Episode 66: ...And the Rest (1991)

Summary

Episode 66: "...And the Rest (1991)"
Released: May 24, 2025
Host: Lori & Scott Free
Podcast: Accelerated Culture

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Introduction: A New Format for Wrapping Up 1991

In Episode 66 of Accelerated Culture, hosts Lori and Scott Free introduce a fresh approach to concluding their deep dive into the music of 1991. Instead of dedicating entire episodes to individual albums or artists, they present a curated selection of notable tracks that, for various reasons, didn't receive their own spotlight. This segment, aptly named "...And the Rest," allows each host to highlight five tracks that they believe deserve recognition.

Lori [08:17]: "If you're listening to this show, you generally likely of the Generation X or your parents were, and you've started listening to their music, you are no doubt then familiar with one 1960s sitcom called Gilligan's Island…"

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Scott’s Selection: "My Definition of a Bombastic Jazz Style" by Dream Warriors [10:55]

Scott kicks off the segment with Dream Warriors' standout track, emphasizing its unique position in the hip-hop landscape of 1991.

Scott Free [12:50]: "This is alternative hip hop. And also, it's just so good."

He delves into the origins of the Dream Warriors, highlighting their Canadian roots and Caribbean influences. Scott praises the track's infectious groove, jazzy samples, and King Lou's conversational flow.

Scott Free [16:30]: "The track itself…an incredible groove and it's danceable."

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Lori’s Selection: "Groovy Train" by The Farm [25:05]

Lori presents "Groovy Train" by The Farm, connecting it to their shared interest in the band Madness through producer Suggs.

Lori [25:05]: "This has a connection to Suggs and Madness…released March 4th of 1991."

She explores the band's history, their rise within the UK charts, and the song's place within the Madchester scene. Lori appreciates the track's dance-rock vibe and its ability to blend psychedelic elements with mainstream appeal.

Lori [27:57]: "It's rock made for dance floors…"

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Scott’s Selection: "Welcome to the Cheap Seats" by The Wonder Stuff [31:09]

Scott introduces The Wonder Stuff’s "Welcome to the Cheap Seats," sharing his personal connection to the band and detailing their evolution.

Scott Free [32:07]: "This was the first song that I ever heard by the Wonder Stuff. Oh yes. And I fell in love with it immediately."

He discusses their transition from hard-edged indie pop to a more lush and organic sound, highlighting the song's energetic composition and guest vocals by Kirsty MacColl.

Scott Free [39:43]: "The production…a string section breakdown in the middle. It's weird, but it's fun."

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Lori’s Selection: "Kiss Them for Me" by Susie and the Banshees [43:39]

Lori selects "Kiss Them for Me" from Susie and the Banshees’ 1991 album Superstition, noting its departure from their darker, goth-oriented sound.

Lori [47:13]: "It's sweet and vibrant…songs about Jayne Mansfield."

She praises the song's accessibility and its reflection of the band’s willingness to evolve, mentioning its success on dance floors and its significance as their highest-charting hit in the U.S.

Lori [48:45]: "It's a beautiful song. I've always loved it."

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Scott’s Selection: "From a Million Miles" by Single Gun Theory [49:45]

Scott brings attention to Single Gun Theory’s "From a Million Miles," an Australian gem that blends dream pop with electronic dance elements.

Scott Free [52:31]: "It's a song…so beautiful."

He elaborates on the band’s innovative use of world music samples, recorded during their travels, and the song’s feature in the TV series Due South.

Scott Free [54:14]: "They were actually field recordings that the band themselves recorded while on a trip."

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Additional Selections by Scott

"Breaking the Girl" by Red Hot Chili Peppers [57:18]

Scott highlights a lesser-known track from the iconic band's album Blood Sugar Sex Magik, focusing on its melodic depth and lyrical introspection.

Scott Free [60:30]: "Breaking the Girl…it's a beautiful track."

He discusses the production nuances, the introduction of John Frusciante, and Anthony Kiedis's evolution as a vocalist.

Scott Free [62:28]: "The lyrics…he feared he was following in his father's footsteps."

"Puke and Cry" by Dinosaur Jr. [66:16]

"Dinosaur Jr.’s "Puke and Cry" serves as Scott's final pick, representing raw indie rock energy and Jay Maskus's distinctive vocal style.

Scott Free [73:27]: "It's the rawness of the music and the rawness of his voice really work together…"

He acknowledges the band's influence on the alternative scene despite personal reservations about the track.

Scott Free [73:35]: "There's something very endearing about how…"

"Alec Eiffel" by Pixies [75:18]

Scott introduces Pixies' "Alec Eiffel" from their album Trompe le Monde, discussing its quirky lyrics and the tensions within the band during its creation.

Scott Free [77:53]: "It's a fun uptempo song…"

He reflects on the band's dynamics, Black Francis's dominance, and the album’s place in Pixies' discography.

Scott Free [79:34]: "It's Frank Black solo…"

"Brutal Equation" by Consolidated [85:20]

Lori presents Consolidated’s "Brutal Equation," an industrial hip-hop track that critiques the music industry and broader societal issues.

Lori [85:59]: "This is a scathing indictment of the music industry…"

She delves into the band’s activism, innovative live performances, and the track's aggressive production reminiscent of Public Enemy's Bomb Squad.

Lori [90:32]: "It's a thick collage of samples, deep texture, but like, it's aggressive…"

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Conclusion: Wrapping Up and Looking Ahead

As Episode 66 draws to a close, Lori and Scott emphasize the creation of a Spotify playlist featuring the ten selected tracks, providing listeners with easy access to explore these hidden gems.

Lori [95:18]: "I'm going to be putting together a Spotify playlist of the 10 songs…"

They tease the upcoming final episode of the 1991 series, focusing on Ocean Blue's Cerulean, and hint at future explorations into 1992's vibrant music scene.

Scott Free [95:53]: "We're going to conclude 1991 in two weeks with Cerulean by the Ocean Blue."

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Notable Quotes

• Scott Free [16:30]: "The track itself…an incredible groove and it's danceable."

• Lori [25:05]: "It's rock made for dance floors…"

• Scott Free [39:43]: "The production…a string section breakdown in the middle. It's weird, but it's fun."

• Lori [47:13]: "It's sweet and vibrant…songs about Jayne Mansfield."

• Scott Free [62:28]: "The lyrics…he feared he was following in his father's footsteps."

• Lori [85:59]: "This is a scathing indictment of the music industry…"

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Recommendations

Listeners interested in the rich tapestry of early '90s alternative music will find Episode 66 of Accelerated Culture particularly insightful. The hosts' passionate discussions and deep dives into each selected track offer both nostalgia and fresh perspectives on overlooked gems from 1991.

To further immerse yourself, check out the Spotify playlist curated by Lori and Scott, compiling all ten tracks discussed in this episode.

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Accelerated Culture continues to celebrate and explore the vibrant and often underappreciated facets of music history, ensuring that the sounds of the past resonate with today's audiences.

Transcript

[Lori]

Foreign.

[Scott Free]

Welcome to the Accelerated Culture podcast. A sonic journey through the vibrant and revolutionary sounds of the 1980s and 1990s. And now 2024 Webby Honoree for best indie podcast. I'm Lori, along with my co host, Scott Free. And in this podcast we explore how new waves stormed the airwaves in the early 80s and gave way for the rise of alternative music in the 90s. Find us on the [e-mail].

Hello and welcome to another episode of Accelerated Culture. I am your host, Scott Free.

And I'm your other host, Lori.

How's it going, Laurie?

Oh, and great, man. This has really been an amazing two weeks. And I imagine you have some good stories to share too, I would say.

So what was so amazing about the time since our last episode?

Well, as you know, Scott, I flew out to Pasadena for the Cruel World Festival.

So envious on that.

Yeah.

Oh, man. Incredible lineup.

Yes. Yeah. And it really was the main reason I was going, as you know, was to see Madness because I've never seen.

Them live, which is insane considering you were a co host of Stateside Madness, the Madness podcast for like three years.

Yeah. So they did not disappoint. They were absolutely amazing. Got to see omd.

Love omd.

Alison Moyer. Blancmange.

Really underrated Blancmange.

I. I did not know any of their music, but they were decent.

Mange 2 album. There's from like 1983 or 4. So good. Oh, man. Underrated. Under recognized.

You know who was absolutely amazing, though? Till Tuesday.

Oh, yeah. And that was a ultra rare Till Tuesday reunion. Like, Amy, man is a prolific solo artist, but Till Tuesday has not performed in quite some time. Right?

Yes. I think this is the first time they performed together in something like 40 years. And she looks amazing. She sounds amazing. I'm ashamed to admit that I didn't know she played bass.

Relevant to your interests as a bass player yourself?

Yes. And then right after Madness was another one of my favorite bands, Garbage.

Shirley Manson Company.

Yes, Shirley, as you know, Scott is Scottish.

I did know that.

Suggs from Madness is Scottish.

All right.

And apparently as Suggs was getting off the stage and Shirley was ready to come on, she like, yelled something, you know, hey, Suggs, Suggs. And Suggs totally snubbed her. Like, he just kind of. He didn't even turn around. He just kind of. He had his back turned to her and he just waved.

Did he just not hear her?

Well, he waved. Maybe he didn't know who it was, but. Yeah, no, it rained the entire time. But we didn't really. Yeah, we didn't care. And I was so sore from skanking, especially madness Night Boat to Cairo. We went freaking nuts. So really glad I got the opportunity to do it and glad I finally got to see my of my favorite bands.

So I am happy for you.

Thank you. How about you, Scott?

Right. So just a few nights ago on Saturday the 17th, got to go see Underworld at Radius in Chicago. I have never been to the venue at all. And while it is just a huge corrugated shed, basically the sound system was incredible, the light and video display was top notch, and Underworld was astoundingly good. Yeah, for a pair of old dudes, really just doing some incredible work. Carl Hyde, the vocalist of the duo, just on top of his game. You know, he's, I want to say 68 years old, but up there and getting it and dancing. Not dancing like hard like 68 year old, but dancing well, but delivering these ethereal vocals and percussive vocals. And his partner in crime, Rick Smith, just behind a huge bank of keyboards and sequencers and synthesizers and whatnot. And the two of them just bringing the house down. Some of the greatest hits, but also deeply, deeply remixed. These were not album versions. It was an incredible show. The video display and the lights, hypnotic and incredible and really just do not have enough good things to say about them. Apparently their first show in Chicago in 23 years and hoping it's not going to be another 23 before I get to see them again.

Yeah, no, that's so cool. So we were both rocking out on Saturday then, huh?

Yeah, we were, yeah.

Did they play cowgirl?

They did play cowgirl. I think the crowd would have rioted had they not. Really the only one of the songs that I would have wanted to hear that I did not get to hear was Bruce Lee. But it was a little bit more of a driving, hard dance set than that would have been appropriate for. So, yeah, I'm all right with it. No complaints about the set that I did see. Not going to let the things that I didn't see get in the way of that. Just an incredible hero.

Cool, cool, cool.

Yeah.

All right. So what are we doing this week, Scott?

Well, I'll tell you what we're not doing. What we're not doing is what we previewed at the end of our last episode, wherein we said we were going to be doing the Ocean Blues sophomore album, Cerulean. While we do plan to do that, we were hoping to get in an interview with the band while they are still on tour. An interview that you have been working very hard behind the scenes to try to set up. And we just cannot make all of our schedules match. So we are still going to try to get that in in the next week, and hopefully we will be able to make the Ocean Blues cerulean our final episode of the 1991 reviews. But there are a lot of things that we have not covered in 1991 for one reason or another. Maybe it wasn't big enough to warrant a whole episode. Maybe it was so big that we've heard the single so many times that we never want to hear them again. Maybe it was just things that we personally liked and really feel like the world needs to know about. And many of these things don't warrant an entire episode unto themselves. So what we are doing this time is something that we're doing for the first time. And it's a little something that we call and the Rest, wherein you and I will each take five tracks, whether they are the feature in their own right or intended to represent the album that they were taken from, and do our own little deep dive into that band, that album, that song, and why it's important that we cover it, even if it didn't get its own whole episode.

Yes. So for the record listeners, I wanted to call this episode still not the Ocean Blue, but that was nixed by my colleague here, so felt like it.

Might have been confusing for those of you out there in listener land who are wondering why. And the rest, if you're listening to this show, you generally likely of the Generation X or your parents were, and you've started listening to their music, you are no doubt then familiar with one 1960s sitcom called Gilligan's island, you may recall the theme song where they list off the cast of characters with Gillian, the Skipper two, the millionaire and his wife, the movie star. And the rest. Well, you know, there were a couple key characters in there that just kind of got glossed over. And actually, as I recall, Laurie, you had a bit of trivia about that.

Yeah. So the first season, it was in Tina Louise's contract that nobody would be introduced after her, that she would be the last one introduced in the intro.

So very movie star of her.

Well, you know, that's the character. Right. So, yeah, for the first season, apparently the professor and Marianne were just relegated to the and the rest category. But after the first season, the other actors really kind of felt that it was a snub, and so they lobbied to get the professor and Marianne at it. So.

So sometimes when you Watch Gilligan's Island. If you can still watch an episode of Gilligan's island, you'll hear the theme song. Say, the professor and Marianne, here on Gilligan's Island.

I'm obviously the Professor. Does that make you Marianne?

I'm comfortable with that.

Okay.

Yeah. I think she was the one that people liked better, so, you know.

Oh, thanks.

Oh, of course. I mean, in Marianne vs Ginger. Come on now.

So, Scott, you and I have each picked five albums released in 1991 that we think are notable, but not notable enough for us to do an entire track by track album.

Deep dive, I would say we have each picked five tracks that are notable, but for one reason or another, we don't want to do a whole episode on. And there's a variety of reasons.

Yeah. Which I'm sure we will get into.

We will.

So. Yeah. So, Scott, you picked our first track. Tell us what you picked.

Freaking love this track. Dream Warriors. My definition of a boombastic jazz style.

[Lori]

Here we go. Are you ready for one another? Dream warriors, noises new discover all once again with the new blend. So telephone up brand yo dream it Compact disc to the prime is optimist. Fans of Friends, I'm Universal and cosmic Concrete jungles of the Stand by the speaker, you're smothered and covered up in the sound. You stand strong as you pump your fist. I'm talking all that jazz now. What's my definition? My definition, my definition, my definition? Is this my definition, my definition, my definition, My definition? Is this my definition?

[Scott Free]

Okay, a few things that I just got to address right out the gate. One, it is unusual for this show to do just a straight up hip hop track or album. We've come close in the form of Massive Attack, but that was trip hop and elements of other genres. And this is just straight up hip hop, but it's alternative hip hop. And as we'll talk about a little bit in its reception and where it came from and where it was popular and where it wasn't, it kind of flew under the radar in the US Hitting on college stations and a bit on mtv, so it pretty firmly falls into the alternative category. That and the subject matter and style of this particular hip hop album, which made it quite unlike a lot of its contemporaries in 1991. So I'm justifying its inclusion as its alternative hip hop. And also, it's just so good.

I had never heard of this band. I'd never heard the song before, but of course, you know, the first thing I thought of when I'm listening to it is. That's the Austin Powers theme.

Right? But then, no doubt, being the intrepid researcher that you are, you dug deeper and found out so much more about.

That sample that says Quincy Jones, as you and I have talked about in a previous episode.

Yeah, we'll get there. For starters, who are the Dream Warriors? Where did they come from? What's up with that? Okay. Dream warriors are a duo of King Lou, AKA Lou Robinson, and Capital Q, AKA Frank Ullert. And they're Canadian from Toronto. Although by birth, Capital Q was born in, I believe, Trinidad, and King Lou was born to Jamaican immigrant parents in Toronto. On this particular track, my definition of a bombastic jazz style, King Liu had a co writer, one Richard Rodwell, who was born in England to Jamaican parents. So for starters, this group, the Dream warriors, is an international group coming out of Toronto, but with a heavy Caribbean influence, which is odd and informs a lot of their music and some of the references. And they're just so damn cool. That's for starters. Also, this duo in particular of King Lou and Capital Q are. I'm just gonna go ahead and say it. They are blurds. Blurds, yes, blurds. Which is to say black nerds. And they talk nerdy subject matter, they drop nerdy references, they love sci fi, they love comics, and they work that into a lot of their lyrics. And as a lifelong nerd myself, it makes my heart happy. Okay, Right. The Dream warriors formed in 1988 in Toronto. King Lou worked in 88 with a variety of Canadian hip hop artists who you've almost certainly never heard of. But he did appear on one track, a track called Victory Is Calling, with MC Light, who was a staple of the OMTV raps early era in the late 80s and early 90s. Thank you the Wikipedias, for that particular tidbit. They got signed to 4th and Broadway Records in 1991 and then released their debut album, and now the Legacy Begins, that same year. That album, by the way, was rated by the cbc, which is to say the Canadian Broadcasting Company. All right, here's the thing. I grew up in the suburbs of Detroit, just close enough to Detroit proper that we could hear CBC Radio, and in particular CBC Music. It informed my high school and college years musical tastes in a way that I've only in recent years come to really truly appreciate. But Canadian Broadcasting Corporation has a required Canadian content amount. Whether it's TV or the radio, they have to play a certain proportion of Canadian artists. So Dream warriors were the type of thing that you would be able to hear on Canadian radio, if not US Radio and things like for me at least, when the CBC says that they were one of the 25 best Canadian debut albums of all time, that actually means something to me because big respect for the cbc.

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[Scott Free]

That debut album received the Best Rap Recording of the year in 1992. Juno Award, that is. Again, it's the Canadian Grammys. And the single My Definition of a Bombastic Jazz Style sold 300,000 copies around the time it was released and eventually would go to sell a total of 800,000 copies to date. It was a hit in Canada and in England it was only a blip. In the United States, it did hit the modern rock charts. You know, it was just a blip. You had to be pretty into hip hop to have heard this one or in or near Canada. But the track itself, let's get a little bit into it. As you said, it does prominently feature that Quincy Jones sample from Soul Bossa Nova. You know that horn section, the big bass drum. Between the two of those, you got the big rhythm backbone for it. And that flute tweedling. The flute, it should be noted, was played on the original Quincy Jones record by Rahsaan Roland Kirk, one of my favorite jazz saxophone players who also played flute and would sometimes play two saxophones at the same time, or play flute and sing at the same time. He was a madman and love to hear him on that track. And it's that that goes throughout. That's him. And then there's, you know, that very prominent trumpet run up and. And also I just learned this today, a kawika, the percussion instrument that creates that sort of weird laughing sound throughout the riff. Also the piano that you hear going throughout the sampled riff was one Lalo Schifrin, who you may know better for his film scores including Cool Hand Luke and Bullet and Unto the Dragon, as well as for writing the theme song to Mission Impossible. So this is an all star lineup Quincy Jones put together in, I want to say 1962, and on a song that he said he wrote in 20 minutes. Because Quincy Jones, major universal talent. Anyway, as you mentioned, that track was prominently featured in Austin Powers. But remember, we're talking and the rest of the of 1991 here. Austin Powers wouldn't come out until 1997, so Dream warriors ahead of their time. But King Lou and Capital Q would have known it as the theme song to the long running Canadian game show Definition so Definition. You see, it was essentially crossword puzzle puns, more or less a wheel of fortune without the wheel, but where the clues were puns. It's actually kind of fun. Thanks to Scott Frampton and his Substack article, the best song ever this week from October 21, 2021. Talking about my definition of a boombasted jazz style. Obviously the sample makes it incredibly compelling. It's just an infectious groove and it's danceable. And this upbeat, crazy energy to the original track. But then the delivery that King Lou gives, you know, that he flows over it is this sort of laid back, almost conversational flow and it's just this great contrast and he makes it seem effortless while this hyped up, groovy energy is going on around him. I think it's a fantastic track. So lyrically, as I mentioned, these guys are nerds. And like there are a couple that are nerd 101 stuff. When I kick rhymes there's something said to do damage Skin so strong even Superman needs a hand H. You don't have to be a nerd to drop a Superman reference, however, towards the end of the track. Oh, just one of the best. End of the third verse. My name is King L. Mine is Capital Q Bags of mostly water. Search to find my definition.

Like a reference for Star Trek, isn't it? Yes, it is.

And like kind of deep Star Trek, the original series. When I want to say there was a robot, that A race of robots.

Okay, it was the Next Generation. Okay, how do I explain this it is.

You're right. Oh, damn. I can't be caught not knowing that and trying to claim their.

You got to turn in your geek card now.

Yeah, yeah. That's awful.

Yeah, but no, it was the episode where there was like a research facility. They were doing some kind of laser drilling, and the drill had malfunctioned and was killing people. And it turned out that there was some kind of life form on the planet made of little crystals, so it wasn't like an organic form of life. And when they finally established communication with this race, then that's how it referred to the humans, as ugly bags of mostly.

[Lori]

Yeah, ugly, ugly, giant bags of mostly water.

[Scott Free]

Bags of mostly water. An accurate description of humans, sir. You are over 90% water surrounded by a flexible container. That's us. Ugly bags of mostly water. Like, come on now. That is an excellent nerd reference. And. Oh, yeah, yeah, come on. Plenty more to get into. Fun track. I chose this as a representative of the album in general. It was the biggest, and I'm making air quotes here, hit from the album. A hit in Canada and England. Not so much in the US but the rest of the album. Not across the board. Amazing. But there are a lot of amazing tracks in there. A couple tracks that definitely, you know, they show their nerd card for it. Include Voyage through the Multiverse and talk about being ahead of your time. Where you cannot get away from Multiverse movies these days. These guys are talking about the multiverse in 1991 as well as another track. It's not the best track on the album, but definitely has the nerd cred. 12 sided dice. All I'm saying is Dream warriors, nerdy hip hop with great jazzy samples, island influence and rock solid flow. Do yourself a favor. If you like hip hop and you particularly like the golden age of hip hop, where jazz samples were a thing. Get yourself or stream. And now the Legacy Begins by the Dream Warriors. Rock solid album.

No, that's cool. I enjoy that song that you chose and I'll definitely be checking it out.

Right on.

Yeah.

Well, okay then.

Okay, well, what do you got, Laurie? What do I have? All right, so the first album I chose for this episode, and there is a connection to Suggs and Madness. Yes. I chose Spartacus by the Farm. And the single that we're going to play is Groovy Train.

[Lori]

You're so special, oh, so special oh so special. SHE SINGS get on, get on, get on, get on, get on. I prove it.

[Scott Free]

So, Scott, obviously you remember that one.

Oh, yeah. You. If you were going to a dance club in 1991, you were hearing that track.

A lot of people tended to lump the Firemen with the Manchester bands.

Right. I mean it has the sound, it has the electronics, but also the guitars. But you know they're making dance rock, right?

Yeah, with the psychedelic aspects, the whole baggy sound. But interestingly enough, they're actually from Liverpool, they're not from Manchester. The single was actually released in August of 1990. The album was released March 4th of 1991. And I mentioned that there would be a connection to Madness and Suggs.

He did.

Now the album was co produced by Suggs, the lead singer of Madness. He also acted as their co manager from 1990 to 1992. The album did reach number one on the UK album charts. The album did not chart here in the us, but the single did.

Sure.

So I'll give you the CliffsNotes version of the History of the Farm. They formed in 1983 and it was initially Peter Hooten, Steve Grimes, John Melvin and Andy mcvan, the drummer. They had actually released a single, also produced by Suggs called Hearts and minds in 1984.

Oh, dang.

Now, unfortunately Andy McMahon was killed in a car accident in 1986, if memory serves. It was like a police chase or something. It was a weird situation. After Andy died, they recruited another drummer named Roy Bolter. They received a 2,500 pounds investment from a fan to cut an album.

Good fan, right.

But they couldn't find a record label to produce it so they actually created their own record label, Smart, which was called Produce Records. Produce Records was based in Liverpool. It's interesting too because if you look at the graphic design of the album.

Spartacus, so good looking. It looks like a product label or product box.

Exactly. Like from a grocery store. So Produce Records. Yeah, it all fits. So Groovy Train was the first single from their debut album and as I mentioned, it was co produced by Suggs and Terry Farley. The Farm. By the way, I probably should mention who's in the band. Peter Hooten on lead vocals. He was also the principal songwriter Chief Mullen and Steve Grimes on guitar, Carl Hunter on bass, Ben Leach on synthesizers and Roy Boulter on drums. Again the album did not chart in the US, but it did reach number one in the UK. The song Groovy Train peaked at number 41 on the Billboard Hot 100 here in the States, number four on the Hot Dance Club Play chart. That's not hard to imagine. And number 15 on the modern Rock Tracks chart. Solid Performance, Yeah, you're kind of an acquired taste. You know, a lot of people really didn't care for him. Peter Hooten has such an unusual distinctive voice. And I know I say that about some of the other bands we've talked about, you know, Jesus Jones, some other bands of this period, but it really was a product of its time and the whole idea get on the Groovy Train. I mean that is totally the rave culture, the rave scene and the baggy music movement.

So I don't even see anybody having an objection to this track or this band if this and the other single from Spartacus were what they were hearing. The other single being All Together now, which was a lot like this track, but a little softer in tone. And those of you well versed in. In your classical music would recognize the chord progression to Altogether now as being Pachel's Canon in D. But they made it into a dance track.

That's one way to get around copyright.

Right.

Is to use a song that is so old that is now public domain, so.

Or Stewart. It's a great song and it really fit in nicely with that whole Madchester scene. It wasn't quite as overtly psychedelic, it wasn't quite as overtly, let's be honest, straight up druggie. But it was rock made for dance floors, right?

Absolutely. Yeah. But that was a good one too. And they went on to do a few other albums after that. The one I can think of off the top of my head was Love See no Color. But they never really reached the same level of fame that they did on this first album with specifically with this track.

So yeah, I mean it was pretty good. High water Mark.

Yeah, exactly.

Many bands never got that much success so eh, maybe we don't do a whole episode on Spartacus, but happily. Listen to a clip of Groovy Train.

Absolutely. So Scott, then you picked our next song?

Yes, yes I did. Although really this is another one of those where I am just using the track as an excuse to talk about the whole album. But the third track we're listening to today is the Wonder Stuff. Welcome to the cheap seats.

[Lori]

Love when he jokes Love him when he jokes it's time to give up of the smokes and oh, when he cries don't wipe his eyes Take the wine from the swine and remind them of his Christ all in another world yeah he could wear a dress oh, in another world yeah he could wear.

[Scott Free]

A dress 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 1, 2, 3, 4th, 5, 6 1, 2. I love a song in 6 man, yeah.

This is the first song that I ever heard by the Wonder Stuff. Oh yes. And I fell in love with it immediately.

Interesting. And I will talk a little bit about that and how where you come into the Wonder Stuff's career will determine how you feel about tracks from this album. But I think everybody can agree on welcome to the Cheap Seats, that this is a rousing, reeling banger of a jig. We've talked a little bit about this band on previous episodes, particularly when talking about the Sturbridge scene which produced you will no doubt recall Ned's Atomic Dustbin. And if you haven't listened to Accelerated Culture's episode on the net, Ease Powerhouse 1991 album Godfather. Go back and give episode 61 a listen, won't you?

Please do.

Please do. Yes. So Sturbridge, a town in the West Midlands of England which produced the aforementioned Ned's Atomic Dustbin and Pop Will Eat Itself, a big favorite of both of ours. Yours, Dustbank, a big favorite of mine, which Laurie.

Well, I don't dislike them, I just don't know a lot of their stuff.

All right. Sturbridge, a town in the West Midlands, England, which produced the aforementioned Ned's Atomic Dustbin, a favorite of Lori's, and Pop Will Eat Itself, a favorite of mine. The Wonder Stuff are the other ones from Sturbridge. From that era I was introduced to the Wonder Stuff by my lifelong closest friend Rabba. Shout out to Rabba who played me their 1988 debut album, Eight Legged Groove Machine. That album was rough edged power indie pop with a cynical sneer throughout it. 1989 saw their sophomore album HUP, which had a decent sized single, Don't Let Me Down Gently and then saw them get a Brit Award, the British equivalent of the Grammys. Notably, they declined to play the awards show for the Brits, which was at Wembley arena, opting instead to play at a high school in response to a fan's letter. Thanks Wikipedia then 1991, which is why we're talking about it today, saw the release of their third album Never Loved Elvis. Never Loved Elvis was a bit of a breakthrough album for the Stuffies, as I just learned today that some fans call them, you know, at least one fan in a YouTube comments section anyway, reaching number three in the UK Albums Chart and lead single the Size of a cow reached number five on the UK singles chart. So to my 21 year old mind in 1991 though, this album represented a bit of a softening. This band had been hard edged for indie power, pop, rock and a Little bit mean, actually. Their lyrics were biting up till this point. Was now kind of nice. Not quite it, but there were some acoustic guitars and mandolins and the videos were these candy colored celebrations with people goofing and having fun. And it's no wonder that people then started to like this band. But damn it, this was my band, right? What a hipster dick. It turns out I was not alone in that reaction. Lead singer and lead songwriter Miles Hunt actually said, I actually like Size of a Cow, which was the lead single from Never Loved Elvis. I actually like Size of a Cow, which surprises some people because we always have to play it. Half of our fans don't like it, half do, depending on when they got into us. So people who came in for Never Loved Elvis, much like my college girlfriend who hadn't really cared for their earlier stuff, but when Never Loved Elvis came out, she actually went out and bought it. She had softer tastes than I did, but she loved this album. Shout out Kelly, if you're out there. Hi there. Anyhow, to represent the wonder stuff in this 1991 year end wrap up, I actually chose the third single from Never Loved Elvis. Not the first big single, size of a Cow, or the other pretty big single Caught In My Shadow, which are both nice. They're nice rock songs, but they're nice. I instead chose welcome to the Cheap Seats. And I chose this because it does capture the more lush and organic sound of this new circa 1991 never loved Elvis era wonder stuff, while in its way returning to the more bonkers energy of the earlier stuffy's work on, say, eight legged Groove machine. So it kind of is the best of both worlds. And I feel like if you like Never Loved Elvis era wonder stuff, you're gonna love welcome to the Cheap Seats. And if you like earlier harder Wonder stuff, you're still gonna love welcome to the Cheap Seats. Right.

[Lori]

Okay.

[Scott Free]

I feel like you do. Okay.

Yeah. So again, this was the first song that I ever heard by them. I actually didn't know it was off of Never Love Elvis because I had it on. If the Beatles had read Hunter, which I guess that's their compilation album, but that is such a good title for an album, right? Because you know, you know I love Hunter S. Thompson for sure. There was a quotation from somewhere. I don't know if it was from a review or something where it said, if the writer, Hunter S. Thompson, had been a presiding influence over the Beatles, then they might have looked and sounded like the Wonder stuff.

Love it.

Yes.

The lead melodic instrumental line and this was unusual for the wonder stuff that I had earlier really grown to love. Has accordion. Accordion Provided by Linda McCrae of Spirit of the west. And do I know who that is? I do not. But also Martin Bell, also on accordion. It's got guitars and an Irish drum corps style drummer just really banging the hell out of a snare drum. It's like a jig. Is it a jig?

I think it is, yeah.

I think it's a jade. It's in six, eight, as I already mentioned, made for dancing, but like lively, spinning, reeling, dancing. It's high energy fun. Also features guest vocals by Kirsty McCall, who you may recognize that voice from the Pogues.

Oh.

As well as I believe she also did some backup vocals for Morrissey and.

And Happy Mondays. Happy Mondays. Hallelujah.

There you go. It all comes together. If you have not yet listened to Happy Mondays, thrills and pills and bellyaches on accelerated culture, go dive back into the archives. It's a great episode.

Oh, the middle eight. Can we talk about the middle eight, please? Where it kind of just breaks down and then there's strings and.

Oh, yeah, okay. That's how you know that this former hard hitting indie pop rock band had gotten some production money thrown at them by a record company because there's a string section breakdown in the middle. It's weird, but it's fun.

Musically, it reminds me of being at the Renaissance Fair.

I can see it.

Not lyrically, but musically. And I'm sorry. I'm eating a gummy. I'm eating a gummy. But not, not the good ones, not. Not the good kind.

Save it till after the show. Gotta keep it together. We're only three songs in. Okay. The lyrics are not Renaissance fare. And the lyrics, what are they about? I gotta tell you, I have no damn idea.

Laugh when he jokes Slap him when he chokes it's time to give up the smokes and oh, when he cries don't wipe his eyes Take the wine from the swine and remind him of his crimes oh, in another world, yeah, he could wear a dress and then it gets weird.

Next verse opens. Imagine his surprise when he opened his eyes and I'd run the lawnmower over his thighs. Just. I have no idea what's going on here and I don't care.

That's. That's pretty gruesome. But, yeah, in another world he can wear a dress. I mean, I kind of. I'm getting the vibe off of the song that they're making fun of the guy and they're saying he's a wuss.

I maybe. But like, ah. But also it fits in with. Again, they're sneering sort of sometimes mean spirited earlier lyrics, but that's part of the dark fun of these guys. Yeah, it has a darkly funny sensibility that made me love the Wonder Stuff in the first place. The Wonder Stuff would tour to support this album with Susie and the Banshees, who we may talk a little bit more about a little bit later in this very episode, actually.

Next.

Perfect. They would play this very track on Late Night with David Letterman. It wasn't the big single from this album, but it was a big enough single with a good enough title that they would name the film documenting their tour supporting this album after this track. Welcome to the Cheap Seats was the video documentary of the tour. Also, they got big enough that they did have a headlining slot at the 1992 Reading Music Festival.

So that's cool.

The Stuffies, they got kind of big for a second there. By 1994, they would break up, which even now Miles Hunt admits was dumb. Doesn't really know what he was thinking. But they would go back on to get back together in various forms and. Yeah, the Wonder Stuff. Check them out.

Hey, fun fact.

Wait.

When we were kicking around ideas for the title of this podcast back when we started about two and a half years ago, one of the initial names I was considering was welcome to the Cheap Seats.

Strong. That would have been a great.

Yeah, well, and then my partner at the time, Trey, had suggested it all started with Duran Duran, but somehow we settled on Accelerated Culture, which I'm happy with, so.

Which, as we've mentioned before, is an allusion to the book that named this Gen X generation of ours, Gen X Tales of an Accelerated Culture.

Yes. Yes.

So there we are. It all comes together.

So, Scott, you had mentioned that they opened for Susie and the Banshees.

I did mention that.

Well, that's very timely because that is my next selection, assuming that you're done with the Wonder stuff.

Oh, I'm done. What's your next selection, Laurie? He asked knowingly.

So the album that Susie and the Banshees released in 91 was called Superstition. And the song, which many of our listeners will recognize, is called Kiss Them for Me.

[Lori]

You Kiss Them for Me.

[Scott Free]

Oh, man. Another one of those songs that was absolutely inescapable. If you spent times in dance clubs. Particularly if you spent times in dance clubs with a darker, gothier bent, like Neo. Yeah. Or City Club in Detroit. Or Club X. Yeah.

Okay, so if you're listening to this podcast and you don't know who Susie and the Banshees are, you probably need to turn in your Gen X card. They are, I think, along with the Cure and Bauhaus, are like the trifecta of goth alternative rock in the 80s and early 90s.

Okay, so now, I'm not saying you need to turn in your Gen X card, but there are some perfectly good podcasts on Huey Lewis in the news that might be of interest to you.

Oh, dear God. You know I can't stand them, right? But anyway, Superstition was actually the tenth album by Susie and the Banshees. They've been around for a long time. The lineup's changed over the years. The core members are Susie sue, who's obviously the singer. We have Steve Severin on bass and keyboards, and Budgie on drums, percussion, and keyboards. And that was the core, over the years, of Susie and the Banshees. Other artists would come and go. Robert Smith was playing with them for a time. Robert Smith of the Cure. By the time they got to this album, it was the three of them, with Martin McCarrick on keyboards, cello, and dulcimer. Love me a good dulcimer.

Gotta have dulcimer.

Yeah. And John Klein on guitars. And there's another instrumentalist that appears on some of the tracks, Calvin Singh, percussion, tabla, and Tavel. And in this song in particular, I think you can really hear specifically the tabla. I mean, it's really got kind of a. An international sound to it. The song. You know who the song was written about, right?

You would think I do, but I do not.

Okay. No, it was written about Jayne Mansfield. If you go back and listen to the song, you listen to the lyrics, it's basically, you know, narrating things from Jane Manfield's life. So.

Yeah, I did not know that this.

Song was Susie's highest charting hit.

Oh, yeah. And it's very accessible. And, you know, you think about Susie and all of the people who you associated with her earlier, and there is a darkness there. That's the goth rock thing. And this song is sweet and vibrant. Yes, yes. Sweet and bright and vibrant in a way that you don't really see so much in their earlier music. It's dreamy in a way that you see earlier, but it's also. Yeah, it's. It's nice.

It's almost dream pop, right?

Yeah, dreamy. Like I said, it borders on dream pop with that goth sensibility that she had, but without so much of the Darkness. Yeah.

The striking thing, when this video came out, it was the first time that many of us saw Susie without that signature eye makeup.

Right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

So this was their first top 40 hit in the United States. It peaked at number 23.

Really?

Yeah.

Peekaboo hadn't made it, huh?

No.

In the previous album, 1988, Peep Show, Big single was Peekaboo. And I would have thought that would have turned it higher, but all right. Okay.

And the album Superstition went to number 65 on the Billboard 200 chart.

Solid.

Yeah. And, I mean, they're still around. Susie played Was it Last Year at Cruel World Festival? I think it was last year. Yeah.

It's a beautiful song. I've always loved it. And again, inescapable on dance floors back in this era, and nobody was mad about it.

It's a good tune. And speaking of dream pop, then the next song that I chose was by a band called Single Gun Theory. They're one of my favorite bands. They're from Australia. Their sophomore album came out in 1991. It was called Millions Like Stars In My Hands, Daggers In My Heart, Wage War. Usually it's just referred to as Millions Like Stars in My Hands. It's an amazing album, and this was the song that really turned me on to the band. This is called From a Million Miles.

[Lori]

Despairing, desperate full of self blame under the water I saw a lime Creamy skin looks flowing golden hair it was alive that I know I saw it gesture to me with the.

[Scott Free]

It is still amazing to me that despite the significant overlap in the Venn diagram of our respective musical tastes, how there still managed to be quite a few groups and albums and songs that we do not have in common. Not just that we don't both love them, but that one or the other of us may not know it at all. Like, this track feels vaguely familiar to me, but I did not know the name Single Gun Theory. I did not know the name From A Million Miles. I don't know this track.

This song got a lot of airplay, at least in the Chicago area when it came out in 91. I don't know that it ever charted. So Single Gun Theory, as I mentioned, they're from Australia. That distinctive vocalist, that beautiful, sultry voice is Jackie Hunt. And she's still around. She's still recording. She shows up from time to time on recordings by Delirium, Conjure 1 or Delirium. I get the two confused because it's basically the same band. Kath Power is also a member of the band, and she does the backing vocals.

Kath Power.

Not Cat Power, Different K A T H. Right. And Pete Rivet Carnac.

Pete Rivet Carnac.

Pete Rivet Carnac. Yeah. So they are Single Gun Theory. I don't know this for a fact, but a friend told me that Single Gun Theory actually refers to the Kennedy assassination. The name Single Gun Theory, that checks out.

Sorry, Conspiracy theorist.

They're very much, you know, synth pop, dream pop, electronic dance. Very, very heavy use of samples, as you heard. There was a. It sounded like an Indian singer and a lot of incorporation of, you know, world music sounds. As I mentioned, this was their sophomore effort. It's not my favorite album by them. That would actually come in 94 with Flow river of My Soul, and they're on the Network label, which is based.

In Canada, and not the only time that that record label is going to come up tonight.

Oh, okay. They actually toured in 94 to support Sarah McLachlan, but they didn't really hit here in the United States. This album did peak at number 41 in Australia, but it didn't chart here. But it's an album that's never left my rotation. I still listen to it all the time. I just. I love the album and I love this song. It's just so beautiful.

Beautiful track. You had mentioned some of the Indian and Middle Eastern voices that appear on this. Interesting to me that they'd been on a trip across the world. Let's see here. This actually from chaoscontrol.com an article called Australian band Single Gun Theory discussed their creative process. Published in 1993 by Bob Gourley. The unusual incorporation of Eastern music and vocal samples came about after Pete and Jackie's travels through India, Turkey and southeast Asia. In 1989. Pete recorded sounds that he liked on a portable cassette recorder, not really knowing what would be done with them when he returned home. He sampled and experimented with them and began using them on the songs that would become the like the Stars In My Hands. These sounds are particularly effective on the LP's first single from A Million Miles, where the Pray for Me sample fits in perfectly with Jackie's vocals. This type of sampling creates a wide array of musical possibilities, though Pete doesn't want to say what's in store on the new lp. Oh, that was a long time ago. Anyway. Yeah, they were actually field recordings that the band themselves recorded while on a trip.

Yeah. So they're not like samples from an existing recording?

Yeah, no. They found people performing them and recorded them themselves.

You know, it's interesting, you Mentioned that Pray for me Sample. My little sister, she's about. She's about 10 years younger than I am. And so when this came out, I would have been 17, so she would have been 7. And I remember the first time I played it. And she heard that. And she heard that Pray for me at the beginning, and she turned to me and she said, is this Jesus Jones? Yeah.

Religious music. Of course.

Yeah. Love you, Amy. And Scott, do you remember a TV series from the 90s called Due South?

Due South? I do not.

Well, it was primarily a Canadian series, but here in the States, you could watch it on cbs. And this song was actually featured in an episode of that series. And I think that that might be part of the reason why we started to hear it so much on the. On the radio here. So we may be hearing more of Single Gun Theory in a future episode. We shall see.

Ooh, intriguing. I'm gonna have to brush up on my Single Gun Theory because I don't know him, but what I've heard so far, I like. And apparently I gotta get ready for an upcoming episode that we may.

Or may it be 94.

So we'll get to that by 2028.

There you go.

[Lori]

All right.

[Scott Free]

All right. So, Scott, then that leads us to the next track that you chose.

Okay, so this next song is from a 1991 album. As we were talking about wrapping up 1991, this album kept getting thrown out there and kept getting knocked down. But you cannot talk about alternative music in 1991 and not talk about the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Blood Sugar Sex Magic. The Red Hot Chili Peppers were not yet the biggest rock band on earth, who sang countless songs about California. And if you were anything like me, you were completely and utterly sick of. There are many songs to choose from on Blood Sugar Sex Magic, and there were a bunch of singles. Two you've heard so many times that you can just hit play in your head and hear under the bridge or give it away in its entirety note for note. We've all heard those songs that many times, so we're not going to play either of those. To represent Blood Sugar Sex Magic and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, I chose an unusual song for them, and I think one of the real standouts from that album, Breaking the girl.

[Lori]

Twisting them, Turning in. Your feelings are burning. You're breaking the. Thank you. So better. But now you're breaking again.

[Scott Free]

I had completely forgotten this song. Scott, this is a really good one.

It's a really good song. All right, so if you will indulge Me for a moment, my own personal history with the Red Hot Chili Peppers. So me and my high school friends, we discovered this band from a cassette of 1987's the Uplift, mofo Party Plan. Driving around in the aforementioned Rabba's VW Cabriolet, blasting skinny, sweaty man in a green suit and Funky Crime. And me and my friends. One of the songs from the album and special secret song Inside. Not the original title of the song, and we won't get into it, but it was a great soundtrack for masculine teenage rebellion, if you really like heavy guitars and kicking funky bass. Its follow up album, Mother's Milk, would hit bigger with big singles in Higher Ground, the Stevie Wonder cover, and Knock Me down, the tribute to the late guitarist Hillel Slovak, who had played on the previous album and died of a heroin overdose between Uplift, Mofo Party Plan and Mother's Milk. Don't do drugs, Kids stay in school. My college roommate and I. What up, Rage? Yes, I had a college friend named Rage. My roommate, in fact, loved Mother's Milk, especially Magic Johnson and the Jimi Hendrix cover fire. So good. And then came Blood Sugar, Sex Magic, and just. Oh, boy, what a monster hit. This album was like. You can't talk about alternative music in 1991 and not talk about this album. But I think in no small part, the reason you and I didn't want to do this album in its entirety is a. The big singles became so big that we're just so sick of them that we want to vomit. I never need to hear under the Bridge Again in My Life and Give It Away is right up there with it. Right? Yeah. But I think in no small part, it's also because of what the Red Hot Chili Peppers have become in the interceding 34 years. Oh, my God, how did we get so old? Oh, right. By not dying.

Yeah, right, Go.

They became the biggest rock band on Earth. Or right up there with U2. Lots of songs about California and Anthony Kiedis. Kind of being insufferably Anthony Kiedis. Yeah.

Now back to the song Breaking the Girl. You know, I always thought this was a flute.

It's kind of a flute. It's flute ish.

It's actually a mellotron.

Mellotron. Using a flute patch to make it sound all flutey.

Yeah, yeah.

So about the music, it's unusual, I.

Think, for the Chili Peppers because it's acoustic. They don't do a lot of songs.

Blood Sugar Sex Magic was the second album with new guitarist John Frusciante, who Replaced, as I said, the late Hillel Slovak after his unfortunate demise. And he was a very different guitar player than Hillel on Mother's Milk. The producer of that album had pushed them to do more hard guitar stuff and make the lyrics more conventional and straightforward. This album, Blood Sugar, Sex Magic, was actually produced by Rick Rubin and was their first album on Warner Brothers Records. To record this album, they rented a mansion that Harry Houdini had allegedly lived in, and the band shut themselves into the mansion for more than a month. Except, I believe, guitarist John Frante, who refused to live there. The band says it was because he thought the house was haunted. He says it's because he wanted to hang out with his wife, so he would just ride his motorcycle home every night and ride it back every morning. But Rick Rubin was helping arrange drum beats and guitar melodies and helping with lyrics. And so, yeah, it had a significantly different sound than their previous album. And even, you know, the aforementioned two singles that we need never hear again under the bridge. Very unusual and different than what had come before. Very melodic.

Soft reality.

Yeah, soft. And Anthony Kiedis kind of crooning in a way where he had been practically rapping for a lot of their earlier career. Rapping, slash, yelling and, you know, give it away. Also a strange track for them with that twangy funk. Well, they did a lot of twangy funk, but not hard really, in any way. But this track is something else entirely. That really active drum line, but not a conventional rock drum line. You mentioned the flute, like Melotron, the flutes that basically sound like something out of Led Zeppelin. And in particular, the whole first third of Stairway to Heaven. It's that same sound, those same fluty harmonies. And, you know, they were actually going for a Led Zeppelin like sound in this one.

We won't hold that against them.

Get out. Get out.

And this one is in six, eight Time, too. I've noticed that that's true of several of the songs you pick for this episode.

I. Yeah, I'd love me some. Six, eight. I'm unapologetic about it.

So Walt's beat. No.

Oh. Also worth noting, production and instrumentation wise. There's a bridge in the middle of the track, a really percussive and hard strummed guitar bridge that the members of the band are playing instruments that they found in a junkyard. They went to a junkyard and they got objects and instruments to beat on. And that was Flea and John Frante and drummer Chad Smith. And they are pounding their hearts out on that lyrically. And this one I just shamelessly took from the Wikipedia but one of Blood Sugar Sex Magic's more melodic tracks, Breaking the Girl, was written about Kiedis's constantly shifting relationships. He feared he was following in his father's footsteps and and simply be becoming a womanizer rather than establishing stable and long term relationships. He is quoted saying, as exciting and temporarily fulfilling as this constant influx of interesting and beautiful girls can be, at the end of the day that shit is lonely and you're left with nothing. So he was fearing that he was breaking the girl, talking about a model with whom he was breaking up in particular, and thus this kind of beautiful for the Red Hot Chili Peppers song. As long as you don't look too deeply into the lyrics, which is always a good idea where the Red Hot Chili Peppers are concerned. As far as the response to this album, obviously Monster Hit made him one of the biggest bands on the planet. Faster Louder called Blood Sugar Sex Magic, the cornerstone album of funk rock. And I would think that the subjects of our last episode of Accelerated Culture, Fishbone are probably like yeah, this here is some because they were among the cornerstones of funk rock, but they never hit like the Red Hot Chili Peppers hit. Sadly. If you haven't heard our last episode on the reality of my surroundings, go check it out the next band, the rock bands we loved in 1991 love this band, dinosaur junior and the track is Puke and Cry.

[Lori]

Stop shooting we need you back cause something's around Things are bombing it's not far off Let everyone hope you can cry Please come down Come on down Come on down Come on down Come on down Come on down on down.

[Scott Free]

Come on down all right Dinosaur junior so yeah, this is the alternative rock band's alternative rock band and so many bands that we have already covered on this show site. Dinosaur Jr. And lead singer songwriter Jay Maskus as a massive influence on them. Fans like My Bloody Valentine, believe it or not from that track you wouldn't think it. Nirvana. Kurt Cobain actually asked Jay Mascus to be in Nirvana twice and Mascus turned him down. Smashing Pumpkins, Sonic Youth, Radiohead, Blur. It is a who's who of accelerated culture artists and they're a weird, weird band. Everything about this band is weird but likable. If you like noisy indie rock that stopped being so indie and that likes country. It's strange like I said. So the concept of the band just so you know what you're in for when you are listening to Dinosaur Jr. I watched a great interview from Guitar Moves on January 18th, 2024. The interviewer Matt Sweeney interviews Jay Mascis, who is an old friend of his, and says to him, you guys, Dinosaur junior Stood out for a number of reasons, but one of them was the volume. I had never heard anything that loud, which is kind of like your calling card. To which J Maskus replied, oh yeah, that's just the concept of the band. Like be like the loudest country band. Ear bleeding. Country was like the initial band concept before anything. See, no one's playing country super loud. So that was in 1984 when the band formed. That was the idea. And Jay Maskus and Lou Barlo form the band in Amherst, Massachusetts. And it's so weird. Like J. Maaskis is singing in that sort of drawl that he does. You'd think he was from Texas or something. But nope, he's an Amherst, Massachusetts guy, born and bred. They formed, as I said, in 1984. They do the obligatory series of lineup changes for a young band. They do a debut album as Dinosaur. They do a tour with sonic youth in 1985. They're forced to do a name change in 1987 because a hippie rock super group consisting of members from, among other things, Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead were already called Dinosaurs sued them and thus Dinosaur Jr. Was truly born. They do a sophomore album in 1987 and a third album in 88. Then Jay Maskus, the lead songwriter and singer you hear, fires his bandmate Lou Barlo and starts composing and playing pretty much everybody's parts. By the time 1991's album Green Mind comes out, J Mask is writing and playing most everything on the album, much to the remaining band members consternation. The band is signed to Sire Records and from there released their major label debut album, Green Mind. The big single from Green Mind is the Wagon, and it's a blistering distortion, heavy, thick production, wall of sound, indie power, alterna pop rock track. But that is not the song that I picked from the lp. Instead, I went with the track you heard the snippet of, and that is Puke and Cry. This one originally came to my attention because it was on a Sire Records compilation album. We've talked a little bit about the Just Say series in the past. Yes, Just say Yes. Amazing. Just say yo. Weird and amazing.

Just say Mal.

Just say Mal. The third one, right, 1991 had the fifth edition of that compilation, Just say Anything and hell, it featured like one of your earlier picks, Laurie the Farm's Groovy Train. And other notable tracks included Body Count by Ice T's Body Count Higher Than the Sun by Primal Scream featured in episode 57 primal screams scream a delica. Tracks by Morrissey and Danielle Dax and Seal, My Bloody Valentine, the Ocean Blue and Ride. Oh, we should do Ride's 1991 album Nowhere and never leave. 1991, okay. But then there is this track, Pukin Cry. This weirdo, jangly, whiny, kind of country fried indie, but no longer indie because they're on Sire track Puking Cry. And it's just J. Mascus being J. Mascus. That weird, whiny drawl. Yeah, and so weird for a guy born and raised in Amherst, Massachusetts. But there you have it. Now Puke and Cry is one of their more laid back, accessible songs. It was on that Sire compilation, after all, and was intended to lure unsuspecting listeners in. But hey, I'm pretty unapologetic about liking the accessible tracks. And maybe I'm just not as cool as Kurt Cobain or Thurston Moore liking their really, really noisy stuff, but I'm okay with this.

Well, I only knew this song, and then there was a song they did that was on the Reality Bite soundtrack. I remember at the time that this album came out, so somebody I was dating at the time had invited me to see Dinosaur Jr. In concert. I did not know the band, so I passed. And you know what? I'll honestly say that I'm kind of glad that I did. This music. No, this music is not for me. This is not for me.

These are not ear jams.

No. I mean, much like I said with Sonic Youth, I really appreciate them for the influence they had on what would come later. And so many of the bands that I love.

Sure.

But yeah, sorry, J. Mascus just not feeling this.

I am sure he'll get over it.

Yeah.

You know, the band, and particularly Jay Mascus, is oftentimes compared to Neil Young.

I could see it.

And it's because of that. How did this guy become a singer?

Voice that whiny, nasally.

Yeah, exactly. It has taken me a long time to warm up to Neil Young because so many people have insisted that the music is worth it. And I am warming up to him. And I can appreciate a singer with a distinctive and we can say probably bad voice. Lou Reed also comes to mind. J Maskus. There was no learning curve there. I just immediately was like, there's something very endearing about how Don't Give a Kind of bad his voice is. And the music that goes along with it is unapologetically hard and noisy. And sometimes aggressive. This track, less so. But there's just the raw. The rawness to it, I guess that's kind of. It is the rawness of the music and the rawness of his voice really work together in a lo fi sort of way that, I don't know, I just always found it endearing. And this track, sing alongable. Come on down, come on down, Come on down.

Okay. Yeah. So you said he's from Massachusetts?

Amherst, Massachusetts. Western Massachusetts.

Oh, well, the next band, the band that I chose is also from Massachusetts. Boston, specifically. Our listeners already know I'm a huge fan of the pixies. And in 91 they released their fourth studio album called Trump Lamont. And the representative song that I have chosen is Alec Eiffel.

[Lori]

Everybody was a real smart alley. Make no sense.

[Scott Free]

Well, Scott, you said you weren't familiar with his album, is that correct?

You know, I guess I just kind of slept on Tromp le Monde. I don't think I had it in any medium. I don't think I had it on CD or I have vague memories of there being a cassette. But no, are they like, I just slept on this album?

Well, so as I mentioned, this was their fourth studio album. It's French. It means fool the world. Previously, episode 37, which you and I did over a year ago now on the Pixies, Dolittle. That was their second studio album. Now we're on the fourth. So there was one in between. There it was Bossa Nova in 1990. That was really good. Then Trump Lamond in 91. And at this point, the cracks were starting to show. Black Francis, the lead singer and Kim Deal, the bassist, were really not getting along and Kim was being frozen out of the songwriting process. So if you look at the album credits, they're all written by Black Francis.

I recall from our Dolittle episode, even though it was a full on year ago, you tend to be a bigger fan of the Kim deal. Pixies tracks. True.

That's. That is true, yes. But I do really like this album. There's some really solid tracks on it. The one I chose, Alec Eiffel, it's a fun uptempo song.

It opens with pioneer of Aerodynamics, Little Eiffel. Little Eiffel. They thought he was a real smart Alec. Little Eiffel, Little Eiffel. First of all, Ryman, aerodynamic and smart Alec is hilarious. Also, the song is Alec Eiffel, about Alec Eiffel, the designer of the Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty. And, you know, they thought he was a real smart Alec. That's just a goofy joke and I can appreciate it.

He thought big, but they called it a phallic. They didn't know he was panoramic.

Right. Goofy but fun.

Yeah, yeah. So this was actually the third single off the album. Obviously it's about Alexander Gustave Eiffel. Might be the second single now that I'm thinking about it. Planet of Sound was the first single. Then Alec Eiffel, letter to Memphis and then Head on the COVID of the Jesus and Mary chain song.

Okay, now that one, I definitely remember it. And it's so good.

Trump Lamond. Not as big, obviously, as their previous albums, but it did peak at number 92 on the Billboard 200. So, yeah, as I mentioned, they broke up shortly after this album, actually. Supposedly Black Francis notified the other band members by fax. He sent them a fax to tell them they were out of the band. Now, how. How 1991 is that?

Yeah, that's pretty 1991. And hilarious. I mean, an incredible dick move, but hilarious.

I love Black Francis, AKA Frank Black, AKA Charles Thompson, but he's a musical genius. But he really is kind of a dick.

He's not a people perker.

Not so much, no.

And you know, at least in this single, you can feel that there isn't so much Kim Deal influence in there. And it feels a lot like what would become the. What I believe was the first Black Francis solo track. Los Angeles have.

I remember. Yeah, you're right, it did sound a lot like that 1993 self titled debut.

And Hang on to your ego and Los Angeles were the first singles.

Yeah, yeah. And I remember hang on to your ego, that was a good one. But yeah, it really does sound a lot like. You're correct.

Frank Black solo is effectively. It was. Other people were playing their parts, but he was doing the songwriting and telling him what to do. Much to at least Kim Deal's chagrin.

Yeah. And like Trump Lamont, his self titled debut solo album has a strong focus on things like UFOs, science fiction, esoteric kind of things. Yeah, so that was really kind of a continuation anyway. Yeah, they got back together for a reunion tour in 2004 and I think that that is the year that I saw them at Lollapalooza, which was absolutely amazing. But their next album wouldn't come out until 10 years after that, 2014 with Indy, Cindy and Kim Deal was also out of the band again by then. There's always this. This tension between Kim and. And Black Francis.

So, yeah, I didn't know it before, but I dig it now. And with you having told me that Head on came from this album. Okay. It didn't completely pass me by, but I guess I just heard the big single and slept on the rest of it. What are you gonna do?

Yeah. So Back in episode 42, Scott, you and I did an episode on My Life with the thrill kill cult Confessions of a knife. And in 91, they came out with their third album. It was called Sexplosion. And this was the song you couldn't get away from if you turned on mtv. Sex on wheels.

[Lori]

Wheels. Tax on wheels. Sats on wheels. Tax on wheels. Sats on wheels, Tax.

[Scott Free]

Okay, Lori, when we were first comparing notes on what songs we were submitting for consideration for this episode, I was looking at your list and going, you're just giving us the songs that you like dancing to in the golf clubs in 1991. And then of course, the Pixies track is the one outlier there.

Yeah. Well, okay, to be fair, I wasn't dancing in goth clubs in 91 because I was underage. So as far as anybody, including my mother is aware, I was not dancing in goth clubs. Yeah. But no, this whole album is actually really, really good.

So good.

Yes. Whereas Confessions of a Knife, I think, really kind of had more of a spooky horror serial killer vibe. This one has got a much sexier, funkier vibe. And there's a lot of stuff here that's like really, really good dance music, but also like good party music. You know, like, you could put on Sexplosion and. Yeah, I mean, we would put this on. And I mean it. This whole album is just a dance party. It's dark, it's sleazy, it's industrial funky. It's so good.

So good. Yeah, I mean, it's. It's a Wax Tracks record, so Chicago Connection, we finally managed to get it in there.

I think it might have actually been Wax Tracks biggest selling album of all time, if I'm not mistaken.

I'm willing to believe that.

Or pretty close to it if it wasn't. It was definitely towards the top. Yeah. This song in particular, like I said, there was a fun video on mtv. It's a fun song. You gotta love the call and response. And do you remember the movie Cool World with Brad Pitt?

Oh, yeah. It is a great, terrible movie.

Oh, yeah, it's. It's so bad. It's good.

Ralph Bakshi at his shamelessly sexploitative Kim Basinger performance. That is cringe worthy and amazing. Brad Pitt being seduced by a sexy cartoon. It's just a whole thing, man.

Well, the song was on the soundtrack. Yeah, it was really, really good album. You really need to listen to the whole thing, not just the one song.

But no argument there. I don't have a lot to add to it other than this song was absolutely inescapable for a couple summers there. A great summertime song, a great dance floor song. Yeah, no, no complaints there.

So I'm not going into a lot more about the band. If you want to know more about my life with the Thrill Kill Cult, go back and listen to episode 42. We go into the story of the band. So.

All right then, I guess that brings us to the final of our 10 and the rest tracks. Okay, all right, this is the last of mine. It is a lesser known track, way ahead of its time. And this is another one that I chose as just sort of the representative of a whole amazing and underrated album. This is consolidated with Brutal Equation.

[Lori]

Cycle and getting the phone to my friend Michael. His story is called Hypocrisy and ours is based on the culture industry keeping the public distracted, paralyzing the artist potential impact while the fascist elite accumulate all the wealth that me and my p sit and ponder our health, which is failing just like our career. But at the moment a hard that's never been. You can see a career go down.

[Scott Free]

A toilet, but no indices line is going to spoil it.

[Lori]

Then you won't question my conviction. You know, music's a contradiction where everybody loses. No win situation, brutal equation.

[Scott Free]

Scott, this is another one that I'd never heard of.

Yeah, I mean, odds are good. Most of our listeners have never heard of this track and may never have heard of Consolidated. They were not big. And if you've heard one song by them, it was probably the one that was more of a naughty novelty off their subsequent album on which they didn't even do the lead vocals. But if you don't know them, the intro track to the album that this song was taken from, Friendly Fascism. That intro track called Zero, is Consolidated being introduced in concert and goes as follows. Are you ready for the hardest liberal vegetarian pro choice, Lesbian and gay supporting from San Francisco? Y' all ready? We'll make some noise for Consolidated. Another good way of summing the band up comes from their previous lp, their debut album, the Myth of Rock. This was quoted on the Wikipedia page as their mission statement. Consolidated is not even a consumer product yet. This is no rock and roll band. It is a unique creative vision of A small, isolated group of individuals, a team that's skilled and dedicated, searching for the knowledge that will enable them to improve the quality of their lives and the lives of those around them. This is an activist group in the form of an industrial hip hop act. And they have a lot to say. I mean, for starters, how many bands have mission statements and of those, how many of them state them aloud on record? Very few, I would say. But first of all, industrial hip hop, unusual. Not unheard of, but unusual. Right. So we consolidated R Adam Sherburn on guitar and vocals, and at this point in their career, not so much guitar, and Mark Pistol on samples, sequencers and synths. Other personnel, mostly guest vocalists, cycle through and then also a particular note. One of the things that makes their albums really interesting and their live shows really interesting are that their live shows featured segments wherein they would pass microphones to members of the audience and. And invite them to comment on the music, on the themes of the music, the issues raised in them, and then debate the band and each other. They would then take clips from those Q and A sessions and put them on the album, as in between song interludes or as sound bites within actual songs. And it is a wild ride. The crowd is oftentimes confrontational, deeply critical of the band, calling them hypocrites, conservative members of the audiences taking on their liberal views, and sometimes the band successfully arguing against them, sometimes kind of falling on their face. And they're not afraid to do that. It's a really interesting study. Yeah. After the album intro that I quoted earlier comes my chosen track, Brutal Equation, which you heard the clip of. It is a scathing indictment of the music industry set to industrial hip hop beats and production reminiscent of the Bomb squad of Public Enemy fame. Like, it opens groovy enough with tinkling bells and a simple backbeat and a funky base sliding and, you know, it's cool little groove. And then with Adam Sherburn's opening line, yo, Pistol, activate the base. They unleash an assault of bass and of much harder beats and shrieking industrial samples like Meat Beat Manifesto meets Skinny Puppy with an angry white hip hop emcee over it. Yeah, I dig this track a lot.

I like it too. And you know, I don't like a lot of hip hop. I like some hip hop, but I really like the. It's the. That. The industrial beneath it, the. Especially the bass. That industrial base is. Oh, yeah, just throbbing, you know.

Yeah. And it's these. This thick collage of samples, deep texture, but like, it's aggressive and it is a little in your face. The entire album is not that way. This track is a opening warning shot as to what you're getting into. So as indicated in that intro that I quoted earlier, the opening track of this album, among Consolidated's favorite targets are capitalism, the patriarchy, the military industrial complex, the political system, homophobia, and those who would suppress gay rights, the meat industry and animal testing, and the music industry. The last of these is the target of this particular song, and the brutal equation in the title is the way in which the record industry reduces music and musicians to a commodity and makes safe homogenized music popular while suppressing music that challenges the status quo. So basically Consolidated themselves. So among my favorite lines, this one, I just like the wit of it. Yeah, I used to be young like you, but look where that got me. He was like 29 when this came out.

Oh wow.

And what can you do when you're too old and too Caucasian? Brutal equation. It may seem self indulgent and self defeating for Consolidated to kvetch about the music industry while participating in it. And they straight up admit to it in one of the crowd participation segments where one of the audience members addresses that specific point and said, you know, I don't think you're hypocrites, but I would like you to justify this. And Pistol says, you say you don't think we're hypocrites. We are hypocrites. But for the left, which I find hilariously honest, it's a tough listen at times. There is a track later in the album, the Sexual Politics of Meat. A Scholar, a woman, is talking about the meat industry and how eating meat is mirror and representation of the patriarchy. There's another track about pharmaceuticals and how America is perpetually stoned, one that's just straight up about the military industrial complex and the war in Iraq called We Got to have Peace, which cribs war. What is It Good for? As the chorus the title track, Friendly Fascism it is a sometimes challenging listen. Trouser Press wrote, and I'm quoting, the insufferably self righteous tone makes the disc hard to endure. However, Alternative Rock called the album a hard hitting soundtrack of hip hop, funk, soul and hard rock. It is a challenging listen. They are activists, they believe what they believe and the interceding 34 years have proven them very forward thinking and maybe not wrong about a lot of stuff. But if nothing else, the production, the aforementioned industrial hip hop beats make it a very cool album and it will make you think. It may make you furious or it may make you roll your eyes, but it will make you think. And that is a lot more than a lot of albums can boast.

Thank you for sharing this song. It was not even on my radar, but I'm digging it and I think it's very timely. Very timely.

A lot of people missed this one. A lot of people would do well to listen to it now and see how, at the very least, Adam Sherburne and Mark Pistol kind of saw things coming way ahead of their time.

So, Scott, as this brings us to a conclusion for the 10 tracks that we've chosen, I'm going to go back to something that Trey and I used to do many, many moons ago. I'm going to put together a Spotify plus playlist of these 10 songs so that our listeners can hear the full 10. Now, I don't do that when it's an album because I figure you can just find the album, right? But I'm going to be putting together a Spotify playlist of the 10 songs and I'm going to be posting the link to the playlist in this episode description so our listeners can listen to these songs in their entirety.

Love it. That is very cool.

I have my molts.

How you doing? Thanks for doing it.

So, Scott, as you said, we are wrapping up 1991.

We are.

We have to get out of 1991.

After doing ourselves already.

Yeah. We're going to conclude 1991 in two weeks with cerulean by the Ocean Blue. We can share our experiences and seeing them in concert a few weeks ago, which was fantastic.

So good.

Then after that, I guess we're Moving on to 1992.

Right on.

Awesome. So once again, listeners, I'll post the link for the Spotify playlist and thank you again for listening. Thanks for your support of Accelerated Culture. If you like what we do and you want to throw us a couple bucks. Patreon.com accelerated culture podcast and that will also get you access to ad free episodes and sometimes some bonus content. And that's all I got.

Right on.

All right, so it's a goodbye from.

Me, Lori, and from me, Scott Free. We'll see you back here in two weeks.

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