TS: James Chance or Jon Spencer?

Chance still took everything a bit further on that first Contortions record, that one is great.

James Chance is on the latest Blues Explosion LP.

I like Jon Spencer better. As much as I like Buy and Off White they kinda drag towards the end, and I'd rather listen to the Pussy Galore LPs and Crypt Style and Orange.

Donut Christ OTM, of course (though I still have time for Orange).

It's a shame that JS and the B EX weren't able to take their project where it should have gone.. i.e. connect independent rock and roll with fuzzy blues.. cause Spencer just couldn't allow himself to be vulnerable for one freaking second! his dumb-ass Elvisisms that miccio mentioned aren't totally to blame either (i think "I Dig You" might be my fave Spencer track)

* Chance never shouted "CONTORTIONS! YEAH!" or "THE BLACKS.. UH HUH!" in the middle of every song.

* James Chance never had a Julie Cafritz in the band to help explain to interviewers that Pussy Galore "was just all about.. 'FUCK YOU, man'. That's what we're about.. 'FUCK YOU'!", nor did Chance ever had said woman flick off the camera in the band photo inside their first major album release.

(That said, I don't dislike Pussy Galore nor some of JSBX, though I highly stress "some". I can understand Pussy Galore being influential as far as 'having a great loud garage sound' goes, but -- with the exception of the much maligned Historia De La Musica Rock which was essentially a Jon Spencer & Neil Hagerty album -- Pussy Galore really REALLY ran that sound into the ground one and a half albums into their career, for my tastes.)

xpost

http://www.robertchristgau.com/images/rsbio.jpg
fuck you, punk

(you may not getting anything from the Dolls - fun sloppy trash-pop-rock - but it has nothing to do with age or maturity)

I could bring up the Cramps, and a gazillion other bands at the time too. but that would be distracting.

"James Chance of the Contortions used to come up to Bob Quine pleading for Bob to play him his Charlie Parker records. Now, in a New York Rocker interview, James dismisses the magical qualities of black music as "a bunch of nigger bullshit." Why? Because James wants to be famous, and ripping off Albert Ayler isn't enough. My, isn't he outrageous? ("He's got the shtick down," said Danny Fields, stifling a yawn, when they put James on to the cover of Soho Weekly News.)"

DC: your points against PG read like you take the band far more serious than they did.

I'm still not sure what the point of that quote was proving, other than lowering my respect for Chance during his prime.

Good point! Are there any other similar stories about Chance being outrageous and shocking in that Bangs article, now that the can of worms has been opened?

DC: your points against PG read like you take the band far more serious than they did.

In retrospect, given the large number of GREAT bands that were influenced by them, if only they HAD taken themselves more seriously... Again, I didn't mind Pussy Galore at all, and they could have been that much greater.

I don't know. Looking at the early song titles ("Cunt Tease" "You Look Like A Jew", etc), I can't really imagine that the band would have wanted to be considered great artistes, let alone tried to ascend to that. I sorta view them like the Monks, where they had a gimmick, worked within it, and the band died out after a relatively brief time, cuz you can only do so much within that frame.

The Replacements started off as being completely non-serious and they ended up trying to be the most earnest band on the planet. (Granted, many of the original members had either been kicked out, left, or died by then.)

ShitHaus vs. Teenage Jesus & The Jerks.

well, if we're going to split hairs here, sure.. I do think Teenage Jesus & The Jerks was a bit more creative than ShitHaus.

Your original point about Chance saying/doing stupid shit stands. I never heard those stories, and hearing them now is kinda harrowing.

Then again, the worst thing Thurston Moore ever said really was either naming a song about what he'd like to do with Christgau, or his liner notes to the Swell Maps' Collision Time Revisited comp... ("Yeah, I fucked girls..." etc.), which may seem disturbing to some.

And yeah, there are various suspicions regarding Devo's subtle lines in videos or what not about "Chinamen", "Chinagirls", the cross-eyed Asian girl in the "Whip It" video and what happens to her in it, and other minor references in those early videos. Extreme? Disturbing? That's up to the viewer.

Well, maybe the Swans said the worst things for all I know, but I only heard that, via Sonic Youth's tales from touring with them, that they were an extremely tense band on the road, and would have really horrible fights.

In which case, the only band that fits that shocking mold that comes to mind immediately is..(drum roll).. Le Shok. And knowing the guys when they were operating, it was certainly a big show. (Hot Rod Todd actually hated rock music, and only listened to jazz and soul. Joey was in the Locust and doing his thing. Rusty was a sound engineer in Long Beach and used to work at Zed Records.. and I think the drummer is now in the Dance Disaster Movement(?))

That is to say, I could probably be in a room with them today. That's all.

Still, I would take Chance's records overall than Spencer's. I might prefer the live Pussy Galore album over Chance's Flaming Demonics album though, but that's about it.

...that yelling "BLOOOOOOOOZ EXPLOSION!" all the time in his songs even just years ago wasn't necessarily the greatest artistic move.

question is, what's his way out of that? i've read a few interviews with judah bauer and he came off like a blues purist asshole. so if it's either the goofball pigfuck velvet elvis stuff or indie clapton, well, ugh.

You shameless lying ho. It was a THREESOME with Chris Robinson. Now begone.

Hey, nobody gets on Matt Johnson's case every time he says "the" in a song!

The reason given at the time of Orange for the all of the "BLUES EXPLOSION!"s was that the band was attempting a hip hop influenced album of rock music. This probably makes more sense coming as it did on the heels of the Wu Tang Clan's debut (see "Method Man", "Wu Tang Clan Ain't Nuthin' ta F Wit'" on said album), Snoop Dogg's debut (also a new album from around the time of recording Orange) or even Public Enemy's first batch of records (Chuck D is on the latest BX record).

I'm not familiar with Matt Johnson, but I think any artist can forgiven by someone for saying "the" in songs all the time since it's, you know, only one of the most commonly used words in the English language... unless we're talking about a very succinct, predictable pattern in the use of "the"?

The reason given at the time of Orange for the all of the "BLUES EXPLOSION!"s was that the band was attempting a hip hop influenced album of rock music. This probably makes more sense coming as it did on the heels of the Wu Tang Clan's debut (see "Method Man", "Wu Tang Clan Ain't Nuthin' ta F Wit'" on said album), Snoop Dogg's debut (also a new album from around the time of recording Orange) or even Public Enemy's first batch of records (Chuck D is on the latest BX record).

..which might be fine for an album. But it's all over Now I Got Worry, too. And while I haven't heard Acme or the following album, I wouldn't be surprised if it existed there as well. (although I can't say.)

The all-show/album concerted repetition of a phrase is something I find annoying in any musical context, hip hop included. And I don't think this was even necessarily a requirement in hip-hop in the mid 90s, either.

donut he's making a joke about "The The."

My problem with "BLOOOOOZ EXPLOSION!" is not that it appears in the band name.. it's that it just gets repeated too much.

Nah, the album he did with Jim Dickinson's sons a few years back sounds exactly like the last few Blues Explosion albums.

I'm not familiar with Matt Johnson, but I think any artist can forgiven by someone for saying "the" in songs all the time since it's, you know, only one of the most commonly used words in the English language... unless we're talking about a very succinct, predictable pattern in the use of "the"?

This was a very bad attempt at my part on at humour at the expense of the band The The. Sorry. (x-post)

..which might be fine for an album. But it's all over Now I Got Worry, too.

Are you sure aboot that? Cuz I learned aboot the "hip hop"/name thing through the press package for NIGW, and they specifically said that's why there are no uses of it on the album (one of the songs on their In The Red jukebox series from this session does go "BLUES EXPLOSION" crazy, though). I haven't listened to NIGW in a long, long time, but I remember it not having any.

Anthony, have you ever heard ShitHaus?

xpost.. haha, I never knew who was the other half of ShitHaus.. it makes sense, but it's still shocking to me.

I can't give a better point about James Cahnce vs. jon spencer because they have some similar styles as rock they are diferent one is no-wave and the other blues-punk,that is