King Dork Approximately (41 page)

Roxy Music:
Eno should have stayed put, if you ask me, but sometimes
art rock
gets it right.

Phil Rudd: AC/DC’
s secret weapon and unsung hero. Rumor has it that he was paid in cars.

Ruddist:
a follower of Ruddism, the controversial philosophy that holds that drums should be played at a steady, even, regular tempo in such a way that it is possible to tell with relative ease where any given measure begins or ends. (cf.
Ayn Rand
)

Rush:
Canadian English for “too much drums.”

Satan:
We invoke Satan even though we don’t believe in Him, because He represents freedom and because mention of His name makes people uncomfortable. Actually, now that so many generations have overused this cheap-trick shortcut to a rebellious image, it has become so commonplace and
banal
that no one even notices when you do it anymore. Satan schmatan. But it was a good ride while it lasted, O Evil One.

Bon Scott:
Dirty, mean, and mighty unclean: the first lead snarler of
AC/DC
.

Sergeant Pepper’s outfits:
The Beatles wore marching-band uniforms on the cover of their SMAS-2653 album. (Their seminal recording of “On, Wisconsin, Suck My Johnson” only appears on early pressings.)

The Smiths:
Southern rock at its finest, especially the song “Sweet Home Alabama (I Hate You and You Make Me Want to Cry).”

stones:
testicles, or the ruins of ancient civilizations. When rolling, the most successful rock band ever to attend the London School of Economics.

Levi Strauss:
Girls, he’s the reason there’s a penis on your skirt. Love him? Or hate him?

sweeps week:
TV is graded on the basis of its performance during one week in the year, so the networks try to make the programming during this week as sleazy and as risqué as they can get away with.
Roxy Music
tried this with album covers.

totalitarian:
thoroughly dominated and controlled by, shall we say, “social services.”

Tourette’s syndrome:
Does it count if it all happens silently in your head? Because if so, I think I may have this.

T.T.G.W.I.M.A:
Try to Guess What I’m Mad About. I’ve always thought this would make a pretty good TV game show. Families would compete for valuable prizes by trying to decode each other’s hostile silences and passive-aggressive behavior. Networks, have your people call my people (i.e., Sam Hellerman). Let’s work something out here, but I don’t want to get screwed on the points.

the universe:
The worst place in the world. Let’s go somewhere else.

Vichy France:
If you can imagine something worse than French Nazis, keep a close watch on that impressive imagination of yours: it’s probably a national treasure.

“Wake Up Little Susie”:
Back when they had drive-in movies, you
could “neck” in the car and, shall we say, “fall asleep.” That’s how couples used to cook each other’s geese back then.

“Who you calling homo, faggot? Who you calling faggot, homo?”:
the typical normal guy’s mantra, if a
mantra
is an idiotic thing you say over and over for no reason except possibly as a veiled threat against the defenseless. Okay, so I actually looked this up and it turns out that’s not what a mantra is. That must have been me projecting there. You do say it over and over for no reason, but it’s more of a self-help thing. Example: “I am strong. I am confident. I am in command of the situation.…”

Brian Wilson:
That it is possible to be a fragile genius with the voice of God in your head while also being kind of a chubby kid has always struck me as a thing of great beauty and poetry.

The World at War:
Laurence Olivier spends twenty-six hours of TV time telling you all about World War II, but the short version is, we won.

World Health Organization:
watching the world’s waistline since 1948.

the Young brothers:
Angus, Malcolm, and (sometimes) George. And Alex. How did the USA sit idly by and allow a single family to march in and just take over
rock and roll
like that? Well, it was during the Carter administration, admittedly.

ZZ Top:
If I were as great as Billy Gibbons, I imagine I’d be pretty irritated to be far more well known for my beard than for my guitar playing. Then again, maybe being a multimillionaire would take some of the sting out of that.

2409-218 (
L.A.M.F.
, The Heartbreakers, 1977):
The title is short for, shall we say, “Like a Maternal Fornicator.” It came out of the ashes of the New York Dolls, if “out of the ashes” means what I think it does, which is that one member of the New York Dolls (two if you count the drummer) went on to form this stripped-down, meat-and-potatoes punkish rock ’n’ roll ’n’ heroin combo after the former band’s inevitable crash ’n’ burn. Despite its notoriously muddy sound, this UK-only release captured a unique, intense flash of dark energy never heard before or since in quite the same form. Even the endlessly complained-about fuzzy mixes add to the possibly unintentional double-entendred “born too loose” effect: too loose, too dark, too fucked up, too beautiful, too soon, too late. Like all such flashes, it died almost immediately on impact, but you can still put on the record, rock out, wish you were dead, et cetera.

APLPA-016 (
T.N.T.
, AC/DC, 1975):
If you’ve been paying attention you’ll know that this is AC/DC’s second album, rated quite highly by yours truly and unreleased in this form in the United States. Have you noticed that practically every single foreign album winds up getting released in the U.S. in noticeably suckier form? They’ll mess up the order, leave songs off, and/or replace them with songs from other albums. The result is almost always worse, but even when it isn’t that terrible per se (e.g., the U.S. version of
S CBS 82000
), it’s still utterly stupid and dishonest and you’d be better off listening to the real record. It
has to be on purpose (though to what end remains a mystery): “Ha, that’ll show ’em,” they say, presiding over the accelerated dumbing down of the American public. I suppose it goes along with the dumbing down of the educational system. They’re preparing us for something, clearly, and depriving us of the real
T.N.T
. seems to be a small but vital part of the plan, like failing to teach us how to read and write.

Seven of these nine songs appear on the U.S. release fraudulently titled
High Voltage
(SD 36-142), along with only two from their first album (the actual
High Voltage
, APLP-009.) But the two that are missing, the “Tutti-Frutti”–like “Rocker” and an extended cover of Chuck Berry’s “School Days,” are crucial tracks, clearly an intentional bridge between 1955 and 1975, a way of summing up and paying tribute to the past while chewing it up and superseding it. Without them, the point is missed. I mean, get the real version, not the fake stupid American one. U.S. out of my uterus and all that.

ASF 2512 (
British Steel
, Judas Priest, 1980):
With a new Ruddist drummer and an unrepentant ambition to take over the world, Judas Priest proved it was possible for a metal band to produce an album of pop songs without sacrificing one iota of heaviness, completing the transition to comparative minimalism begun with 1978’s S CBS 83135. While perhaps not as cohesive as a whole as
FC 38160
(their finest hour), as a succession of succinct, aggressive, self-aggrandizing anthems of rebellion it has few equals. “You Don’t Have to Be Old to Be Wise”—yeah, they did that, with a straight face, and it worked, which is borderline amazing. Makes you want to go out and break something, maybe even a face.

Recorded at Ringo Starr’s house. That’s really true.

BS 2607 (
Machine Head
, Deep Purple, 1972):
“Smoke on the Water” tells the true story of a fire at a Frank Zappa show at the Swiss casino where Deep Purple had been planning to record the very song about this selfsame incident that prevented
them from doing so. Highly illogical, I know, but basically in the third verse they move to a hotel and manage to finish it all up there, with the aid of the Rolling Stones’ mobile recording rig, referred to in the song as “the Rolling truck Stones thing.” Making it up as you go along never had such chart-busting results. So “the water” is Lake Geneva, which is one great big, kind of random lake. And this is one great big, kind of random album, three main songs padded with a remarkably high grade of filler and some tritones. “Highway Star” explains, I think, what happens to Eddie Cochran after he gets the car and the girl and does a whole lot of drugs. Ain’t nobody gonna take his car, his girl, or his head.

COC 39105 (
Sticky Fingers
, The Rolling Stones, 1971):
So, obviously COC 69100 is more important, but this has quite a lot to recommend it nonetheless: one of the best snare sounds ever recorded, the best country-rock tune ever written and performed by foreigners, some crazily “mean”-sounding guitar, and “Bitch,” which gets my vote for best Stones song of them all, not to mention a supposedly risqué cover featuring a Warhol-designed crotch image with a working zipper. (That zipper is the reason the back cover of so many copies of NPS-2 is all messed up; after 1981, it’s COC 16052 that gets the COC 39105 zipper treatment, obviously not as much of a loss.) “Sister Morphine” is Sam Hellerman’s unofficial theme song.

FC 38160 (
Screaming for Vengeance
, Judas Priest, 1982):
There’s high drama and a great big ball of righteous anger in this prickliest, bitterest, biggest, and most triumphal and genre-transcending metal album ever, arguably the first Judas Priest album to use Rob Halford’s astonishing vocal range to full advantage, possibly the finest, most emotive screaming ever scratched into vinyl. The guitars scream too. The whole thing screams. Listening from beginning to end can be a harrowing experience, sonically and emotionally. It presents a dark vision, a paranoiac’s manifesto, someone once called it. Oh yeah, that
was me who called it that, even though I’m not totally sure what a manifesto is.

KC 32425 (
Mott the Hoople
, Mott the Hoople, 1973):
There are probably a thousand eccentric, scarf-wearing Englishmen with floppy hats who did their own small part to save rock and roll as it drifted this way and that, post-Altamont/pre-CBGB. And Mott the Hoople were four or five of them. “Honaloochie Boogie” is quite possibly the catchiest song ever written, so skip that track whatever you do. The band is named after an impossible-to-find novel, which I’d read in a second if I were allowed, but for some reason the powers that be want to make it as difficult as possible to learn what a “hoople” is. Must be something pretty shocking, right?

KSBS 2021 (
Flamingo
, The Flamin’ Groovies, 1971):
They arguably outdid the Stones on KSBS 2031 and brought the Beatles into the New Wave on SRK 6021, and while I doubt anyone would sincerely prefer KSBS 2021 to either of those, it has the rough, in-your-face charm that bare bones prematurely unearthed sometimes have. If I didn’t know they were San Francisco hippie boogie-woogie freaks, I’d have sworn I was listening to an unsung UK pub rock classic, a forgotten Ducks Deluxe or Count Bishops or something like that. “Second Cousin” genuinely rules, though.

NAR-012 (
Milo Goes to College
, Descendents, 1982):
Not necessarily the greatest album ever, maybe, but almost certainly one of the last truly great ones ever recorded. I mean, it’s been pretty much downhill after that, album-wise. Frantic, catchy, punchy, funny, and surprisingly moving at moments. “Jean Is Dead” will make you cry. Careful about singing “I’m Not a Loser” to yourself in public, though. That won’t end well.

PCS 7009 (
Revolver
, The Beatles, 1966):
yet another perfectly fine album vandalized by its own U.S. release. I mean, three of the John Lennon songs were simply left off the American version, making it all Paul and George-y. Why? Just to mess with
people, is the only thing I can come up with. Nice going, government. You ruined the Beatles. Now get to work on Santa Claus and that Christmas cancellation, why don’t you? (Best bass sound of any rock recording, though, and the drums are pretty terrific, too.)

PD 5537 (
Kings of Oblivion
, Pink Fairies, 1973):
The third and final album from this oddball Deviants splinter and product of Britain’s anarcho-psychedelic underground freak scene was five years ahead of its time and as solid a guitar album as its own era ever disgorged, if “disgorged” means what I think it does. They were tour buddies with Hawkwind and their singer-guitarist went on to join the first edition of Motörhead, whose debut album owes a substantial, perhaps surprising debt to the the Pink Fairies’ blueprint. Motörhead’s rough cover of “City Kids” possibly helped it to become this album’s best-known song, but it is the deeply mysterious and haunting ten-minute epic “I Wish I Was a Girl” that truly sticks in a person’s head while refusing to reveal its secrets. It was apparently real, true anarchy in Ladbroke Grove ’72, and if so this is pretty much all that’s left of it. Way too good and fine and special for normal people to know about, so stay away.

SA-7528 (
Leave Home
, The Ramones, 1977):
Specifying your favorite of the first four Ramones albums is kind of like indicating your favorite Beatle or Monkee or U.S. president. It tells the world something about you that you might not necessarily be all that comfortable having them know. This is mine, which I think is equivalent to George, Mickey, or Rutherford B. Hayes.

S CBS 82000 (
The Clash
, The Clash, 1977):
Again, the U.S. Department of Destroying the Integrity of Rock and Roll Recordings allowed release of a record of the same title and cover as the debut Clash album with largely different music on it. Basically the U.S. release (PE 36060) is a singles compilation with a truncated version of the original debut LP crammed in around the edges. These singles are great, and the result is
by no means a waste of time. But it isn’t anything like the real album. It’s historically inaccurate, like something Stalin might have perpetrated, if “perpetrated” means what I think it does. And it leaves off “Protex Blue,” which is a love song about alienation and buying condoms from a vending machine. Wouldn’t you like to hear that? Too bad. The universe says no. It ought to be ashamed of itself.

SD 36-142 (High Voltage, AC/DC, 1976):
The fraudulent U.S. issue of seven ninths of AC/DC’s second album under the title of its first. See
APLPA-016
.

SEEZ 1 (
Damned, Damned, Damned
, The Damned, 1977):
This Nick Lowe–produced album has the distinction of being the first full-length LP to be released by an official UK punk rock band. It also has the distinction of not sounding like anything besides what it is, unlike most everything else did after everyone started reading from the same playbook, if you know what I mean by “playbook.” The doubled crooning vocals always kill me. Miles better than anything else in your pathetic little world, I can almost guarantee.

SMAS-2653 (Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles, 1968):
what it sounds like when you Anglicize Buddy Holly and replace his amphetamines with acid. Nothing could be as great in reality as this record is in reputation, but it is nonetheless about as good as drugged-up pop-art rock gets, an impressive feat considering it was recorded on secondhand equipment in a public restroom in Ireland. I prefer “I Wanna Hold Your Hand,” but then I would, wouldn’t I?

SRK 6081 (
The Undertones
, The Undertones, 1979):
As a punk pop document of good-humored teen angst, this is an album with no equal. Feeling strange and awkward, wanting the girl, rarely to never getting the girl, being compelled to jump around aimlessly physically as well as mentally—well, it turns out it takes about two and half minutes to tell the world about this situation, and what’s more, it’s something you can do over
and over again. And if the choruses are catchy and the songs well-written enough, people won’t even mind all that much. For some reason the Undertones are always likened to the Ramones, but to me they seem much closer to the Modern Lovers’ sensibility. Now, maybe all that means is it’s just a different sort of cartoon, but it’s probably a picture of your life nonetheless. (n.b., if “n.b.” means what I think it does: they’re from Northern Ireland, and their warbly-voiced singer Feargal Sharkey—that’s the guy’s actual name, kidding you not—was a former scout leader. But it’s still a picture of your life, trust me.)

ST 11395 (
Desolation Boulevard
, The Sweet, 1974):
Ever notice how bands that begin as the Something (or the Somethings) often remove the “the” as they get older, lamer, and more full of themselves? The Pink Floyd became Pink Floyd, the Led Zeppelin became Led Zeppelin. Even the Dead Kennedys became Dead Kennedys, and there are people who will correct you if ever say “the Buzzcocks”: “It’s Buzzcocks, man, just Buzzcocks, what are you, some kind of monster?” (And the Beach Boys, in a kind of inversion of this process, had a brief, pretentious stint as the Beach.) Well, that happened with the Sweet, too, and by the time they bridged bubblegum and glam and became famous they were generally known as just Sweet. But they’ll always be the Sweet to me. Oh, and
Desolation Boulevard
is one of the greatest, if not the greatest, rock and roll records ever recorded, despite the missing “the.” Some people are beyond good and evil and can break rules with impunity, if “impunity” means what I think it does. (And it does. I looked it up. Are you ready, Steve? Andy? Mick? It means you can’t be punished for any reason. You’re golden.)

UAG 30159 (
Another Music in a Different Kitchen
, Buzzcocks, 1978):
They taught the world how to bypass the music industry by releasing their own records (with 1977’s
Spiral Scratch
7”) and followed it up by somehow tricking the music industry into releasing this remarkable blend of tube fuzz, pop melody,
deadpan art-school pretensions, and lovelorn moping. It’s the melodic moping that scores, perhaps, but the sonic experimentation and minimalist, angular soundscapes are nearly as important to the effect, if not quite as “deep” as they seem to have been intended to be. This is what the cutting edge of pop modernity appears to have sounded like in 1978, and it’s a real shame it doesn’t sound like that anymore.