Where should I go with my Unrest obsession?

As for Factory stuff in general? Uh, Dr. C to thread! But you could do a lot worse than Joy Division/New Order, Happy Mondays, Crispy Ambulance, Miaow/Cath Carroll...

:-(

There is a new Mark solo album I downloaded one of the songs. I tried to get Teenbeat to send my college station their stuff, but they chose to ignore me. Can't blame them considering how much the kids love the Coldplay and Offspring and such around here.

I have Hydro, thats the looong one right? Very nice.

The Tube Bar LP is essential (although the second side is not).

That said, Flin Flon is a good idea. Especially the "Chicotoumi" (or however you spell that) compilation, which has the best versions of the "Boo Boo" tracks, and three new songs that are their best yet. "Boo Boo" will do you good too. The earlier releases, "A-OK" and that first "Swift Current" single are alright, but a bit dry.

You'd probably like the first Grenadine record "Goya" (Grenadine = Mark Robinson, Jenny Toomey, and Rob Christiansen)

As for recommendations, you might enjoy The Wedding Present, Josef K, June Brides, Close Lobsters, and other mid-80's British Bands from the C86 movement. TweeNet is a good guide.

TeenBeat: You will probably enjoy Eggs. Bruiser is their best album. Grenadine - for sure, as previously suggested. The second Tel Aviv album, The Shape of Fiction, on TeenBeat was produced by Mark R. and has a lot of latterday Unrest-type sounds. Phil Krauth's solo albums are worth a listen. Versus might be up your alley, as well.

Factory-wise, not mentioned thus far are Section 25, The Wake, Stockholm Monsters, and A Certain Ratio, who all had their moments - esp. in their early days.

I can't imagine New Order seeming cold to anyone.

Blue by Olympic Death Squad (which is just Mark R. solo) is for devoted fans only - one really great song ("Ski Jump") and some okay short strummy songs, etc. A bit thin.

And, be sure to check out "Puerto Rico Way" by the 6ths, which Mark sings. And there's MRG 100 on Merge Records, which has Mark remixing (and adding vocals/sounds to) various Merge artists.

And another thing, Mark loves to borrow lyrics from other people ("angel, I'll walk you home" is a line from "Moves Like You" by Cath Carroll; "...you look better than the face of God on a sunny day" is from the James song "How Was It For You" - I was a bit disappointed to find out that Mark didn't write that, since it's an amazing line!)

Re: Factory, don't forget ESG, whose "UFO" was covered by Unrest (A South Bronx Story is the one to get and won't leave your CD player for weeks).

Also, please stop talking up Grenadine I am trying to win that record on Ebay.

Then there's always the Velvet Underground's "Live with Lou Reed 1969," yes? The version of "What Goes On" on there anticipated a lot of Mark's guitar style...

Perhaps some early Wedding Present?

That first Grenadine single is called Triology, and "Fillings" is the same version as the one on Goya, but the flip side ("Gillan" with an "A" I think) is a different version from the one on Goya (entitled "Gillen (Except Sometimes)") - the single version has no drums. You can also find the single version on a Melody Maker compilation CD called Caution! Hot Tips!.

I should point out that the "Don't Forget the Halo" single has amazing packaging - it's on clear red vinyl, and the sleeve is made of transparent red plastic! Truly a thing of beauty. Oh yeah, great songs, too, heh. Both songs are included in the Wakefield boxed set.

If you've come this far, you might as well track down the third single too, Christiansen, and the second album Nopalitos.

Do you know where the title "Gillen" came from? It's Jenny Toomey's middle name.

Can you believe that TeenBeat Records turns twenty next year? I mean, good lord. Merge Records turns 15 this year.

If your eBay auction doesn't work out, I just checked the TeenBeat web site, and they have Goya on vinyl for sale for $10: http://www.teenbeatrecords.com/

Mark & Evelyn are married, I believe, and have a son.

-- the surface noise (electricsoun...), February 3rd, 2004 3:53 PM. (electricsound) (admin) (userip)

nice to know i possess at least a little insight

I guess the new Maybe It's Reno album would qualify, as it's apparently an Unrest reunion. Haven't had a chance to do more than a quick listen, but it's all B vocals I think, which I'm fine with. Described as "for fans of Vibe Out!" which happens to be my favorite Unrest song. Seems a little glossier though...

wait what?!? Are Mark and Phil on this also?

"Vibe Out" is awesome.

gonna buy this lil bastard right now

hmm i don't know that i'd be falling over myself to recommend this as the next step after unrest.. it does have its air miami-ish moments but it's very much lacking the songwriting touch of mark robinson and it really misses it IMO

It's weird, but it's hard for me to imagine "liking Unrest". They seem like so many different bands, and so dissimilar to themselves. I meam, I like Custom Carnal and Malcolm X Park, but those albums have almost nothing to do with the band that cut Imperial FFRR. Only connection being the lyrics to "Yes, She Is My Skinhead Girl". Maybe. If you really like the early stuff, you go to what, NOU? King Crimson? Sonic Youth? And if you like Imperial and the Air Miami stuff, you go to, what, The Pastels? Raincoats?

So after a few spins I do like this one. It does sound most like some combination of Flin-Flon and the more droney Bridgette stuff from the Perfect Teeth era (the latter I'm perfectly fine with). Maintains the old Unrest weirdness in that the weird parts are weird in weird ways. Faves so far are Baby's Lost in the Tracks and Gravestones and Christmas Trees (which is, I think, the most Unrest sounding).

I also really like the atypical Venice Itch which starts out like something old Liz Phair might have come up with (think Flower) and ultimately goes Unrest-y again. The hardcore Drunk Pilot is fun.

Heh, I was thinking of reviving an Unrest thread yesterday. If they made an album's worth of slow, more sparse, not especially poppy stuff, i.e. an album full of songs like Angel I'll Walk You Home, and Breather X.O.X.O (which to me remain some of the best songs ever) then I'd be eternally happy.
That's what I think really differentiates say Air Miami from Unrest, that underlying dark tension behind the sugary popness, which I think is what made them so good.

I'm not too familiar with their early stuff though, it's much harder/rougher, no?

correct, in general.

dlp and esoj are y'all buying this on iTunes or somthin'? who's putting the record out?

Whoa. I had no idea about this. This looks awesome. Buying now!

Re: mhelt

Early stuff is harder and rougher, but super varied, too. First non-cassette album (apparently called Tink of SE, though you'd never know it to look at it - all covers handmade and differently labeled) and the Catchpellet EP are where I came in. Basically dadaist bedroom punk/prog coming from all directions. Noisy jazz, indie pop, hardcore punk, cuts ups and collages, proggy freak-outs and covers, all sounding as if recorded on a boombox. Some cool stuff in there, but you've gotta grit your teeth and wade through the debris.

Malcolm X Park is a (slightly) better sounding version of the same. Just as sloppy and incoherent, but the hits are starting to outweigh the misses. "Can't Sit Still" is an early pop classic, suggesting where they'd be a few years later, and "Christina" isn't too far behind. Still, at this point, the band have more in common with Thinking Fellers and Truman's Water than with the Unrest of Imperial and Perfect Teeth, which is to say there's an ocean of near-unlistenable art junk between you and the good parts. Me, I LOVE the crappy cover of Kiss' "Strutter", where you can hear Mark's voice break, teen style, on "she'll pass you byyyy-yyIII-iii". The roaring, crazed coming out anthem "Castro 59" pretty much rules, too, and points to where they'd go next.

Custom Karnal Blaxploitation is what you call the "difficult, transitional" record. "She Makes Me Shake Like a Soul Machine" would have fit right in on Imperial, but a lot of the rest is much more aggressive. They were working a Kenneth Anger jones real hard at this point, so you get punked-up metal rubbing shoulders with fake glam funk and a whole bunch of weirdly mocking (?) approaches to the idea of "blackness" in a white rock context. It all has an archness and a self-awareness that prevents it from ever being (or even really verging on) offensive, but on the other hand, it's not exactly welcoming. I always got the feeling they were trying to digest intentially noisy and confrontational New York art rock on this album (Sonic Youth, Lydia Lunch), so its identity winds up being a bit compromised. Still a great record, but one that takes some getting used to.

Or rather mehlt.

I got it via eMusic. Totally random...I think D. Wolk did a review of the day on it and it caught my eye. xpost.

yeah i got it on emusic.. it's a teenbeat release

i think i need to spend more time with it. at the moment i'm finding it kind of unmemorable and the recording is way way trebly

"Teenage Suicide" off Kustom Karnal is probably the most foreshadowing track on the album. They rerecorded it for the Isabel maxi-cd single.

there's a bunch of stuff in amongst the noisy dreck on the fuck pussy galore comp that is pretty close to the imperial stuff, eg hill part 2, the tundra, holiday in berlin, hope, can't sit still (just a slightly rockier cath carroll) , egg cheer (the start of their heavy james influence?), laughter..

HATTERZ

I love the noisy dreck! The title track of Malcolm X Park is awesome, as is "Kill Whitey", their cover of the Byrds' "So You Want To Be A Rock N Roll Star", "Castro 59", etc.

i think i need to spend more time with it. at the moment i'm finding it kind of unmemorable and the recording is way way trebly

I'm a little surprised, but this has grown on me a lot and very quickly. Sounds better on speakers than on headphones. The one that's stuck in my head lately is the oddball "Venice Itch." First album to knock Portishead off of heavy rotation, actually. And the opener, Baby's Lost In Tracks, is seeming more and more like a great lost Unrest song.

And the opener, Baby's Lost In Tracks, is seeming more and more like a great lost Unrest song.

I thought the same thing. Seems to me like it would have fit perfectly on the Animal Park single.

Why are the Unrest albums out of print? Is Mark Robinson planning some jam-packed re-releases? I haven't heard these albums in ages; my cassettes are all in boxes. I would re-buy this stuff on iTunes, even. I can't even find Imperial FFRR or Perfect Teeth on S0alseak... (This thread gave me an itch!)

i managed a copy of 'kustom...' through other means, but mp3 only. hard to track down. i've got imperial and perfect teeth savannah.

http://www.teenbeatrecords.com/

LOL

if you want to pay

i thought they reissued imperial ffrr recently

Perfect Teeth and, I think, the maxi-singles are out of print, but the rest should be in print. Maybe Fuck Pussy Galore is out of print too.

the U.S. Isabel CD-single and the UK Cath Carroll CD-singles are the main prizes here. The latter for the 33+ minute version of "Hydro"

I think just Imperial FFRR and BPM are in print; I know you can get BPM on emusic.

All the stuff that was on 4AD is out of print and god only knows if they'll ever reissue it. You should be able to get at least Perfect Teeth cheap online. The EPs, I dunno. I'm with Mackro though, the Cath Carroll 12" is the best with Hydro and Vibe Out (which is also on BPM, I think).

4ad won't reissue any of the unrest stuff but imperial is on emusic too. i'd be extremely surprised if the imperial reissue on teenbeat was out of print already, in fact i don't believe for a second that it is

BTW, I mentioned this elsewhere but Teenbeat is also selling the Air Miami demos cassettes on CDR now. They are somewhat worth having.

i can put up a bunch of singles ripped from vinyl anyone wants them.

will rip fuck pussy galore in a bit. havent played it in ages and am liking it with my coffee this am...id be hip to have some singles if theyre other than the fpg(aatf) ones. i can up versus lets electrify ep, if people want...otherwise i seem to have lost track of my early (more unresty) versus

theres gotta be people dying to hear mod fuck explosion

i'll put up bavarian mods and animal park and later i can do the isabel and cath carroll discs mentioned

i have their peel session and other random stuff somewhere too

like calvin i love you lol

as much as i enjoy unrest's impish ways, that last song on isabel, the test tone thing, is utterly agitating (and i go in for alvin lucier).

bavarian mods and animal park

http://www.zshare.net/download/120159658414b6e4/

thnks

running out soon, and connection kinda crap but can/will up fpg(aatf) and the versus later if people want..say the word

Ah, indeed, there is an Imperial FFRR re-issue:

1 Volume Reference Tone
2 Suki
3 imperial
4 I Do Believe You are Blushing
5 Champion Nines
6 Sugarshack
7 Isabel
8 Cherry Cream On
9 Firecracker
10 June
11 Loyola
12 Electrico
13 Hydrofoil One
14 Full Frequency
15 Isabel (12" recording)
16 Cherry Cherry (7")
17 Wednesday and Proud
18 Empire
19 Rip-Off
20 Chdemo

theres gotta be people dying to hear mod fuck explosion

answer to the original thread question that I'm surprised nobody gave is Family Fodder - "Debbie Harry" (which Unrest "covered" as "Winona Ryder")

someone did say "check out Josef K and all those C86 bands" but they should get a namecheck

http://i11.ebayimg.com/03/c/01/a3/08/25_7.JPG

this comp (Rough Trade Post Punk 01) has a lot of Unresty stuff on it. the Family Fodder track is on there.

Maybe Its Reno album is great! luv

theres gotta be people dying to hear mod fuck explosion

i have it. If people want it, I can rip the Unrest side.

-- Bill in Chicago, Wednesday, May 14, 2008 10:21 AM (3 weeks ago) Bookmark Link

yes please

BTW, I mentioned this elsewhere but Teenbeat is also selling the Air Miami demos cassettes on CDR now. They are somewhat worth having.

― dlp9001, Wednesday, 14 May 2008 10:02 (7 months ago) Bookmark

was just coming to ask about this, as both are now on emusic..