Full treatment: The Swirlies

And the offshoots of the band - ah, many a day I am thankful for Syrup USA and Victory at Sea. Seana's solo stuff, however, sounds like watered-down Mary Timony - live, it didn't sound good at all.

The idea of a bunch of American kids trying to record Loveless with thrift store Silvertones and Casios on a Tascam 4 track seems insane, but somehow it works, and I don't think they were merly aping MVB. Sweet pop songs abruptly shift into heavy metal riffs and then wind down into a low-fi buzz, and by some miracle it all manages to fit together.

Rumor has it that recent Swirlies output has been less that stellar (I wouldn't know), but the past records are still in heavy rotation at my house and I imagine they will be for quite a while. I think time has shown the Swirles to be a lot more interesting than most of the shoegazers they were supposedly imitating. I know I don't spend much time listenting to Lush or Curve anymore.

The recent material has, indeed, been silly. And it's not even "recent," really -- a lot of it seems to be old junk that they never got around to doing anything with. There were a couple of tracks on that remix album, though, that were fantastic, even if the concept and the product as a whole were embarrassing.

I don't understand the lack of web sites dedicated to this terrific band. Grr.

But a grossly more underrated band is Timonium.. who are an San Francisco/Los Angeles band that has combined some of that shoegaziness with some rather stunning droney low-key dynamics. Suspende Animation is quite nice. See Timonium live whenever you can. Two other related bands from the South Bay/Orange County area are September and We Are Not Going To Stand For This.

Thinking about taking Blonder Tongue Audio Baton to the used shop this weekend.

Is it worth keeping???

Well, rip it at least. (I mean, I presume everyone does that with their CDs now.)

I just saw the Swirlies last night! It was pretty cool. They fucked up the beginnings of some of the songs and had to start over, but they did it in a charming way. I wish it could have been slightly louder, but overall, really solid.

saw them live last night, it was ... okay. kinda fun. lots of false starts and messing around with equipmnt though.

xpost - lol, what he said

(I mean, I presume everyone does that with their CDs now.)

Honestly... I really don't. I figure if I'm disinterested enough to sell something, what's the point in ripping it? In fact I already have all my stuff ripped. If I were to sell it, I'd rid myself of the mp3s as well. What's the point in selling it, but not *REALLY* getting rid of it?

(I realize I'm probably alone in this line of thinking.)

As the years go by, I more and more wish that they'd had better vocals. The "we're in college!" sound of the singing puts me off increasingly as I get older.

Nonetheless, I'd keep it: they had better hooks than most of their US competition and when they pop up on shuffle my ears always perk up.

their slumberland 45 is one of the greatest singles of the 90s imo

blonder tongue could only be a disappointment after it but it holds up surprisingly well to me now

Blonder gets much better as the album progresses... "Jeremy Parker" and "Park the car by the side of the road" are pretty stellar.

They Spent is still their greatest achievement.

electricsound, others,

Does anybody know anything about this "Blue Bunny" compilation?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&_trksid=p4340.l2557&item=330533815295&nma=true&rt=nc&si=lQ5PZuaQHoNzYtLQHbgShqKqGtA%253D#ht_1761wt_1141

It recently sold in a 7" bundle on ebay aside from the above listing, but I can't find it listed in Damon's "Collectors discography" or discogs.

I have that 7"... It came with a zine called Flygirl and features these tracks:

Dennis Callaci - Back Up
John Davis - 300 Bags of Two Target Practice
Lou Barlow - Riding
Stuffd Bear - My But It's Warm Today, Isn't It?
Ruby Falls - Hi Blue Bunny
Swirlies - Indian Ocean Nosedive
Juke-Box Hero - Salt

Pretty sure the same version of "Indian Ocean Nosedive" is on "Cats of the Wild."

Oh Ok, thanks!! Love that song.

http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archives/2015/04/swirlies_celebr.html

Yay! Reissue finally as well!

Okay I could have sworn there was some more recent Swirlies chat, but no matter.

So, someone on D1me@d0z3n has uploaded their cache of Swirlies live stuff, they were all pretty short so I packaged them together, can't see many people other than Evan perhaps being interested in this, but what the heck...

https://www.fromsmash.com/aAZ8fDav.L-bt

i’ll def check that out. saw them in 1993 maybe, in Houston. My memory of that night is hazy

Oh wow, totally missed the revive. Thanks Maresn3st!!!

You're welcome, some more have gone up since so I'll make a second link.