Fire Records is working hard to ensure that the music of Pat Fish, aka The Jazz Butcher, doesn't become lost to new ears (or old fans). We think that this is a divinely endorsed mission, and we encourage you to support it. Last year, the label released a compilation of The Jazz Butcher's first four albums entitled The Wasted Years. They now have followed that with The Violent Years, which brings together albums Fishcoteque, Big Scarey Planet, The Cult of the Basement, and Condition Blue, all of which were released via Creation Records from 1988 to 1991. The Violent Years is available now as a four CD bookback set (20 page booklet) or digital download.
The 42 songs are superbly crafted, and are packed with pop references, social commentary, dark humor, love, loss, and joy. The presentation often jangles and there is a bit of a too-cool-for-school vibe that adds to the outsider atmosphere. But working with various artists, including at time members of Spacemen 3, Suede, Blue Aeroplanes, and the rhythm section from The Weather Prophets, Fish's arrangements are deceptively tight and perfectly proportioned. While the collection could be described as dream pop, the collection includes sufficient examples of jangle pop, drone rock, garage pop, roots rock and country modes to resist any single tag. References could include the The Velvet Underground, The Go-Betweens, Lloyd Cole and the Commotions, The Weather Prophets, among many others.
In our opinion, this is an essential guitar pop collection that transcends boundaries of style, geography and era. We've provided multiple samples below, but we strongly encourage you to visit the Bandcamp link and listen to the entire album while waiting for your own physical or digital copy to arrive.
Website
Bandcamp for The Violent Years
Fire Records
No comments:
Post a Comment