A Final Christmas Memento from the Pointed Sticks!

Word on the street is that Vancouver's reunited Pointed Sticks may have played their final gig, and they are ready to call it quits. Today, one of my favorite bands, I was blissfully unaware of their existence in their original 80's days. Sometimes its so crazy--it's as though there was some invisible cultural border fence separating America from all these fantastic Canadian bands. I'm discovering great Canadian bands, new and old, and I'm completely shocked by my ignorance.

Well thanks to the good folks at Sudden Death Records, the Sticks' early output is mostly covered by their reissuing of  Perfect Youth their lone studio album, and the indispensable compilation, Waiting for the Real Thing. Out of Luck is one of my all time favorite songs. What was once rare music is now readily available. I recently bought a copy of the Pointed Sticks comp released by Zulu Records, but I lucked out--that one seems a little pricey these days. Their 2nd album, Three Lefts Make a Right is another worthy collection of music, that I recommend highly.

But since it's Christmas I wanted to share with you something I stumbled on accidentally. The Pointed Sticks posted complimentary MP3's of two Christmas tunes a few years ago. Well, they pressed a  nifty 7" single with the two holiday songs that they were selling at their final shows.

Well it turns out that they did not sell them all. If you are a Pointed Stick fanatic or maybe just plain Christmas crazy, you can get a copy without hiring a sled team and heading due north.

La-Ti-Da records (latidarecords.com) has a number of said Christmas single, with the songs Power Pop Santa & Xmas Time Again. Both exemplary Christmas songs, with a festive Christmas package cover and green vinyl. Very cool. They have some other cool things for sale, like a 7" single by the Tranzmitors.


Though possibly gone but probably not to be forgotten, The Pointed are also rumored to be releasing a third studio album in the near future, entitle Missed The Bus. I'm hoping that they ultimately decide to be like the Clean, and reassemble once in a blue moon, record a bit, do a few gigs, and go back to civilian life. If they call it quits entirely, there will probably be a national day of mourning in Japan!
In any event, if you don't know their music, I urge you to check them out--Waiting For the Real Thing belongs right next to your well-worn copy of Singles Going Steady.

No Internet! No Cel Phones! No PC'S!--Bloodied But Unbowed---Historical Documentary of Vancouver Punk Scene now on DVD!

Bloodied But Unbowed is a highly entertaining documentary movie by Susanne Tabata, chronicling the Vancouver punk scene of the late 70's /early 80's. And now it's available on DVD!!  For $10.00!!! Go to www.thepunkmovie.com. Excellent product for a cheap price. The collectors 3-DVD version is sold out; they only made 150 of them, unfortunately. I held out and found myself out of luck last month. Luckily I managed to win one on Ebay. The single disc is still worth double what they are asking. If this project is successful, maybe more film makers will be encouraged to make more films like this.



This is a white hot, intelligent, humorous look at a special scene that like a lot of punk scenes, came and went in a short short period. And while things that happened there paralleled the trials and tribulations of other scenes, as in the early days places like Vancouver were islands in a mainstream ocean. Hell, they were an island in their own city! These days all bands are alternative, so this is something a lot of people probably don't understand. That punks had to travel in groups in order to risk getting mauled by complete strangers.
But the Vancouver had its own unique qualities, and that had to do with the unique personalities of the musicians.

A big part of this movie of course is D.O.A. and the Subhumans, excellent bands who are more hardcore punk. But the documentary includes a variety of bands, showing the diversity and experimental nature of the scene. In other words there was a high level of musical tolerance in those days. It wasn't like certain styles were considered verboten then.

One of the biggest problems was finding venues where punk rock was accepted, one of which was the Smiling Buddha, which seemed to be a bit of a dump but nonetheless a haven for the new sounds. Of course one of the problems was that places got wrecked, so there was not going to be a second booking. There is a lot of historic footage in the film, plus loads of contemporary interviews with many of the Vancouver groups and also American musicians of the era who performed in Vancouver and were fans of the music. San Francisco and Vancouver were very much kindred scenes with a lot of similarities. Dead Kennedy's Jello Biafra and The Avengers' Penelope Houston have a lot of insight on the subject, as do Southern Californians like Black Flag's Henry Rollins and Circle Jerk's Keith Morris.

In addition to the above mentioned bands, there are interviews with Pointed Sticks, the amazing pop punks, Tim Ray, Jade Blade of the Dishrags. You have interviews with Buck Cherry and Mary Jo Kopechne of the Modernettes. Kopechne speaks with a great deal of candor about her punk experience. On the one hand, getting involved got her into a community, because she was going in a bad direction earlier. On the other hand, some of the things that happened to her in that period are absolutely harrowing. It's no wonder that she is disillusioned about the old days. As tough as it was to a punk rocker in those days, it was triply tough to be a female punker. You also have an interview with Art Bergmann of the K-Tels/Young Canadians, one of the most talented artists of the era, who unfortunately did not find the success his ability merited.

One of the most intelligent, engaging interviewees is Gerry Hannah of the Subhumans. Later on you find out that he was an extreme environmental activist, one of the Squamish Five, who did some pretty serious stuff. They blew up a factory building parts for cruise missiles and also a power plant. He did five years hard time out of a possible 10. Today he still holds strong convictions, but is contrite about how you go about achieving goals. Another one of the cautionary parts of this movie is the destructiveness of hard drug use. A lot of people who could have been in this were not around to do it.



I highly recommend this movie. By viewing this movie, you get a good idea of what things were like in those days. And the interviews are insightful and funny. It puts a face on the great music we listen to today. A lot of the recordings of these bands can be found on Joe Keithley of  D.O.A.'s music label, Sudden Death Records. It's great that classic Canadian punk music like The Modernettes, D.O.A.,K-Tels/Young Canadians, and Pointed Sticks and the landmark Vancouver Complication comp are readily available today. But check out this documentary sooner than later. I think you will really enjoy this. Kudos to Susanne Tabata and all involved in the making this important movie.

The Best Way To Spread Christmas Cheer!----Part 38--Pointed Sticks!!!

The Best Way to Spread Christmas Cheer is singing loud for All to HEAR!


The Pointed Sticks-XMAS Time Again

The Best Way to Spread Christmas Cheer!----Part 12---Pointed Sticks!!

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

The Pointed Sticks-Power Pop Santa

Pointed Sticks--Waiting For The Real Thing--Don't wait--buy this now!!!!

Canada---home of Bryan Adams, Bachman Turner Overdrive, Celine Dion, Lawrence Welk, Stompin' Tom Connors. With the exception of Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and Rush, Americans didn't show a lot of respect for Canadian musical artists. That is at least until recently with the success of New Pornographers, Sloan, Arcade Fire, Metric, Stars, The Dears, etc.. Turns out that there were quite a few cool bands back in the 80's, Modernettes, D.O.A, Young Canadians, The Nils to name a few.

Out Of Luck Again

Pointed Sticks are probably the biggest example of punk greatness that I was clueless about. It's unbelievable that I learned about these guys so recently. This music was not easily available until Sudden Death Records reissued this compilation and also their Perfect Youth Album. Maybe this band is only cool to like if you live in Japan, where they apparently have a loyal following. The Waiting For The Real Thing compilation is by far my favorite Canadian album. If the Undertones were the Irish Buzzcocks, then the Pointed Sticks are Canada's Undertones (albeit with more keyboard).

Waiting for the Real Thing is an odds and sods collection of singles, performance from the landmark Vancouver Complication comp, unreleased songs and live performances.So what do you want me to do? Listen to the same titled first song. A nice driving  classic punk pop song. The B side to that single follows, Someone Else's Mom. Some great vocals by singer Nick Jones plus a kinetic solo by Bill Napier-Hemy on guitar. After this single Gord Nicholl played spirited keyboards on all the other tunes except  the great You Must Be Crazy from Vancouver Complication. Real Thing is a slower more new wave tune-pretty good, though I prefer the uptempo numbers.

Out of Luck is definitely one of my favorite songs ever--a soundtrack to romantic frustration, a blur of tuneful energy that almost seems to end before it starts. And there is one great tune after the next on this collection, each a near equal to Out Of Luck. Lies, I'm Numb, It's Ok, all revved up smashes. All I Could Take is a speeded up Country tune. How Could You is another terrific tune in the vein of Shelley & Diggle.

Another standout on this record is Marching Song, an infectiously poppy 100 words a minute winner. They also notably cover the 60's garage tune The Witch by Seattle's own Sonics. Apologies is another high water mark on this bountiful anthology. The Pointed Sticks were not around for that long at all, so one thing you see is that the unreleased track are all pretty worthy songs. They were not songs that were unreleased due to quality control, but because they never got around to formally recording them. Care Less, Worse, Middle Age Teenagers/No More Love, are all worthy additions to the canon. Additionally, the rave up Automatic You has 2 more songs appended to it, Dion's (I Was) Born To Cry and Del Shannon's Keep Searchin' (We'll Follow The Sun). So actually 26 songs crammed on one disc!

Canadian Punk Pop Masters

In 2006 the band began working together again after many years. They put out a 7" My Japanese Fan and also released on the Internet two pretty nifty Christmas songs, Power Pop Santa and Xmastime Again. That was just a teaser for their long overdue 2nd album Three Lefts Make A Right, which is pretty good, not on the level of this disc, but a very welcome addition. In fact they just toured Japan briefly again in July, so who knows maybe one of these days we may see them do a gig in New York. But for the time being, do yourself a favor and get this CD without delay.