Waitresses - Classic or Genious?

Don't look at the video. Just listen to the music.

You know what still rules? Christmas Wrapping, that's what.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUOxmXPo69w

Hell yes!

I got "Wasn't Tomorrow Wonderful" for free bcz the guy at the record counter thought I shouldn't be listening to it. His loss!

I would have happily paid the $2 they were asking.

Oh god there is GOD AWFUL spice girls cover of christmas wrapping on youtube. My poor ears. wow.

I was just jamming this (the original)!

god, i love this song.

♥

god, i love this song band.

I heard "Christmas Wrapping" in a store last week and thought, "Ahh, now Xmas is really here...I wonder when the Waitresses thread will get revived on ilx?"

I still listen to them an inordinate amount. I wish they made videos for "No Guilt" and "Wasn't Tomorrow Wonderful".

This actually isn't too bad. Brett Anderson almost has the same kind of sly, laconic presence needed to pull it off.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRTU0wrW5Dc

Christmas Wrapping has to be my favourite Christmas song but I do love both the albums too. Make the Weather is probably my favourite track of theirs.

That song just came up on my Pandora Waitresses station.

such a fucking tune

My roommate made eggnog last night and poured me a glass, but before I drank it I was all "Oh no... wait wait!" and ran to put on "Christmas Wrapping." Pretty cool times.
(ok, I actually put on Mary X-Mas Everybody by Slade *first*)

They're one of those bands I love that I wish had put out a few more albums. It's so unsatisfying just having two albums by an artist I really like, see also Kenickie, Cristina , Yazoo and Earl Brutus.

The Waitresses are one of the best bands of the '80s, and "Christmas Wrapping" is pretty much, like, the best Christmas song ever. Sad that they won't ever reunite. RIP Patty Donahue.

I think I might find her grave next time I go home to Cleveland...

i last played this on 17 july. festive.

You know what still rules? Christmas Wrapping, that's what.

― ★彡☆ ★彡 (ENBB), Monday, December 14, 2009 10:32 PM (11 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Still true.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyEztz6nY9Q

I just listened to two Waitresses records this afternoon including the fabulous song above. I literally just navigated to ILM New Answers from the Discogs page for them because I was looking for any B-sides I might have missed (there don't seem to be any, but there is a King Biscuit live disc!)

I put "Christmas Wrapping" on a Christmas mix for a co-worker today. Still amazing--best punchline ever, along with Grin's "Lost a Number." That video with the house is great.

Man this song is a JAM! I've never ever heard it before!

"I know what boys like" was pretty popular in Aus in the 80s tho.

Where can I shot mp3 of this awesome tune.

check yer ilx mail

sleeve u r a gem.

hmmm no mail yet. Maybe it takes a while.

grr it didnt mail me. my name at the gmail will work tho.

Wait I found it on emusic all good nm!

oh good!

and what the hell, there's a great unreleased live concert that I might as well put up.

Leonardo Music Journal -- Awesome!!

The minute I first hear this around the beginning of December.

Christmas is on like Donkey Kong.

"...but they are going to be famous. I just know they're going to be the new Eagles. Ha..."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROz_pFW6DDI

Ha, love the segue halfway through "I Know What Boys Like" into "music score by Tom Scott." Or is that "special musical material by Paul Shaffer?"

Was introduced to the Spice Girls cover of 'Christmas Wrapping' this year. It's everything you could possibly imagine, much like ENBB said upthread:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-Bg9BT82sQ

their track 'the Comb' from the Akron compilation is totally gnarly

http://www.electricadolescence.com/2009/11/07/the-waitresses-%E2%80%93-the-comb/

Never heard that, thanks!

Reissue labels, give me a 2-CD complete Waitresses set NOW!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtS9FiZw9NE

haha. the spice girls really can't keep up with the fast singing on that version.

WTF is wrong with me that I never heard this before

I just listened to two Waitresses records this afternoon including the fabulous song above. I literally just navigated to ILM New Answers from the Discogs page for them because I was looking for any B-sides I might have missed (there don't seem to be any, but there is a King Biscuit live disc!)

― sleeve, Monday, December 13, 2010 4:17 AM (2 weeks ago)

"Hangover 1/1/83" is a neat instrumental track that was the b-side to the UK 12" release of "Christmas Wrapping.

the band's very first single was "Slide" b/w "Clones", both with Chris Butler on vocals. it's basically Tin Huey under a new name.

some other rareties are listed here with annotations by Chris Butler.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Znab15H3O08

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnQeka6x6rk

Those lyrical changes in the Spice Girls version -- world tour? aeroplanes? Christmas with my mates this year? -- are truly smdh-inducing. ¯\(°_°)/¯

wow "No Guilt" is amazing

Reissue labels, give me a 2-CD complete Waitresses set NOW!

done:

http://omnivorerecordings.com/the-waitresses/

argh it doesn't have the first single or "The Comb" or the two Bowling Balls From Hell tracks, but this band deserves everything they get.

I prefer Patty to Debbie tbh

G Kenny on Butler's Easy Life:

http://somecamerunning.typepad.com/some_came_running/2014/03/chris-butler-easy-life-.html

Smog Veil press release:
SONGS FOR UNSUNG HOLIDAYS
NEW ALBUM BY THE INIMITABLE CLEVELAND MUSICIANS RALPH CARNEY (TIN HUEY, THE WAITRESSES, SERIOUS JASS PROJECT) AND CHRIS BUTLER (TIN HUEY, THE WAITRESSES)
STREETS SEPTEMBER 7, 2018 ON SMOG VEIL RECORDS
Album features songs commemorating fun and far fetched holidays like "Cheese Ball Day," "Polka Day," " Bubble Wrap Day," and "Buffet Day."

July 11, 2018 (Cleveland, Ohio) – Smog Veil Records is set to release on September 7, 2018 the highly unique, comedic album titled, Songs For Unsung Holidays, by two of Northeast Ohio’s best loved musicians Ralph Carney and Chris Butler. The album is a collection of songs that are deliberately silly and absurd about goof ball/off-the-wall holidays. They take a page from the songbooks of artists like Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band, Captain Beefheart, Tom Lehrer, Randy Newman, XTC, The Who, The Grateful Dead.

Carney and Butler set the tone for wild, fun and funny use of instruments and arrangements early in their careers, first with innovators Tin Huey and later with The Waitresses. They have performed with artists like Tom Waits (whom Carney both recorded and toured with), B-52s (Carney became thee go-to New Wave horn player), Kronos Quartet, Run DMC, The Smithereens, and They Might Be Giants. Ralph Carney recently helped his nephew Patrick Carney of the Black Keys record the theme song for the Netflix series Bojack Horseman. His signature horn playing on this recording is unmistakable. Chris’ signature composition, “I Know What Boys Like” recently was heard in an episode of the second season of the Netflix series GLOW.

Butler explains how the project came together with a call from Carney asking “How come there are no more silly bands? Let’s do a project!” And so they brainstormed and wrote songs about obscure holidays. "We'd pass tracks back and forth, and bingo…we soon had enough material for a whole record!"

"I had the good fortune of writing “Christmas Wrapping” while in The Waitresses," Chris Butler recounts, "and folks have always urged me to write other holiday songs. Like for Easter, or Thanksgiving. Nah. No fun in that. But National Salami Appreciation Day? Or National Polka Day? That’s more like it!"

All songs were written and produced by Chris Butler and Ralph Carney and were recorded in their respective home studios. The record was mastered by Gary Hobish at Armin Hammer Productions.

All noises on the album were made/played by Ralph Carney and Chris Butler, except iPad synthesizer played by Christine Repella on “Lobster Day,” and on “Hippie Day” The Hippie Crowd is Becky Sue Armstrong, Tim Daugherty, Verne Davis, Scott Shepard and Tracey Thomas Shepard.

The eighteen tracks on the CD version of Songs For Unsung Holidays are 1. “Tapioca Pudding Day,” 2. “Bald and Free Day,” 3. “Cheese Ball Day,” 4. “Introduce A Girl To Engineering Day,” 5. “Polka Day,” 6. “Bubble Wrap Day,” 7. “Penguin Awareness Day,” 8. “Gorilla Suit Day,” 9. “Day of the Dead,” 10. “Buffet Day,” 11. “Salami Appreciation Day,” 12. “Bath Safety Day,” 13. “Hippie Day,” 14. “World UFO Day,” 15. “Lobster Day,” 16. “Blessing of the Bikes Day,” 17. “Bath Safety Day (radio edit),” 18. “Lobster Day (radio edit).” The color vinyl LP ends with the track “Hippie Day” and includes the remaining tracks as a freebie download.

The album is dedicated to Ralph Carney who died unexpectedly late last year and is missed by all who knew him and whom he touched with his music and charisma.

Ralph Carney recently helped his nephew Patrick Carney of the Black Keys

themoreyouknow.jpg

Bread And Butter is so great

Shut up! Not yet! Don't interrupt!

Somehow hadn't been conscious of the Tin Huey connection. Had been aware of the Television one since Billy Ficca was on drums.
I picked up a good Tin Huey compi a few years ago. Have been into the Cleveland scene for years so thought I'd pick up something by contemporary fellow Ohioans and it is pretty good.

Another one gone. RIP Mars Williams.

OK the we can start listening early this year :/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nud2TQNahaU