Happy Down Here: Crippled Pilgrims Collected Recordings--Late Greats Redux

Washington, DC, has its share of great bands, but Crippled Pilgrims were one of my favorites. I was in the Record Stop shop in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, poking through the records when I happened to read the spiel written in ball-point pen on a round sticker on the protective plastic sleeve of a bright green album entitled Under Water, by a band completely unknown to me. I can't remember precisely what the blurb stated, but I was compelled to pick this up immediately. Years later these songs all seem so familiar to me, because for quite a while I played the Crippled Pilgrims music incessantly.

Broken Lightbulb Shines so Bright

In a way these guys are a little hard to characterize. Some people compare them to Television or Meat Puppets, just to name a few. I would say they are a little like REM or Verlaines with Neil Young or The Wipers' Greg Sage, which still fails to fully encapsulate what this band was up to. Energetic emotional vocals full of attitude and despair by Jay Moglia and intricately powerful guitar work by Scott Wingo combined for a potent blend of post-punk. Rounding out the band, Mitch Parker played bass and Dan Joseph was on drums. In a very brief period of time in the 80's these guys made some fantastic creative music, and then suddenly it was all over. Mitch Parker played bass and Dan Joseph was on drums.

For some reason, unlike many bands who were a lot less talented, Crippled Pilgrims never made the media jump from vinyl to Cd, at least not for a very long time. It was not until 2004, when Ric Menck of The Velvet Crush released their collected output on his Reaction Label, which I guess is a subsidiary label of Parasol. Apparently, he was at least as wowed by this band as I was, and felt it was high time more people heard these guys. Incidentally, Parasol Records is closing their mail order business for good in about a week. I know I spent a good amount of cash there over the years. But they ran a pretty great online service, promoted little known bands, indie groups, Swedish bands, and also released quite a few terrific records in their own right. I know that I truly am sad to hear they will be hanging up their mail order store, just as I was when Chicago's Ajax records shut down.

If you pick this album up, you will be amazed that these guys are pretty obscure, but I think you will be gratified that you finally got a chance to hear Crippled Pilgrims. In some ways, when I hear Scott Wingo, I think of Nels Clines guitar work in the Wilco live album, where he effortlessly weaves his way through the arrangements with his guitar. While I like the music from their first ep, Head Down Hand Out, particularly Black and White, I think that they really hit their stride on Under Water.

Down Here, the first song, is a great start, a jangling manifesto to alienation. One of my favorites is the powerful So Clean, the second song, reminiscent of the best work of The Chameleons. Another great song is Undone, which definitely has Byrdsy, almost country vibe to it. The moody Oblivious and Numb is another one of the high points on this anthology. Add the driving Sad But True to the mix, and you have a great lost classic postpunk album resurrected from the graveyard of obscurity. Check out this unjustly obscure band today and see what you've been missing out on!