U-30599 (1991)

Crackerbash (Imp)

I was never crazy about indie bands appropriating corporate logos, a trend that got a bit out of control in the 90s, but there was something cool about Crackerbash borrowing from Oregon’s own Copeland Lumber. Kind of a formative band for me, though I’m apparently alone in loving the subsequent Jr. High even more. But a nice label for Halloween I think, and a perfectly satisfactory final post for me.

Taang! (1989)

The Lemonheads breakthrough single, "Luka": the cover song that got them signed to Atlantic, that got them just far enough to hit the CMJ charts with another cover, their very-90's, very fun "Mrs. Robinson." So begins the final stretch of our short residency at Collector Not Completist--tales of the rise and the crash, the plateau, heartbreak, dejection, suicide... The what-have-you of bands that never made the pantheon, for whatever reasons. A lament, in short. And where else to start but with Evan Dando and his Lemonheads, right?

The Lemonheads started their recording career on Taang! Records, a Boston label devoted mostly to the hardcore scene, in which the Lemonheads initially played a bit part. The cover art on early LPs "Hate Your Friends" and "Creator" is so amateur-DIY that it's almost painful, and the music is so uninspired that it could only have been recorded by acolytes of a scene. And then, "Luka"...

It's hard to believe that many of the short-lived wonderbands of the 90's ever started on small labels, had cred, had an indie spirit, or had more than five or six songs written before being signed. Even in the era of the buzz ballad, there wasn't a whole lot of soul on the scene. But Evan Dando had soul. Ultra-northern soul, real California soul. It seems unlikely that covers of Suzanne Vega's "Luka," the Stone Poney's "Different Drum," or Hair's "Frank Mills" could have been anything but ironic in the Reality-Bites era, but Dando showed heart. He was genuine.

And then, as the story goes, he started doing a lot of coke. His success and good looks made him an alternative-rock coverboy and he started hanging with the wrong celebrity crowds. Out on the the town with Noel and Liam Gallagher, he played the clown. He followed Robert Deniro through a hotel stairway, got locked inside, and banged on the door yelling, "Robert! It's Evan from the Lemonheads!" Things went bad fast, which couldn't have been helped by the fact that 1993's "Come on Feel the Lemonheads" featured none of Dando's heartfelt covers, only alternately comical or nonsensical originals. (Still great, just totally valid grist for the crazy-mill.) The big-time likes kookie but doesn't feel so comfy with crazy, and the Lemonheads disappeared not long after the release of 1996's "Car Button Cloth." Dando didn't play live again for another four years.

Has Evan Dando resurfaced? His solo shows are all heart, still. He pulls the deepness out of the old classics like "It's A Shame About Ray" or "Big Gay Heart." But he's at his best when covering Gram Parsons, the Misfits, Linda Ronstadt or Hair. This is not the stuff of success, apparently, but it's maybe as close as pop music can get to suburban soul. So, "Luka"--it started here, and it's been ending ever since.

Disaster (1990)

Smog's LP debut, "Sewn to the Sky," was the sole vinyl issue on Bill Callahan's Disaster Records, based out of Maryland. In his even-adolescent coolness, Callahan had been involved in the zine scene, publishing a Replacements fan mag, "Willpower," and a generalist music mag called "Disaster." When he began releasing cassettes as Smog in 1988, he appropriated the Disaster name for his home-run label. The label didn't last for too long; Callahan shut it down when he was signed to the nascent Drag City in 1991. In the next few years, Drag City would re-issue "Sewn to the Sky" and "Forgotten Foundation," a compilation of tracks from Smog's early Disaster cassettes.

The label art here, like many of Smog's later labels, is by Callahan himself, and though the side A drawing is a little hard to decipher at first, it appears to be a self-portrait. Callahan rarely drew himself in his later sketchbooks and cover art, but it seems fitting that the introspective Callahan's debut LP would offer up this shadowy, stage-setting image.

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What a raw, simple and strange drawing. Beautiful. The music is similarly raw and direct coming from former Bad Livers plucker Ralph White, who I assume also did the drawing.

Ugella and the Viking Pops Orchestra

Here's an lp with pretty standard label format. What attracted me to the composition was the hand drawn viking mask with the downward-pointing V. There's a real Baphomet vibe about it. It ties in well with the song titles.

SST (1987)

A classic SST move: cram the entire track list onto side one's center-label and leave the space on side two for the artwork. Here's just one more reason to admire the supreme team that was SST Records.