SOUNDTRACK: THE VASELINES-The Way of the Vaselines (1992).
I had never heard of The Vaselines until Kurt Cobain praised them so much back in 1992. SubPop quickly issued Way of the Vaselines, a fairly comprehensive collection of their recordings.
I bought it and thought it was okay. Not revolutionary or anything, but decent indie pop. And I think my lackluster response is in part because I often react the same way to what you’d call originators of a scene when I’ve already been in the scene for a while. Once people have blown the fundamentals away, it’s hard to appreciate the fundamentals anymore.
And so I’ve given them a new listen with more appreciative ears. I also enjoyed poppier music a lot more now than I did in 1992 (it’s funny how poppy The Vaselines are and yet how noisy Cobain was).
The songs really hold up quite well in a Velvet Underground way (“Rory Rides Me Raw”), or the left field dance anthem cover of Divine’s “You Think You’re a Man.” They also have some fast punk songs (“Dying for It”).
Nirvana covered three of their songs, “Son of a Gun” and more famously “Molly’s Lips.” (The Vaselines version of “Molly” is much cuter (with a bike horn in the chorus)). And, perhaps most famously, “Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam” (which is pretty close to the original).
The Vaselines sang a lot about sex, (“Sex Sux,” “Monsterpussy”) that was disguised in a largely pop context. But they also had inclinations towards fuzzy punk.
I think what’s so wonderful about this collection is that it’s four Scottish kids who had good pop sensibilities (and some talent) playing what they liked. They’re an amateur love to the whole disc, and yet for all of their lo-fi ness, the songs sound good–even if you can’t always understand the lyrics. (Sub Pop remastered and re-released the package with bonus tracks as Enter the Vaselines, but I’ll not be getting that).
Were they, as Allmusic says, the best pop band from 1986 to 1989? I don’t know. But they sure played some great songs. I’m don’t think I need to hear their reunited selves, because there’s something about the charm of these Edinburgh kids playing these songs in something of a vacuum that I rather like. It only took two listens to this record (probably the first time in ten years) for me to see how much was here.
[READ: April 16, 2011] “Underachievers Please Try Harder”
The subtitle of this article is “Indie Rock Reunites on the English Coast,” and I’m mentioning it because it got me to listen to the Vaselines record again.
It was an interesting article about the state of music and “festival” tours, specifically All Tomorrow’s Parties. (This year’s ATP spinoff, I’ll Be Your Mirror will be in Asbury Park, New Jersey! and features Portishead, Mogwai and A Silver Mount Zion among others–were I 20 years younger, I’d be there). (more…)





Mark Barrowcliffe wrote a very nice comment about my review of his book. But he made me aware of some things that I thought about saying then but which I didn’t.
SOUNDTRACK: KISS-Alive! (1975).
This was the first Kiss live album and was the album that broke Kiss worldwide. I’m not entirely sure why a live album of songs that didn’t sell very well would do better than the original studio albums, but so it was.
SOUNDTRACK: The Believer June/July 2007 Music Issue Compilation CD: Cue the Bugle Turbulent (2007).
The 2007 Believer disc smashes the mold of folkie songs that they have established with the previous discs in the series. The theme for this disc is that there’s no theme, although the liner notes give this amusing story:

Many many years ago (1995), while I was in Boston, I bought my first copy of
This is a periodical I haven’t mentioned before. Wholphin is a “DVD Magazine of Rare and Unseen Short Films.” So yes, the reason I hadn’t mentioned it is because it is a DVD and not a book. However, as I have been watching Vols 1-8 over the last few months, I have noticed that a few writerly names keep cropping up in the credits. Plus, it’s got that whole McSweeney’s connection.
film possibly ever by Scott Prendergast called “The Delicious” which you can watch, and I encourage you to,