#101 damnations

[jonny-be-gewd]

[spilladabalia]

Carter U.S.M. - Sheriff Fatman

[chronivore]

1987

[amarriageoftrueminds]

Thought: a story where two lonely Demonologists summon demons in the same city at the same moment, only the two demons meetcute by colliding in mid aether, end up match making their Summoners so they can see each other more often, and having lots of demon babies. Chaos ensues. 

Call it: 101 Damnations

[gokuma]

Earth, some day in the future

Thundercracker: You, from the Lost Light! Sit down!

Everyone: *sits down*

Thundercracker: Now, you ignorants... I'm gonna show you what a "dog" is

[aphroditelion]

The 90s Revival - Paris Sera Toujours Carter

Carter USM - Live in Paris 1991 (Album)

It's probably not the most fashionable thing to admit but back in the first few years of the 1990s I was a massive fan of the south London indie-rock duo Carter The Unstoppable Sex Machine. I'm sure it was their ever so slightly rude name that snagged my teenage interest but soon like everyone else I was growing my fringe and dancing around the indie disco to 'Sheriff Fatman'. By 1993 my musical taste had changed and I was up to my knees in Pavement and other cool transatlantic sounds, so I never really saw Jim Bob and Fruitbat to the end of their time.

Now that I am well into the '30 Something' category, but not quite a fat bastard, I occasionally like indulge in a bit of nostalgia for the days when my hair was less grey. Thankfully I'm not the only one and Carter still do occasional gigs in the UK and drip-feed old recordings into the public domain. Last week, via their Bandcamp page, they released a live recording of their May 1991 show in Paris. It is 'name you price' with any proceeds going to The National Autistic Society. You can stream it below.

<a href="http://carterusm.bandcamp.com/album/carter-usm-live-in-paris-1991-paris-sera-toujours-carter" data-mce-href="http://carterusm.bandcamp.com/album/carter-usm-live-in-paris-1991-paris-sera-toujours-carter">Carter USM - Live In Paris 1991 (Paris Sera Toujours Carter) by Carter USM</a>

According to the archive on their website Carter played 130 gigs in 1991 which is pretty considering they also released an album and a handful singles. Looking at the gigography I am pretty sure I was at the 10th October gig in McGonagles, Dublin. I have a vague memory of somebody cracking their head-open on the discoball when they stagedived. I definitely saw them the following July in Munich during the 3 weeks I fruitlessly spent trying to get a job with my pigeon German. I have great memories of that gig: sitting on the edge of the stage and the band sharing their beer with the crowd. I still have the ticket for posterity.

If you are familiar with their back-catalogue you will see that track listing of the Paris recording is heavy on tracks from '101 Damnations' and '30 Something'. There are also some of their great b-sides ('Re-Educating Rita' has always been a favourite of mine) and some choice cover versions like Soft Cell's 'Bedsitter' and the Pet Shop Boy's 'Rent'. The quality isn't brilliant but considering it was recorded on a cassette tape it's a good as it could be. Anyway if you fancy a bit of a 90's revival, I suggest you do what I did: turn it up load and sing along to those pun-filled lyrics like it is 1991 all over again.

[revolutionaryspirit]

Carter USM - A Perfect Day To Drop The Bomb (by hansenradiosatelite)

[wordsarefornerds]

101 Damnations

The other day a friend of mine was explaining how she had to move these pixels around her computer and had to add 20 megabytes of memory to handle the operation. I had the disquieting thought that all this memory she was adding had to come from somewhere. Maybe it was coming from me because I couldn't remember a thing that day. And then it became blindingly obvious: All the memory that everybody keeps adding comes from people. Nobody can remember a damn thing. Every time someone adds memory to their machine, thousands of people forget everything they knew. Americans are singularly devoid of memory these days. We don’t remember where we came from, who raised us, when our wars use to be, what happened last year, last month, or even last week. School children remember practically nothing. I take the greyhound bus every week, and I swear people on there don’t know where they got on or where they're supposed to get off. They explanation is simple: computer companies are stealing human memory to stuff their hard drives. Greyhound I believe has some kind of contract with IBM to steal the memory of everybody riding the bus. They’re probably connected by a cable or something. Every hundred miles, poof! Another 500 megabytes get sucked out of the passengers’ brains. The computer’s thirst for memory is bottomless: the more they suck, the more they need. Eventually, we’ll be walking around with a glazed look in our eyes, trying to figure out who it is we live with. And then we’ll forget our names and addresses and we’ll just be milling around trying to remember them. The only thing visible about us will be these cables sticking out of our behinds, feeding the scraps of our memory to computer central, somewhere in Oblivion, USA. I think it’s time for all these memory sucking companies to start some kind of system to feel and shelter us when we forget how to eat, walk, and sleep

- Andrei Codrescu, 101 Damnations