REMEMBRANCE OF BEERS PAST

I’ve been collecting notes on a number of stellar beverages over the past six weeks that I thought important to share with you. Let this dewy-eyed remembrance of recently-consumed beers serve as a consumer guide of sorts – a helpful shorthand look at those ales you should be going full-on gonzo to acquire an experience with, as well as a cautionary tale of several to avoid (or ignore). Let’s take it from the top, as it were.

MASTERPIECES

BROOKLYN BREWING “SORACHI ACE” – An absolutely brilliant-tasting saison, as good as it gets and then some. SORACHI ACE is an amazingly dry and cloudy ale, which ratchets down the normal yeast and hops in your typical garden-variety saison, and adds a really rich, lemony zest to the whole thing. You smell this thing for miles – and then even better, you get to taste it. A masterpiece completely deserving of the word. 10/10.

NEBRASKA BREWING “HOP GOD - RESERVE SERIES, AGED IN FRENCH OAK CHARDONNAY BARRELS"” – This was a landmark beer for me. A year ago I wrote a post claiming I’d (probably) never buy a beer that cost more than $20. Whilst in New York, with all the good feeling and money-wasting extravagance such a visit inspires, I dropped the hammer on this one at the urging of a friend. $23. I actually put it back after it was rung up, then said awwhatthehell. And confound it, it was actually that good. A Belgian IPA with tripel-like spiciness – yum. A musty yeast smell gives way to grapefruit tang, and the “unmistakable flavor” of Chardonnay barrel – which this reserve version of HOP GOD was aged in. 10% ABV, 101 IBU, and one of the strongest, most special, and most truly barrel-aged beers I’ve ever had. 9.5/10.

PRETTY THINGS “FIELD MOUSE’S FAREWELL” – Here’s another of my new favorite brewers, who knocked me cold with their excellent BABY TREE not long ago. This rustic golden ale has barley, oats, wheat and rye making the magic happen, and yes, “rustic” is the operative word. A deep golden ale that these Massachusetts-based yankees make you feel was transported from the cobblestoned streets of Brussels about five minutes ago. 9/10.

THE OUTSTANDING

BARON BREWING – “THREE SKULLS BLOOD ORANGE WIT” – Oh yeah. A really drinkable witbier I had in a Seattle restaurant last week after being told “you’ll like this if you like BLUE MOON”. I actually kinda do like Blue Moon, and I like this a lot better. Yellow/orange pour, thick luscious mouthfeel, with rich blood orange taste and a little grapefruit. More fruit beer than wit. Really drinkable and something I pray to YHWH I’ll get more of someday. 8.5/10.

THE VERY GOOD

STONE/VICTORY/DOGFISH HEAD – “SAISON DU BUFF” – It smells of yeast. It tastes of yeast. Hey, I’ll bet there’s even yeast in the beer. This collaboration saison between two giants and one near-giant is quite delicious. They say it has “parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme”. Ouch – you almost lost me there. It’s not all that evident, but there is a marked spiciness. Foamy, carbonated, and when it was gone I pronounced it a 7.5/10.

THE BRUERY - “TRADE WINDS TRIPEL” – Because j’adore THE BRUERY, and hold them to a very high standard, this came off as something of a disappointment, while still being quite good. This Belgian tripel is less dry and more fruity than I’m used to. Citrusy orange, yeasty of course, and a little sweet. Just not a Bruery-style knockout. 7/10.

NAPA SMITH “BONFIRE” – This sat in my “beer fridge” for so long I finally had to crack it open because I was beginning to feel sorry for the brewer. It’s a nice imperial porter, weighing in at 8%. Creamy coffee and chocolate taste, a little more coffee than cocoa. Thin body, nice smell and very slight alcohol burn. A decided step below The Abyss, Black Butte XXII etc. but they should still be proud they got it this good. 7/10.

THE DECENT

21ST AMENDMENT – “WIT CIN’D” – A cinnamon witbier? Well all right. A spicy, fresh, 6% ABV wheat ale with thick mouthfeel and high carbonation. Drinkable and interesting. Like a lot of 21A’s beers it’s “good enough”, but seems like they should be aiming a little bit higher than that, don’t you think? 6.5/10.

DESCHUTES BREWING - “HOP IN THE DARK” – I want to take a point off my score simply because of the trumped-up PR term “Cascadian dark ale” – barf! – that some Oregonians want to apply to any IPA that’s black in color. This wasn’t all that bad for a dark IPA, just somewhat thinner and less flavorful than I’d expected from a heavyweight like Deschutes. 6/10.

THE LAME

ELYSIAN “THE IMMORTAL” IPA – Don’t know what it is about ELYSIAN BREWING in Seattle, but I just do not like their beer. Every one of these well-distributed ales that I try falls well below the midpoint for the style, including with this IPA that I see everywhere. Malty, piney hops, and so little in the way of zest or character that it tastes like sloppy homebrew that I’d make. And I don’t even brew. 5/10.

TWIST AND BURN! - VOLUME 3

This compilation is a companion piece to two similar comps that I put up on my old DETAILED TWANG blog - #1 is here, #2 is here – and also a compliment to my review of Eric Davidson’s “WE NEVER LEARN” book that I posted a couple of weeks ago. In fact it was reading that book that gave me the proverbial gumption to roast & rip this thing for you. There is just so much garage punk treasure from this era that it’d be a shame to just have it sit in boxes at my house, and yeah, most of it’s totally out of print and lost to time. This compilation contains such savers of civilization as THE CHEATER SLICKS (cover heroes), THE GORIES, SUPERCHARGER, THE NIGHTS AND DAYS and CLAW HAMMER, each captured in the rose-colored bloom of their snarling youth.

All tracks are circa 1990-1993; all come from 45s. Every track rules, and you can quote me on that. (Except maybe for the Blues Explosion stuff, which did not date well). If you want to make a CD out of this, it all fits.

Track listing
1. THE NIGHTS AND DAYS – These Days
2. FIREWORKS – She’s a Tornado
3. CLAW HAMMER – Sick Fish Belly Up
4. SUPERCHARGER – Icepick
5. GAUNT – Jim Motherf*cker
6. CHEATER SLICKS – Rum Drunk
7. GORIES – Give Me Some Money
8. OBLIVIANS – Jim Cole
9. DOO RAG – Swampwater Mop Down
10. SUPERSUCKERS – Luck
11. JON SPENCER BLUES EXPLOSION – Shirt Jac
12. BUNNYBRAINS – On The Floor Again
13. INHALANTS – Kolchak, The Night Stalker
14. HONEYMOON KILLERS – Vanna White, Goddess of Love
15. THE NIGHTS AND DAYS – Lookin’
16. SUPERSUCKERS – I Say F*ck
17. BLUE – King F*ggot Man
18. GORIES – To Find Out
19. SUPERCHARGER – Want It Bad
20. FIREWORKS – Untrue
21. OBLIVIANS – No Reason To Live
22. JON SPENCER BLUES EXPLOSION – Latch On
23. DOO RAG – Engine Bread
24. BASSHOLES – 98 Degrees in the Shade
25. INHALANTS – Middle Ages
26. GORIES – You Don’t Love Me
27. CHEATER SLICKS – This Life of Mine
28. SUPERSUCKERS – Caliente
29. HONEYMOON KILLERS – You Can’t Do That
30. CLAW HAMMER – Moonlight on Vermont

Download TWIST AND BURN, VOLUME 3 (this is a .zip file)

BOOK REVIEW: RICK PERLSTEIN’S “NIXONLAND”

One of my earliest political memories is of something nebulous and complicated that was going on when I was 6 years old called “Watergate”. In August 1974, I remember being shushed as my extended family gathered around a TV in my Aunt Adele’s living room to watch President Richard Nixon give his resignation speech. I had hippie uncles on both sides of my family who made underhanded comments about the President and his lies and his war; I had conservative parents who not only voted for Nixon, but actively worked to re-elect him in 1972. So though I am barely able to remember it, we were living right smack in the middle of “NIXONLAND”, right there in our own family.

I knew I was eventually going to be reading Rick Perlstein’s 750-page nonfiction history of Richard Nixon and the times he presided over & helped to stoke/flame, from the moment this book hit the bestseller lists and I found out about it. Perlstein wrote my favorite book I read all of last year, and one of the best pieces of history I’ve ever read: “BEFORE THE STORM: BARRY GOLDWATER & THE UNMAKING OF THE AMERICAN CONSENSUS”. You can read my review of that book by clicking here. This book picks up more or less where that one left off, after a few chapters about Nixon’s childhood and rise to power – his Vice-Presidency under Eisenhower, his loss to Kennedy for the presidency in 1960, and his premature exit from politics soon thereafter (the famous “you won’t have Nixon to kick around any longer”). More importantly, these early chapters are not a rote recitation of biography, but set up the dichotomy that Nixon exploited time and again his entire career: the resentment felt by the common, “left-behind” everyman and everywoman at the gains made by the pointed-headed liberal intellectual types, who brushed away the turmoil of the 60s that was tearing up cities, neighborhoods and families with a condescending sweep of hand (or phrase). The common folk were presciently dubbed The Silent Majority by Nixon and his people, and this phrase captured the mood of the US electorate like no other before or since. I might add that no politician as inherently unlikeable (or as hideously paranoid and self-loathing) as Richard Nixon has done so much with so little since then as well.

This book is important for the generations of us who came of age after the 1968 and 1972 elections, who have a hard time understanding – what with all we’ve been spoon-fed our entire lives about the glories of 60s protest, the Civil Rights struggle, the liberation of women etc. – how Richard Nixon, of all people, won such convincing elections in those two years. More so than in his Goldwater book, Perlstein shows his political hand pretty clearly in this one. He (mostly) appears to detest Nixon, while at times expressing admiration (of a sort) for his tactics. It mostly comes down to Vietnam, which Perlstein details, atrocity by atrocity, lie by lie, until it’s hard not to get pretty worked up by the whole thing. It’s an equal-opportunity sort of takedown of the 1960s' main players. When the book seems like it’s going to bury Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon for their many cover-ups and mistakes on Vietnam, it shifts focus abruptly, and buries the Tom Haydens, the Black Panthers, the Hubert Humphreys just as effectively. Hypocrisy, grandstanding, and bullying tactics get equal savaging in this book, which makes it pretty fun to read – since so many of these people seem like utter cartoons forty years later.

The inner machinations of elections have never been as fascinating as they are here. The American system of government looks like a fragile African military junta as times, when one considers the power wielded by men like Richard M Daley in Chicago, or the ways in which Nixon’s “dirty tricks” committees found quasi-legal methods to undercut their opponents en route to his landslide victory in ’72. I didn’t know much about how or why McGovern was anointed at the savior of the Democratic Party that year, but now I understand how the left-wing half of the electorate felt the burning need to “go for broke” in the wake of a catastrophic Vietnam war. Also, Perlstein does a good job recounting Nixon’s despicable kowtowing to Labor in the name of more votes, which unleashed “wage and price controls” on American business, one of the worst ideas of any era, and one which made the 70s easily the worst decade in recent American economic history.

There is one bit of Perlstein journalistic shorthand that may very well drive one crazy. I’m so used to it now, after reading these two giant books, that I’ve made my peace with it – but it’s the only detraction from two otherwise nearly-perfect books. Perlstein, whenever he wishes to capture the feverish or crazed mood of America in a given moment in time, recites several paragraphs-long snapshots in time that are supposed to make us feel the rising dread and terror on the back of our necks. Here’s an example of how it works (making this one up, but it’s 99% like ones you’ll encounter throughout the book):

While Nixon continued his law-and-order barnstorming through America’s heartland, America itself was on fire. A riot broke out in Peoria, Illinois when a black man was stopped by a cop. A construction worker in Brooklyn was heard to say, “Let’s shoot all the n*ggers”. Students were burning draft cards in Ohio. In San Francisco, the Weather Underground blew up a storage shed behind a police station. George Wallace was lecturing an audience in Alabama that contained at least 5 known Klansmen. A mysterious 4am fire in Chicago at a Labor Union office. Abbie Hoffman, on TV, telling people to kill their parents. Behind the scenes, Richard Nixon was laughing.

That sort of thing. OK, that’s my parody version, but when you read the book – and I whole-heartedly suggest you invest the time – you’ll see what I mean. The book is a totally immersive plunge into the American mindset of 1964-1972, and I won’t look at that time the same way again after the experience. It’s that good, and that all-encompassing. Perlstein has the gift of being able to make the seemingly mundane pace-quickening, and despite my kidding above, does a great job capturing real snippets from the American zeitgeist to capture the mood. The United States has never been torn asunder the way it was during these tumultuous years, and never has it had a politician so good at exploiting the divisions for his own advantage. When Nixon is finally brought down, at the end – as you knew he would be – the curtain abruptly closes without a whole lot of detail on Watergate and the resignation, leaving one to wonder what Perlstein’s next move might be. The Ford era (ha!)? The Church commission, the CIA hearings, the backlash election of Jimmy Carter, followed by the rise of Reagan? Now we’re talking. I’ll spend another 750 small-type pages and many, many weeks devouring that one.

A TRIP TO DESCHUTES BREWING

Well, let’s be technically accurate. I could have toured the DESCHUTES BREWING facility in Bend, Oregon – I drove right by during touring hours. But then I would have had to look at kettles and tanks and lackeys mashing the wort, when all I really care about is drinking the product. You scientist/brewing types who dig that sort of thing – well, bless ya. You make my hobby/vice what it is. But no, I went to the “DESCHUTES BREWERY & PUBLIC HOUSE”, which was the original home of the brewery in 1988 and is now a restaurant and pub. It was something that was an absolute must on our vacation to Bend, and my wife and son were kind enough to accompany me as I got busy with their beer.

Had I been left to my own devices, I would have done some real damage here. In the late 90s, their BLACK BUTTE PORTER was one of my go-to beers, along with MIRROR POND PALE ALE. Now, as then, those are their flagships, but they’re still a very renown brewer among beer dorks thanks to limited, seasonal, high-alcohol masterpieces like THE ABYSS and MIRROR MIRROR. My friend Erica, who lived in Bend during her formative years, told me that the pub was the place to try all their “experimental” beers that they were considering for wider distribution – and so it was in 2010 as well. I had to hit them up for a sampler; here’s what I tried:

• SAISON DE LA BLONDE – Excellent, classic saison.7.5/10.
• HOP TRIAL STRONG ALE – No real recollection on what this was, I’m afraid, but I scored it a 7.5/10.
• TROPISH BRUIN – A fruity, Belgian brown ale that uses the tamarind fruit. I’m guessing this doesn’t make it into bottles anytime soon. 6/10.
• BLACK BUTTE XXII – Wow. This new version of their amped-up Black Butte Porter (last year’s was, naturally, BLACK BUTTE XXI) is going to whup some serious tail. I absolutely loved this rich, creamy, intense imperial porter. 9.5/10.
• BELGIAN IPA – 7/10.
• MCAYELAH SCOTCH ALE – Way too sweet, definitely an experiment that maybe shouldn’t have even made it this far. 5/10.

Keep an eye out for that BLACK BUTTE XXII because it’s going to knock your socks off your ass. And if you’re in Bend anytime soon, this is one of 7 breweries within the city limits, and easily (and deservedly) the most popular. Go there, and tell them the ‘Jive sent you.

THE BIZARRE TERRORLAND OF NORTH KOREA

No, this is not a rehash of why North Korea’s the most terrifying totalitarian nightmare-state since Stalin’s Soviet Union – though it is a topic I’m perversely interested in, since we’ll all likely witness the eruption (and hopefully the liberation) of the North Korean people within our lifetimes. It will be a major event, full of grim revelations that will blow the lid off the most tightly-controlled society of our time. I recently read BR Myers’ North Korea book “THE CLEANEST RACE”, which attempts to understand juche and racial theory, and why The State acts as it does, and how it chooses to willingly portray itself to the outside world. The book is OK – I can’t say I fully recommend it, if only because it’s more of a polemic that I found it hard to learn from. Yet I, and probably all of us, want to know more about the lost, only-sometimes-lamented people of North Korea and the horrific deprivations they suffer on a daily basis.

These two recent podcasts, both very short, are helpful. One comes from the NEW YORKER OUT LOUD podcast, and it’s an interview with Barbara Demick, who wrote a book high on my must-read list called “NOTHING TO ENVY: REAL LIVES IN NORTH KOREA”. In this podcast she recounts her interviews with refugees who slipped across the Chinese border, and the lives they chose to leave back home. The other is from the Cato Institute, and it’s a bit of a polemic itself, about a hideous, punitive currency devaluation that was undertaken by the regime last November that’s having catastrophic effects on the long-suffering people of the DPRK. I listened to them back to back earlier this week, and thought they were devastating enough to share them with you today.

Listen to The New Yorker Out Loud – Barbara Demick on North Korean Refugees


Listen to The Cato Daily Podcast – A Fresh North Korean Tragedy

Download The New Yorker Out Loud – Barbara Demick on North Korean Refugees
Download The Cato Daily Podcast – A Fresh North Korean Tragedy

THE HEDONIST JIVE GUIDE TO MODERN MUSIC, 2010

I made you a mix CD that compiles a great deal of the outstanding musical compositions being created by young people today. Believe it or not, we’re still paying attention. It’s not difficult – finding the good stuff only requires a Google Reader subscription to the best music blogs, as well as some occasional searching through The Hype Machine to find out what bands you’ve read about actually sound like. Throw in the odd iTunes download, and blam – you’ve got 26 killer tracks that represent the finest in up-and-coming “modern music” that creative youth are playing for their peers at record hops and dance parties all over the world.

But seriously folks. This is a compilation I made myself out of new-ish 45s and downloads, and I thought you might want to hear it. It’s got a more “pop” bent than any of the previous 17 new-stuff comps I’ve made myself over the past few years, which is in keeping with the gradual but unmistaken mellowing of my musical taste that now favors buoyant garagy-pop music over snarling, guns-blazing punk and noise. Especially when the ladies are singin’. Which is not to say this stuff’s everyone’s bag – my guess is it’s a little too sub-underground and fuzzy for most folks who come to our blog for the beer blather – but who knows, you might find a new favorite band if you’re ready to free your music-lovin’ mind.

Everything here was released in the last two years, and over 90% within the past 1-4 months. There are other acts that The Hedonist Jive heartily endorses who are not represented here – Yellow Fever and White Mystery are two that spring to mind – and hopefully me sharing a song or two from these folks doesn’t raise anyone’s dander. Download this .zip file, zap it over into iTunes, and/or burn a 60-minute CD of it and lemme know what you think.

Track Listing

1. THE LIMINANAS – I’m Dead

2. FRANKIE ROSE & THE OUTS – Candy

3. HARLEM – Someday Soon

4. DUM DUM GIRLS – Pay For Me

5. TEENANGER – Big Spirit Payback

6. VERONICA FALLS – Beachy Head

7. TY SEGALL – Caesar
8. BEST COAST – Far Away

9. MIND SPIDERS – Worlds Destroyed

10. WETDOG – Trehorne Beach Song
11. WOUNDED LION – Creatures In The Cave

12. SLOW ANIMAL – Saturday Mourning

13. THE SPLINTERS – Blood On My Hands
14. BASS DRUM OF DEATH – Get Found
15. AIAS – La Truita
16. THE MANTLES – Cascades

17. THE ETTES – No Home

18. HARLEM – Spray Paint
19. VERONICA FALLS – Stephen
20. TY SEGALL – Swag
21. EAT SKULL – Don’t Leave Me On The Speaker
22. DUM DUM GIRLS – Brite Futures
23. UNNATURAL HELPERS – Sunshine/Pretty Girls
24. BAKE SALE – Meanwhile
25. GERMAN MEASELS – Wild Weekend
26. WETDOG – Womens’ Final

Download THE HEDONIST JIVE GUIDE TO MODERN MUSIC, 2010 (this is a .zip file)

BEER SPELUNKING ALONG THE OREGON TRAIL

Just returned from 8 nights in Oregon and Xtreme Northern California and that's why it's been a little quiet around here of late. We traveled up to Bend, Oregon in search of sun, and got a ton of it - and also decided in short order that Bend's easily one of the most beautiful towns in the US, with tons to do outside, great food, zero crime, clean livin'- and yeah: the largest concentration of breweries per capita in the United States. Seven - seven for a town of 80,000. One of them you've heard of - DESCHUTES BREWING - and I'll be reporting on my experiences there later. I did a lot of other beer exploration on this jaunt, and figured you'd be wanting a "scene report" right about now. Onward!

STANDING STONE AMBER - Leading off with this one simply because it's the best photo I snapped....and the final beer I enjoyed on the trip. Moreover, it broke a streak of five IPA's in a row. We stopped at this longtime (1996) brewery in Ashland for dinner, and not only was the food fantastic (I had the tempeh stir-fry after 7 nights of burgers, pizza and whatnot), so was this seemingly simply amber ale. Fresh-tasting beyond belief, with light caramel malts and a faint heavy fruit taste. Easily one of the best ambers I've had in a long time. 8/10.

CASCADE LAKES IPA - This brewery was a mere 3 miles from where we were staying in Bend. Their IPA is a great pine bomb, really hoppy and carbonated, with loads of bitter aftertaste and tongue-buzzing going on. They didn't label it a "double" (it is 90 IBUs) but that's sure what it felt like. Loved it. 8/10.

LAURELWOOD WORKHORSE INDIA PALE ALE - Whoa, really bitter, one that actually took some getting used to. Chalky (in a good way), cloudy, piney and way-strong. This is a Portland brewer and I picked up a bomber of this at a hippie grocery store in Bend for $3.99. Totally got "groovin'" with it after it harshed my mellow a little at first. 7.5/10.

10 BARREL S1NIST0R BLACK ALE - Apparently 10 BARREL are the newest of Bend's 7 breweries, and they make a fairly decent "black ale". Not quite a porter; malty and light and easy to drink, with a distant whiff of the cocoa plant. 6.5/10.

SILVER MOON HOP KNOB - Read something about this being an "English IPA" or a "light IPA" - no friggin' way. Sure, it’s “only” 40 IBUs and 5.7% alcohol, but it tastes way stronger on both counts. Creamy, with light citrus taste dominating over the malts. A really good bitter IPA from another small Bend brewer. 7/10.

TERMINAL GRAVITY IPA - Finally, the winner of the trip. TERMINAL GRAVITY brew out of Enterprise, OR, and this IPA popped up everywhere we went in Central Oregon. The kids obviously love it, and so do I. Big, bold fruit-forward IPA with medium hops. Nice “fermented” taste – a real beer lover’s beer that can also be relished by the hoi polloi. 8.5/10.

This is a wonderful town that’s worth a trip in & of itself, even if you’re teetotaling. Some of the most majestic scenery I’ve ever come across – Crater Lake, Mt. Bachelor, Skaggs Lake, whitewater rafting down the Deschutes River & more. And if you like white people, man, is Bend the town for you (this is something the locals are a little embarrassed about – easily the least diverse city I’ve ever been to). We’ve decided to make it part of our vacation rotation every couple of years, a decision made only in small part because of the breweries. I’ll tell you about the Deschutes Brewing visit next time.

BOOK REVIEW: ERIC DAVIDSON’S “WE NEVER LEARN!” – A REAL ACTION-THWUPER

Most of us who get head-over-heels fanatical about rocknroll music typically see our fanaticism crest at a young-ish age, with the teenage and early 20s being a particular time of record-buying frenzy and live-show abandon. That’s how it worked for me anyway, and my glory period was roughly 1982-1995 or so, which bookended the years I turned 15 and 28. That’s when my 45rpm and LP collection was expensively crafted into the low four digits; when I thought nothing of going to a marginal, maybe-this-might-be-fun four-band bill on any given Tuesday night; and it also happened to be about 75% of the period covered in Eric Davidson’s total action-thwuper of a new book, “WE NEVER LEARN!”.

“WE NEVER LEARN” stitches together a topic that I really never thought anyone would care to tackle in a “literary” way – the garage punk heyday of the 1990s. This era is best represented (to me, anyway) by bands like THE GORIES, THE CHEATER SLICKS, SUPERCHARGER, THE OBLIVIANS and many other fine knuckle-draggers. We can all argue about how important this music was in the overall pantheon of rock & roll; about whether it represented a “reaction” to the mainstreaming of garage-based punk sounds or not; and about which bands are worthy of conversation in such a tome. Davidson, as the front-man of the NEW BOMB TURKS, a fine slashing combo in their own right who were certainly among the more popular of the garage punk bands, had a front-row look at many of the goings-on in this loosely-defined scene. I like his take on things because it’s not a “scene-y” sort of book; Davidson is obviously a music freak and record nerd first, and a glad-handing and back-slapping rock and roll frontman second. His mind was blown by Cleveland’s DEATH OF SAMANTHA, of all acts (though there was a short period around 1989 when I too professed them to be my “favorite band”), and that led him to go deeper into the more raw, 60s-influenced sounds coming from his home state of Ohio and across the US in the late 80s.

The book, through a series of interview and recollections with label heads, bands and even yours truly (look it up! I somehow made it in here four times, including a picture of my 90s fanzine Superdope), draws a sharp line in the sand, upon which one side stood the oft-mocked Beatle-boot-wearin’, shag-haircut-sportin’ 80s bands like The Fuzztones, The Unclaimed, The Miracle Workers etc. – bands that we used to call “60s punk” back then – and the new breed of raw, dirty and haphazard slop bands that came out in the late part of that decade – PUSSY GALORE, LAZY COWGIRLS and some of the better Sub Pop/Amphetamine Reptile label stuff. These new eye-openers tarted up their two- and three-chord action with a level of grime, reverb, or just all-out aggression that wasn’t seen on the other side of the line, and man, I took to it like white on rice, as did Davidson. His book adds another key element to what makes this music distinct from rote punk rock or noisy rock music – its sense of fun (or absurdity). Outside of perhaps the amazing Cheater Slicks – not a “fun” band most of the time, but still a little lyrically goofy on their best tracks like “Possession” and “I’m Grounded” – the bands recounted here were either musically or lyrically ungifted or tongue-in-cheek, with perhaps the best example (and obviously one of Davidson’s fave bands) being THE DWARVES.

As I devoured this book over 3 successive nights, I’ll be honest – I felt not only a little nostalgia but a hint of jealousy too. Thinking that this music that was so crucial to my own youth was too unimportant to the public at large, I never even considered that it might one day be captured in book form. I read this wishing I’d taken a stab at writing it myself – and I want to note that it’s NOT because there are wide deficiencies in Davidson’s account of it. Sure, I think I could come up with a better catch-all term than “gunk punk”, which is cringe-worthy but meaningless and harmless in the end. No, I’ve never heard the bands “The Candy Snatchers” nor “Nashville Pussy”, so their late-90s exploits probably wouldn’t have made my book. And I probably wouldn’t have defined the music as in any way a reaction to grunge mania, The Offspring, Green Day and whatnot – because bad or boring music then, as now, is exceptionally easy to ignore. My take is that these garage punk acts were more taking inspiration from each other and the sounds of the past than anything going on “above-ground”. Davidson does a great job recognizing the massive impact the BACK FROM THE GRAVE (60s punk) and KILLED BY DEATH (70s punk) compilations had on these guys, and that showed in his own band as well (my jaw hit the floor when I saw The New Bomb Turks perform “Job” by THE NUBS in Seattle in 1993).

“WE NEVER LEARN” provoked this twinge of jealously mostly because I feel like Davidson’s already captured the proverbial lightning in a bottle so well, and named all the names that needed to be named (save for Claw Hammer and Rob Vasquez &The Night Kings), that the book on the era and this music is very nearly closed already. If you “came of age” during this time, or have good tidings toward the music, you’ll absolutely find the book to be a stone-cold action thwuper, if you know what I mean.

GRANDMA’S POSTCARDS – SAN FRANCISCO EDITION

San Francisco. Where when we’re not taking our cable cars halfway to the stars, we’re downing boilermakers at the Mark Hopkins after work, or eating a big sourdough bread bowl of crab cioppino at our favorite restaurants on Fisherman’s Wharf. That’s the popularized version of San Francisco in the 1940s and 1950s, the era from which most of these postcards from my grandmother’s extensive collection came from. As told in our previous posts of Grandma’s Postcards (the first one is here; the second one is here), these all came to me when she passed away several years ago. I’ve culled my favorites and put them into categories, and this is the San Francisco batch. My grandmother lived the second half of her life in Berkeley and El Cerrito, California, just across the Bay from SF (“The City”). Here are a few idealized postcard snapshots that ended up in her treasure trove (click on them to enlarge):

Yes, selecting the crabs for a local's nightly hot meal - this is a big part of daily life in San Francisco, with our great masses of fresh-off-the-boat Italian immigrants greeting us every evening at Fisherman's Wharf, bringing their "old country fisherman" ways to the New World:

Beautiful shot of Union Square as it looked in the 1960s:

Whoa - watch out tourists, it's the "Crookedest Street in the World!!"

I checked for you - these guys haven't been taking reservations for at least 60 years:

These next two came to my Grandmother from the San Francisco Treasure Island World's Fair in 1939:

The most iconic image of San Francisco - it's still a pretty big deal for those of us who pay $6 to traverse it from time to time:

This is the newly-created Broadway Tunnel, taking locals into the sin and vice of North Beach and Chinatown:

NINKASI BREWING's “TRICERAHOPS”

I threw a mild – very mild – rebuke to the city of Portland, Oregon and their “Beervana” reputation a couple of posts ago, and as expected, I myself got rebuked. Good times. That tossed-off line wasn’t to put a pox on all of the Great State of Oregon, no sir – not when there’s NINKASI BREWING ’s awesome double IPA TRICERAHOPS heading down the I-5 from Eugene. And not when I’ve just booked the family for a vacation to Ashland and Bend, Oregon coming up, a replacement trip for Santa Barbara. Those of you on the California coast, you know what redonkulous weather we’re having this summer. I read that the summer average in Los Angeles this year is 66 degrees. Say what? Next week’s highs in Santa Barbara? 65 degrees, for what was supposed to be the quintessential beach/pool vacation. It’s time to head north, to the land of NINKASI beer and 85-degree head-scorching.

Just looking at this picture I snapped of TRICERAHOPS is making me ungodly thirsty. The beer showed up inexplicably at a Beverages & More store in Emeryville, CA, and I flat-out couldn’t believe my luck. I’d just read that week about how NINKASI BREWING were masters of the India Pale Ale arts, and here were two of them ready for purchase in Northern California (the other was TOTAL DOMINATION IPA, which I haven’t tried yet). And then they delivered, and then some. TRICERAHOPS is about as creamy as a hoppy beer gets, pouring a luscious and viscous orange/brown color and biting the heck out of the tongue with piney hops. Really juicy and strong, with a deep and rich malt body that gives some oomph to counteract the hops. Apparently it steps on the scales at 100 IBU’s, and as we discussed previously, that’s a lot of bittering action. Definitely up in the top tier of IPAs to be had, and it’s refreshing to know that there are new monsters to be discovered in that category every week if you choose to look for ‘em. 8.5/10.

VELVET UNDERGROUND BOOTLEGS!

I have a lot of them - one of the best-documented of the all-time great bands, and some of the platters, even live tapes, are as good as the studio recordings. (Robert Quine's "Quine Tapes", which were circulated on tapes for years, got the official release a few years back and recently came out as a multi-LP set with extra tracks). I was rooting through some old boxes and found the Summer 2001 issue of MOJO COLLECTIONS magazine and this nice two-page feature on some of the better Velvets boots. Just stay away from "Screen Test: Falling In Love With The Falling Spikes" if you're new to this game. (click on pictures to make them larger).

FIRESTONE WALKER’S “PARABOLA” IMPERIAL STOUT

Have to be straight-up with you: I’m a total sucker for beer that comes in a box. And they know it, too, don’t they? That’s why they can charge me and others stricken with my beer-dork disease double digits to try “limited edition” rarities that come packed in protective cardboard. It’s a darn good thing that FIRESTONE WALKER and their hyped-to-the-12-galaxies imperial stout PARABOLA deserves that extra coin. I bought a bottle of this at the only place I’ve ever seen it, San Francisco’s secret beer-selling gem, MONTEREY DELI. This store – which I wrote about initially here – has stuff the other local kingpin stores just don’t get it, or sell out of too quickly. When everyone else was sold out of Russian River Sanctification, Monterey Deli had it. When everyone else was running out of “Batch 5” of Russian River Supplication, Monterey Deli had it. And when Firestone Walker “Parabola” was shooting up the Beer Advocate hype-o-meter, only Monterey Deli had it.

So anyways, the reason I was so hot to try this is because of how much I loved the Firestone Walker “10” some years back. That was a barrel-aged creation of the godz, and I know that Paso Robles, CA-based brewer is justly famous for their experimentation with all manner of barrels and fermentation models. PARABOLA fits into their hallowed pantheon quite nicely. Once I “unboxed” it (I thought of YouTubing the unboxing ceremony, the way people do with iPads), it poured a deep jet-black (which is good, because it’s what I was expecting in a Russian Imperial Stout). Check out this stat – 13% alcohol. Sure, you taste it a little, but not in that burning, mouth-peeling way you do with some others. Initial taste was of dark cherries and cola, with the requisite vanilla flavor that often comes through in aging. Parabola is a real smooth sipper, and it’s delicious both cold out of the bottle and warm an hour later (and yeah, I took my time with it). Believe it or not, it’s not as ridiculously complex as some big beers can go – it’s just really, really good. 8/10. I’d put out an APB if I were you on this – maybe even Monterey Deli has one.

A NICE LITTLE RECORD BY HARLEM CALLED “HIPPIES”

There’s this Austin, TX trio called HARLEM, and I’d been noticing their CD “Hippies” on Matador for a few months. It’s got an intriguing cover, as you can see. I did some online scouting, liked the few indie-garage songs I heard, and decided to pick the thing up. Outside of the fact that 16 songs is about four-to-six songs too many for just about any band on any album, “Hippies” has got some real good honest-to-goodness garage chug going on, leavened with a dose of 1950s bubblegum pop shimmer. These guys – and they’re all guys – sit squarely in the middle of a road that winds through some of the more bent 1990s indie bands that Matador made their stock in trade (GBV, Pavement) and into something a bit more raw and dirty. Nothing exceptional, but there are a few corkers on the disc, starting with “Somewhere Soon”, a track I’m posting for you today. I was hoping that their “Spray Paint” would be just as spazz-out & crazed as Black Flag’s but it’s a totally different (tamer) beast yet nearly as fun. I’d go see these guys live, let’s put it that way, but if I missed ‘em in favor of a warm bath that’d be OK too.

Play "Somewhere Soon" by Harlem

Download HARLEM - "Somewhere Soon" (from 2010 CD "Hippies")

BLOCKBUSTER MANIA – “INCEPTION”/“TOY STORY 3”

Just a quick look in on two of the summer’s hottest blockbusters today. Yeah, in the space of 24 hours this past weekend I saw both “INCEPTION” and “TOY STORY 3” – and am here to report that both are excellent and well worth your time. Let’s start with the former, shall we? “INCEPTION” is the latest from Christopher Nolan, who only directed my favorite film of the most recent decade. I went in expecting a fun, baffling, “Memento”-like film about dream states, but from the moment I strapped in to my seat it was GO time. This movie started with “Bourne Identity”-style thrills and really didn’t let up for 150 minutes. I believe you call it an “edge of your seat thrill ride”, am I right? Yet it was more than that – “Inception” is a smart, blink-and-you-missed thriller with a deep metaphysical angle about dreams within dreams within dreams (within dreams?), and the ending is open to at least three plausible and wild-ass interpretations I’ve heard so far. The audience in our theater gasped, and then applauded the final scene. We all let out a collective big breath after this one. It’s that kind of film. Hedonist Jive says check it out.

We almost didn’t see “TOY STORY 3” because the one thing that gives my 6-year-old son nightmares is mannequins. Now there are no mannequins in this film, but the character of “Big Baby” looked sufficiently enough like one – particularly with a damaged left eye and weird crayon marks on his legs – that he decided to delay the gratification that would come from finishing the Toy Story franchise until he was, oh, about 10 or so. Three weeks later, we got the all-clear, and as it turned out, the only part that caused any distress at all was when “Lots O’ Huggin’ Bear” made Big Baby cry. See, aren’t you excited about this already? Suffice to say that if you’re a fan of Pixar’s genius already, you’ll only confirm it yet again. This is truly one of their best, up there with “WALL-E” and “MONSTERS INC”. They up their animation game with each film, and I marvel at the economy in which they tell stories. There is plenty for the adults to rally around here as well, particularly a Barbie doll’s shouted soliloquy about “authority should derive from the consent of the governed”. This film explores maudlin themes of loss and children who grow up before you want them to, as well as fairly sophisticated notions of power and control. And boy are some of those toys cute. I’m glad I can stand behind a kid as my excuse for paying $10 to see these Pixar films, but rest assured if I didn’t have one I’d be going anyway.

MY LATEST NEW YORK CITY BEERCATION

One of my favorite things about a work trip to New York, such as the one I undertook two weeks ago, is the gravitational pull the city’s amazingly robust beer culture has on me. I’d call NYC one of the four main hubs of quality beer activity in the US, along with the West Coast standbys of Seattle, San Francisco and San Diego. (Don’t worry Chicago and greater Michigan, we still love ya. Portland – you just need to work on some better breweries). One of my least favorite things about New York is when I leave my beloved iPhone 3GS in the back of a taxi, which then pulls away only seconds after I realize what I’ve done. Said iPhone contained all of my photo snaps of the fine ales I’d just consumed the previous two evenings, as well as my painstakingly-enumerated, eh, “tasting notes”.

So let’s reconstruct from memory just what an amazing bounty was to be had in New York at this moment in time – mid-July 2010:

PRETTY THINGS – “BABY TREE” – This is one of the two main highlights of the visit, an absolute genius quadrupel ale enjoyed on tap at The Ginger Man. A dark, plum-packed 9% ABV beer that has a little wisp of smoke in the flavor as well. In the fine tradition of the Belgian Abbey ales, and definitely the best thing from this new upstart New England brewer I’ve had. (Photo ripped off from the excellent beer blog The Drunken Polack). 9/10.

TWO BROTHERS – “THE BITTER END” – It isn’t often that you find The Hedonist Jive raving about a simple pale ale, but it isn’t often that I drink one this outstanding, either. This was quaffed on tap at a cool Lower East Side restaurant and bar (a “gastropub”, if you will) called SPITZER’S CORNER. I loved this place – their food was amazing (smoked fish plate + a bowl of artisan mac-n-cheese!) – and this Illinois brewer’s pale ale was just perfect for a hot late afternoon. So fresh, so hoppy, so flavorful – the closest equivalent is Three Floyds’ “Alpha King”, and this is nearly as good. 9/10.

NOGNE Ø - “SUNTURNBREW” – A sweet smoked barleywine from Norway, something I got to try as a sample at Rattle-N-Hum in Midtown, then came back two nights later to enjoy in its own (larger) glass. Orally fixated folks are always going off about “mouthfeel”, but this one is the real deal, delivering a tongue-clinging velvety pillow of smoke and dark fruits. An 11% whopper that you’ll want to make sure you’re in the proper frame of mind for. 8.5/10.

SIXPOINT BREWING – “BENGALI TIGER” – I raved and hooted about this IPA on my old beer blog and gave it a 10/10 the last time I had it. This time it didn’t quite have the je ne sais quoi I’d remembered. Very hoppy, tangy and a murky deep yellow. Definitely an “imperial” in terms of taste, and heavy on the piney end of the IPA scale. I’m knocking it down to a very good 7.5/10.

CIGAR CITY – “JAI ALAI” IPA – Malty and caramel/creamy – in an IPA? Yeah, this heavily-hyped big boy was really delicious but not a world-beater. I’d better have another three of these to see if we can bump it up from a 7.5/10.

NEBRASKA BREWING - “EOS HEFEWEIZEN” – Things start getting lost on this one; the notes are all in the phone sitting in the cab driver’s house now. I remember a pretty good wheat beer and my burned-to-memory score of 7/10.

GREAT DIVIDE – “CLAYMORE” SCOTCH ALE – Same here. Enjoyed this malty red “wee heavy” at the Blind Tiger Ale House, but wouldn’t go out of my way to have it again. 7/10.

NEBRASKA BREWING – “APRICOT AU POIVRE SAISON” – The only proverbial turd in the punchbowl this trip. I’m excited about this brewer – apparently their big beers are amazing, and I picked up a bottle of their HOP GOD at this incredible Whole Foods beer store in lower Manhattan to take home ($22! It better be!). This thing was a bit of a mess, though – a strange fruity Belgian ale that lacked character and balance. We’ll grant that we probably tasted Nebraska Brewing’s more basic ales, and that the real treasures are to be found in their aged and 9%+ big boy beers. 5/10.

That’s all for now – let me know if I missed any East Coast rarities that I need to hunt down next time.

THE STORY OF HELEVATOR, SAN FRANCISCO ROCK GROUP

See this flyer? It’s the only thing that remains from my time in a study in San Francisco rock and roll marginalia called HELEVATOR, way back in 1990 and 1991. I formed this band with my pals Steve Watson and Chas Glynn on something of a whim during the late summer of 1990, when we were all looking for something to do. Steve (guitar) and Chas (drums) had actually played in bands before, Steve dating back at least a decade in Detroit and LA, and Chas on guitar in other groups (he’d barely picked up drumsticks before, and like me on bass guitar, it showed). I’d just unceremoniously ended my college radio DJ career – which I recapped a bit in this post a few months ago – and, being a music fanatic, though I’d try my hand at being in a real band, as a real contributing member. I reckoned Steve could teach me the ropes on bass, so I bought a right-handed one at North Berkeley Music in Berkeley, CA, and then had them string it left-handed to accommodate the hand-preference handicap that has been oppressing me my entire life.

Now I’d been in bands before, the previous two years in college in Santa Barbara, but mostly as the comedic frontman/"singer". For evidence, I offer you THE UMBILICAL CHORDS MOVIE from 1988. There was also Sluggo, We Got Power and a guest role as drummer in a Devo cover band called Steve Garvey’s Hair. Forming a band in Santa Barbara around that time was as simple as 3 or 4 non-musicians deciding to form one – and only then figuring out how to play along the way. Helevator were a little bit like that. I came in with two covers I wanted us to do: “Confusion” by THEE MIGHTY CASEARS, and “Lookin’” by THE NIGHTS AND DAYS. Steve taught me how to play these exceptionally easy songs, and off we went. We rented a practice space in the bowels of Oakland, right by the Coliseum (where the A’s, Raiders and Warriors play, and where nobody in their crime-averse mind dares to walk otherwise). No one in the band had a functional car, so three times a week (!!) we hoofed it thirty minutes each way on BART – the local subway system - with our “gear” to practice. Far as I can remember, practice spaces in San Francisco were either way too expensive, had waiting lists, or both.

Beer was consumed, songs were gingerly learned, and soon enough through the racket we actually had something that could be discerned as “songs”. Here’s the thing, though – I can’t even remember if we had any originals. I know I certainly didn’t write any. I feel like maybe Steve wrote an original song in one of his old Detroit bands, and then “ported” it over to Helevator. Here’s a list of songs that we did cover during our six-month stay on the scene:

The Germs – “Forming”
Solger – “American Youth”
Richard Hell & The Voidoids – “Love Comes in Spurts”
Thee Mighty Caesars – “Confusion”
Ramones – “Swallow My Pride”
The Nights & Days – “Lookin’”

Could that have been our entire set list? (Answer - No. Chas Glynn himself answered this question on Facebook - we also had our intro song called "Hey Hey We're Helevator", our "riposte" to "Hey Hey We're The Gories"). Well, before we’d even practiced a half dozen times, our friends in the band CACTOPUS invited us to open for them at the 6th Street Rendezvous club in San Francisco one weeknight, probably about November 1990. A bunch of our friends showed up to hoot at us, and since all we played was a tuneless version of “Forming” (how appropriate) three times in a row, we certainly deserved a bunch of hooting. I remember lots of faux pandemonium after we played the song and mock-graciously said “thank you – good night” to our audience of about 30 – which culminated in our “encore” performance of “Forming” for the fourth and final time.

The next time we played was around New Year’s Eve 1990, at the house party you see advertised on this flyer. I was a bit nervous for our first “real” gig. People were going to share their Friday night with us. Girls would be there. We wanted to be solid. People even came out from my work to “watch Jay play in his rock band”. I donned a burgundy smoking jacket that was given to me by a Cactopus member named Brig Tratar. And then – clunk. We played our six or so songs, got some polite applause, the room cleared out and the party ended. We didn’t sound as loud as we wanted to; the drums were more tippy-tap than crash/boom/bang, and I could barely play the most simple of basslines. I think that’s when we started making fun of ourselves in earnest, and where the seeds of our decline were sown.

A third and final illustrious gig remained for Helevator. Early in 1991, we were invited to come visit my alma mater, UC-Santa Barbara, and play at “The Red Barn” in Isla Vista. The Barn was a spot that people could reserve or rent out for parties or shows, and we played with a couple of local “IV” (Isla Vista) bands that almost certainly were part of our circle of pals (PMS? Cactopus?). Again, it was one of those fake-crazy crowds that chanted our name before and after we went on, slamdanced, stage dove etc. I recall calming my nerves with pre-show beers so aggressively that I played the basslines to our entire set list to the audience as we were tuning up – then played then again for real in the same order. Of course it was a blast, and perhaps it really was the right way to go out.

We sloughed off our thrice-weekly practices when we got back, and the band quickly imploded through inertia. Both Steve and Chas went on to be in good bands that made real records throughout the next decade and a half. Me, I sold my bass guitar way before 1991 was over. My thinking was that I’d rather listen to real musicians make records, than to play-act at being one – so I started a fanzine called SUPERDOPE instead. Not once have I wished I played music again; because for all intents and purposes, we were barely playing music anyway. Even now on the rare occasions when I see Chas or Steve, if Helevator ever comes up it’s so we can give each other a high-five and a chortle, in the solidarity of knowing that we were as pathetic as they came. I’ll let you know if the long-rumored “lost practice tape” ever turns up in one of our shoeboxes.