C/D S/D - Karate

"I hear you sayin' `I am just one kid. We can't do what one thousand once did.`"

^^^For some reason, I love that line.

Has anyone ever gotten the term "Kraut-jazz" applied to them? Because, sometimes I feel like Karate was just that.

Thanks for the reminder that there are still Karate songs that I haven't heard.

Never heard of these guys before but was in a record store while the new reissue of The Bed Is In The Ocean was playing and bought it. Frankly I love this. There is a real tension between energy and restraint. The guys voice really grabbed me. There is someone he reminds me of but I can't figure it out. The chorus to The Last Wars gives me shivers.

Total classic.

― Austin, Sunday, April 14, 2013 10:05 PM

Also I've heard Geoff Farina's voice described as similar to a lot of different people from Robert Smith to Donald Fagen. I get what you mean, as I can't rightly place it either.

Highly recommend this live album if you can find it.

Smith or Fagen wouldn't be who I was thinking of. I was getting maybe Fugazi vibes - that sort of vocal intensity - but I don't know Fugazi that well so that might be me reaching. Great stuff and I will check out the live album you linked.

My introduction to Karate in the late 90s was someone describing them as "Steely Dan meets Fugazi" so yes: also agree with your assessment there. I just kind of made peace years ago with the fact that Farina sounds vaguely familiar to, but also not quite like, countless other folks and I'll never pin it down definitively.

Steely Dan meets Fugazi is some description.

It's cool that this band is getting some long overdue praise and attention but I think I finally understand how it feels to be one of those boomer psych rock freaks who talk about finding private press records that now go for four figures in the cutout bin at Woolworths or whatever. My memory of this album that's just been reissued (which I like) is of it being one of only a handful of rejects from when I decided to sell most of my CDs to three different used record shops after I graduated college. You couldn't give this album away back then.

yeah the southern/polyvinyl curse ime

That's wild. On the west coast, I had to special order all of their records.

Even though I still think they're wonderful I've cooled on them in recent years. I relistened to Cancel / Sing and the 595 live album the other day after the thread got revived and they still sound great. I didn't remember them being so jammy, but I don't mind it because Farina's style is really fluid. He can convincingly recall Keith Levene and Grant Green on the same album, but it always sounds fresh and natural. Unsolved was always my favorite. It was like the melancholy nuAmericana power trio counterpart to what the Sea and Cake was doing around the time, complete with esoteric "without context" lyrics.

This is a jam:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMgx4RfnA1s

"The Halo of the Strange" (2000)

If you want something totally different (and maybe a bit hokey), Farina's solo albums from the time are what I'd call "whimsical indie." Reverse Eclipse was my favorite and is recommended if you really like his role in Karate. Blobscape was different (solo electric guitar) and I liked it to fall asleep to, but it's kind of notorious for being one of the lowest scores pfork has ever given out. Used copies cheap on Discogs, but I can't find any way to stream it presently.

i'm happy people are discovering this band! i think i only have cds of the self-titled and in place of real insight but i'm very fond of them. i remember my friend playing "new martini" from IPORI for me in like 2002, and then i bought the s/t without having heard anything off of it, but their austerity and sense of dynamics fit in well with stuff i already liked and i fell in love quickly.

when i saw the reunion show dates i texted a couple of guys i became friends with much more recently to see if they were fans (we all have somewhat overlapping interests in the emo/hardcore/indie of that era)--one was just like "nah" and the other said he saw them in D.C. in the late 90s and was bored to death. i'm not shocked since obv this band had a pretty unique lane they worked in.

it sucks that numero doesn't do CDs anymore--maybe i'll go off to discogs and fill out the collection. in the meantime just imagine being 17 and firing up this cd for the first time and hearing this track:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKRLJa295Es

I probably would’ve thought — “when does the rocking start?”

and it doesn’t, and then you have something else to think about

their austerity and sense of dynamics

Great description of what it is that this band does well. It's like spare emo on the knife-edge before a crescendo or payoff. Tension is the word that comes to mind.

it sucks that numero doesn't do CDs anymore

Yep, I get their reasons why, but it's been painful to see them reissue stuff like this on vinyl and cassette, but not CD. Even the used CDs on discogs from these guys seem to go for around $20 and up.

I was hoping that Numero would maybe do a CD box set once all the vinyl is out but I’ve been buying the vinyl reissues as they come out anyway. ‘IPORI’ was always my favourite but I’ve been listening to ‘The Bed Is In The Ocean’ a bit since the reissue.

This is the song that just kills me:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmsVg5Hv1yQ

Kids come across as solemn and lost,
I know old men evoke last wars and holocausts
German kids,
Croatian kids
just like American kids,
we know

was listening to that (and the whole album) tonight, really really good.

First time hearing these guys. They're kinda like a softer Silkworm.

I thought the same thing - something about the voice and the emotional intensity.

i can see that although it's actually never crossed my mind (and i'm a huge, huge, skwm fan).

You guys know 90s indie better than I do: does Codeine factor into Karate's DNA at all?

echoing all the late love here. these dudes really know their way around a 7#9 chord.

I know I'm a member of that vanishingly small percentage of folks still buying new compact discs, but I can't be the only one that was stoked to see Numero Group putting out a CD box for these guys:

https://numerogroup.com/products/complete-studio-recordings-cd-boxset

DISC 1 Self Titled + Death Kit Single, The Schwinn & Cherry Coke
DISC 2 In Place Of Real Insight + Operation: Sand/Empty There Single
DISC 3 The Bed Is In The Ocean
DISC 4 Unsolved
DISC 5 Cancel/Sing
DISC 6 Some Boots
DISC 7 Pockets
DISC 8 In The Fishtank 12

plus an 80-page book

I was pleased to see the CD box arrive, as I hoped up thread, but not sure I’ll buy it as I’ve bought all the vinyl reissues. That does leave me a little short of the full catalogue, though.

that boxset contains a good amount of stuff that i would consider the folk music of my early 20s. this band means so much to me.

i mainly wanted to see if there was any talk about the box, but also really wanted to post "airport"-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7CjYuNrlVY

Honestly I've not yet cracked open my box. Holding it for a quiet winter day to delve into more deeply, unless I get impatient before then.

pls post thoughts when that happens.