Creator, for that scrambling guitar, the languid matter of fact vocal delivery, and the line "Some say openly, I don't know. Some build eleavators"
― Dr X O'Skeleton, Wednesday, 29 June 2011 21:28 (twelve years ago) link
five year later, this still sounds gorgeous and amazing to me:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIFx2_Se8R8
― alpha flighticles (Drugs A. Money), Sunday, 30 September 2012 21:00 (eleven years ago) link
I agree. Great tune. I hadn't heard it before.
― Mule, Sunday, 30 September 2012 22:22 (eleven years ago) link
New podcast interview with Cris Kirkwood
https://soundcloud.com/theair-raidpodcast/air-raidnet-episode-263-meat-puppets
― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 18 August 2015 21:46 (eight years ago) link
Here 15 golden greats.
― morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 11 October 2017 01:50 (six years ago) link
Great list! I'd have had Light and Like Being Alive from Monsters in there I think.
― MaresNest, Wednesday, 11 October 2017 17:21 (six years ago) link
Saw them several times, first at this show in Bloomfield NJ, summer of '85. I don't remember Derrick Bostrom looking this friggin' hot:
https://pooneilblog.wordpress.com/tag/the-jetty/
Springsteen was playing a Born in the USA show a few miles away, so during their encore someone (in a crowd of maybe 30) yelled "Bruce." So they did a loud, fast version of "Dancing in the Dark."
― ice cream social justice (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 11 October 2017 17:47 (six years ago) link
was just listening to Up On The Sun last night, it sounded great.
― sleeve, Wednesday, 11 October 2017 17:49 (six years ago) link
I think I'd add a few more of the 1st lp tracks as my favourites but that list isn't bad.
― Stevolende, Wednesday, 11 October 2017 18:53 (six years ago) link
love the demo tracks included in the 'up on the sun' reissue, some of it is the most stoned sounding music I can think of
― global tetrahedron, Wednesday, 11 October 2017 19:13 (six years ago) link
UotS still and forever in my top 5 rock records
― harbinger of failure (Jon not Jon), Friday, 13 October 2017 12:14 (six years ago) link
This is one of those bands where Cobain farted in their general direction once, so YouTube comments for their songs are full of stuff like: “KURT’S FAVORITE BAND!!”; “KURDT HAD GOOD TASTE, MAN”; etc.
It used to be the cool thing was not telegraphing that you learned about something that way, lol
― brush ’em like crazy (morrisp), Sunday, 14 October 2018 17:06 (five years ago) link
Haven't seen the Meat Puppets play in years, but they sound really good on some of the semi-recent video clips online for radio sessions.
They were doing some shows with Mike Watt and someone else pretty good from the old SST scene out on the west coast recently too.
― earlnash, Sunday, 14 October 2018 18:35 (five years ago) link
xxp Meat Pups covers and participation on Nirvana's Unplugged show add up to more than farting in their general direction: more like meaty-aromatic otm. Repost of the review-interview I did for long gone Paper Thin Walls in '07, had a really nice conversation (they were in a Texas truckstop, I was on the phone):https://papercomet.blogspot.com/2017/03/meat-puppets.html
― dow, Sunday, 14 October 2018 19:54 (five years ago) link
Derrick Bostrom is back in the band, it seems???
― valet doberman (Jon not Jon), Sunday, 14 October 2018 22:45 (five years ago) link
great news!
― Elvis Telecom, Monday, 15 October 2018 02:31 (five years ago) link
Seriously great/immediate new song (with Bostrom on drums I guess?). Hits all their best note-vibes; you can ride this one a long way out into the desert. (Trust me on that: I live there, haha) I never would've expected them to regain their particular stride, but here it is
https://youtu.be/-gny-gp8J9A
― jaywbabcock, Saturday, 15 December 2018 17:26 (five years ago) link
Wow that's pretty good!
― No Smockin' (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Saturday, 15 December 2018 19:11 (five years ago) link
There’s a recent set on archive.org with the bostrom on drums new guy on keys lineup and it’s really cool. Hear what the keys element is doing on Seal Whales - super interesting. It’s like the keys are taking up some of those chiming pinging Curt overdubs from the studio recording.
― valet doberman (Jon not Jon), Sunday, 16 December 2018 15:02 (five years ago) link
Here's the URL for that show: https://archive.org/details/mp2018-11-24
― Elvis Telecom, Wednesday, 19 December 2018 08:27 (five years ago) link
Elvis, thank you, I'd figured that was the one to download. I shoulda gone to that show, it's in the neighborhood — had no idea Bostrom was back in the mix. This song is so good I'm figuring I need to work thru their last coupla albumss.
― jaywbabcock, Thursday, 20 December 2018 01:53 (five years ago) link
Hope we see a new full length and I would be super delighted if the current five piece w bostrom came northeast. Pups are so deep in my blood.
― valet doberman (Jon not Jon), Thursday, 20 December 2018 12:46 (five years ago) link
There is a new full length, it's out in March! The song in the video linked above is on it.
― wronger than 100 geir posts (MacDara), Thursday, 20 December 2018 14:20 (five years ago) link
fuuck yeahhh
― valet doberman (Jon not Jon), Thursday, 20 December 2018 17:12 (five years ago) link
* Everything * about this 1985 local TV in-studio appearance (even the limo commercial) is so damn adorable. Amazing treasure moment
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKMtKD-aw1I
― jaywbabcock, Saturday, 22 December 2018 16:55 (five years ago) link
Thanks for that loveable live video!
― Ich bin kein Berliner (alex in mainhattan), Monday, 24 December 2018 17:58 (five years ago) link
This is, word-for-word, line-for-line, story-for-story, joke-for-joke one of the best music interviews I've come across in a while. Meat Puppets, 2007.
https://music.avclub.com/meat-puppets-1798212463
― jaywbabcock, Wednesday, 26 December 2018 01:55 (five years ago) link
I don’t know how long it’s been up but it looks like their full discography is now streaming, save the Out My Way EP I think.
― JoeStork, Wednesday, 29 September 2021 19:46 (two years ago) link
So glad I opened this thread and discovered that video of them.
― Starmer: "Let the children boogie, let all the children boogie." (Tom D.), Wednesday, 29 September 2021 20:45 (two years ago) link
They should add Out My Way, it rules
― covidsbundlertanze op. 6 (Jon not Jon), Wednesday, 29 September 2021 23:16 (two years ago) link
yes that video up there is magical xp
― global tetrahedron, Wednesday, 29 September 2021 23:54 (two years ago) link
From my Nashville Scene ballot comments on 2019 releases:...those Dusty Notes come flying, and the dust doesn't come off, but they're still somehow plenty shiny, in this heavy jangle drone rock with country crosscurrents at the right times--incl. Floyd Crameresque sparkling piano waters, never abusing their spotlight comp time---the possibly Buddhist truck-driving man seemingly tells everything he sees, while, like the song says, "Lookin' at the world through a windshield," and vice-versa: for instance,"The Great Awakening" did even more to this land than for it, making for a real nice theme song in my mind, as he sings through it and all else, not scurred of those In Through The Out Door-reinforced juxtapositions, or that yowling tom cat guitar tail under---has he got a rocking chair in there? Rock the nation, big 'un, rolling through suggestions of Grateful Dead karma ballads too, in a poise I can only envy----Serenity Now!
― dow, Thursday, 30 September 2021 01:10 (two years ago) link
Also once again: anybody who likes Curt will prob enjoy this long-ish truckstop conversation (following a brief review of Rise To Your Knees)--originally from 2007 Paper Thin Walls:https://papercomet.blogspot.com/2017/03/meat-puppets.html
― dow, Thursday, 30 September 2021 01:35 (two years ago) link
discography is now streaming
...through my head, anytime the sun is out? been that way forever
― the adventures of pavlo and schrödis (geoffreyess), Thursday, 30 September 2021 01:40 (two years ago) link
Wherearetheystreamingwherearetheystreamingwherearetheystreaming----Spotify? Don't see 'em on bandcamp, alas.
― dow, Thursday, 30 September 2021 02:05 (two years ago) link
That tv show appearance is amazing
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, 30 September 2021 03:46 (two years ago) link
i'd never heard this until recently cos i never bought the ryko reissues but i'm super-into this weird demo version of 'hot pink' off the expanded Up On The Sun. Glockenspiel melody line, weird echoey percussive noises, a dubby bassline going wubba-wubba the whole time, and just a general feeling of falling through a dream backwards. it's kind of like they'd been listening to husker du and thought it would be neat to fuse 'the baby song' with 'reoccurring dreams'. are there any other pups tracks out there that are like this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9SSELVxdvY
― primate marmite (NickB), Thursday, 30 September 2021 11:31 (two years ago) link
Pretty sure that demo predates “The Baby Song” by a year, at least; it might be the other way round.
― wronger than 100 geir posts (MacDara), Thursday, 30 September 2021 15:10 (two years ago) link
oh i'm sure that was the case, wasn't a serious hypothesis i was putting forward there. just that childlike instrumentation and melody brought it to mind
― primate marmite (NickB), Thursday, 30 September 2021 16:45 (two years ago) link
If I recall correctly, they mention in the Ryko liner notes something about that demo being their original vision for Up on the Sun – something like Pet Sounds.
― fpsa, Friday, 1 October 2021 02:53 (two years ago) link
They apparently stuck themselves playing Sloop John B way too frequently in later years. At least according to the complaints of somebody I knew who followed them for years.
― Stevolende, Friday, 1 October 2021 05:34 (two years ago) link
They were the kings of tacky cover versions, first time I saw them play they busked through 'A White Sports Coat & A Pink Carnation', like some sort of wedding band, it might have been their opening song too iirc?
― Maresn3st, Friday, 1 October 2021 09:48 (two years ago) link
I think that's what you call the final soundcheck if it's the opening number
― a down-on-his-luck gastromancer enters (Matt #2), Friday, 1 October 2021 10:35 (two years ago) link
They were infamous for starting a set with the overture to South pacific to a hardcore audience when they supported one of the bigger bands, was it Dead Kennedys? Always seemed to be a maverick streak that I quite enjoyed but it could go too far into cheesiness in places. Just seems like they were playing Sloop John B every night when they could have played something less cheesy.
― Stevolende, Friday, 1 October 2021 10:38 (two years ago) link
Damn that first record is really something totally unlike anything else, I listened this morning for the first time in forever and had my gourd blown all over again. "II" is unimpeachable, after that my interest...err...ebbs & flows.
W/r/t to the cheesy opening song, even as late as sometime in the 00s when I last saw them, the crowd was pretty much just backward white baseball cap wearing jocks. I don't remember what exactly they started with (UMS might recall) but what it was it was really weird and wrong-footed the whole room in a good way, it ended up being a really great gig.
― chr1sb3singer, Tuesday, 1 February 2022 20:51 (two years ago) link
yah first record is incredible just wow
― kurt schwitterz, Tuesday, 1 February 2022 20:59 (two years ago) link
First e.p. is quite incredible for a different direction. even more bluegrass based hardcore.But my introduction was the vinyl version of that first lp and it is still something I would love to hear a lot more of. NOt sure if anybody did take that as a starting point and get even more into getting stuck in the mud and actually stretching things out like not just for a couple of minutes. I did hear that it has been cited as a major influence on grunge. I remember the NME review comparing it to the ballroom sound of SF . Also sounds like pretty advanced playing heavily disguised as extremely amateur.Well glad i got the Rykodisc version which expands it out to twice or 3 times the length.
Now I need to get the rest of the Monitor lp.
― Stevolende, Tuesday, 1 February 2022 21:11 (two years ago) link
Oral history book was really interesting, not sure if you can still get that.
― Stevolende, Tuesday, 1 February 2022 21:12 (two years ago) link
that ryko disc first album with all the bonus tracks is essential. i tried to listen to too high to die last week and its wack. oh damn i posted on this thread 16 years ago and just found myself agreeing with myself before i knew it was me lol.
― kurt schwitterz, Tuesday, 1 February 2022 21:20 (two years ago) link
Interesting that the later SST records, esp "Mirage" even though the music & playing is definitely more mersh, the vocals are...worse? Kudos for that at least.
― chr1sb3singer, Tuesday, 1 February 2022 21:26 (two years ago) link