The Diodes: Survivors (1982)

While The Diodes created one of the sturdiest power-pop songs in the history of the Great White North, "Tired of Waking Up Tired", nothing else in their catalog quite approaches that height.



It's not that there's not other fine tracks in the band's oeuvre. Their cover of Paul Simon's "Red Rubber Ball" rips, "Teenage Nation" is a fine pop rallying cry and "Jenny's in a Sleep World" makes for a nice, moody ballad. Anyone's who's listened to their albums could name other good tracks but for a lot of us who weren't there at their Toronto club, The Crash n' Burn, back in '77 there's something audibly missing from their studio albums. Of course that something is probably the result of the lack of a sympathetic producer, record label or media outlet in the Canada of their times. If this band had moved to London, England earlier on, their legacy might be even greater then it is now. Of course, speculation now is of limited value, so let's just enjoy what we can with this OUT-OF-PRINT 1982 LP that compiles outtakes from the band's five year career.

A1		Survivors
A2		When I Was Young
A3		Hot Sands
A4		Heat Or The Beat
A5		Lost In The Dark
B1		Burn Down Your Daddy's House
B2		Curiosity Girl
B3		Roses And Thorns
B4		Coma
B5		Play With Fire

let us know what you think of The Diodes career in the COMMENTS section (which is where you'll find the Survivors link).

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The Vapids: Teenage Head (2002)

On this OUT-OF-PRINT 2002 album ($65.00 on Amazon!), Hamilton's The Vapids bring a Ramones-core sensibility to their cover of the entire first Teenage Head (more HERE) album. Unlike Screeching Weasel, the Vindictives, The Queers and MTX (see HERE) who re-recorded the first four Ramones albums in their entirety, The Vapids are dealing with a lesser classic and hence we can have as much fun as they do with these revved-way-up frat-punk anthems.





let us know what you think of The Vapids take on Teenage Head in the COMMENTS section (which is where you'll find the TH link).

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Teenage Head: Heatwave Festival (1980)

I grew up under a promotional poster for Teenage Heads' Tornado that my older brother got for free from Pepper Records, a long since dead Winnipeg music store. The blurred images of the boys from Hamilton rockin' out never made me very curious about their music. In fact when they played at here at Wellington's in 1984, I was at the venue upstairs slamming to SNFU. Later, when I grew to quite like - but not exactly love - Teenage Head, I learned that Tornado was seen as their sell-out record. And not without reason. For that mini-album, they ditched much of their Flamin' Groovies worship, added slick sax and smooth arrangements and changed their fucking name. How is Teenage Heads, which sounds like a group of juvenile junkies to me, so much more radio-friendly than Teenage Head? And this sanitizing happened just after they had appeared playing their best song, "Ain't Got No Sense", in the sex and violence soaked dystopian 1982 horror flick, "The Class of 1984". The eighties were a weird time to have a recording contract.

So since my pal Midnight Rambler has generously posted EVERY out-of-print TH album over at the always-magnificent Sons of the Dolls, I'll offer up a bootleg of a professional  recording of Teenage Head's last-minute performance subbing for The Clash at the failed 1980 Heatwave Festival in Toronto. It's a great set and captures the band outside the clutches of the producers that usually compromised their studio work.





Let us know what you think of Teenage Head in the COMMENTS section (which is where you'll find the link for Heatwave).


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The Dump Bin Blues: The Grace Babies: Frequency

 

A former co-worker and I once figure that one of the worst things to befall a musician was either to wind up in the dump bin or record the cliché blues album. Combining the two nadirs, we entitled an imaginary album, "The Dump Bin Blues". So, MRML's "Dump Bin Blues" series celebrates works obtained for less than two dollars out of one of the ever-growing dump bins that chew-up floor space in the ever-shrinking world of music retail.

The Grace Babies made me hate myself. Back in the mid-nineties, I thought I was writing some pretty hot power pop (non)hits and, in my arrogance, felt reasonably assured that some kind of notice of same would come my way. Then, straight outta Halifax, comes the Grace Babies second full length, Frequency and I'm forced by its glorious perfection to realize how far from my goal I am. Hell, in comparison to "Philosophy" I'm not even playing the same game as these Eastern seaboard cool cats.

Sure, it probably helps the Babies cause to have Todd Rundgren's biggest Northern disciple, Moe Berg, manning the boards but, c'mon, the triptych that opens things up ("Sick", "Wore Glasses" and "Philosophy") would've had to have been recorded on masking tape by Jandek in order to fail. O.K. maybe perfection is a bit of an over statement as things start getting somewhat bland towards the end (a couple of tracks after the token "punk" song "Drag It Out") but honestly this album needs to be a registered classic with the no-longer-Teenage-but-still-Fanclub set. So get up off the couch, put on your glasses and rock out to the band who let me know I'd missed it by a mile.

Thanks to CallPastorJerkface for the guest post.

Let us know what you think of these here Grace Babies in the COMMENTS section (which is where you'll find the Frequency link).

The Shell Corporation: Force Majerure (Full Album Stream)

Well the Occupy Wall St. music has started to dribble in and the verdict so far is that, while it's sure better then any of the music of the Tea Party has produced, its a still a little earnest and self-conscious. Now while LA vets The Shell Corporation (ex-members of Time Again, A Wilhelm Scream, Madcap, The Briggs, Le Mu Le Purr), followers of righteous politics of punk tradition of the MC5, The Clash, Dead Kennedys et al, recorded this album before these uprising began they have produced a brace of muscular, scream-along punk songs that might inspire anyone opposed to the concentration of power in the financial districts to fight on.





Here's the requisite video:





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Hat tip: It's a **** Thing.