Wednesday, November 20, 1985
Daily Nebraskan
Page 9
tA.S.F fly to top of list
Arts
MeirfaiIirimat
Dead Kennedys.
By Charles Lieurance
Senior Reporter
Editors note: Following are
five recent album releases.
O The Clash, "Cut the Crap,"
CBS Records.
This is not a review, it's an autopsy.
Close analysis of the wounds (i.e. the
loss of Mick Jones to synth-beat box
music and a Marxist ideology that
chases its own tail shows that the
Clash died of a lethal dose of self
congratulation, ("We are The Clash,"
and you're not?) and multiple blows to
the ego.
Record Review
The Clash's only successes on this
LP "Three Card Trick" and "This is
England" sound like "Sandinista"
outtakes and their failures are over
i produced, sloppy shouting matches.
Here's what the headstone says:
j The Clash emerged from D.I.Y. dole
queue (England's unemployment
lines), three-chord, pre-Thatcherite
England as rock 'n roll's Robin Hoods. A
bland of reggae, punk and rock alaThe
Rolling Stones, the Clash at one time
was truly "the only band that mat
tered." 1 ate, slept and breathed "Lon
don Calling" and "Sandinista." Mick
Jones and Joe Strummerwere the grea
test song-writing team since Lennon
and McCartney.
Rvquiescat in paccrn.
G.P.A. 1.0.
O The Dead Kennedys,
"Frankenchrist," Alternative
Tentacles.
This is a fine time for The Dead
Kennedys. The United States is just
chock-full of the things Jello Biafra
loves to hate. These are a few of his
favorite things: Yuppies, MTV, Reagan,
The Dukes ("Goons") of Hazzard, jocks
and working-class automatons.
The band hasn't changed much.
They've added some surf guitar and a
few Ramones-style melodies, but all in
all, it's still Biafra's "I am a dental drill"
tremolo, East Bay Ray's minor key
chording and Klaus Flouride's heavy
industry bassline cranking out hostil
ity, anarchy and irritation.
To the Kennedys, society is this
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Paul VondtrlageDaily Nebraskan
Danny Shonerd of Cockey Monroe.
J 9 I
wound that keeps scabbing over with
complacency. They just keep picking
and picking and picking.
Review copy courtesy of Dirt Cheap
Records.
G.P.A. 3.5.
O This Mortal Coil, "It'll End
in Tears," Warner.
This is what the haircut set call a
supergroup, I guess. Members of Xmal
Deutschland, Modern English, The Coc
teau Twins, Dead Can Dance and
Colourbox get together in the studio
and make meditation music for preten
tious art school students. Everything
here is beautiful, mournful, lush and
super melodic, not a note or a hair out
of place. Most of the time it sounds as if
Olivia Newton John (circa 1978) wan
dered in on a recording session with
Orchestral Manouevres In The Dark or
China Crisis.
When 1 grow up and have kids and
don't want to wake them up, I'll play
this a lot.
0 The Blow Monkeys, "For
bidden Fruit," RCA.
Just like Everything But the Girl and.
The Style Council, The Blow Monkeys
play jazzy, convoluted torch songs.
Unlike those bands, The Blow Mon
keys aren't tedious. Sharp sax licks
and some slick acoustic guitar riffs
combined with Dr. Robert Howard's
urgent, plaintive wail set this stuff
apart.
Although I'm normallly pretty wary
of British bands that write songs like
the Monkey's "My America," these guys
pull it off with class. It's one of the few
new "protest" songs worth the effort.
"Forbidden Fruit" is supposedly a
single, but it is packaged like a double
LP. What easily could have been one
album is separated on two discs with
three songs a piece. I guess this is so
they could take those close-ups of each
band member's face and give each one
a full jacket side.
1 don't know why anyone would want
to be so close to a person's face that
you can see the walls of his pores, but
maybe I just don't understand
marketing.
G.P.A. 3.0.
O W.A.S.P. "The Last Com
mand," EMI
This is great heavy metal. "Blind in
Texas" gets my vote as the best heavy
metal song since Iggy Pop's "Search
and Destroy." The band has a sense of
humor, hot and nasty riffs, and appar
ently doesn't belong to any witch's cov
ens. There is a healthy dose of sex, but
hey, even Tipper Gore has kids.
I've got to talk some more about
"Blind in Texas." This headbanger
walks into a bar in Texas thinking he
can drink rednecks under the table. He
fails and the. rednecks leave him
stranded in the desert.
Great line: "The cowboys have taken
my eyes." Why can't all heavy metal be
this good? There isn't even a pentangle
on the front cover.
G.P.A. 3.5.
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0
Paul VonderlageDally Nebraskan
Marty Fauchier of the Verandas.
Musicians' union
recruiting members
The Lincoln Musicians' Association,
Local 463 of the American Federation
of Musicians, has launched a major
recruitment campaign.
The AFM, which represents leading
local musicians as well as top record
ing, TV, motion picture and symphonic
instrumentalists thoughout the United
States and Canada, is the world's larg
est union of performing artists. It has
more than 250,000 members.
The membership drive, which began
Oct. 1 and runs through Dec. 31, allows
musicians to join the union at reduced
initiation fees. They also can take full
advantage of a long and growing list of
member services and benefits.
While anxious to align themselves
with the music industry's most out
standing professionals, young
musicians' frequently low earning
power often makes it difficult for many
to afford initiation fees.
The reduced fees can help these
young musicians and many older play
ers who are non-members or former
members.
Detailed information about the
musicians' union and its program is
available from the Lincoln Musicians'
Association, 508 S. 13th St., or call
474-3868.
East Campus fair
looks at art, crafts
The University Programs Council
East, through its Visual Art Committee,
will sponsor an arts and crafts fair
Thursday and Friday from 9 a.m. to 5
p.m. in the Great Plains Room of the
East Union.
The fair offers the community, stu
dents and faculty and staff members a
unique opportunity to see arts and
crafts as they happen under the skillful
hands of a master craftsperson.
iVerandas
perfect soun
d stele contes'
By Chris McCubbin
Staff Reporter
The Verandas won first place and
walked awav $1,000 richer from "The
Battle Of The Bands" on Monday night.
Cockey Monroe won second place
and $500 worth of studio time in the
competition sponsored by the Resi
dence Hall Association.
Concert Review
Splash and E.S. Pop won some valu
able exposure, but mostly the agony of
defeat.
Splash was a cover band and proud
of it. Their show was straight off the top
40 charts. As the first band up, Splash
had the difficult job of warming the
crowd up, and they worked hard at it
silly glasses on "Money For
Nothing," authentic ZZTop style guitar
choreography and Pat McKeen playing
a guitar solo with his teeth on "Sharp
Dressed Man."
Keyboardist Bruce McCracken could
conjure up an impressively full, rich
sound, and Marsha Nielson was mem
orable for her booming voice and jerky
Grace Slick style moves. But in the end,
lack of original material and pitch
problems early in the set took them out
of the run for the money.
According to Tony Coe, Residence
Hall Week co-chairman, the idea be
hind "The Battle Of The Bands" was to
show off top local talent and to give the
people of UNL and Lincoln (particu
larly those who are too young for bars) a
real rock'n'roll party. With admission
only $2, the price couldn't be beat. The
event was organized by Coe and John
Tucker.
Omaha band ES Pop sounded like
the Knack, only not obnoxious. They
were introduced "Music for the pas
sion, not the fashion."
Best moments included the sophis
ticated harmonies on "World Wide
Mystery" and the red-hot synth riff on
"Messiah," both originals, and covers
"Tears Of A Clown" and "Heatwave."
ES Pop was tight and entertaining,
but their anachronistic pop sound per
haps lacked the sophistication neces
sary to appeal to a college audience.
The people didn't dance and ES
Pop had to recruit their sound man
to stand in for a recently departed bass
player. But the substitution wasn't
obvious to the crowd.
Cockey Monroe put in what was by
far the evening's most musically sophis
ticated set. Playing an all original set
of glam-rock a la David Bowie and The
New York Dolls, Cockey Monroe had
the heaviest sound and, with the addi
tion of a sax player and a second per
cussionist, the richest sound. '
The bands were being rated by a
panel of judges including Bob Allen
from KFMQ, Sherm Bixby from Applause
Attractions, Dominque Cheene from C&C
Consultants and Jeff Weak, the even
ing's master of ceremonies. Weak, in
his alter ego "Rollin' Ray" kept the
audience either amused or irritated.
The Verandas were out to win. Their
sound check was excruciatingly long.
Obviously they wanted to be sure that
the.sound problems that had plagued
the other bands were all ironed out
before they took the stage.
The second that the band began
their first song, "Last Time" by the
Stones, the floor filled for the first time
all night with dancing kids, many of
mem proudly sporting Verandas
T-shirts.
The Verandas are expecting their
first album, "V-Notes" to be out by
Christmas, and they looked very pro
fessional Monday night.
Their set, divided between covers
and originals, was predictable (the
originals tended to sound like Cheap
Trick or Men At Work, except for "Get
Out Of My Car, You Drive Like Shit,"
which was a pretty good rap).
But no one was looking for original
ity from this band. The band was tight,
the sound was perfect, lead singer
Marty Fauchier leaped wildly around
the stage and the crowd was moving. In
the end, the judges made the only
choice they could.
If you're one of the many who de
cided you would rather spend your
Monday night watching Nebraskans
and Czechs chasing a round ball, or the
Redskins and Giants chase a different
shaped ball, or even, as a last resort,
studying, all I can say is you missed a
great show.