1992 10 Past 12 Records E.P. are totally different. It's frustrating to think how much better Reach could've been with the use of some of these excellent B-sides. For more Snuff go HERE.

1 That's Fine (Smile)
2 Another Day (Reprise)
3 I Can See Clearly Now
4 You're Wondering Now

So which is the better version of the 'That's Fine" single? Let us know in the COMMENTS section (which is where you'll find the link for the That's Fine E.P.)

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