I didn't know Yank Crime was on a major! I haven't listened to half of these. That Mr. Bungle album rules but I voted Boredoms
― friday goodness thank it's (flamboyant goon tie included), Friday, 11 January 2013 15:11 (eleven years ago) link
I love the first Bungle album. It makes me feel 13 all over again without feeling the slightest hint of shame. The music is just that cool.
― afriendlypioneer, Friday, 11 January 2013 15:13 (eleven years ago) link
I don't know if this detail matters, but Mr. Bungle were already signed to and had an album released by WB before Disco Volante. The self-titled album came out in '91. I remember the lyric, "Will Warner Brothers put our record on the shelf" in "Carousel."
― afriendlypioneer, Friday, January 11, 2013 10:07 AM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
yeah there was def a little bit of cheating on that entry, but the fact remains that no one ever said WB had to put out a SECOND Bungle record
― lol cassidy fan club (Whiney G. Weingarten), Friday, 11 January 2013 15:16 (eleven years ago) link
especially one with a 10-minute musique concrete suite on it
The hit single off the Cop Shoot Cop album was $10 Bill - a genuine chart hit in Britain after Jakki Brambles championed it on daytime radio and played it every show.
― Troughton-masked Replicant (aldo), Friday, 11 January 2013 15:18 (eleven years ago) link
Well, I just learned some things about Fred Armisen and Carla Bozulich
― friday goodness thank it's (flamboyant goon tie included), Friday, 11 January 2013 15:20 (eleven years ago) link
Hello, I gather I was invoked earlier.
― Ned Raggett, Friday, 11 January 2013 15:22 (eleven years ago) link
Dude, you owned this thread without even showing up.
― Loud guitars shit all over "Bette Davis Eyes" (NYCNative), Friday, 11 January 2013 15:23 (eleven years ago) link
Hahah well then.
― Ned Raggett, Friday, 11 January 2013 15:25 (eleven years ago) link
Now we all want to know what you vote for.Or at least, I do.
― Loud guitars shit all over "Bette Davis Eyes" (NYCNative), Friday, 11 January 2013 15:28 (eleven years ago) link
Sorry, I do not vote in poll threads (nor do I start them). I will stand by that assessment of Pop Tatari, though.
― Ned Raggett, Friday, 11 January 2013 15:30 (eleven years ago) link
listening to interstate right now, first time in a while -- definitely not the best pell mell album but great nonetheless.
― tylerw, Friday, 11 January 2013 15:31 (eleven years ago) link
Do you think any of these actually paid off for the labels?Pure Guava must've made some dough by now.
― brio, Friday, 11 January 2013 15:33 (eleven years ago) link
Trenchmouth was really trading
― fart the police (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, 11 January 2013 15:33 (eleven years ago) link
Raging
― fart the police (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, 11 January 2013 15:34 (eleven years ago) link
Yank Crime for me...will be checking a load of these out though, sweet thread!
― Blue Collar Retail Assistant (Dwight Yorke), Friday, 11 January 2013 15:37 (eleven years ago) link
Do you think any of these actually paid off for the labels?
royal trux definitely did not
Pitchfork: You started making Accelerator with Virgin but it was released on Drag City. What's the story behind that?
JH: We dictated the whole thing, actually. We requested to be let out of the contract after Sweet Sixteen. We knew that [Virgin] couldn't get their head around what we were doing. But having signed the contract for three records, they were going to have to pay us for a third record no matter what. And in the contract, we were given total artistic free reign-- we'd administer our own budgets and we didn't have to have them sign off on anything. So after Sweet Sixteen came out, we basically freaked the fuck out of [Virgin]. We told them that we were going to make this other record right now, and that we were going to do it on eight tracks with no producer. Then we'd have the lawyer convince them that it would be easier for them to give us all the money for that record and not have to spend anything to promote it. That was our game. So we got exactly what we wanted, because the record was paid for by Virgin, even though it wasn't even started when we got the money. Then we went about recording it however we wanted and finished up the trilogy as it were.NH: It wasn't really a relief to get away from Virgin since we had a good deal-- I think they were pretty lame though. Our [Virgin] deal was for two LPs straight out, then they had an option for the third, but they had to decline by a certain date. We got paid one fee if they declined, one fee if they accepted-- and then if they declined, they had to buy out the remaining options on our contract. If they had stuck with the contract, they would have put out Accelerator, Veterans, and Pound4Pound-- all of which would have been done with bigger producers, and they might have eventually been able to break one of them. But fuck them.
― tylerw, Friday, 11 January 2013 15:37 (eleven years ago) link
ha never saw this video before:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGI6mbD0E9A
love Firewater, bums me out that Cop Shoot Cop's albums don't seem to be in print or on itunes/spotify, etc.
― trey songza (some dude), Friday, 11 January 2013 15:38 (eleven years ago) link
who could have predicted this wasn't going to fly off the shelves!?!http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-0MzSeqFbaZY/TpzchghicMI/AAAAAAAAAAk/GC23OaCxtAI/s400/Royal%20Trux.jpg
― brio, Friday, 11 January 2013 15:40 (eleven years ago) link
feel like this is the apex of major label weirdhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a16igonZo20
― tylerw, Friday, 11 January 2013 15:42 (eleven years ago) link
it's funny at the time there was so much hand-wringing and angst about The Man co-opting the underground, but now looking back on it, it's like it was free ice cream day at ben & jerry's
― brio, Friday, 11 January 2013 15:51 (eleven years ago) link
http://www.stayfreemagazine.org/images/15/music/the_man.jpg
― Tarfumes The Escape Goat, Friday, 11 January 2013 15:56 (eleven years ago) link
in a sense the underground was co-opted by signing everybody and showing them that anything beyond niche careerism was too hard a mountain to climb
― da croupier, Friday, 11 January 2013 16:02 (eleven years ago) link
also kind of funny how boomers get to be all WE CHANGED THE WORLD while 90s nostalgiacs are more "man remember when we dressed funny and the economy was decent"
― da croupier, Friday, 11 January 2013 16:05 (eleven years ago) link
would love to write a book full of stories about the creative and/or financial ruination of so many people involved in this gold rush. Our Band Could Be Your Tax Write-Off.
― trey songza (some dude), Friday, 11 January 2013 16:06 (eleven years ago) link
― friday goodness thank it's (flamboyant goon tie included), Friday, January 11, 2013 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
If I recall correctly they were signed as a condition of Rocket from the Crypt's major label contract. Speedo wanted both his bands signed.
― scott pgwp (pgwp), Friday, 11 January 2013 16:07 (eleven years ago) link
mid 80s probably more remembered for funny clothes and financial prosperity? the Nirvana generation still has plenty of illusions about how the world was changed.
― trey songza (some dude), Friday, 11 January 2013 16:08 (eleven years ago) link
the memoirs by dean wareham and the semisonic drummer definitely go that "lol majors" route
and yeah i realize those are broad generalizations but c'mon some dude
― da croupier, Friday, 11 January 2013 16:09 (eleven years ago) link
xpostsit's hard to say really what the long-range effects of this goldrush were since the bottom fell out of the music biz right after this period,...and not because they signed a bunch of wackjobs, but because people stopped buying records. if people still bought zillions of records, i bet the majors would still splash out for longshot/niche/cred/vanity projects like these.
― brio, Friday, 11 January 2013 16:09 (eleven years ago) link
actually cds were selling more than ever in the late '90s when all these guys got dropped, they just weren't buy alternative cds
― da croupier, Friday, 11 January 2013 16:10 (eleven years ago) link
oh yeah - don't doubt this crop would have been dropped, just think the cycle of more far-out major signings would have repeated if not for the crash
― brio, Friday, 11 January 2013 16:12 (eleven years ago) link
it'd be interesting to see similar lists for the 60's-80's
― brio, Friday, 11 January 2013 16:13 (eleven years ago) link
I'm not sure about the order, but these 3 for me:
Flaming Lips (half this album is still some of my favorite Lips stuff)Ween (love most of the album, but only a couple songs still get played)Mercury Rev ( I still listen to this. it's a roller coaster of beauty and noise)
― nicky lo-fi, Friday, 11 January 2013 16:20 (eleven years ago) link
Yank Crime for me, one of my favorite records, and certainly the most influential to me when it came out. By far the biggest "event" record on this list for me.
― grandavis, Friday, 11 January 2013 16:34 (eleven years ago) link
Disco Volante for me.
― aloo mutter, aloo fatter (WilliamC), Friday, 11 January 2013 16:40 (eleven years ago) link
That RTX video is hilarious.
― Emperor Cos Dashit (Adam Bruneau), Friday, 11 January 2013 16:46 (eleven years ago) link
Voted 'Steel Pole Bath Tub' - Chicago record store and label Permanent Records released their swan song, 'Unlistenable,' last year. It's named after the Slash Records A&R team's reaction when they brought it to the table. It's pretty friggin' awesome too. Just looked up their wikipedia entry and it seems they've had a good run of making video game music!
― BlackIronPrison, Friday, January 11, 2013 10:08 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
always been curious about these dudes. a friend of mine told me he saw them open for Faith No More once and that instead of playing their own originals, they just played Sabbath's "Paranoid" for 45 minutes. And I don't mean a 45-minute jam of Paranoid, I mean they'd play it through to completion, stop, then start it again.
― NINO CARTER, Friday, 11 January 2013 17:05 (eleven years ago) link
haha, sounds like they lost a bet
― tylerw, Friday, 11 January 2013 17:07 (eleven years ago) link
ha, sounds like something they would do! pretty sure they did a version of paranoid on one of their albums too btw
the one time i saw them they were supporting the melvins but iirc also they played the second support slot too under the name "duh!"
― clive mendonca's big soccer (NickB), Friday, 11 January 2013 17:09 (eleven years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5FqS4XFOto
^ this song of theirs is sooooo fucking great btw
― clive mendonca's big soccer (NickB), Friday, 11 January 2013 17:10 (eleven years ago) link
Saw Steel Pole Bathtub with The Fluid and Mudhoney in 1989 - all three bands were opening for GWAR at City Gardens in Trenton, NJ. Don't remember much about 'em.
― 誤訳侮辱, Friday, 11 January 2013 21:19 (eleven years ago) link
The three I've owned at some point (not sure if I still do) are the Mercury Rev, Ween and Butthole Surfers. The one I'd be most likely to want to listen to now is the Mercury Rev.
― o. nate, Friday, 11 January 2013 21:51 (eleven years ago) link
fontanelle 4eva
― maura, Friday, 11 January 2013 22:04 (eleven years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.
― System, Thursday, 17 January 2013 00:01 (eleven years ago) link
are we supposed to vote for the best or the weirdest
― tylerw, Thursday, 17 January 2013 00:01 (eleven years ago) link
fav, i think.
― some dude, Thursday, 17 January 2013 00:07 (eleven years ago) link
Vote for fav.
― Loud guitars shit all over "Bette Davis Eyes" (NYCNative), Thursday, 17 January 2013 00:17 (eleven years ago) link
Kevin Martin must have A++ powers of persuasion if he managed to convince someone at Virgin that God were a "jazz" group. Voted for it due to it being the only album on this list to feature members of Henry Cow, Naked City or Bill Fay's band.
― it's all fuck what sit says, we'll do our own thing (Matt #2), Thursday, 17 January 2013 00:48 (eleven years ago) link
Voted for God.
― 誤訳侮辱, Thursday, 17 January 2013 03:08 (eleven years ago) link
i voted trux of course. i would have voted jesus lizard (so weird they were on a major, i guess death grips was on a major just last year so plus ça change etc.) but it's not their best album by any means.
― flesh, the devil, and a wolf (wolf) (amateurist), Thursday, 17 January 2013 03:46 (eleven years ago) link