ILM Opinions On The Underground.

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I'd like to hear some opinions on the following bands. Things i've heard of but never heard:
The Fugs
No Neck Blues Band
Jackie-O Motherfucker
Holy Modal Rounders
Pink fairies
Deviants
Hawkwind
Wire
Gang Of Four
Young Gods
Seeds
Love
Acid Mothers Temple
Skip Spence
Taj Mahal Travellers
Can/Neu/Tangerine Dream/Amon Duul II/Faust.
Flower Travellin Band
Soft Machine
A Silver Mt Zion
Kid 606
Lesser
Trans Am
Gastr Del Sol/Jim O'Rourke.

I dont really read The Wire or Mojo,but have seen these bands mentioned when looking through issues in shops(+ other mags)
whats worth checking out? Any help will be gratefully received.

― Peter M, Monday, 9 December 2002 00:51 (twenty-three years ago)

"High Rise" by Hawkwind is one of the best songs ever.

― , Monday, 9 December 2002 00:58 (twenty-three years ago)

you realize that with such a big list, it may take a while...

― hstencil, Monday, 9 December 2002 01:06 (twenty-three years ago)

Wire and Gang Of Four: godly first albums filled with tight, paranoid danceable punk, good if filler-addled second albums and then a smattering of decent tracks and experimental claptrap for the rest of eternity (though I haven't heard the recent Wire reunion stuff). Go4 was a bit funkier and not as funny.

Love: crazy, trippy, hippy stuff that never caught on due to a lack of zeitgeist and lyrical coherency (though Arthur Lee's gobbledy-gook is memorable). It's their own fault their only hit was a Bacharach-David cover. Their first three albums are godsends to those who love the genre. I'm fine with Forever Changes and the compilation Comes In Colors.

Haven't heard the rest.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Monday, 9 December 2002 01:22 (twenty-three years ago)

The new Wire stuff is good IMHO, although I haven't heard more than three songs. It seems more focused; quite recognizable but a touch more current production style.

Young Gods I recently got into and are great, if you need vocals you might not like as much.
Trans Am also does mainly instrumental with some vocal work, the first album "trans am" is classic, the rest are pretty good too.

― webcrack (music=crack), Monday, 9 December 2002 01:52 (twenty-three years ago)

for what its worth:

gang of four
wire
young gods
kid 606
lesser
trans am
seeds

are all pretty good bets.i dont feel like describing them.www.allmusic.com is a great site for researching and getting good descriptions of music/bands although there is no sound clips

― juiceboxxx, Monday, 9 December 2002 01:53 (twenty-three years ago)

You can probably find an entire thread devoted to most of these -- try the Search function at the bottom of the page.

― Mark (MarkR), Monday, 9 December 2002 01:56 (twenty-three years ago)

yeah i know it could take a while with all those bands, but with so many mentioned,everyone is bound to have an opinion. Which im always glad to hear. If theres any other similar bands then dont hesitate to recommend.
I dont know anything about Post-Rock and krautrock(bar kraftwerk) so i'm open to all suggestions of that stuff,from the best known to obscure lost classics.
I also prefer recommendations from music enthusiasts on here than say AMG. which is iffy to say the least. The 'Similar Artists' links are crazy.

― Peter m, Monday, 9 December 2002 02:24 (twenty-three years ago)

I also prefer recommendations from music enthusiasts on here than say AMG.

There is some overlap.

― Rockist Scientist, Monday, 9 December 2002 02:35 (twenty-three years ago)

I knew this was Peter M before I saw his name.

― sundar subramanian (sundar), Monday, 9 December 2002 02:49 (twenty-three years ago)

The reason i've been mentioning 'older' bands recently is because i grew up in late 80s/early 90s with Pixies,Nirvana,Dinosaur Jr,Sebadoh,Primal Scream,Orbital,acid house and punk/hardcore/post hardcore etc and i was always told by NME (and the readers in the letters page) that prog was evil and only punk or 3 min pop songs(made by young people) were worth listening to or the beatles/stones. They left me fairly close minded for years. So i missed out on a lot of good music. the last 3/4 years ive been catching up(thanks to Napster etc)
Ive heard about a lot of good bands,usually named as influences by bands i like,and i'd like to check some out. So therefore i request some opinions on here.
And it seems many do know about these bands,so i'm happy to read what they say.
The morale is, dont listen to prejudices spouted by nme.

― Peter M, Monday, 9 December 2002 03:40 (twenty-three years ago)

testify! I avoided all things chartpop or Led or Zep thanks to subculture-installed punk bias once. Now I've seen the light!

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Monday, 9 December 2002 03:45 (twenty-three years ago)

and i'd like to add i do still like some pop. So im not dismissing pop music. im just saying i realised 3 min songs with catchy choruses arent the be all and end all.

― Peter M, Monday, 9 December 2002 03:47 (twenty-three years ago)

yeah! Led Zep is a great example!
Never read anything good about them in nme/mm etc until a few years ago.
The stone roses were slagged off for liking/sounding like Led Zep. Then suddenly they entered the NME Canon.

― Peter M, Monday, 9 December 2002 03:50 (twenty-three years ago)

I'd say it's maybe unfair to list "Can/Neu/Tangerine Dream/Amon Duul II/Faust" as a single entry--German, from around the same time, that's really a lot of what they've got in common. But if you want to dip into that pool, maybe start with one of the great Can albums, _Tago Mago_ or _Ege Bamyasi_ (I prefer the former).

― Douglas, Monday, 9 December 2002 04:41 (twenty-three years ago)

Kid606 is most famous for taking existing tracks and making radical deconstructions and remixes. These tand to include adding a lot of CD skipping effects, noise, bass boosting and other filtering tricks, and looping short sections The effect is that the original is recognisable but pretty fucked. When it's good it's exhilerating. Sometime's it's pretty forgetable.

See also Hrvatsky.

The Young Gods were a late 80s industrial band from Switzerland who used a lot of fuzzed up classical music samples. They were most interesting when doing uncharacteristic things like an album of Kurt Weil songs. Otherwise, I think it's a sound which has dated pretty badly. I recently got one of their albums from 95 and I only listen to a couple of tracks, infrequently.

― phil jones (interstar), Monday, 9 December 2002 04:44 (twenty-three years ago)

Downloaded 'Only heaven' and L'eau Rouge by The Young Gods. Like them a lot on 1st listen. Whuich Kid 606 is best to start with? i was thinking about the one on Mike Pattons label. It sounds the most interesting according to AMG.
Anything else recommended i will get round to buying or downloading. I must admit after checking out peoples recommendations ive downloaded a lot and ended up buying them.

― peter m, Monday, 9 December 2002 05:14 (twenty-three years ago)

Re: Kid606, I've heard Down With The Scene, P.S. I Love You and The Action Packed Mentallist Brings You The Fucking Jams, and I've only really liked Down With The Scene (which is the one on Mike Patton's label Ipecac). It reminds me somewhat of Atari Teenage Riot's uber-distorted electronic thrash, except without ATR's annoying slogan-shouting and a better sense of humor. P.S. I Love You is its polar opposite— very mellow ambient-glitch which doesn't distinguish itself too well from the Mille Plateaux-style stuff it apes. And Action Packed Mentallist jumps on the bootleg bandwagon but it seems much less inspired than "A Stroke Of Genius" et al.

― Nick Mirov (nick), Monday, 9 December 2002 05:27 (twenty-three years ago)

P.S. I Love You is its polar opposite— very mellow ambient-glitch which doesn't distinguish itself too well from the Mille Plateaux-style stuff it apes.

Uh, it's on Mille Plateux.

― OCP (OCP), Monday, 9 December 2002 05:33 (twenty-three years ago)

i just sold a Jackie O-Motherfucker album this afternoon. it's kinda free acoustic stuff. like improv folk. some pretty moments, but mostly just rambles aimlessly. it's very similar to the No Neck Blues Band cd that i have. also not very interesting and sometimes kinda muddy. but i'm gonna hold onto the NNBB cd because i bought it cheap and it has cool packaging. it's in a wood case w/the band logo cauterized into it and the back is a piece of plastic velcro-ed on.

― JasonD (JasonD), Monday, 9 December 2002 07:44 (twenty-three years ago)

the seeds are brilliant!

dumb ass 60s psyche that sounds like oldschool 92 era uk breakbeat hardcore (all bass and treble, nothing in the middle). makes me want to use the word...'rumbling!'

― gareth (gareth), Monday, 9 December 2002 10:11 (twenty-three years ago)

I got an Acid Mothers Temple Album (The "Freak Out...!" one if that's any help). I think it's great headphones music, but I don't know if I would recommend it to anyone. Sorry, I know that's not really very helpful.

I think that everything that Jim O'Rourke has done is worth owning, but I know some people on ILM disagree.

― Nordicskillz (Nordicskillz), Monday, 9 December 2002 10:15 (twenty-three years ago)

I hoped this thread was going to be the ILM equivalent of Poems On The Underground. I'm not quite sure how that would have worked.

― Tim (Tim), Monday, 9 December 2002 10:30 (twenty-three years ago)

The Fugs - weird bunch, more about politics and arts and happenings than music (quite forgettable) if i remember well.

Wire - godfathers of art punk with short crispy songs. originals.

Gang Of Four - don't know them well, their reunion album a couple of years ago wasn't bad. the older stuff mixing punk with funk and left-wing polical statements is very powerful.
Young Gods - industrial quite tuneful stuff from switzerland. loud and hypnotic.

Love - forever changes is a gem of the 60s. probably my favourite "hippie" album. folkrock with pop sensibility.

Can - coming from a classical background, influenced by stockhausen etc. they are ok but i never really got into them. they like long free-flowing songs/sessions with weird vocalists. think of a german zappa.

Neu - their first album from 72 is amazingly modern. check what i wrote about it here in my old blog.

Tangerine Dream - electronic pioneers. never got into them. anticipating ambient. atmospheric soundscapes.

Amon Duul II - the 1st incarnation of this band was at the beginning of krautrock. grateful dead influenced with long jam sessions. i have yeti and find it hasn't aged well. progrocky.

Faust - i only have 4 and a reunion album. weird band. minimal and experimental. i like them.

Soft Machine - i used to like them but haven't listened to them for ages. i have third at home and didn't listen to it more than once. jazzrock with some improvisation. i prefer robert wyatt on his own.

A Silver Mt Zion - godspeed reduced to three or four members. chamber music with violins and stuff. i liked their album from last year. the sound is quite opposite to the monumental godspeed. more intimate. maybe i even prefer them to their father band.

― alex in mainhattan (alex63), Monday, 9 December 2002 12:19 (twenty-three years ago)

wadda lotta "i" -- all un-dotta!

― t\'\'t (t''t), Monday, 9 December 2002 14:39 (twenty-three years ago)

The Fugs - Very amusing, intentionally or otherwise.

Pink Fairies - Notable for Motorhead affiliation. Crap otherwise.

Hawkwind - See Pink Fairies.

Wire - Genius.

Gang Of Four - Perfection. Even MALL.

Young Gods - Loved their first three albums. Lost interest after that.

Seeds - I prefer the Standelles, but sure....the Seeds rocked.

Love - Not my bag, personally, but lots of band I like cite them.

Taj Mahal Travellers - Boring as far as I'm concerned.

Can - I love MONSTER MOVIE for "Yoo Doo Right."

Neu - More interesting than Can. Big influence on Killing Joke!

Tangerine Dream - All I know is their "Risky Business" score. Yawn.

Faust - Only know a couple of tracks, but I do like, notably "It's aRainy Day...."

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Monday, 9 December 2002 15:56 (twenty-three years ago)

The Fugs : political art folk anarchists, good for one album but tiringly 'funny' after that
Hawkwind : heavy, heavy space rock, awfull but good for doped up nights
Wire : as others have said about the early stuff but the track from Read and Burn I heard on the last Wire tapper cd made me go out and buy the new stuff.
Love : folk influenced west coast psychedelia, great lyrics, beautifull songs, lovely orchestration.
Acid Mothers Temple : every psych riff ever played, I've got 3 of their records but only every played them once or twice - ie the idea is better than the output
Skip Spence : another 60's rock drug casualty but this time not as interesting as syd barrett et al
Can : tracks based around long drug fueled jams that were edited expertly to enhance the best bits and then moving towards more real songs, try any of the first 6 albums
Neu : mixing long dreamy, echo filled tracks with tight, energetic, almost punky pieces, they were undoubtably a huge influence on a lot of more modern music, try any of the first 3 albums
Tangerine Dream : long, spacey almost ambient synthesiser pieces, moving later to mechanistic, sequencer based stuff.
Amon Duul II : for one album the best psychotic psychedelic band in ever, try Yeti
Faust : my favourite band - more drug fueled experimentation but this time more cut up and juxtaposed, try any of the first 4 albums
Soft Machine : jazz influenced rock/pop combo with the individual vocals of robert wyatt who turned to noodly jazz-rock completely after their 3rd album
Gastr Del Sol/Jim O'Rourke : mixing singer/songwriter styles with improv, modern classical and electronics which usually works quite well, for Gastr try crookt, crakt or fly and for o'rourke try the more straight ahead Insignificance

― phil turnbull (philT), Monday, 9 December 2002 20:43 (twenty-three years ago)

Fuck all this anti-Fugs sentiment! The first two records are great. Philistines will focus on silly, sexual lyrics, but the songwriting could be beautiful (see "Morning, Morning" and "I Want to Know" from The Second Album, also, "Kill for Peace" is early punk). The Golden Filth live album is also fantastic.

Holy Modal Rounders were close friends of the Fugs, and it shows. Mountain folk music with increasingly odd lyrics as time went on... A best-of is your best bet. (a side note: my dad used to play with Rounder Peter Stampfel.)

― Yanc3y (ystrickler), Monday, 9 December 2002 20:52 (twenty-three years ago)

Acid Mothers Temple - Use the search function.

A Silver Mt Zion - Not as much on them here so I'll mention that the first album is far less annoying. He Has Left Us Alone... Which includes an attempt at singing and perhaps their most rockist moment on Three Dogs Galloping...
If only they would shorten up the titles.
Second album As Sparks Fly Upwards... or something equally long winded is filled with your usual GYBE sorta vague socio/political statements that get the hippies all wound up for another night of fighting the system. MAN.

― Mr Noodles (Mr Noodles), Monday, 9 December 2002 21:13 (twenty-three years ago)

recommendations:

No Neck Blues Band ~

recorded in public & private (Ecstatic Yod, e#57/fyp116/actuel 1) LP
Hoichoi (s@1, #1) LP
Letters from the Earth (Ser/Sound@One, SER #2/S@1#26,27) 2CD
Letters from the Serth (no label, no number) CD
A Tabu Two (New World of Sound, NWOS-21) LP
A Tabu Two (New World of Sound, NWOS-22) LP
The Birth of Both Worlds (Sgr/Sound@One, SGR 3/S@1 46, 47) 2CD
Live at Ken's Electric Lake (Sound@One, 48-49) 2LP
Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones But Names Will Never Hurt Me. (Revenant/Soundatone, 103/50) CD
Re: “Mr. A Fan…” (Trade Mark of Quality, TMQ 638) LP

Shambolic collective goes from AMM-harshness-with-a-tribalish-bongo-beat to slightly countrified something or other. Very good late night hash jams. (Note: I haven't listened to the boot yet.)

Wire ~

Pink Flag (EMI/Harvest, ST-11757) LP
Chairs Missing (EMI/Harvest, SHSP 4093) LP
154 (Warner Bros., QBS 3398) LP

[RIDICULOUS HYPERBOLE ALERT!] Probably the three best albums of the punk era, all by the same band. I like their 80s stuff too, but a lot of people don't.

Gang Of Four ~

Entertainment! (Warner Bros., BSK 3446) LP
Solid Gold (Warner Bros., BSK 3565) LP

After these, they fell off hard. But these are classics. Listen to the beginning of "Anthrax" if you wanna hear where just about every Albini-played guitar sound comes from (aside from the times when he rips off Metal Urbain, that is).

Love ~

Forever Changes (Elektra, EKS-74013) LP

I've only got this one, but the other ones are good too. Better than the Beach Boys.

Skip Spence

Oar (Sony Music Special Products, WK 75031) CD

His only solo album, total underrated classic. His drumming on early Jeff. Airplane is good, too.

Taj Mahal Travellers

July 15, 1972 (Iskra, 3002) LP
August 1972 (P-Vine) 2CD

Kinda similar (and not, at the same time) to the No Neck vibe.

Can

Monster Movie (Spoon, spoon CD 004) CD
Soundtracks (Spoon, spoon CD 005) CD
Ege Bamyasi (Spoon, spoon CD 008) CD
Future Days (Spoon, spoon CD 009) CD

Some day I'll get around to buying Tago Mago, it's their best one. Great rhythmic action, kinda like a more advanced (and less American, less Welsh, more GERMAN plus a bit of JAPANESE) Velvets, in a weird way.

Neu!

s/t (Billingsgate, 1001) LP
Neu! 75 (no label, 941030) CD

boom boom chicka! boom boom chicka! Motorik. 2 is for completists, only.

Amon Duul II

Carnival in Babylon (United Artists, UAS-5586) LP
Dance of the Lemmings (United Artists, UAS-9954) 2LP
Wolf City (United Artists, UA-LA017-F) LP

I listened to Dance... whilst stoned outta my gourd Saturday night. That should tell you, er, something. Great stuff. Also search: Yeti.

Faust

s/t (Polydor, 2310 142 SUPER) LP
Faust So Far (Recommended, R.R two) LP
The Faust Tapes (Virgin, VC 501) LP
IV (Virgin, V2004) LP
Seventy One Minutes Of… (ReR Megacorp, ReRF1CD) CD

Freakin' classic. NOT minimalist at all.

Soft Machine

Volume Two (Command/Probe, CPLP 4505) LP
Third (Columbia, G 30339) 2LP
Fourth (Columbia, C 30754) LP

Everything with Robert Wyatt is golden, after that it goes downhill.

Gastr Del Sol

The Serpentine Similar (Teen Beat, teenbeat 95) CD

The first, O'Rourke-less one (has Bundy K. "Call me Ken" Brown on bass and some McEntire drumming). "A Watery Kentucky," indeedy.

Crookt, Crackt, or Fly (Drag City, DC-43) LP
Mirror Repair (Drag City, DC54CD) CD
Upgrade & Afterlife (Drag City, DC90) 2LP
Camofleur (Drag City, DC133) LP

Of these, Mirror Repair is my favorite (it's the most concise), but they're all pretty all right. Crumbling the antiseptic beauty.

Jim O'Rourke ~

Disengage (Staaltape/Korn Plastics, S.T.CD 048/LP 4292) 2CD

Not much there there.

Scend (Divided, DIV01) CD

Crunch crunch crunch goes the snow underfoot. I like it.

Remove the Need (Extreme, XCD 018)CD

Guitar? Guitar!

Rules of Reduction (Metamkine, MKCD009) 3”CD

Musique? Concrete!

Terminal Pharmacy (Tzadik, TZ 7011) CD

Not much there there.

Happy Days (Revenant, 101) CD

They compare this to Fahey, but ol' John never did just sit around and play octaves. Kinda like Town n' Country being attacked by a hurdy-gurdy. The hurdy-gurdy doesn't win, unfortunately.

Bad Timing (Drag City, dc 120) LP

Highly awesome dude.

Eureka (Drag City, dc 162) LP

Pretty. In a good way.

Halfway to a Threeway (Drag City, dc 178) EP

Ah, wotta joker!

I’m Happy and I’m Singing and a 1, 2, 3, 4 (Mego, 050) CD

Hot wired!

Insignificance (Drag City, dc202) LP

This one don't move me so much. Solly, challie.

Does that help?

― hstencil, Monday, 9 December 2002 21:47 (twenty-three years ago)

one year passes...

Check out Piero Scarufi's "History of Rock"
www.scaruffi.com/history
i found all those bands in the alphabetical index

― mark galloway, Thursday, 12 August 2004 22:48 (twenty-one years ago)

yeah! Led Zep is a great example! [of NME prejudice against]

Erm, did I dream this, or was an album by Robert Plant of all people the first one to get a 10/10 after they started using numbers in the late 80s?

― OleM (OleM), Thursday, 12 August 2004 22:59 (twenty-one years ago)

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