No Subject

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

I seem to be making a habit of reading Love-Hounds in big chunks (1 1/2 weeks
this time) but that's what I get for getting sick and going on vacation and
stuff like that.

I'm glad the Kate/Stradivarius/Drums/Elvis/Banjo/Guitar disgustion has died
out a bit.  It was becoming really really boring and consuming huge pages
of text that just kept sliding up past my glazed eyes and making them itchy.

Latest in a series of me buying records I hear about a lot and am urged to
buy: yes, it's true, I finally bought Sonic Youth's EVOL (did it realy
take people months to figure out that it's LOVE backwards?) and the most
prominent truth is:
		STARPOWER IS ABSOLUTELY GOD
The rest of the album is also bitchen.  If the noise gets to you think about
what you thought of Kate's voice the first time.  An incidental thing that
impresses me is that, rather than just shit on everything like a lot of noisy
"alternative" bands, they really seem to be trying to construct something,
to say something.  Have they been reading a lot of Crowley and Reich?

And why didn't anyone say that they sound a bit like Savage Republic?  If
someone had I would have bought this album months ago.  (Must be all the
funny-tuned guitars and stuff.)

Speaking of which, I think I already said so but S.R.'s "Ceremonial" album
is good stuff, altho without the bite that the first album had.  They're not
angry anymore, I guess.  More melodic, less savage.  Some of the first side
even gets a bit REMmy.  The second side has long instrumentals that jam out
and, even though their mood has mellowed, keep alive the spirit of the band.
Mood music, I guess, but not Windham-Hill style.  Hof' might even like this
album.

How is "Trudge"?

Resolution: I will pick up "Atomizer" sometime soon, if only to annoy Hof'
for glomming onto his bands.  (Well, there's more to it than that.)

** And some further notes, inspired by my friend who returned to town, sold
off a lot of his records stashed here and bought multitudinous CDs with the
proceeds:

	James Brown "In the Jungle Groove".  SERIOUSLY funky.  Long jammy
		songs that lock tight into mutha grooves and reach out from
		the speakers and whomp your booty but good.
	"Lost In the Stars"  A collection of modern-day folks doing Kurt
		Weill songs.  Far be it for me to malign someone whom everyone
		else says is a genius, and I guess that includes the fine
		people performing, but it's all oom-pah HELL to me.  Except
		maybe Mack the Knife.
	"The Velvet Underground"  Hadn't heard this their all-powerful third
		album before, so let me say WOW.  I apologize for its not
		having been accepted into my life for the past nineteen years.
		Everyone in the world should go out and listen to this album
		seventy-seven times.  (I swear, if there were another sad
		song after "Jesus" I'd be lying in a bloody bathtub right now.)
	Wire "154"  Last album by much-ignored postpunk group, moving into
		spacier sounds and even their version of the perfect pop song.
		Must listen to another few times.  I suspect it's great.
		CD contains four extra tracks for your consumer pleasure.

I realize all the hep people already know this and look down their noses at me
for stating the obvious, but I must look like a hep person to someone and it's
for their edification that I say what I just said.

						--Peter "doesn't even wear
						  black most of the time and
						  has non-wavo armpits and
						  has never even used styling
						  mousse, but is still not
						  hep enough to have non-
						  existent snotboys post
						  their messages on his
						  account" Alfke
						  alfke@csvax.caltech.edu

ALRIGHT I'm gonna count four and we'll let the
funky drummer take it on out
	1
		2
			3
				4