Consumer Frenzy: XTC / 'Twins bootleg / Dax redux / Christmas

[J. Peter Alfke <alfke@csvax.caltech.edu>]

Okay, my friend Diana returned from the UK via London, with a couple gifts
for moi, the audio portion of which:

** XTC "Grass" / "Dear God"
	Yup, a new single from a new album.  Indeed produced by Todd Rundgren,
	under whose influence the band has not gone Nazz-wards (as I would
	have hoped, seeing as how the Dukes EP was the grooviest thing since
	Black Sea) but straight back to the more pastoral areas of Mummer.
	I'll give it some more listens before leaping to any critical con-
	clusions.  But it exists.  (The song is, incidentally, about adolescent
	frolics in a field, rather than any sort of Killer Weed.)

** Cocteau Twins bootleg "Peel Sessions 82-83-84"
	Recorded straight off the radio, here's 90 minutes of the Twins
	performing on the BBC's John Peel radio show, as well as a demo
	("Some Other Aeon") and a Whistle Test show.  Since this is taken
	from radio, and the recording is live-in-studio, the sound is consider-
	ably better than holding-your-Walkman-up-to-the-stage, but still not
	too hot (cheapo tape duplication probably).  And the four songs that
	can be found on the CD of Garlands are included here and are indubita-
	bly the best; the rest are the Twins trying to cover their own songs
	(they usually work in moments of divine inspiration in the studio)
	and doing OK at it.  In no way an improvement over the originals.
	Still, if any CTwins completists out there want tapes, send me a 90
	and I'll record it for you.

And then the fruits of another trip to Poo Bah:

** Danielle Dax "Jesus Egg That Wept"
	Her song titles are almost as good as Elizabeth Fraser's, I swear.
	All KTphiles should listen to this one, if only to hear the first
	song on side two: its rhythm track is the rhythm track to "The
	Dreaming", didgeridoo and all, played at 45 rpm.  And of course it's
	a great (short) album in all.

** Christmas "In Excelsior Dayglo"
	These folks are from Boston, so you Eastern types should be able to
	tell us all about them.  gtr-bs-drm trio with female drmer, sound a
	bit like every other roots/REM American guitar group, but somehow
	not; real interesting sound to a couple of their songs.  And "Every-
	thing you know is wrong" points out that these people are up on the
	Illuminatus/Subgenius scene.  Worth more listens.

AND I got a Dead Milkmen album, which I was less than impressed with, and
almost picked up Camper Van Beethoven's EP of "Take The Skinheads Dancing"
which has the funniest cover I've seen in a while, but I ran out of money.

						--Peter Alfke
						  alfke@csvax.caltech.edu
PS: Talking Heads are deaddeaddead.
    "Wild Life" SUX METAL ROX.
PPS: "Raising Hell"  (Run D.M.C) is out on CD;
    now we can all do random-auto-scratching.

"Bad thing up and stole my favorite bits"