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And so we bleat again! I've got to admit that it's been a pretty decent week for me, what with me passing a few medical tests and doctor appointments with somewhat flying colors (much to your chagrin, I know) to the arrival of some WONDERFUL AND LIFE-REAFFIRMING MUSIC (and reading) into my otherwise staid and sordid life. Of course I'm gonna tell ya ALL about it...I mean, after all this time you don't realize that I remain that suburban slob spiritual turdler who HAS to be at the center of attention even to the point where mom 'n pop 'r gonna stop the proceedings with a few  swift slaps to my posterior?

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As far as the progress regarding my ROCKSBACKPAGES contract go, right now (at this very moment!) I am copying down for future reference everything on there that not only BACK DOOR MAN co-founder and noted scribe in his own right DON WALLER (bless his soul!) has available for consumption but the work of Waller's BDM co-hort PHAST PHREDDIE PATTERSON not to mention the better (mostly non-reggae) material from Vivien Goldman from her SOUNDS days inna late-seventies. I'm even copying the stuff regarding music I probably would not care to  read about let alone  listen to, but glomming ideas about music from such from such top notchers really makes me wish I had the expansive tastes and knowledge about music (pop or otherwise) in general that they had even if I tend to think that acts like Chic and ABC not to mention those Grrrrrl types (in Goldman's case) are best left for the losers in life among us ('n NO WISE CRACKS ALLOWED!). Still, I'd rather read any of these writers doing the eclectic bit than I would Chuck Eddy who might have had wobbly tastes, but an even wobblier personality when it came to dealing with me. Sheesh, I must bring out the worst in people without even trying (a good trait if true!).

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Haven't had many rock 'n roll-oriented dreams to relate to you all, but the one where I was in Cleveland at some venue (more or less akin to a small gymnasium with tables set up) in the audience with PETER LAUGHNER listening to a band perform his Friction material as a "tribute" sure stands out as one to keep in my mind! Of course I was surprised when I saw the group featuring like three violins doing "Old Song Re Sung" but hey, these dreams sure do being out small details that a wide awake mind would never think of!

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IMPORTANT FANZINE READING NEWS! While creepin' through the internet I have discovered that the ENTIRE run of THE SHAKIN' STREET GAZETTE (including the early inserts for the local Buffalo State paper THE STRAIT) is now available online! NOW's the time to fill up all of those blank spaces...in your mind that is.

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I caught this one via BLAZING CAT FUR and thought you'd also get a kick outta it.  The ultimate spoof of "black grievance porn" extant if you ask me, 'n is that thee famed Johnny Brown playing the aged astronaut??? Didn't even know he was still up and about! If you can't laugh at this then you deserve late night television!

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'n now for the credits. This post was written by me, with help from the likes of Bill Shute and Paul McGarry who contributed burnt items, not to mention Feeding Tube Records, Guerrsen Records and "Stereo" Records who brought some pretty good hard copy to my attention. The rest was gathered up by my own hard sweat'n toil, for what little that was worth!

Two Much-THE ABSTRACT HORSE LP (Feeding Tube Records)

Here's one of those neat basement rock recordings that's getting released in the here and now only because one of the members (drummer Robin Amos) went on to "better things", mainly the Boston group the Girls! You remember them (I think), they were the ones who had the honor of being the only non-Ohio act to record for Pere Ubu's Hearthan label (that I know of, that is!). Face it, if Amos had been a nobody this would have remained in the closet next to many a Monopoly game along just like a thousand other similar efforts, but it's out and thank goodness it's a pretty good rocker that thrills this jaded fanabla!

Even more basic than many a similar minded home-recorded effort from Jack Starr to the Rockin' Blewz, Amos pounds some pretty good drums while guitarist and vocalist John Chadwick strums some at times out-of-kilter guitar while singing even more out-of-kilter vocals. Recorded on a reel-to-reel in the group's communal living room by Amos' dad, this does say more about the state of late-sixties teenage ranch house existence than THE BRADY BUNCH ever could! A total winner, sorta like what the Smashchords woulda sounded like if only done up a good ten or so earlier!

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Sensor/Spook-COLLAPSE & RISE AT THE AIR MASS cassette ("Stereo" Records, France)

This tape is actually Gregory Raimo of Hopital de la Concepcion fame on microphone feedback and stylophone making more of that post-psychedelic music that seems to defy the current trend towards dippyness that has overtaken a good portion of the musical scene no matter where you look. Feedback and ghostly melodies remind me of everything from a missing Silver Apples track to Nurse With Wound. Ethereal sounds that you can really lose yourself in which attain a sort of holy feeling as if you are actually being visited by an apparition and not necessarily a good one. Those of you who are still awash in late-seventies theories of "minimalism" might appreciate this, and even ignorant special needs slobs like myself will enjoy the spacial nature as well.

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Bomis Prendin-CLEAR MEMORY CD (Guerssen/Mental Experience Records, Spain)

Yep, it's the same cadre that gave us everything from the PHANTOM LIMB flexi to the Titfield Thunderbolt doing their OP-minded music on a limited (fifty only!) cassette back 1984 way. Only now it's 2020 and you can now have a copy to hold in your sweaty mitts pressed up as a Cee-Dee! Not as "dense" as PHANTOM LIMB and perhaps dated because of the use of casiokeyboards, but still an electro-rock wowzer with the distorto repeato-riff madness that usually makes these kinda recordings all the better. Sorta like a nicer version of Throbbing Gristle with some mid-seventies Can (and at times early-eighties funk punk) mixed in. Add some Ralph Records references tossed in for good measure. Although I would have loathed the thing back when it came out, nowadays it does remind me of what those experimental college kid things sounded like at least before it all went down the tubes.

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Attrix-"Lost Lenore"/"Hard Times" 45 rpm single (Munster Records, Spain)

There are so many of these seventies rarities just waiting to be discovered, and when ya get one like this boy is it time to flip out jes' like I 'm doin' with this wowzer! Brighton's Attrix hearken back to the more straight-ahead rock groups of the late-sixties/early-seventies on their sole effort with both sides just leavin' the listener beggin' for more what with the repeato-riff drive that will flash you back to many a seventies-era fave that got lost inna shuffle just like these guys did. Upon first spin one group that initially sprang to mind were the obscure acetate wonders the Velvet Frogs who were treadin' the same musical realms a good decade earlier and also got wooshed away for all their efforts. Hope that the eventual archival dig surrounding these guys proves to be quite fruitful.

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The Gay Intruders-"In The Race"/"It's Not Today" 45  rpm single (Munster Records, Spain)

Hold on precious, the name has nothing to do with unicorns and rainbows because these guys were around long before you creeps co-opted the "gay" tag for good! Naw, these Gay Intruders were all rather healthy middle-Amerigan kids who recorded this rather spiffy Bo Diddley beat track way back in '66, all kept under the covers until only now which is kind of a shame but better now than in the future when we don't have any ears to hear the thing. You can bet it's just as powerful as all those other Diddley-cum-Stones records that have been comped for the last thirtysome years, and perhaps even better because they do seem even more"aw shucks" about it than usual. The flip's an even neater surprise, a standard six-oh stomper that was left unfinished back during them days only to be spiffied up for release now an' it's done so good that you never woulda known it! THE MODERN DAY SUBURBAN SLOB REFUSES TO DIE!

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Van Der Graaf Generator-THE AEROSOL GREY MACHINE LP (Mercury Records)

Curiosity had me dishing out actual lucre for this '69 progressive rock "classic" featuring Peter Hammill, who did a way better job of tingling my tootsies on NADIR'S BIG CHANCE (one of those "I'm not supposed to like it but everybody seems to an' I don't wanna be left out" classics). Not that AEROSOL is a turdburger by any stretch of the imagination, but each and every cut sounds like a song just waiting to pop its kernel only to flub-a-dub to the point where the music just wooshes right by ya without leaving any sort of imprint you'd care to have left on your psyche. I somehow get the feeling that the initial efforts from fellow (and oft-compared to) prog brethren Genesis would sound dazzling in comparison. Not that I'm anxious to find out...

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THE ONES CD-r burn (originally on Rerun Records)

Might-tee good heavy metal influenced olde tyme punk rock from this Milwaukee band who, as far as I can tell, have no connections to any other groups on this planet calling themselves "The Ones". At times the straight ahead Ramones riffs give way to the standard "Communication Breakdown" swipes heard so often in punk rock, perhaps "dating" the entire proceedings but then again I wouldn't mind re-living the seventies THE RIGHT WAY. Raw and primal demo-quality recordings that will thankfully remind you that there was a good side to seventies music despite what a whole slew of REVISIONISTS'll tell you over and over again.

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Hans Kollar Free Sounds-PHOENIX CD-r burn (originally on MPS Records, Germany)

I was thinking that the free sound here was gonna be even freer than what transpired within these "grooves", but the Hans Kollar Free Sounds ensemble are about as steady as most of the other European experimental jazz acts that were comin' outta Europe back inna late-sixties and early-seventies. There's kind of an early ECM cleanliness to this that doesn't ruin the proceedings one bit, tho you do get the idea that this would have sounded way more in-tune with your own sense of free sound splat had PHOENIX been performed by some heavy duty freedom players 'stead of these Continental latch-ons. Good 'nuff for a quick jazz fix to jangle your already too calmed down nerves.

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Various Artists-TENDER MINOR LIBERTY TOOT CD-r burn (Bill Shute)

Listening to a Bill Shute burn is akin to opening up a box on Christmas Day knowin' that whatever's in it, you're gonna have a hard time returnin' it tomorrow! All funnin' aside, this is another wonder from the man who invented the word what with the usual splurt of things from Christmas radio jinglies to more off-key local kids trying to ape the Beatles' popularity (and gash quotient) to Otis Redding from that oft-milked Monterrey album. Sure some of it drags more than a pair of NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC titties onna ground (that "Perversion Waves" thing is about as perverted as a MISTER ROGERS special!), but there's more'n just a li'l fun and jamz to keep me goin' through the day from kitchy instrumental fun 'n heavy rock of a half-century vintage to low-rung-on-the-totem-pole avgarde experiments, in here. Well, at least  I didn't get any socks.

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BACK ISSUES PLUG TIME! Need some real rock reading in your system to soothe those pent up frustrations of having to live in a world with Miley Cyrus? Why not try some of these old BLACK TO COMMs to help get you over the mass o' misery we call EVERYDAY LIVING? Just click on the link and get those horrible memories of having to read ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY in the waiting room outta your already fetid system!