the feelies - classic or dud?

maybe Bill Million, after being a security guard at Disney World

Don't sell him short. He was doing computer stuff...

From the NY Times article
When he abruptly moved to Florida, he worked on security for Disney World, doing computer programming for access systems. But when one of his sons started playing guitar, Mr. Million was drawn back to the instrument. “It sounds odd to me to even call this a reunion,” he said. “It’s just that we’ve gotten together after a long break.”

http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowlLA/original/mickey%20mouse.jpg

Supposedly, Water's planned reissue was unauthorized, but the first two albums are slated to come out on Bar/None Records later this year. I wrote them to confirm this.

Here's what I wrote about Crazy Rhythms and The Good Earth.

yeah i just saw on the other music email update that water was reissuing Only Life, too! seemed weird since they never got around to getting crazy rhythms reissued .... but yeah, if there isn't going to be any extra stuff on the reissues, i probably won't buy them. maybe. i probably will.

IATTOQ

They're kind of a band that only people who are *into music* are into.

AIR?

That Disney World thing was my favorite fact. Why not a whole article on Million's experiences riding a monorail?

also: lol "Mr Million."

so if you are like me and far away from NYC (and Hoboken), you can check out (very good!) recordings of a few of last week's feelies shows at www.nyctaper.com. coupla new songs, "outdoor miner" (!) and good times so far.

Who is playing drums? Demeski?

yep, it's demeski (and weckerman on percussion). basically the lineup who recorded good earth, only life and time for a witness. listening to the july 1 show right now -- sounds great! could easily pass for a 1991 show. in fact, mercer, might be playing guitar better these days ...

Since New Jersey’s favorite nerds played a Fourth of July gig with Sonic Youth in New York’s Battery Park, they’ve reasserted their reputation as one of the best bands of the 1980s, despite a career that never really felt like taking flight (aside from a trip to Florida, where the band worked as security guards for Disneyworld).
http://dustedmagazine.com/reviews/4501
I hate music journalists sometimes.

"(aside from a trip to Florida, where the band worked as security guards for Disneyworld)"

lets call it laziness

Any news on whether they're going to record? Wasn't that part of the reunion plans?

isn't there another NY show this fall? at the bowery or somesuch? frankly, i'm not going to hold my breath for frantic feelies activity, as much as I'd love some real touring and a new record ...

when are they going to reissue that goddamn Crazy Rhythms for crying out loud.

I am just anal enough that I emailed Dusted and asked them nicely to double-check their facts on the Security Guards thing, and they've changed it. I feel much better.

Was re-listening to Glenn Mercer's "Wheels in Motion" and parts of it really are pretty good.

Bar/None replied to my emails but ignored my questions about The Feelies. Those albums really need to be in print again.

Someone please translate this for me

I mean, are the French getting a reissued Crazy Rhythms before anyone else?

I knew taking four years of French was going to be a waste.

The author bought a copy of Crazy Rhythms on CD, enticed by the inclusion of "Paint It Black" as a bonus track. He doesn't tell us whether it was a new release, but keep in mind that "Paint It Black" appeared on the (now impossible to find) reissue that came out in the early '90s. Don't get your hopes up.

Damn - but thanks. Think I was thrown by that album art.

Yeah, I have no idea what that came from.

Weirdly, the 2008 Water Records reissue of Only Life seems to be available on Amazon. Water was supposed to reissue Crazy Rhythms as well at the beginning of the year, so I'm not sure why one came out without the other.

yeah i've seen Only Life in shops ... but since there's nothing new on it -- and it was apparently released without the band's input/approval, I haven't bought it. My vinyl still sounds good! But yeah, Crazy Rhythms has gotta be one of the biggest out of print records around right now! with the press they got from the reunion shows, you'd think the time would be right ...

I've quit holding my breath for reissues. But DAMN, this band need the Mondo Box Set With 50 Gazillion Rarities And A Scorching Live Show treatment. What's wrong with the world that this has not happened? Probably something like a lack of ambition on the band's part more than anything.

Can some über-geek fanboy get the ambition to compile this and then either a) present it to the band as requiring only their approval/liner notes and a decent label, or b) torrent the fucker?

Looks like the Feelies are playing a few shows this spring ... www.myspace.com/thefeelies Philly and DC, plus this slightly bizarre bill: http://www.remtribute.com/

After years and years of wondering about it, I'm finally listening to the Field Mice's cover of Loveless Love. Nice!

I bought their first album last year and thought it was terrible. I was wondering how anyone could consider it a classic. Maybe I heard it too late.

Maybe you have questionable taste.

seriously. crazy rhythms is one of the best albums ever recorded.

wtf. why can't a guy just not a like an album anymore?

it's ok if you don't like it, but what does "Maybe I heard it too late" mean?

i know exactly what he means.

I should love Bauhaus, but I can't stand them cos to me it sounded dated and thin when I first heard them in the 90's. To those who heard it at the time, it still sounds great.

Sometimes, you just have to hear an album in the time and context that it was recorded, otherwise it just doesn't sounds right hearing it for the first time years later..

This isn't the case with every band of course, but it's happened to me with a few..

"Maybe I heard it too late"

yeah, exactly what jack said. It might have sounded amazing and revolutionary in 1970 or whenever it came out, but I just don't think it translates well to me now. Maybe if I heard it in 1980 I'd like it right now, but I didn't. to me, it seems to me nothing more than a mediocre early 1980s college rock album-- one that grates on me considerably, actually. but I'm not hearing it in its original context. Anyway, I think REM's albums (or more accurately, isolated songs) transcend their time, but I don't feel the same about this album.

crazy rhythms was a huge influence on both REM and the formation of college rock. to call it a 'mediocre college rock album' is sorta ridiculous, since it was such a cornerstone album for many bands that followed, but i guess you're entitled to muck up this thread with your opinion if you please.

being influential alone doesn't make it a good album, but it does speak to the fact that this it is incredibly likeable. i heard it long after it was released (7-8 years ago or so) and gravitated towards it immediately. i'm wondering what exactly you find 'grating' about the album? the energy? it's such an accessible mix of post punk rhythmic propulsion and indie pop songwriting craftsmanship, hard to imagine any fan of television, the clean, or felt would be turned off in the least

I bought their first album last year and thought it was terrible. I was wondering how anyone could consider it a classic. Maybe I heard it too late.

reads different to me than saying "I don't like this record", if you want to know why the original comment warrants a response.

But if it grates on you, well there's a clue right there. It's not just that you don't like this album. It's not just like "I don't like the songs". The entire m/o of that album, the weird space it exists, the strange way it was recorded, the minimalism, the repetition, the simplicity, etc. Are all pretty unique and different, and it's hard to judge it in the context you're trying to judge it, i.e., is it as good college rock as REM.

Context isn't relevant as there really was no context, other then people considering it second rate Talking Heads at the time. There wasn't really 80s college rock yet. I first heard it some time in the 90s.

Yeah, I can't think of many records that sound like Crazy Rhythms (even the stuff that it supposedly influenced, or the Feelies later albums). I heard it in the 90s too, and it did not seem "of its time" or of any time really, though I think since then I've filled in the context of VU/Modern Lovers/Eno/Television/New Jersey ... Anyway, taste is taste, if didn't excite you, then it didn't excite you. It's probably one of my top 10 albums of the last 30 years, though ...

I haven't heard this record, but reading about it makes me want to.

I hadn't heard any Feelies at all until earlier today when totally randomly I wanted to hear the "Loveless Love" by the Field Mice and remembered it was a cover version, which led me to the original...

will investigate more.

I've never heard this Field Mice cover ... it's good?

yeah, my memory of the album is fading a bit, but what i remember was that the energy wasn't appealing to me for some reason, and i think it might have had something to do with the production. i remember it sounding kind of flat, perhaps lacking dynamic range or something to that effect. also, i thought i remember the lyrics being vaguely embarrassing to listen to... but, my memory of the album is no longer clear.

field mice cover here

The production was very flat. There was a lot of debate back then about how to do it. Live, they were a very intense band, like The Modern Lovers, Ramones, Talking Heads and VU in a blender. When it came time to record they weren't happy with initial results, then made a last minute switch-up of engineers and made some strange choices, including playing the guitars directly into the mixer. The result is mixed for some people, people who remember them live hated it, and today even the band question if that was the right choice. The rest of us though think it resulted in this really amazing pure insular sound, without much distortion, reverb, room or even life to mess with the perfect sound of a jangling strummed electric guitar. Piled on top of like 12 people playing percussion, and it was pretty unique. It's definitely something to hear on headphones and/or at top volume, and it helps to submit to it. A casual listen one may or may not dig the tunes, but with more attention paid, it's like Lou Reed performing Einstein on the Beach.

Their next album, The Good Earth, years later, would have a much more traditional production, but by then they really weren't the kind of "punk" band they were in 1977. Coming out in the midst of a college rock revolution, The Good Earth is among the best. Their songwriting is a bit more complex, but there's still plenty of frantic energy.

i'm shocked i haven't seen anybody mention their actual best disc Time for a witness....

it's mentioned up there .... don't know if it's their best, but it is pretty solid. great guitar record.

xpost, thanks, dan -- that sums it up very nicely. The feelies probably could've made a more straight-up debut, and it probably would've been pretty damn good, but I don't know if it would have the same weird magic that Crazy Rhythms has ...

That Field Mice cover is so great... shame the sound quality is so shit.. I had an original copy of the "something's burning in paradise again" and the quality was the same..

I did see the Feelies cover Outdoor Miner last year.

Yeah, that might've been my fave thing about the reunion shows! (which i heard via live recordings, not in person). Great version. I might have to put together a Feelies covers mix.

sorry if I missed someone already mentioning Something Wild, one of the great '80s movies, and that tune from Good Earth--I think at the end of the dance sequence when Charlie and LL go back to her high-school reunion? Very evocative. I appreciate their first one more now that I've not listened to the Velvet Underground very much in a few decades; the Go-Betweens are the only band who took the Velvets influence and did it better, because them dudes was as good a songwriter as Reed, I think, I mean maybe it took two of them but they were coming at it late. But the Feelies, yeah, it's a bit suburban but they were good and I quite liked that second record at the time but lost interest later, I mean how many records by the Shoes or the Feelies do you need, or the dB's? For the average fan of rock and roll I'd recommend The Good Earth myself but they were always reliable, like REM has always been. Anyway, Jameson wrote a book on poster-modernism a while back and he really talks a lot about Something Wild as a great example of what he's apparently talking about.

I mean Something Wild, Blue Velvet, Street Smart, 52 Pickup and that halfway good movie with Adam Ant in it, Slam Dance (Virginia Madsen never looked lovelier)--all real Lou Reed territory but Lou Reed was no Roy Scheider. Anyway, those movies are all about white males getting themselves into a little trouble--more than they bargained for--and I'm just saying all the bands who modeled themselves after Lou Reed and the Velvets (Violent Femmes, Feelies, about a zillion others), Yo La Tengo, it's all really the Velvets just like so many fucking things are just all about the Beatles (XTC, Squeeze, Marshall Crenshaw at least had more real Brill Building verve in his shit), back in the era that the Feelies came from. White dudes getting themselves into more situation than initially suspected...

Whatever happened to the Crazy Rhythms reissue that was supposed to come out on (IIRC) Water?