Douglas Martin picks Cherries in Yakima, boxes with shadows, and managed to leave “In the Garage” off this mix–presumably as punishment for “Beverly Hills.”
You’re out of school for the next two-and-a-half months. You don’t have a job, and your parents won’t lift a finger to help you get a car until you get one. You just checked the weather report, and it’s supposed to be Hot as Hell Degrees. So, what do you do? You call up your boys (and/or/preferably girls/at least one girl) to see if they want to sweat their balls (or, in the case of the girls/at least one girl, hopefully not) off in your garage and crank out some jams, duuuuuude!
If we music fans can agree on anything, it’s that garage-punk bands aren’t made during the winter months. Very few souls are dedicated enough to hit their practice spaces in parkas and goose downs with the army jacket lining (unless you’ve just formed The Pixies, but they’ve always been the gold standard). Most bands worth their weight in amplifiers are born out of sweat and sun; out of making sure their neighbors never mow their grass without earplugs. I mean, it’s always nice to hit the beach or cruise around for chicks in daisy dukes and bikini tops, but this summer, we ain’t leaving the garage.
Le Garage: http://www.mediafire.com/?nhwjc1zmnn1
1. Crocodiles- “Here Comes the Sky”
If you want your summer to get to a blissfully-woozy start, there’s no better way to do it than through a sea of heavily-treated guitars and a deceptively-simple piano line. Recalling the spacey ambiance of Spacemen 3, San Diego’s Crocodiles record what has got to be the audio equivalent of watching the clouds part as the sun peeks through them, eventually taking over the sky.
2. Wavves- “No Hope Kids”
Say what you want about Nathan Williams’ antics and live-show-that-borders-from-merely-okay-to-totally-disastrous (I’ll unabashedly say that, solely due to how much derision he inspires, he’s without question the most punk dude in music right now), but there are very few artists that have mastered the art of, as my friend Daniel Krow puts it, “warped nostalgia” like the young 22-year-old Californian.
Given the subject matter– more-or-less a song about a guy who literally has nothing– you wouldn’t expect a song to be so… summery! It surprising how much mileage Williams gets out of so few elements: Three of the brightest chords he could muster, lovably-half-assed backing vocals, enough distortion to make a Dr. Dre-like audiophile quit music in total disgust. Ladies and gentlemen, your skate park anthem of 2009.
3. Wipers- “Can This Be”
Before the Garage Punk Renaissance of 2008, you’d be hard-pressed to find more than a handful of music fans outside of the Northwest that had heard of Wipers, easily one of the finest bands to come out of the region in music history. That is, before Vivian Girls started namedropping Youth of America and the aforementioned Wavves ripped off their logo. Songwriter Greg Sage has nearly an entire catalog of tunes that sound great in the scorching summer heat, but “Can This Be” is a MONSTER of a ditty, with verses that are even hookier than the chorus and a chorus with some subtly deft guitar work during the chorus. To realize the true power of this song, I recommend blasting it with all of your windows down, doing speeds dangerously close to 100mph on the freeway. And don’t turn it down when the cops pull you over; that’s not punk.
4. Harlem- “Beautiful and Very Smart”
“I’ve been looking for someone like you,” starts the first verse from the Austin-based band, “You look cool and I like your walk.” The good thing about spending your day practicing with your band is that sometimes, you don’t have to cruise around for those aforementioned chicks in daisy dukes and bikini tops. Sometimes, they pass right by you. And sometimes, you have no choice but to write a song for one of them. And sometimes, they’ll stay and watch you play. And sometimes, you’ll be given a lock of her hair. And you will keep it in your pocket.
5. No Age- “You Is My Hot Rabbit”
Out of all of the righteous punk tunes they’ve written in the span of their short career, “Hot Rabbit” represents No Age at their most garage-like; a lo-fi instrumental with an addictive guitar line and a tom that sounds dangerously close to a timpani that breaks into a fist-pumping middle eight before tucking itself back into its shell. The best garage moment comes when there is an out-of-nowhere chord and drum hit, startling you out of that stoned haze you worked yourself into while chillin’, minding your business, humming along with the main riff.
6. Eat Skull- “Cartoon Beginning”
“Cartoon Beginning” sounds like the type of song you and your friends could make in your garage. That is, if you and your friends totally fucking rule.
7. Dum Dum Girls- “Hey Sis”
Nowadays, you don’t even need your friends to start a band. All you really need is a cheap Fender starter guitar, a cheap drum machine, a laughably-outdated computer, and at least some grasp on the concept of melody. Of course, some people record without the latter, but it’s recommended. “Hey Sis” represents the beginning of summer, where you’re thinking about what you could do while you’re out of school and you’re trying to convince your best friend to do something fun and totally reasonable, like Shopping Cart Surfing or dropping Mentos into a half-full bottle of Diet Pepsi. Cue the refrain: “It will be fuuu-oooh-uhhhh-uuuun-unnnnnn!”
8. The Raincoats- “No Looking”
Whoever told you that they don’t believe in love at first sight is pretty much a fucking liar. Falling in love at first sight is probably the oldest practice in the entire world. You really have never looked at someone for the first time and thought about marrying them and/or producing offspring in Jon & Kate Plus Eight quantities? Get outta here with that bullshit. “No Looking” is all about the age-old dillema of unrequited love at first sight, about the person you want not even looking your way. The rhythm-section-led first-half of the song is spent liveblogging exactly what the alluring object-of-affection is doing, about their love for coffee, cigarettes, and raincoats (how meta, amirite?). As the outro gallops its way to the finish line, one voice turns into two, and they’re both raised, having a manic depressive freakout over this person that didn’t even look the way of the protagonist. Shut up. You’ve done that before, too.
9. Vivian Girls- “Blind Spot”
As great as their brief moments of punk exhilaration are, Vivian Girls are at arguably at their best when they augment their angelic harmonies with a slower tempo. On this cover from obscure sixties band Daisy Chain, the voices, the jangly reverbed guitars, and the quintessential sixties percussive instrument, the tambourine, all come together perfectly. It’s like going on a walk with your sweetheart, holding hands and looking at the trees swaying in the wind, thinking to yourself, “Life can’t get any better than this.”
10. Beat Happening- “Tiger Trap”
Ahh, summer love is a magical thing. With a surplus of heart and a quite-noticable lack of chords, Calvin Johnson, arguably the inventor of indie-rock, likens gaming down a girl to a tiger trap. Hobbes, and Calvin by proxy, is not amused.
11. Liars- “Pure Unevil”
Have you ever been all introspective and stuff about your summer crush not even knowing you’re alive, but you’re a little distracted by the swarm of bees about ten feet away from you? Well, “Pure Evil” is the musical embodiment of that scenario. “I know, waiting, there’s someone for me,” Angus Andrew sings as he staves off both lonliness and those goddamn bees that won’t leave him alone.
12. The Intelligence- “Universal Babysitter”
With its bouncy, surf-indebted feel, getting paid $5 an hour to watch a bunch of unruly brats never sounded so much fun.
13. Eric’s Trip- “Secret for Julie”
“Secret for Julie” represents the summer letdown, where during a “break,” your lover taps someone else’s guts. But now, you’re back together, and you suspect they’re still fucking, and you’re pissed. Or sad. But most likely a combination of both. You’re confused. You’re hurt. You don’t want them to go back again.
14. Shop Assistants- “It’s Up to You”
Another band enjoying a lot of post-breakup love, “It’s Up to You” is the equivalent of sitting on the grass in the park and blowing bubbles while you glare at your asshole significant other for popping every single one of them. Twee as fuck, y’all.
15. Japandroids- “I Quit Girls”
Here’s something else we’ve all done before: Being so into someone that we’ve literally said, “After her, I quit girls.” You can’t tell me you’ve never been THAT hung up over someone, that you’ve contemplated living a Morrissey-like oath of celibacy. Don’t worry friend, even Morrissey broke that oath. You’ll be okay.
14. Futureheads- “Le Garage”
Okay, so this one’s not garagey. But the extremely-melodic intro has “summer” written all over it. Try not to attempt to try out those harmonies in the car with your friends. I dare you.
