VA - Yellow Pills - Prefill
i n f o
ripper.: Team CMS date ripped..: Sep-01-2005
label..: n/a date released: 000-00-2004
encoder: Lame 3.90.3 APS release size.: 154,4 MB
bitrate: VBR kbps tracks.......: 33
mode...: Joint-Stereo source.......: CDDA
url....: n/a
n o t e s
Great compilation of underground gems of 90's indie
pop. Many rarities and undiscovered tracks on this
one.
ps
sorry about the year fuckup in id3!
of course it is 2005, not 2004 :)
From
http://pitchforkmedia.com/record-reviews/comp
numero-group/yellow-pills.shtml
The last thing in the world I want is to be a teenager
again. I mean, being an adult is no great shakes or
anything, but the desire to relive my formative years
is just not there at all-- I already have enough
regrets from those years following me around as it is.
So why do I keep singing to myself, over and over, "I
wanna beeeeeeee a teen a-gain"? It's running through
my head just now, even as I'm listening to another
song, this catchy, heavenly falsetto that pines for
some sort of idealized salad days it can't get back. I
can't even remember the name of the band that played
it without a quick glance at the tracklisting, but I
can't get it out of my head. That's not to say I'm
trying to, though. I love a good power pop song, and
I'm not opposed to carrying it around with me for a
while.
Turns out it's by this band called the Toms, and if
you've heard of them, well+congratulations. You're one
of probably less than a hundred or so people who have.
The Toms have three songs on Yellow Pills-- the latest
offering from Numero Group, one of the smartest
upstart reissue labels in this vast pop culture
wasteland we call America-- and all three of them are
amazing pop orgasms that could have and should have
been hits. Hell, what justice is there in the world if
none of the songs on this two-disc run of
uninterrupted power pop awesomeness ever graced more
than a few awkward ears? Fact is, there are 33
non-hits on here, all by bands that never went
anywhere in the culture industry, instead settling to
the bottoms of dedicated collector hearts and into the
backs of dust-lined milk crates full of musty,
forgotten vinyl that smells like what I imagine God's
own sweat must smell like.
The biggest name in Jordan Oakes' well-penned,
self-effacing liners is Jon Brion, who was a member of
the Bats, a different band from the great New Zealand
indie rockers. Oakes lived and breathed the music you
hear on these discs for years, publishing the Yellow
Pills zine (10 issues) and compiling the Yellow Pills
power pop discs (4 volumes) that lend their name to
this new set, and the Numero guys dragged him out of
"retirement" to have a crack at introducing the
curious to some of the best, most overlooked stuff
from his own collection.
That's part of what makes this work so well-- it's not
a bunch of "essentials" or whatever. It's a guy
sharing records that crawled out onto his sleeve along
with his heart, digging through his music library and
playing his favorites for you. It's a labor of love
and it's openly nostalgic, which is fine, because the
people who will scoop this up and internalize every
note of it (it doesn't take more than a few listens,
actually) are likely to be in a nostalgic frame of
mind anyway-nostalgic for that certain Beatles/Beach
Boys/dB's/Flamin' Groovies/Nick Lowe pure pop
perfection that almost no one does these days. The
best-known band on here is definitely the Shoes, whose
"Like I Told You" is awesome and singular. Sure, these
guys listened to Big Star and Badfinger and all that,
but they had a unique sound of their own, and it's a
spangled, jangly sound with tense, dark rhythms and
slinky vocal melodies.
From there, it's into the depths of power pop
obscurity to a dozen or so bands All Music Guide has
never even heard of, skinny tie-wearing assortments of
talented boys with collective names like Treble Boys,
Kids, Tweeds, and the Trend who seemed to have no luck
whatsoever with women. They also seemed to have pop
confections dripping out of their noses-- Luxury's
"Green Hearts" is catchy like Marburg, and dig the
awesome guitar parts on "Hello Mr. Jenkins" by the
Finns. They bounce from speaker to speaker with little
melodic doodles in the right channel answered by big
chords in the left while the band snottily yet
humanely calls out some old Archie Bunker type who
can't handle black people, women's lib, or
homosexuals.
Ooh, yes, there's snot on this thing, too. It can't
all be silky smooth harmonies and 600-watt guitars.
New York's Speedies sound British and they translate a
fractured rhythmic sense and evident Buzzcocks
influence into spiky pop-art. Their "You Need Pop,"
produced by Blondie drummer Clem Burke and never
before released, is an addictive, pulsating New Wave
beast, quite different from its counterparts on this
compilation. Elsewhere, Jack Stack a Track's "Good
Time Music" is an uncanny Beach Boys homage-the high
tenor sounds exactly like Brian Wilson circa just
before he installed the sandbox in his living room.
It boggles the brain to know that none of this music
was ever the least bit popular despite being the very
contagious epitome of pop. Listen to that synth hook
on the Bats' "Not Easy for Me", while they sing "it's
not easy for me to be in love with you/ Without you,"
speaking for every miserable pining soul on the planet
with melodic effortlessness.
Yellow Pills isn't just another compilation of old
stuff you've never heard of. It's a guy and his record
collection, his passion for curiously unloved music
and his generosity in sharing it. It's the story of
your life, too, with love and loss and adolescent
angst and adult regret and even a song called "I Need
That Record", which of course is the common cry of
everyone who'll dig this. Yellow Pills makes me happy
and makes me want to play my guitar and sing nonsense.
It makes me want to spin it over and over and it makes
me wanna beeeeeeee a teen a-gain. If you love guitar
pop, you'll love this.
-Joe Tangari, April 15, 2005
d a t a
# t r a c k n a m e t i m e
CD1
01- Luxury - Green Hearts [03:02]
02- The Tweeds - I Need That Record [03:22]
03- The Colors - All I Want [01:59]
04- The Speedies - You Need Pop [02:26]
05- The Shoes - Like I Told You [02:37]
06- The Sponsors - In And Out Of Love [02:35]
07- The Bats - Not My Girl Anymore [03:21]
08- The Tweeds - She's The Girl (Who Said No) [03:10]
09- Randy Winburn - Somebody Else's Girl [02:53]
10- Luxury - One In A Million [02:27]
11- The Toms - Sun [03:47]
12- Luxury - Countdown [02:31]
13- The Colors - Rave It Up [02:17]
14- The Speedies - 1-2-3 [03:09]
15- The Kids - Hey Little Girl [02:13]
16- The Bats - Mr. Peculiar [03:06]
CD2
01- The Toms - (I Wanna Be A) Teen Again [04:02]
02- The Bats - Not Easy For Me [03:38]
03- The Treble Boys - Julie-Anne [02:45]
04- Tommy Rock - Dream Rocker [03:17]
05- The Sponsors - Love I Can't Wait [01:32]
06- The Colors - Growing Up American [02:10]
07- The Finns - Hello Mr. Jenkins [03:55]
08- The Tactics - Things I Am [02:33]
09- The Treble Boys - One Kiss [02:40]
10- The Trend - She's Hi-Fi [02:17]
11- LMNOP - Forever Through The Sun [03:13]
12- Jack Stack A Track - Good Time Music [03:12]
13- Randy Winburn - Sunshine U.S.A. [03:45]
14- The Toms - House Of Horrors [03:15]
15- The Brat - Long Time Away [03:00]
16- The Kids - There Goes My Heart Again [01:58]
17- The Trend - (I Feel Like A) Dictionary [02:28]
154,4 m e g s t o t a l [94:35]