Anything On Your Mind?
I thought it might be fun to periodically try out some different formats for the blog. I’m generally happy with the usual template, of three albums on my mind, three recent releases, and then five random songs. But one thing that I want to write about occasionally is going through the tags on Bandcamp to try and ferret out some records on my own. I rely heavily on a collection of websites and mailing lists (which I mostly try and call out in the footer of these posts) in order to learn about new music. I’m not on any promo lists for any labels, so I never get anything new through that route. That’s not a bad thing! I don’t want to feel obligated to anybody for whatever it is I’m doing here. As a result of that, I really rely on learning about records from others, but I do have a couple other sources for finding music.
One of those is following labels and bands. Obviously, if I know a band already, I already know what to expect from new releases and so when I see something from them on a list (or just get notified about it on Bandcamp), I know if it’s worth checking out. Labels, especially ones that are small and are primarily driven by the tastes of the proprietor, can be great for discovering new things. I know that everything that Iron Lung, Total Dissonance Worship, New Standard Elite, Coalmine Records, Convulse Records, and many others are always worth checking out. Bandcamp also has the useful feed which combines new releases along with purchases from people you follow, so that can be handy as well.
On top of all those, there’s another exercise that I like to do sometimes, and it’s the subject of today. In fact, let’s throw in a header.
Tag Sale!
Sometimes, if I just go digging around in the tags on Bandcamp, I can come across something that otherwise would have flown under my radar. I don’t always find things when I do this, the tagging interface isn’t perfect, but it’s worth poking around in there sometimes. So that’s what we’re going to do today. Join me as I explore the tags and try and find some hidden gems. I’ll go through each tag I’m going to look around in, let you know what I find, and with luck, I’ll find some records worth buying. Welcome to Tag Sale.
Rocksteady, Ska, and 2 Tone
This is maybe the set of tags that I am most optimistic about. I love this stuff, and I don’t have a good source for finding it, so maybe I’ll discover some fun records. When I look at a tag, I first start by looking at best-selling records, with the “fresh” time frame. One problem with tag diving is that it just mixes the singles and loosies with longer records, even though I’d prefer to just look at longer releases. Anyway, here’s the rocksteady tag, although it will probably be a different list when you look at it. I usually skip dub releases, they’re not normally my thing, so the first thing I’m pulling up is the self-titled record by The Skabratts. It says this is their debut record, so that’s fun. And…pretty good! Lots of horns, pretty traditional ska, and I’m liking that. I think that’s a buy. Great start!
Next up looking through the list is Fruits of the Diaspora by Mo Kolours & The Co-Operators. Hitting play on this, and it’s immediately reggae, not ska or rocksteady. Here, I have to mention the imprecision of the tagging. No big surprise, people use them as marketing, but you’ll often get bands using adjacent tags. So, reggae, ska, and rocksteady albums will often get all three tags. Anyway, this isn’t really my bag, so I’m going to move on.
Next record! Let’s have a look at Take a Beat from the Doomstompers. Pretty sure this is going to be ska-punk, just from the styling, and sure enough. Well, mostly just punk for the first minute, in kind of a Rancid mode. But then, abruptly, kind of rocksteady for a bit, then back to some punk. All right, Doomstompers, I see you. Track 2 is a pretty trad ska song, track 3 is a more uptempo number, and you know what? I’m sold, I’m having fun.
It’s probably worth mentioning at this point that I usually start with rocksteady for this category, because the “ska” tag is often pretty polluted with bands who think it’s funny to label random crap “ska”. Anyway, the other record from the rocksteady tab that I wanted to look at is Brixtown Special from Natty Bo and the Top Cats. Pretty traditional ska, seems as if they’ve been playing together a lot, judging by their Bandcamp copy. I’m not sure yet on this one, I’ll think about it some more. Into the wishlist!
Moving on to the ska tag, the first record in my list is Grey Matter by Grey Matter. Pretty clearly ska-punk, at least from the first track. I don’t know about the first track, the downtempo thing isn’t quite working for me. Track 2, “Benefits”, is working much better for me. In particular, Pip Bazard’s trumpet is really doing it. All right, I’m sold.
Lots of repeats in that tag, I’m not seeing anything else jumping out. So let’s have a look at 2-tone. Like rocksteady, 2-tone isn’t an obvious target for bands screwing around, so maybe we’ll find something here. It’s also pretty specific, so that can also help finding stuff. Lots of English Beat records in here, which is fine, but not what I’m looking for. It is at least 2-tone, I guess. Aside from that, I have to say, these records are looking a little rough. But let’s not judge too much yet.
First up is Ska ‘N’ B by Bad Manners. I’m not going to judge by the cover here. And I’ll say this: this is pretty 2-tone. But I’m not feeling the Madness impression here. And it’s at this point that I scroll down and see this album was originally released in 1980. So, original 2-tone! Actually contemporary with Madness. Well, whatever, I guess I’m just an idiot. Moving on!
Next record is from the same label, Contagious by the Loafers. Since I’m paying attention, I looked, and this is also a re-release, from 1989. Also very 2-tone, so again, good work with the tags. This time around, I’m hearing a lot of Toasters in this, who again would have been contemporaries of this band. It takes a couple tracks to get going, but “Bad News” is pretty good, as is “Skinhead”. But overall, I’m just not quite hearing a lot of variety here. So that’s a pass/
The=is next record stretched my commitment to not judge an album by its cover to the breaking point. Eskalatie’s self-titled record is looking rough. And it’s also looking pretty Dutch. (“DIT IS EEN PRE-ORDER!”) Well, let’s have a listen. All right, look - at least half of the people in this band are passionate about juggling and/or can ride a unicycle. Let’s move on. In fact, let’s look at some different tags.
Soul-Jazz, Jazz-Funk, and Funk
These tags get at another area of my listening, but still involving horns. Gotta have horns. Some folks I love in soul-jazz, like Parlor Greens and Delvon Lamarr Organ Trio, so that’s promising. I’m just going to be kind of poking at stuff at random in here, I’m really not very knowledgeable about this whole area, so let’s start with Chasing Light by Moses Yoofee Trio. An EP, nice! Hitting play, I’m 27 seconds in and really feeling this. This is a buy for sure. Should I know about them? I probably should. Anyway, I do now!
Let’s move on to A Color Map of the Sun by Pretty Lights. This is a 2013 release, which is during Baby Time for me, so I missed it the first time around. Lots of hip-hop in this as well, and I’m having fun, it’s sitting in that seam between jazz, soul, and hip-hop. This is going to be an expensive tag! Add it to the bag!
Next random pick, we’ve got The World Is On Fire by Isaiah Collier. This is a jazz album, and I don’t know shit about jazz. It seems good, but I’m going to pass for now because the shopping is already getting kind of out of hand.
Let’s have a listen to Mystic Suite by Atlantic Jazz Ensemble. Right away, first credit is someone listed as playing trumpet and flugelhorn. Flugelhorn! I’m not made of stone here! I still don’t know shit about jazz, but I am absolutely feeling this. I got to the first trumpet solo and I was in, dammit.
Moving on, we’ve got the New Astral Blues by the Modern Beat Combo. More jazz, this time guitar jazz, and that’s not usually what I seek out, so I’m going to keep going.
We’ve got another trumpeter, with Look on the Bright Side from Malcolm Strachan. Another pretty straight jazz record, and I’m not really feeling the melodies or the solos on this release. The truth of the matter is that when I’m going tag surfing, I am usually judging pretty quickly. I am listening to most of these albums as I go, but I am also probably not giving a fair shake to everything.
Going to the next record, we have Coal & Soul from Norside, and damn, that’s what I’m talking about. Listen to that groove! And from Pittsburgh. Sold!
Let’s move on to the jazz-funk tag. Lots of overlap, as you’d guess, and some familiar records in here as well. Lots of singles and re-issues in this list as well, so I’m not sure how successful I’ll be mining for new releases. But let’s click on a few anyway. First one that caught my eye was Groove In The Face Of Adversity by Don Was and the Pan-Detroit Ensemble. Yeah, that Don Was. The description says this is a new band he put together to celebrate Detroit, and this record came out last year. And man, this is filthy!
Next record I gave a spin to is Ascending by Clear Path Ensemble. This starts out percussive and chiming, all rhythm, and the writeup is referencing Steve Reich. Sure, yeah. I think there might be another day where this record might get me interested, but not really today. Fire & Sugar by Caunedo is a reissue of a 1975 record, an Afro-Latin jazz-funk record that I’m not familiar with. This is very good, but I’m going to skip it for today. Into the wishlist for now.
Finally, let’s have a look at the funk tag. For whatever reason, it’s dominated by a bunch of releases from some band called Goose. A whole series of live records from them. I’m going to give them a miss. I’m only going to pick a few records to look at, starting with Access All Areas by Karate Boogaloo. Hmm, a pre-release not coming out until October, so we can’t listen to the whole thing. Well, I like the three tunes that are available, so yeah, I’ll bite. It’s from Colemine, so probably worthy of trust.
The Kelliebank Sessions from Deltamanic is our next listen, and I’m going to pass. And that’s what I’ve got for funk.
Noise Rock
Next time I do this, I’ll spend more time on the heavier end of things, but I’m just going to have a look at one loud tag today, the noise rock tag. I have to say, from past experience, this tag is rough. I keep hoping I’ll find some new hidden gem in here and I seldom do. Looking at it today, there’s lots of stuff in here I know about already (Foetus, Chat Pile, Crippling Alcoholism, Shearling, Kowloon Walled City, YHWH Nailgun, Rhododendron, etc), some stuff that isn’t noise rock (Dinosaur Jr., Mannequin Pussy, Health, etc), and some stuff that looks really dodgy. Let’s have a listen to Violence by Truck Violence. It comes out of the gate blasting before settling down into a slower groove that does read as noise rock to me. That’s nice! Kinda feel like I should already know about this record. Well, whatever - I’m not sure I’m quite here on this record, despite some surprising moments. I’m going to slap it into the wishlist and think about it some more.
Let’s do one more and wrap things up. [To See the Next Part of the Dream by Parannoul] looked promising. Looking closer, it’s a Korean act, and in playing it, this seems more emo than it does anything else. At least for the first song. The drums on “변명 (Excuse)” are nicely distorted, but again, this is coming across as more of an emo record. Not bad, but not what I’m looking for. Well, that wraps up the Tag Sale for today. Lots of fun stuff, and I’ll do this again at some point.
Five Random Songs
Yes, it’s the “classic” five random songs format. It’s been told before on this blog many times, but basically, on an old forum, people would post the last five songs their shuffle pulled up. I liked it, so I made it into a blog. And now, here we are.
“Soul Typecast”, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion
I’m sure I’ve told this story before, but I’m going to tell it again. During the summer of 1993, my summer job was being a general dogsbody for the utility company in Spokane, WA. A fair bit of the summer was spent attached to a gas crew, as the contract the company had with the union allowed them to include one non-union person to do manual tasks with each crew. In practice, that meant mostly doing the manual digging around power lines, where the mechanical trenching machine couldn’t operate. I would just be pointed to a location and told to dig a trench of a particular size, and more or less left to my own devices. That wasn’t so bad, although one of the gas crews clearly resented the college kids. Mostly, though, they were all solid folks and the work was hard work but it was outside, I got to observe some of the work the crews would do once I dug the trench, and I got in great shape. However, sometimes, it involved flagging traffic. Standing in the sun with a Slow/Stop sign sucked out loud. It was boring, it was hot, it was dusty, it was filled with car fumes, and people were fucking animals. They would screech curses at me, as if that was going to help anything. They would throw trash at me. I had multiple beer bottles thrown at me that summer. Awful stuff.
Well, just to change it up, for a few weeks that summer the utility had a special project. A bill passed the state legislature that prohibited stapling flyers to power poles. The problem is that the staples would sometimes cause the cleats that utility workers used to climb the poles to slip, and it made service work hazardous. After the passage of the bill (which as far as I could tell did nothing to stop people from stapling things to the poles), they send out a bunch of us to go clean up the poles. Each day, I was told to drive myself to a particular section and clean all the poles, using a screwdriver to pull staples, a big magnet to pick them off the ground, and a bucket to dump them in. My equipment was finished up with a orange safety vest and a hardhat. No gloves, of course. Did I think to bring some for myself? I did not. I would have so many tiny splinters in my hands at the end of the day, thanks to all the times the screwdriver would slip and I would scrape my knuckles on the pole. I just kind of gave up trying to get them all out.
I was left alone in my area, with the supervisor driving by periodically to check on progress. It was mind-numbing work, and so repetitive that when I closed my eyes at night, my arm would feel like I was back pulling staples again. A nightmare job, made more nightmarish by being on the side of the road (again, dust and fumes and people yelling at you) as well as the summer sun baking my brain in the hardhat. However, the hardhat did have another valuable purpose: it could effectively conceal headphones under it. I would run the cord inside my shirt to a Discman hidden under my vest, and the supervisor couldn’t tell I was listening to music against OSHA regulations. And thank god for that.
One of the records I had on constantly that summer was this one, Extra Width. I love JSBX but this one has a special place in my heart, as it really did contribute to keeping me sane during probably the craziest stretch of employment I ever had. There’s a certain part of me that feels that baking Spokane summer still whenever I hear these tunes, but the intervening decades have softened the memory into just something funny that happened to me, so recalling it is a fun exercise now.
“Transsexual Girlfriend”, Mud On My Bra
From a Seattle band, and here’s what I know about them: they’re a duo from Seattle. Fun EP, though.
“There Is No Horizon”, Ulcerate
From Ulcerate’s 2020 record, with the death metal band doing their usual dissonant stuff. This is a pretty legible album by their standards. Like, this track has a fair bit in it that is pretty well within the parameters of, say, prog metal. Certainly for parts of it, anyway. It’s not my favorite record from them (that’s Vermis), but for all that their music is overtly challenging I think they’re also a relatively approachable band, if that makes sense. Might just be my ears.
“Gum”, Mustard Plug
This would fit in right alongside the 2-tone records from above.
“Buckingham Palace”, Canibus
Well, anyway, there are some other good songs today!
Josh, What Are You Doing Here?
I’m just writing about music. A structure like this blog helps me get my thoughts out, and it’s a way for me to explore my own music collection through various lenses. My sincere hope is that some folks out there find some new music they love. That’s all I’m up to. Sincere thanks to everybody who sends me feedback, with news that they’ve found a new favorite especially fun for me. There’s no monetization, no metrics, no ads, no promos, no nothing. Just some static web pages, some links, and my scribbling. If you want to support it, just shoot me a note! Thanks for reading.
Some Better Places To Learn About Music
Check these folks out, you’ll learn more for sure. In no particular order: To The Teeth, Wolf’s Week/Plague Rages, The Devil’s Mouth, Burning Ambulance, Lamniformes Cuneiform, Hex Records, See/Saw, Starkweather, Treble Magazine, The Quietus, Stereogum.