Leftover College Radio Station Indie Rock Records I Haven't Listened To (And That Nobody Will Buy)

after being blown away

*I was 11 at the time.

post-r.e.m. the amateurishness goes away which is kinda sad. one dollar production makes jangle-indie sound more charming. so amazing how crappy (in a not good way) so much u.s. stuff sounds in comparison to u.k. stuff. just more ambience in cheap u.k. studios i guess.

its like the difference between the studio sound of 1980-1983 u.s. hardcore and 1984 and beyond u.s. hardcore. did all the studios get new equipment in 1984? that big horrible echo-y sound. metal bands seemed to know how to get the sound they needed for the most part. though they got a lot more pillow-y too until death metal got going.

Boiled in Lead was a Minneapolis Celtic/indie rock band that did quite well locally live for many years, but that Irish-y stuff always has a pretty loyal audience

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMlaDcsWRy0

the Magnolias are local powerpop/punk legends, they still play, great band

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oK9oH7HLJc

coffin break

Unremarkable but I got a kick out of their Freebird cover when I was a kid.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LzeX22sHwo

agitpop are decent minutement-influenced indie rock from minnesota

actually upstate NY but were on Twin Town

coffin break did good covers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kjh97hVmJVc

the Cucumbers were cute

i def saw Coffin Break and Boiled in Lead live

Saw boiled in lead live once as well - they played the reading festival in 89 iirc?

lois is a twee legend, iirc

That dharma bums album had some bangers on it. Post REM jangle but with the raucousness of early soul asylum. John peel used to play this track:

https://youtu.be/d2fAiSev10Q

oyster band : peel fave cos they did a cracking cover version of a new order track (love vigilantes), but in an upbeat roots/celtic style.
saw them live at reading'90 while the pixies were on the main stage, and had a brilliant time.

i'm going to call it and say that 1986 was the nadir for non-rap/dance music production in the u.s.

unless 1987 was.

one dollar production makes jangle-indie sound more charming.

otm

lois is a twee legend, iirc

she later became courtney love. the band, not the person.

/pedant/ that pre-dated the Lois albums

Courtney Love singles are great, I still have two of the three

(xp) ah, thank you. fact checking cuz very much appreciates fact checking, obvi.

June Tabor is in Oyster Band!!!!

crazyhead - third best of the grebo bands iirc

'bad news travels fast' was their big crowd pleaser i think.
one of the better grebo bands, but no idea what i would think if i heard them now!

or maybe that was just for one album? did they back her up? is that a totally different oyster band?

xp

Oysterband are the only band on here so far to have had a number one single in the UK - they did Day Trip To Bangor under the name Fiddlers Dram

i only included oyster band because of the new order cover. they were obviously looking for some of that Clannad crossover money.

i feel like i've been staring at that syd straw album in dollar bins for as long as i've been staring at cindy lee berryhill's debut in dollar bins or that marti jones debut in dollar bins. all three should tour together.

i'm going to call it and say that 1986 was the nadir for non-rap/dance music production in the u.s.

unless 1987 was.

― scott seward, Thursday, November 9, 2017 1:51 PM (nineteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Bands that didn't have access to professional studios in the early '80s knew that one guy across town with a 4-track reel-to-reel, plus that other guy who we could totally borrow a mixer and some mics from. The goal of such recordings was just that everything could be heard; there was no way to approximate big production.

Then these bands came back from tour with a little money, and maybe a label willing to put out a record and pay for time in a pro studio. Studio time! I didn't think we could do that! Now it can sound "professional"!

oh god, so otm

"Cyclops Nuclear Submarine Captain" by Dogbowl is great. His other albums don't deviate much from it but aren't as good. Haven't heard any that stuff in years though.

in 1985 the sound got so mushy here! like, just terribly weak and that infernal echo and everything got gauzy and indistinct. just abysmal drum sounds. things actually improved when people started recording for CD. i never thought i would type that sentence. but at least you could hear the music again.

maybe the don gehman cougar mellencampisms of lifes rich pageant made people tighten their sound up too. this is merely conjecture. 1985 was ground zero for "atmospherics". but there was no budget mike hedges to make your crappy enigma record death rock sound like hyaena.

This is upthread a ways now, but aren't Samiam pretty well-known in certain 90s punk/emo circles? I'd be surprised if you couldn't find a buyer for one of their early records.

its like the difference between the studio sound of 1980-1983 u.s. hardcore and 1984 and beyond u.s. hardcore. did all the studios get new equipment in 1984? that big horrible echo-y sound.

― scott seward, Thursday, November 9, 2017 12:36 PM (fifty-eight minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I've wondered about this too! It went hand-in-hand with stylistic shifts in hardcore that I also mostly hate.

Started back in '83
Started seeing things differently
And hardcore wasn't doing it for me
No More
Started smoking pot
Thought things sounded better slow
Much slower and heavier
Black magic melody to sink this poser's soul

(I also vastly prefer pre-84 USHC)

I heard Greater Than One on college radio just a couple days ago:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8nRjmS_qAQc

The Windbreakers and Winter Hours are both fantastic bands. I love them both.

Ah darn - someone already claimed The Slugs record

this old neon judgement song is cool.. totally harsh awesome coldwavey thing
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-1WjgkIbX0

yeah, good band

I love old Neon Judgement. Don't know that album though

re neon judgement : thought so.
tis very alien sex fiend vs LS6.
if only my local charity shops had such excellence.

here's some vertigo - pretty similar in style to tar amongst all the amrep noisemongers:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkiW8T3pjMI

Did you get that stuff from WMUA?

Stuff I own and still love:
Syd Straw - "Surprise", a great album and a singular voice. Michael Stipe guests on one track. Also, she was a Golden Palomino!
Low Pop Suicide is a hidden gem, Dave Allen of Gang Of Four was their bassist.
Winter Hours - friggin' LOVE these guys, sort of alt-country-folk, tremendous lyrics and emotions in their music. The lead singer came to a tragic end.
Close Lobsters - c'mon, way too good for this trash heap list. The Wedding Present covered one of their songs on their Hit Parade singles!
Bleach - great noisy shoegazers, their singles all bettered their one album.
The Creepers - this is Marc Riley's band! Great Fall-esque stuff as you'd expect. Also covered by The Wedding Present.
Lois - as in Lois Maffeo, K Records wunderkind, gorgeous voice and guitar stuff.
Someone mentioned the Judybats and I still love their debut.

Bands I once owned but no longer:
Oyster Band has their moments but never made me love them.
Neon Judgement had a great track "Voodoo Nipplefield".
Shiva Burlesque - I used to own their albums, Grant Lee Phillips was a member.
Cavedogs were a big Boston band, I liked their radio hit.
Hex - I think there are multple bands with this name. Steve Kilbey was in one that I had but they weren't very memorable.
Clay Idols - related to The Black Watch, J'anna Jacoby and Steve Schayer. Not as good as I hoped.

Many of the rest I heard at the time, maybe even checked out some of the bands, but they belong in the trash.

The first Close Lobster album is terrific, beats all C-86 fluff to dust

LobsterS

Did not know Gang of Four's Pete Allen was in Low Pop Suicide, will check them out! Also want to go back to Death of Samantha, Das Damen (think I've got them on SST, one of the few labels I used to collect, other than ESP-DISK), and I've heard a number of other bands here, but the one I remember best is the Donner Party, who seemed like a crisp, juicy plot twist of the times; xgau got it:
The Donner Party [Cryptovision, 1987]
R.E.M. as punks. Feelies as folkies. Horseflies without horseshit. "John Wilkes Booth." "When You Die Your Eyes Pop Out." "Jeez Louise." B+
Donner Party [Pitch-a-Tent, 1988]
Like Camper Van Beethoven, who started the label in their DIY days, they're sardonic ethnic/folk-rock postpunks, just as Kaleidoscope and the Cleanliness and Godliness Skiffle Band were sardonic e./f.-r. hippies two decades ago. I don't know why northern California does this to its bohemians, but rootlessness must contribute; rootlessness fertilizes popular culture, forces it to reach out. As in their fabulous folk-punk name, these postteenagers are fascinated by mortality--their most striking songs are about infancy, ingestion, illness, fucking yourself up, and various commonplace-to-horrible vicissitudes. They're posteenage psychologically as well as chronologically because they don't romanticize death--just joke about it a lot. A-
Wikipedia: The band consisted of Melanie Clarin on drums and accordion, Sam Coomes on guitar, violin, and banjo, and Reinhold Johnson on bass....Clarin also played drums in another San Francisco folk-rock band, The Cat Heads, and also Harm Farm.[1] Coomes would later play in Heatmiser, and then form Motorgoat and Quasi with his ex-wife, Janet Weiss. Hey, Harm Farm's on Scott's lists too!

donner party

went on to form Pop Will Eat Itself iirc

I saw quite a few of these bands as perennial West Coast opening acts...

i liked Shelleyan Orphan back in the day, the lead singer died very recently. i also used to love that The High album but i know it would sound dated today. i might have heard like two or three other bands on here and that is it.

i wonder how many of these bands had members who went on to be part of medium-big but not-especially-cool alt-rock bands a few years later. it would not surprise me at all to learn that Sponge or Collective Soul or Seven Mary Three were primarily composed of shuffled-around members from some of the younger bands here.

I remember loving the Doughboys & would buy an album.

Coffin Break are a sentimental fave - they would play a gig ANYWHERE. Really nice guys, too.

TWAS had a nice write-up of that Primitons record: http://www.furia.com/page.cgi?type=twas&id=twas0008
I'm a huge fan.