— or at least that’s what this one guy from pitchfork calls it. and i gotta say he’s right on the money.
i stumbled across these guys searching out, related-video-by-related-video, anything else that might sound remotely similar to lewis, and then got this:
HOLY CRUPUP, right, folks?! this is incredible!
today’s been quite the goldmine for historically-ignored-yet-still-totally-mindblowing-hits-from-unexpected-corners-of-the-world-that-seemingly-define-yet-brilliantly-sythesize-and-extend-all-contemporaneous-genres. i spent the morning, for example, rediscovering Amanaz, who set the soundtrack to most of my sophomore year of college with their Africa [1975]:
(this, too, was supposed to get its own blogpost. i mean, when i said we were gonna bring this thing back this year, i really meant it! anyway, soon, next time: post-glam-rock velvet underground-sy futures in zambia!)
BUT: let’s march ourselves back to the subject at hand! apparently, this album is a pretty big deal. a big deal because it got released a couple of years back and caused quite a critical stink over on the blogs (apparently it is — appropriately! — beloved as the same dude from the Out of the Bubbling Dusk blog that championed our buddy Lewis!); but it’s a bigger deal because of the way these boys (aged 17 & 19 when the record was released) came to put it together.
in fruitland, washington.
these two kids apparently grew up on some sort of lumber plantation, and had a daddy with a dream that this little sprouts would grow up and become a rock band. he apparently built them a log-cabin-studio, mortgaged the farm to fund their self-styled vanity recording project, and also threw in a nice perk — a gigantic rock’n’roll arena/coliseum. all out in the great emerson-family woods!
although andy beta and folks around the internet make alot of the similarities between the emerson boys and the shaggs, and like to emphasize their apparent regional isolation, pieces on the emerson wonders also acknowledge that they were avid listeners to that great american mid-70s rrradio. although the disastrous commercial failure of their only recording makes a grand story in print (much like the stories of the mysteries of lewis!), i’d be curious to know more about the circumstances surrounding its production and attempts at chart success. it wasn’t, by any means, out of the picture — not with a song like this:
i think this might be the best new song i’ve heard all year. i mean — this is so clearly, undeniably, a rock’n’roll song. i’m listening to it for the fourth time in a row right now. i don’t think i can stop. i don’t plan on stopping anytime soon.
i mean, come on!:
life was easy in the country/
country’s goin’ side-to-side (?)/
i could love you in the springtime/
that’s when my heart comes around — oh yeah!
*
take it! come and love me, anymore!
take it! come and love me — oh yeah!
pure rock glory if i’ve ever been bathed in it.
other cuts off the record run more soulful:
this is adorable:
— glad to see that these kids are finally getting the recognition they deserve. it’s incredible to think how much more stuff like this is out there; and we’re very lucky, i think, to live in an age that’s such a hotbed for incredible historic-y re-release labels who spend their time and lives diggin’ this stuff up, saving it from obscurity, and putting the stories together. more on them, too, later, because: without whom not.
but, for now, i’ll leave you with their biggest hit (apparently covered by lots of dub-steppers and rappers? or maybe i’m inventing that because all of the emerson bros. youtube videos have ‘KID CUDI SENT ME HERE’ scrawled in the comments), which lacks the clear-hearted rock’n’roll lou-reedy stomp-drive of “Good Time,” but is haunting in its own “Rainin’ In My Heart” sort of way:
(this just in from jeff & the New York Times — it wasn’t this album, but donnie’s solo project, that bankrupted the Family Emerson. also a great photo and some other amazing d.i.y. flops-turned-re-releases to check out here, at Bubbling Dusk!)
alright! no more for now ’cause i gotta go buy this record. pals, it’s good to be back. and remember:
“it’s alright to sit beside me/
’cause i’m gonna love you tonight — oh yeah!”
xo,
jess!
gittin' along without dogies 