Suzannah Johannes - Suzannah Johannes 7"

Suzannah Johannes – Suzannah Johannes 7”

Range Life, 2008

Acquired: Suzannah Johannes Live Show, New, 2008

Price: $5

 

I totally expected to step into a time machine when I put this one on. Like the Bandit Teeth/Dactyls 7” I recently wrote up (also from the anti-halcyon days of 2008), seeing Suzannah Johannes open half the Lawrence shows was a big part of that time period. The nice thing about Johannes was that she was an opener you actually wanted to catch. You made sure your pregaming was done by 9 and headed down to the Replay to see her play. It’s not like her sets varied too much—it was either Suzannah with her band or Suzannah on her own—but her songs were just so fucking lovely you never got sick of them. As far as I know, this is the only thing she ever released, and I’m fairly certain it was recorded on with the studio time she won when she won KJHK’s Farmer’s Ball (which used to have studio time at the Get Up Kids-owned Black Lodge Studio in Eudora, where bits of this record were recorded). Man, I can’t get over how pretty these songs are. It’s just plain pure, pleasant vocal pop that reminds me of an earthier version of Taken by Trees. It’s a nice slice of Lawrence music before everything got steeped in irony and cool.

"Horserider's Smile" and "Kelly Ann" can be found on this terrific Daytrotter session.

The Dactyls/Bandit Teeth - Split 7"

The Dactyls/Bandit Teeth – Split 7”

Self Released, 2008

Acquired: Crossroads Music, Used, 2013

Price: $2

 

Of COURSE I found a split featuring two Lawrence bands in a Portland record shop. Crossroads Music was an intense place. It was packed with records. Most of it was junk. The impression I got was that it worked sort of like an antique mall for records: Independent sellers lay out their wares and the guy at the counter keeps track of who sells what. It was confusing until I found one or two little rows of modern indie rock 7”s and promptly spent an hour and a half combing through 45s from bands I’d never heard of. This is one of my favorite fucking things on the planet. The overhead is minimal, so I’m more likely to make an investment in something that just plain looks cool or I have even remotely heard of on the off chance it’s something tasty. Even if I had picked up a copy of this when it was released in 2008 (I’m pretty sure I attended the release party for this 7” and did not purchase a copy because it was during my “I’m about to graduate college and am currently unemployed and have no money” period (not to be confused with my current “I graduated college five years ago and am underemployed and the bulk of my extra money to Sallie Mae” period). While I always liked seeing Bandit Teeth and the Dactyls play live, I never really had any desire to listen to them outside of the Replay Lounge. It’s funny, because I listened to Bandit Teeth auxiliary projects Blood on the Wall and Rooftop Vigilantes at great length at home and in the car. Their contribution to this 7”—“Pajamazon”—is bringing back some fun memories. The nice thing about Bandit Teeth was that the Brad, Zach and Charley all seemed like this was the band that brought them the most joy. The band that was the most fun to be in just because they had all been buddies for forever. It’s ramshackle indie rock with some crustier garage influences. The Dactyls’ fondness for the glory days of indie rock was always firmly apparent. The specter of Pavement was always in the air anytime that played. They seemed so influenced by Pavement I remember remarking that it was strange they didn’t do a one off Pavement tribute because they would have been so good at that. They ultimately grew out of the Pavement knock-off and into a well rounded college rock troupe that seemed content to not set the world on fire and to exist as one of the better openers that Lawrence had to offer to national touring acts. This 7” is stirring up a massive wave of nostalgia for what was at my absolute worst.  My most dickheaded, my most drunk, my most destructive, and most ready to get the fuck out of Lawrence as soon as humanly possible. It’s all kind of funny in hindsight. A period jam packed with reality lessons that helped me grow and learn from my mistakes sound tracked by one of the better periods in the Lawrence Music Scene.

Even though it has only been five years, almost all evidence of these songs ever existing has seemingly vanished from the internet and I'm wishing I had a USB turntable to share these tracks. Preserve them in amber as an artifact of the time when $2 cans of PBR were king.

Here is what is left of Bandit Teeth

Here is what is left of the Dactyls

Gut Feeling: Hospital Ships - Destruction In Yr Soul

Hospital Ships – Destruction in Yr Soul

Graveface, 2013

 

In March of 2004, during my senior year of high school, I drove to Lawrence with my sister to see John Vanderslice. I can’t remember why my sister went with me, we never really hang out, but it was nice. It was an infinitely-late-for-a-school-night show at the Bottleneck and when we got there the opening band, Minus Story, was having a hell of a time getting set up. At this point in my youth I had been to maybe five shows on my own or with friends. It was still very new experience (my mother flat-out refused to let me go to KC or Lawrence until I was 18, and because of Catholic guilt, I mostly obeyed…mostly). “That band has TWO drumsets! Isn’t that wild!” I remember thinking. There were 8 people on stage (I’m sure it was fewer but it felt like there were 8 people on stage) and when the band finally played I experienced a very intense excitement. I’d just committed to KU a few days before and was moving up to Lawrence in the fall and here was a Lawrence band and they were weird and great and I’d go to the Bottleneck and see them all the time (although I think at that time Minus Story might still have been hailing from Boonville, MO but they might as well have been from Lawrence considering they were on almost every bill for every show I saw Freshman year). The next band was Okkervil River, who totally blew me away as they played to the 8 people who’d come out for JV. Okkervil River right when their second album Down the River of Golden Dreams came out and look at them now! And they’re one of my favorite bands! I always felt like that show was mythical. I loved JV and wanted to go, but it was gonna go way late and I had to get up way early the next day but I went anyway.

Now it’s almost ten years later and I’m listening to Hospital Ships frontman Jordan Geiger’s third album under the Hospital Ships moniker and I’m giddily thinking that I couldn’t possibly be more over the moon about this record. I was over moon about the last one, too. And when Hospital Ships’ debut Oh, Ramona came out the same time as Rooftop Vigilantes Carrot Atlas (both bands were inexplicably featured on Stereogum) it seemed to herald a new wave of local music. To watch a band grow by leaps and bounds over the span of three albums is a marvelous, marvelous thing. There is nothing more satisfying than having a set of expectations for the next album only to find that the band has exceeded them. Jordan Geiger has grown Hospital Ships into a full band and is making his best music yet. Everything on Destruction in Yr Soul clicks. Though Geiger’s voice seems particularly well suited for sadness, he has a gift for brightening up the elements around him. The band finally feels like it’s outgrown its bedroom origins. You can almost hear wizard-esque producer John Congleton coaxing the band out of its shell and into this big place of absolute potential. The album is monumentally bigger in scope than its predecessors, but feels like an entirely different animal. The songs roam these big sonic landscapes and while they have free reign to move around, they feel meticulously directed and lovingly crafted. Mostly, Destruction in Yr Soul makes me antsier than ever to move back to Lawrence, set down my roots, and enjoy this hearty Midwestern indie rock on a regular basis.

Fag Cop - Complete Shit Volume 1

Fag Cop – Complete Shit Volume 1 7”

Eat Records, 2008

Acquired: Fag Cop Live Show, New, 2008

Price: $5

 

Once I went to see Fag Cop in the basement of the Eighth Street Taproom and I couldn’t hear right for three straight days. I blame that show for the lion’s share of the hearing damage acquired from years of going to shows without earplugs. Seriously, everything was dulled for THREE days after that show. Because these motherfuckers play loud. Loud is overrated. Something used as a substitute for substance. Granted, considering that literally anyone can start a punk band, punk rock really doesn’t need to have a lot of substance. Which is perfectly fine. Everything on this 7” is distorted to within an inch of its life. The guitars, the drums, the bass, the vocals. All of it sounds like it’s going to fall apart if you so much as look at it wrong. As much as I think it takes minimal effort to make noisy punk rock, Fag Cop was one of the better Lawrence bands from the post-Anniversary era. They seemed to give less of a fuck than other bands, which I liked. The fun they were having was genuine, or seemed genuine at least. Despite the hearing damage, their live shows were a blast, and it barely needs to be mentioned that a band like this is built for live shows. The recordings are more like an obligation rather than something seriously labored over.