Joe Lally

The Miracles, “You’ve Really Got a Hold On Me”

1962, baby!

McKinley Dixon, “Chain Sooo Heavy”

I really enjoy the sax blowing while he’s rhyming, it really sets things off, and makes my ears kind of ping back and forth between what sounds like competing leads. That tension really provides a lot interest in the tune.

The Dead Milkmen, “Big Lizard (Live)”

Chaos Rules: Live at the Trocadero is sort of a live career retrospective by the Dead Milkmen, but I gotta say, it’s hard to recommend it. The live renditions don’t add a ton, and the sound quality isn’t great. Uh, as you can hear.

Joe Lally, “Day Is Born”

The first track to Lally’s second record, giving a good idea of what sort of bass-forward tunes you can expect to hear from him. If you’ve listened to Fugazi’s instrumentals, you’ll have a decent picture in mind also, even though Lally does sing.

House of Lightning, “James Brown”

Part of the Floor family tree, House of Lightning shares members with Floor and, as you can hear, aesthetics. If you’re looking for more stuff in that vein, of really big riffs and melodies and some clean singing, you’re in the right spot.

Jan Jelinek, “If’s, And’s and But’s”

I honestly think that Jan Jelinek might be the artist I can consistently identify the fastest in my collection. That glitch is just so recognizable. Also, love the grocer’s apostrophe’s here!

Crunt, “Unglued”

Been a while since we’ve had them here. (checks) We’ve never had them here! Crunt were a side project of Kat Bjelland (Babes in Toyland), Russell Simins (Jon Spencer Blues Explosion), and Stuart Gray (Lubricated Goat). They produced one album, which rips, but that was it unfortunately. It’s basically totally forgotten at this point, but it’s a good time.

Excellent one today.

Joe Lally, “Message From Earth”

I don’t know why I’m surprised at how minimal Lally is willing to get, given how even the most spare Fugazi songs still had a lot going on. But, it’s silly to get surprised by that, as Lally has always clearly been talented, and there’s no reason to believe he’d just make Fugazi Light once on his own.

J Church, “Chemicals”

We’ve discussed many times how J Church has put out a ton of compilations in their time, but when I look at their normal albums, I think Prophylaxis is my favorite of the bunch. It’s hard to pinpoint why exactly, as J Church didn’t really vary their sound much over the years. I suspect some of that is just that it was one of their earliest, so I spent more time with it. When you encounter an album at 19, it makes an impression! But, whatever, it’s my favorite! You can’t take that away!

Today!

Joe Lally, “Reason to Believe”

Joe Lally was, of course, bassist for the incomparable Fugazi, and one of the biggest reasons why the bass is one of the instruments I choose to butcher. All of the members of Fugazi have pursued various projects in the wake of Fugazi’s break (I choose to pretend that it’s just a really long pause), with one of the first being Lally making a solo record, There to Here. This is how that album opens, and it sets the tone for what you might hear. It’s fairly experimental in feel, with a lot of differences between songs, and a musical approach that varies from sparse to lush. While there are other post-Fugazi projects I like more (the Evens, the Messthetics), this is still an interesting album.