sforz

the greatest bands you (n)ever heard. unless, somehow, you're in my head. in which case, get out.

[sforz]

Wraight Mite Stale

Boys will be boys, and in the case of a Wraight Mite Stale live show that means gamecore nerds thrashing around like tin-eared punk rock sharks in a mackerel mosh pit during fashion week. It isn't easy to make out the lyrics but they're practically window dressing for the runway-show-as-musical-statement from this Portland-based outfit. Expect to see more than a few "stalegamers" (fans) in studded pink leather jackets with hand-painted old-school video games on the back. And if you must wear ear plugs (and, really, you must) remember that basic black never goes out of style.

Wright Mite Stale at the East By Southeast, Friday, May 25. $8.

Levi Jo. "About Town." The Boston Helix. May 24, 2012

[sforz]

Daffodil Army

Pineapple Up, Downside Cake Trillmart Records 1989

The D.A.s began in 1979 when a trio of friends lead by Troy Molloy, influenced by the popularity of the movie Grease, got their start as a Du-Wop revival group. After graduation they picked up instruments and within six months were playing local clubs under monikers like Don't Answer, The Drive-Aways, Drunken A-holes, and Dick Attack. Over the span of six years they managed to release a half dozen 7" singles, one full-length album on Weasel Records, and were included on the compilation It Only Hurts When I Swallow, with mostly tepid reviews. It seemed like Molloy and company were doomed to becoming footnotes in LA punk history when a drunk-driving accident nearly wiped out the band one night after a show. The band survived with minor injuries but Molloy, unconscious for three days following the accident, was shaken by the experience. The result was Daffodil Army.

In late 1987 a four-song 12" white-label EP release announced to the world that The D.A.s were now firmly part of the growing Paisley Underground. Swirly organs and spacey guitars muted and mumbled like hippie dirges, with lyrics so buried in the mix as to almost seem incidental. The whole effect was like listening to out-takes from from The Monkee's soundtrack to their death-knell film Head. Cryptic press releases hinted at "big things happening behind the scene" and the EP was only the beginning. Rumors circulated that Molloy was the only remaining member of the band soldiering on, that he'd experienced some sort of near-death experience, and that he'd been seen wandering up and down Sunset Blvd wearing a sandwich board proclaiming "The Beginning Is Near!" The general consensus was that Molloy had gone off the deep end and the band was finished.

Almost two years later to the day, Daffodil Army's debut Pineapple Up, Downside Cake emerged laying to rest premature proclamations of the band's demise. In hindsight the EP, press releases, and rumors may have been an elaborate hoax created by Molloy to lay the groundwork for fans to either lower or change their expectations in preparation for what was to come. No matter what, no one could have imagined Molloy and company would deliver what is likely to become the best album of 1990...

Brad Tcheche, Wax On! January 1990

[sforz]

The Nut Graft, interview excerpt

So I have to ask. The name... 

Owen Moore: Our names, or the band?

Both. 

Payen Moore: Our dad had a twisted sense of humor.

OM: He told me once that the moment he knew he was having twins that he'd be owing and paying more for everything. 

PM: He was still drinking back then.

OM: But the thing is, he was also a huge fan of Jack London and Robert Service. Service was a Canadian poet I think, wrote about these colorful characters from the Alaskan Gold Rush and whatnot. The Killing of Dan McGee. The Something of Sam McGrew. Something like that.

PM: And London had those brothers, Wolf and Death Larsen. All things considered, we could have ended up with worse names than Owen and Payen.

So what's a nut graft?

PM: Owen was born a hermaphrodite.

Seriously? 

OM: Payen was born with a full sack and I had this one withered testicle that was totally exposed.

PM: They asked our parents if they wanted to go with sexual reassignment -- basically make Owen my twin sister -- or if they wanted to try something riskier. Long story short, they decided I didn't need a matched set so he got one of mine. And part of my scrotum as well. Hence...

OM: It works, as far as we know. They tested me when I hit puberty and I've got swimmers.

PM: Yeah, the only problem is that any kids he has are gonna have my genetic signature.

OM: I'm going to love those paterntiy suits.

That's.. wild.

OM: Yeah.

The Moore brothers shift uncomfortably in their chairs and give each other a look. It's a look I've seen them give before, one where you can swear they are communicating telepathically. Suddenly the room booms with laughter.

PM: Oh my god, you're such a rube!

OM: What kind of a journalist are you anyway?

What?

PM: In journalism, newspapers, the opening paragraph is usually a condensed version of the whole story. 

OM: They call it the nut graph.

PM: Short for nutshell paragraph. We first heard our mom use it. She did layout design for the Chicago Tribune for a couple decades.

OM: They didn't teach you that in J-school?

I didn't go to journalism school.

PM: That's cool. Most musicians don't actually know how to read sheet music.

OM: We certainly don't!

PM: Our great-great uncle was a computer programmer and he didn't even finish high school.

OM: I don't even think our manager can read.

PM: Not based on the contracts he signs, that's for sure.

The boys laugh again, a different laugh this time, at their own expense. I began to wonder if the entire interview was a well-rehearsed, elaborate prank. Would I have to assume that the opposite of everything they said was true? Was I dealing with a pair of master manipulators who took the pranking of twins to its most logical level, modern day vaudevillians who played dumb to disarm critics? Initial follow-up confirmed that Cassandra Moore, their mother, did indeed work at the Chicago Tribune and that their distant uncle worked at Hewlett Packard when it was a fledgling start-up. And despite what they would have me believe, their manager, Norton Weld, is well equipped to read contracts: he graduated from Yale Law School.

But the ease in which the Moore brothers can deflect and redirect conversations with a genial laugh or self-deprecation suggests a deeper secret beneath the surface. Payen Moore not only can read music, his graduate thesis at UCLA examined "the seemingly unordered hexachords in the music of Josef Matthius Hauer." Meanwhile Owen's dissertation examined the philosophical roots of 1970s stand-up comedians. Are they awkwardly trying to strike a casual pose in public, like the geeky kid who suddenly gained an unexpected cache of cool, or are they nervously hiding their light under a bushel fearing their fans will dump them for being the braniacs they are?

Clint Jay, "Busting Balls With the Moore Brothers" Solid State Magazine, June 2001

[sforz]

The Grasshopper Pumpjacks

There's a sense you get from The Grasshopper Pumpjacks of a freight train making time, a steady chugging rhythm that shows no sign of slowing down, no intent on stopping. It's an economical bar blues whose songs start as sudden as a needle drop and rattle to a quick stop once they've reached their destination. With every song there's a certain unique familiarity, an immediate trust, like running into an old flame on the street that conjures up sun-drenched late afternoon trysts and the invincibility of youth. The 'Jacks, as their steadfast fans call them, stand like a through-line of rock-and-roll history. They traverse the landscape of New Wave, Punk, and Modern Rock on tracks laid down by Bo Diddley, with engines once driven by Steve Marriott, stoked by the coal fires of Bruce Springsteen, rattling past contemporaries like Bono and The Edge. Like the song says, you don't need no ticket, you just thank the Lord for The Grasshopper Pumpjacks

X. Ponent (Eve Respow) "Thank The Lord For The Grasshopper Pumpjacks" End Groove, November 1985

[sforz]

Cry From the Rooftops

"...their playfulness is abundantly evident in their song titles and in their often whimsical jams. "Troubleweeds" is full of nuggets of thumping bass lines wrapped in crispy shreds of keyboard artistry, while "Stort Shack" rummages the attic of 70s Tower of Power precision salsa.

You'd be hard pressed to find lyrics more absurd than those in "Lipstick Chiles," falling somewhere between the funk obscenities of Anthony Kiedis and the sheer word salad of Captain Beefheart. 

Fire-roasted carburetor / Undercarriage incubator /  Double-cut, rubber braced / Stick those chili lips in my face 

 But the quintet from Raleigh lets out all the stops on "LollyPops," an eighteen-minute odyssey featuring an infectious Moroccan vibe destined to make Cry From the Rooftops a household name for generations to come, and cause weaker men to weep ."

Hilbert Roburn Creed March 1996

[sforz]

ROBOTS OR DINOSAURS?

dinobots with robosaurs