Cover Them Impressed! I'm in Love with that Song--Australian Replacements Tribute

Lampshade Optional....

 

 

It's hard to believe it but the Replacements are back! It seems like almost everybody comes back, if only for a limited time only. I was looking at Paul Westerberg's website and it looks like he and Tommy are really enjoying this. And if proceeds are going to help Slim Dunlap, who is very ill, it is a
 great cause.





But this post is about a tribute album from 1999. I haven't really done a lot with tribute album's but this is one I really like.

I don't have a lot of buying music stories recently. Unfortunately it involves the click of a mouse more often than not. But when I finally got around to buying I'm in Love with this Song, an all-Australian tribute album of Replacements tunes, it turned out the disc was long out of print and was pretty pricey.

One day after work I noticed someone was selling one for a reasonable price. It was late October a few years ago. The weather had started to go a little haywire here in New York. It was snowing, which is extremely unusual for us. Within a few moments, I noticed that the branches on the trees were hanging down; the snow was so heavy the branches were literally touching the ground within a matter of a half hour. Just as I went to purchase the disc, the power went down. Power came back about 5 days later, so I have mixed associations with this album. But I don't regret the purchase as much as the deferred gratification.

As far as The Replacements go, I probably identify with them more than any other band. They could be me, or people I know. Sometimes if you are in the Burbs, you kind of feel like you're from nowhere, as though you, Paul, Bob, Tim & Chris were all from the same home town. Of course I had the opportunity to see them in their prime at Mabel's in Champaign-Urbana and blew the gig off for schoolwork!

To some degree, I think every tribute is a mixed bag. They can be label showcases, sometimes they are bloated productions with a host of big stars paying tribute to another big star. Some of them seem to be slapped together a little too carelessly. It seems to me that this collection is more of a labor of love, of combination of Australian contemporaries who loved their music, and other bands who bought  their music as teenagers and were thus encouraged to pick up some guitars and raise some hell.



As far as tributes go, this is better than 90% of your typical covers collection. For the most part the songs don't stray too far from the originals--which is unfortunate. Maybe you might have wanted a few different songs represented. I probably know about half the acts on this, if only by name in some cases. Its nice that the roster of bands is not a stag party--there are some women belting out the tunes which I think is great. And I'm pretty certain that all the albums are represented. From the snotty to the sublime.

I knew from the very first song, Brad Shepherd's spirited take on Alex Chilton, that this tribute was a keeper. It's a little faster and punkier than the original--less sentimental but just as powerful. Brad of course is a member of the HooDoo Gurus, an Australian institution, so its no small wonder that he smacks this song out of the park. When I hear the song, it feels a little ironic, like we're celebrating the next generation of underappreciation, like Chilton passing the baton to Westerberg. The powers that be thought they would be America's Rolling Stones, but as it turned out they could only be themselves, brilliant, warts and all. And this tribute shows the reverence that musicians hold for this band (even halfway around the world), but also the unimpeachable quality of the songs, which rings truthfully through these interpretations.

The Celibate Rifles make an appearance here performing a sans-mandolin rough take on I Will Dare from Let it Be. Power poppers IceCream Hands do a nice version of Swinging Party. A band well worth seeking out, Brother Brick, represent well on Color Me Impressed.

Other bands that I recognize are Challenger 7 who smash through Left of the Dial with panache. The Pyramidiacs have their way with On the Bus. Pop aficionado Dom Mariani's DM3 do a nice twangy Rock n Roll Ghost. You Am I cover White & Lazy from the Replacements Stink, and its okay--I'm not sure how much you could do with this. The Finkers have fun Tommy gets his Tonsils out.




As far as groups I'm unfamiliar with go, Blood Sucking Freaks pounds out Taking a Ride with conviction. Really good take on one of the standouts from Sorry, Ma.....Half Miler's hard 90's sounding take on Here Come's a Regular is one of the few covers that strays from the songbook a bit.
And it works. Erbs & Pisces do a mashup of both sides of the Mats first single, I'm in Trouble/If only you were Lonely. Nick Barker, Michael Thomas & Jen Anderson do a nice jangly countrified version of Skyway with lovely three part harmony, a violin solo, and if I'm not hallucinating, a banjo.

I enjoyed The Scruffs doing Can't Hardly Wait--not as good as the original but much better than the movie with the same title. Eva Trout perform Androgynous--female vocals seem very appropriate here. Mandy Pearson and Love Me do a nice version of Sadly Beautiful--it's like listening to the song from an entirely new perspective. Achin' to Be is similar to the Alt-Country sounding original but with piano added to the mix.

If you haven't figured it out, I really liked this Tribute, but not nearly as much as I like the Replacements. Who knows, maybe they've another chapter to write in their songbook.


Here's another interpretation not from Australia, but from another American legend.

The Best Way to Spread Christmas Cheer!----Part 24--Celibate Rifles!

The Best Way to Spread Christmas Cheer is Singing Loud for All to Hear!

Celibate Rifles---Merry Xmas Blues

(death by Christmas continues)

Let's Make Some New Mistakes--Celibate Rifles' The Turgid Miasma of Existence!

The Turgid Miasma of Existence is probably my favorite album title ever. The fact that it was made by one of the best Australian band ever, Sydney's Celibate Rifles is even greater reason for jubilation. The Celibate Rifles are one of punk rocks finest ongoing institutions, starting up in the wake of The Saints and Radio Birdman, and continuing to the present. A shining example of why punk rock is great--visceral guitar work, politically charged intelligent lyrics, always passionate in their convictions. Fighting the good fight against hypocrisy and for a greater good.

Thunder From Down Under

But I was listening to this fine album again very recently and some of the lyrics in the liner notes struck me as being quite prescient, in the wake of the shooting tragedy in Tucson. From Sentinel:

I hear the beasts outside my window

They speak the dead man's alphabet

I fear the violence of their speech

Their thoughts that drift just out of reach

Like stars upon a midnight beach

They fail to reach their destination

Another day of cancelled expectations.

Those words really struck a chord with me. While naturally, you cannot definitively prove a causal relationship between hate speech from the conservative right politicians and pundits and the killings in Arizona, it raises the question why people are using violence in their speeches these days. What purpose is served by this? And don't kid yourself. One of the tactics of the conservatives is to try and make this issue universal--the left wing does the same thing, so everyone is guilty. Sure, you can find examples of this, but preponderantly this violent tone is coming from the Right.

I hear people on the TV endlessly lamenting how such a madman could get such a weapon, and how there should be a way to prevent a deranged person from obtaining automatic or semi-automatic weapons. Really the issue is why anyone should be able to obtain an weapon with such a mass killing potential at all! Some people have ventured the opinion that maybe if people had more guns, they could have taken the lunatic out in Tucson before he harmed so many people. Well..., there is a certain logical truth to that. But, the United States has more guns per capita and in sheer numbers more guns than any other country on this planet already, and we have an awful history of gun violence here. So how many guns will we need in order to end violence here? Even though we have more than everywhere else, it is apparently still not enough. When you look at the problem in this way, the logic is sheer lunacy.

I heard someone say that we need guns because of the bad people. Who are these bad people and why does America seemingly have more bad people than other places? I hope when people speak about American exceptionalism, that is not what they are referring to. When you hear an the argument in this manner, you can't help but detect an undercurrent of racism. I hope that in the near future a new version of the Brady Law banning assault weapons will become a Federal Law again. Under the Bush Administration that was allowed to expire. Ironic, because Mr Brady was shot in the head during an attempted assassination of conservative icon and American President, Ronald Reagan. On that note, let me return to the world of music.

On TTMOE, you have the indominatable Damien Lovelock on Lead Vocals. Kent Steedman is on Guitar(!), Mykle Couvret on Bass, Dave Morris also on Guitar, and Phillip Jacquet pounds the Drums. Bill Bonney Regrets opens this album, and the beginning instrumental is one of my favorite punk rock musical moments ever. With their energy and politically astute lyrics they remind me of an Australian version of  Canada's D.O.A. Then again with their name purportedly being the literal opposite of the Sex Pistols in a way makes them the Sex Pistols of the Southern Hemisphere. (You know, like the opposite swirl of the toilet)

"The News is what we want to hear, electric magic diarrhoea...."

This is a very solid album. Kent Steedman shreds giant guitar riffs throughout. Another bona fide classic tune is the awesome Sometimes, which is very much in the vein of Stranded by the legendary Saints. Those two songs I've mentioned make this album essential on their own. But there is also so much more. Eddie is another winning uptempo number as are JNS, Conflict of Instinct, Some Kind of Feeling, and New Mistakes. There are also very good quieter tunes like No Sign, Glasshouse, and the aforementioned Sentinel. The Cd also includes an acoustic version of Eddie and two live cuts, Ice Blue and Thank You America.

So if you are a fan of punk rock there is no way you can be disappointed with The Turgid Miasma of Existence. This is a killer album with a load of great songs. This album seems to be a little tough to get a hold of right now, but there are collections of their early music like Sofa that are readily available. So do yourself a favor and get familiarized with a great Australian band.