"Get Ready To Boink with the Boynks"

Or: The Musical Genius of Randall Peck


The Boynks
Get Ready To Boink with the Boynks
(Mr. Basement's House of Hidden Agenda, 2011)

*** Just who are these Boynks who wish us to boink with them? ***

The Backstory: Back in the early '80s, I had the pleasure/privilege of playing drums with Randy Peck, Jay Ludwig, Rick & Stephanie Eney, and Katie "Katatonic" Glancy in a pop music group called The Boatniks. We wore silly sailor caps and Hawaiian shirts and celebrated middle class life in our 'hood, the azalea- and rhododentrum-covered suburbs.


Boatniks' '81 World Cruise

Katie and I were freshly departed from punk band Thee Katatonix, and emerged from the rough-and-tumble sonic wilderness of the Marble Bar Scene to serve an apprenticeship under the song-writing workshop that was the Boatniks - an ensemble in which Peck, Ludwig and the Eneys all wrote songs (Jay and Randy even helped me out, like Beatles Paul and John with Ringo, on my "Bake You a Bundt" and "Teenybopper" songs).


Boatniks songwriters Jay Ludwig & Randy Peck

But it was Randy Peck's "pure unadulterated pop music" song stylings that most impressed me; influenced in equal parts by the lyrical inventiveness of Elvis Costello and the melodic, harmonious musical leanings of his beloved Brian Wilson-led Beach Boys, Randy's songs pointed to all the signposts Katie and I loved in pop music: British Invasion, The Beatles, The Zombies, The Raspberries, Badfinger, 10cc. It was Pure Pop for Then People, Old School pretty three-minute melodies in an era of harsh-sounding punk rock and the cold synth-heavy sang froid of postpunk music. In a word, it was kinda corny compared to what was on the MTV and radio airwaves then. The words were clever and humorous, if you stopped to listen to them, and the melodies were unabashedly pretty. And the "middle eights"! These were a revelation to Katie and I, accustomed as we were to the one-note simplicity and repetitive three-chord onslaught of punk. The songs even celebrated love without irony - OK, maybe some irony in lines like "I bought some pizza and I saw your face in it" from Peck's masterpiece "The Honky Tonk Is Over" (which won a songwriting competition and landed us free studio recording time and a gig at Washington, DC's The Bayou). Which is why I liked it. Plus, I learned how to play drums in the Boatniks, after years of faking it (though few were fooled!) in Thee Katatonix.


The little drummer boy became a man - thanks to the Boatniks!

Post-Boatniks, Randy Peck played for a while in Saddle Soar, went to culinary school, became a chef, got married, and became Randall Peck. But he never stopped writing songs and recording them in his basement (on analog tape, the dominant medium of the time) with the most rudimentary of instrumentation (Randy was never one for fancy tech gear - back then he'd just as soon use chopsticks and an ashtray for drums rather than buy a beatbox!). The only change since then has been technology; he's gone digital, invested in a few electronic gizmos, and now records onto CDs instead of tape. But his studio is still his basement, where he retires after a hard day at work to record his musings about life and love. And, like his muse Brian Wilson, he can create a whole mini-orchestra of sound working at his own pace in the comfort of his home.

On a recent visit to Randall's workplace, he gave me a copy of one of his latest home productions, which was called Get Ready To Boink with The Boynks. Though the attractively packaged CD attributed the music to The Boynks - specifically "Chad Boynk" and "Gordon Boynk" on guitar, "Kirby Carlisle" on keys, "Christian Velcro" on bass, and "Nigel Tripper" on drums - they are merely Brit Invasion Boy Band standins for one-man band Randall Peck himself.


RP: The One-man Band

Randall explained, "I figured you would 'get' this one because we like the same kind of stuff that no one I work with, these kids, appreciate. You know, Raspberries, Beatles, 10cc, Badfinger..." Yes, the usual pop suspects. He added, "And it's real poppy and uptempo, unlike some of my other stuff, so I had a feeling you'd appreciate it."


It's official: I'm a Fan!

Well, I do appreciate it - and I think others will too. Too bad Big Deal and Not Lame and those other power pop labels aren't around anymore, because Randall Peck's Boynks CD could be released on them as is. It's that good and that pro. For, like Mark Harp and Mark O'Connor (another former Towsonite, who made his "mark" with OHO, Food for Worms, Dark Side and B.L.A.M.M.O.), Randall is another local songwriting genius I've had the privilege of knowing (and wish more people knew about); Harpo is gone (well before his time - Goddammit!), but like Mark O'Connor, Randall is one of those creative-type dreamers (and full-time romantic, to boot) who will never stop plugging away, making home recordings of his music (a genre I hereby christen "Basement Beat"). To be Randall Peck is to create, whether it be cookin' up food or sounds. And if music be the food of love, as Shakespeare said, play on.

And speaking of play on, play on we shall...

*** OK, Now Get Ready To Boink with the Boynks! ***



I played the Boynks CD on my way home and was so excited that I played it next for my classic pop-loving girlfriend Amy. She loved it as well, and we both agreed that two things stood out almost immediately: 1) Randall loves the Beatles (whose influence is everywhere) - not to mention Elvis Costello (listen for the Steve Nieve-styled keyboard riffs) and The Zombies (all those harpsichord sounds and minor keys) and The Beach Boys (Brian Wilson was and will always be his Obi-Wan Kenobi mentor) - and 2) Randall loves kissing. In fact, we couldn't remember an album that so celebrated kissing, the lip-smacking phenomenon known alternately as "First Base" or "Oral Sex" to our Baby Boomer generation. (Alas, I believe today's cut-to-the-chase, 4G-speed cream-on-demand generation considers cunnilingus and fellatio "First Base.") At least a half dozen songs either specifically mention kissing ("Wake Up Baby It's Time To Kiss") or are orally fixated on the mouth and bussing. I, for one, find oscullation incredibly sexy, as did wrestler-turned-politician Jesse Ventura when he likened the act of face-chewing to "Two carp goin' after the same piece of corn." (A beautiful image for a beautiful act of intimacy, no?) But to Randall, kissing is as romantic as it gets and he's far from tongue-tied in celebrating the elation that comes when two tingles intermingle.


Randall Peck: Bitten by the Kissing Bug?

And, with my flair for the obvious (it's a true gift), I would add a third glaring observation: 3) Randall loves being in love. Following is the evidence to support my case:

Tuned In: Track by Track

1. "HEY GWENDOLYN"

"There she is full of fizz, just about to pop/All the while I just smile and I cannot stop/Hey Gwendolyn, you make gray skies blue/Hey Gwendolyn, I'm so turned on by you."



Things kick off with a blast of irresistably catchy fun (and yet another song to add to my A-Z List of Girl's Name Songs) flavored with Zombies-styled harpischord sounds and lyrics celebrating the Zen of Gwen. "Smartly dressed, she's the best you will ever find." In Arthurian legend, Gwendolyn was Merlin the magician's wife; in modern times, she's simply the girl who's cast a spell over RP.

Oral Fixation Factor: "To the lips takes a sip, spills some on her blouse/After tea, nuzzles me, plants one on my mouth."

2. "HOW COULD I FALL IN BED WITH A GIRL LIKE YOU?"


Romance Downy Ocean

A poignant and uptempo break-up song that unfolds at a Beach Boys setting, Downy Ocean ("You went off on vacation/I'm alone at the beach"), but while Brian Wilson preached that the girls on the beach were all within reach (if you knew what to do), Randall instead finds himself out of his depth: "Now I'm drowning in sorrow, and my beach towel is wet/You have taught me a lesson I will never forget..." but seems resigned to his plight. He had his thrill and got stung by the jellyfish of love. "There will be no tomorrow, I know that we are through/How could I fall in bed with a girl like you?"

Oral Fixation Factor: "You are sweeter than sugar/When you melt in my mouth..."

3. "WAKE UP BABY IT'S TIME TO KISS"


Only shallow non-romantics forgo kissing

To paraphrase Mssrs. Hall & Oates, this "Kiss" is on my list of the best things in life. (Quite a different take on rising-with-the-sun morning fun from Ian Dury's "Wake Up Make Love with Me"!) Personally, the first thing on my mind when I emerge from the Land of Nod is peeing and gargling with mouthwash, but Randall's a romantic who's allowed poetic license.

I am a fool for you, I love you through and through
I only go to be bed to wake up next to you

Wake up, roll over (sha la la) and join me in my bliss
This is one of those moments (sha la la) that I refuse to miss
Hello, good morning (sha la la) - wake up baby it's time to kiss

4. "ONCE AGAIN THAT GIRL IS ON MY MIND"



Another girl crush song, this one finds Randall obsessively pining every minute and every hour for someone he sees in every bouquet of flowers and even in his "toast with jam and tea." She's "one too many, all too much, one of a kind," small wonder that "once again that girl is on my mind."

Oral Fixation Factor: "Even when I lay my head, her name's my final breath/I dream about her every night, kissing me to death."

5. "IF SHE KNEW"


If she knew...

Randall's variation on The Beatles' "If I Fell." But the classic heart-felt ballad structure isn't limited to just the Fab Four, as I also hear the love-smitten inclinations of Brian Wilson circa "God Only Knows."

Oral Fixation Factor: "If she knew that I really want to kiss her/She may even laugh, if she knew."

6. "ALL-WEATHER SUNSHINE HAPPINESS GIRL"



Exhilirating upbeat ditty that walks on sunshine, regardless of weather advisory.

"She look so good, she looks so cute
She's on the town in her electric suit
She plugs it in and does a twirl
She's my All-Weather Sunshine Happiness Girl"

"She knows her Bach, she knows Chopin
She knows that shit like the back of her hand
She's an endless string of cultured pearls
She's my All-Weather Sunshine Happiness Girl"

Oral Fixation Factor: "Well she kisses hard and she kisses deep, and still makes love when she's half asleep."

7. "THING FOR YOU"


Got a Thing - for you!

A finger-snappin', toe-tappin' honky-tonkin' good-time romp. Randall may have honed his Country & Western chops during his stint in Saddle Soar, but the country-flavored pop in this song is more of the Beatles variety circa "Act Natural."

8. "DADDY I WRECKED THE CAR"



As a survivor of one too many heavy metal crashes in my wayward youth, I'm greatly amused by this clever, fast-paced pop song. Maybe Randall the Dad is anticipating the not-so-distant future when his kid will get his license - and become an insurance liability. (Ah, the Parent Trap.) Junior not only laments wrecking the car while out driving with a girl from outer space, but also wrecking the house (he was just doing his homework when somehow a party boke out), and finally wrecking his mind:

"My mind, my mind, Daddy I wrecked my mind
I took a little something I don't understand
That I got last week from the Ice Cream Man..."

Ha! I remember back at college the ice cream man was the campus drug dealer (was it that way everywhere? Has the Drug-Dealing Ice Cream Man become a counter-culture stereotype?).

Nice freakout - and guitar solo - during the middle jam. As Freakbeat revivalist Dave Cawley says, whenever you're rockin' out and run out of words, just scream "Wahhhhhhh!" and wail, baby! Works every time!

9. "GIRL IN THE WINDOW"


Window shopping for love

Very Zombies-like neo-psych. I can easily imagine Colin Bluntstone singing this over Rod Argent's farfisa organ; in fact, the song has a '60s Swingin' London feel with lines like those below evoking images of whatever Brit "It" Girl - Julie Christie, Twiggy, Jeannie Shrimpton, Marianne Faithful, Jane Asher - tickles one's retro fancy:

"When she purses her lips and starts to flirt - Girl in the Window
In her go-go boots and miniskirt - Girl in the Window
Well she's just the coolest thing I've ever found
So bear with me, while I expound: Girl in the Window."

Oral Fixation Factor: "She can play it cool, she can play it hard/As she blows French kisses to the Palace Guard."

10. "SUDDEN SORROW"



There's a vacancy I have inside, and it's where true love resides
Without warning, weeping quietly, a gentle wave sweeps over me
And I feel a sudden sorrow in my heart when I think about losing her

A remembrance of past love lost, l'amour perdu. Don't we all have one (or two, or three)? Bury those memories as we might, they still come back to us at unexpected moments - during a rainfall, looking through a photo album, passing an old dating haunt. Not an uptempo toe-tapper, but then sorrow isn't supposed to be.

11. "HOT TUB LOVE"



"Hot tub love, come join me in the jets/Hot tub love, let's make it a duet."

The album mood changes instantly from "Sudden Sorrow" to wet-and-wild fun in this sonic splash about really hot love. "Hot tub love, I miss you when you're gone/Hot tub love, the meter is still on/So crawl back in, and let the fun begin, with your hot tub love."

12. "PASSING ON A TRAIN"



Ships pass in the night and trains pass in vain, with barely time for fledgling flirtations to form ("You were gone just as fast as when you came"). But a glimpse of a girl with hat and gloves and bonnet on - looking "sweet in the gentle London rain" - is enough to fill the narrator with regret:

You were passing on a train that was stopped for a moment in the dark
Just long enough for that face to break my heart (doesn't it figure?)

I love the opening train sound effects, as well as the delightful nod to the Beach Boys at the end of the middle passage that recalls their acapella chorale showpiece "Our Prayer." It's only a snippet, but it's yet another reminder of Brian Wilson's pervasive influence on RP's songwriting. Paul Westerberg never travels far without a little Big Star; Randall never leaves ground without his Pet Sounds.

13. "PLANET LOVE"



"I'll take you where the stars light your hair
It's almost time - we're almost there, on Planet Love."

This dreamy ballad closes the album of a leisurely, lilting note and sort of reminds me of Santo and Johnny's "Sleep Walk" (which was famously covered by another of Randall's favorite '60s artists, The Ventures) as crooned (with an occasional hiccup) in his best emo-Elvis P. voice. It's meant to sound corny with the ice-rink organs and such, but I find it charming as Randall sings of love taking flight at the speed of light before reaching the final destination: "We'll crash, we'll burn, we'll land on Planet Love."

*** Final Thoughts ***

This is easily the best new music I've heard all year, with more melodic hooks and catchy choruses in one album than some songwriters manage in their whole careers. It's also one of the greatest feel-good discs you could ever pop into your CD player and immediately feel like you're walking on sunshine. It's already taken the edge off my normal road rage during the morning commute downtown to work. Lennon & McCartney...Bacharach-David...Elvis Costello...Brian Wilson...Bob Dylan...Graham Gouldman...Ray Davies...Todd Rundgren...Dee Dee Ramone...Randall Peck. Yes, that's right - I mention him in the same breath because he can take his rightful place alongside these legends as a fellow popsmith extraordinaire. I'm not kidding. In my musical wonderland, he goes toe to toe with the heavyweights and more than holds his own.

And yet I wonder how many people will ever hear his back catalog. He's so modest about his talent that Randall reminds me of those non-traditional "outsider" artists whose work is only discovered after the fact when it's displayed at the American Visionary Art Museum. You know - the unheralded artist who works a day job and comes home at night to create a secret cache of awe-inspiring works that remain unseen by the public until he dies and the landlady cleans out his room and donates them to a museum. So too does Randall create these recordings that are only known to a select few cadre of friends and associates. But that seems to be just fine by him. He loves making music and these songs are like his day journal, his diary, an audio scrapbook of who he was and what he was thinking at a certain point in his life.



Back in the Boatniks days, our "Ahoy Maties" press kit said this about Randall: "Randy's been happy lately...The happiest day of his life just might be tomorrow." Going by the sounds on Get Ready To Boink with the Boynks, it looks like that day is here - and how!

My Ego Knows No Bounds

Looking at myself through the mirror of cyberspace

My past is history, my future a mystery...OK, so here's some history, as I continue to delve through the detritus of my post-Spring Cleaning gleanings to live in hindsight's golden vision...

Old "Found Fotos" of Tommy Gunn


Katatonix drummer "Tommy Gunn"

Geezus, lookit that hair! That's me as Thee Katatonix drummer "Tommy Gunn" (yes, I took my nom de stage from the Clash song - not the poet Thom Gunn) playing at some God-awful shithole in the God-awful Shithole Days. What a scrappy looking kit, too; I think my floor tom is literally sitting on the floor! I bought that kit for a song from a law student who needed to buy new textbooks.


A more respectable, cleaned-up Tommy Gunn

Well, at least the hair's shorter. Must be from our April 1979 debut at Towson's Oddfellow's Hall. I was still wearing my college uniform of button-down blue shirt and cordoroy pants. For some strange reason, I never wore jeans during my college career; either I was subconsciously rebelling against Hippie fashion or my years in a preppy high school ingrained in me the vanilla-blandness of the WASP Dress Code. Full disclosure: I even wore a Kelly green cable-knit sweater to band practice!


Longshot of Tommy manning his Gunns

Above is my fave pic from this era as, from a distance I kinda resemble Paul Weller playing drums. (Though a co-worker thought I looked more like a blonde Beatle - would that make me "Blingo Starr"?) Note the cinder block in front of the open face bass drum. My kit used to move around stage. Sometimes I had bassist Katie Katatonic stand in front of it, but she was a lightweight and her lithe frame was easily tossed aside like a leaf-blowin'-in-the-wind by the savage force of my off-beat pounding.

Speaking of savage poundings, my Big Beat became so legendary that cartoonist (and punk rock enthusiast) Ned Riddle asked me to pose for one of his "Mr. Tweedy" strips, as shown below:



Ha! Tweedy, pure hi-larity!

And speaking of 'toons, no one made the Kats look better than George Wilcox (or was it Dave?) in his "The Band That Adds Assault To Insult" flyer:



Being a Towson State University guy, I used to hang out a lot at Oddfellows Hall, which was just up the street from the university (or "Towson You-Adversity" as we called it affectionately) across from what is now the Recher Theatre (then the Towson Theatre), where there was also head shop, a Little Tavern and an Old Man's Bar called The Kent Lounge (a personal fave dive, as Sourcis attracted high school kids with fake IDs and The Crease was a lacrosse/preppy hangout). As the name implies, it attracted a "Beautiful Weirdo" demographic of punks, hippies, druggies, rock musicians, and other social misfits. Below I can be seen cavorting with TSU Class Clown Marty Benson (aka Dimi Petrol and Dr. Bongo) in my Clockwork Orange Droogie ensemble. I remember Marty always called me "Von Tom." Oh, this was Halloween, hence the festive garb.


Clowning around at Oddfellows Hall, Halloween 1979

Funny thing is, I did used to wear that getup - the bowler derby hat, long black overcoat (I called it my "deathcoat" - this was years before the dour, dark "Columbine Look"), dark sunglasses and cords - around campus on occasion.

Though sometimes I let my guard - and pants - down. (I was single, after all!)

Still Katatonic After All These Years

Thanks Hon: Thee Katatonix 30th Anniversary
Thee Katatonix
UK Spud, 2009

Excellent singles compilation highlighting local band's glorious mid-'80s neo-psychedelic period.

Forward into the past...

Adolf Kowalski just mailed me this latest "new" Katatonix CD - a collection of choice singles (and one new "bonus" track) by my old band's best lineup of Kowalski and Mr. Urbanity and various bass players and drummers (but mostly "Beautiful" Tony Belle on bass and "Big" Andy Small on the skins) - in honor of the 30th anniversary of the group's founding in 1979...(though the groundwork for the band was set in motion, amidst puffs of hemp and gulps of Blackberry brandy, in the fall of 1978 in Towson State University's wooded "Glen" - where freshman Ross "Adolf Kowalski" Haupt, freshwoman Katie "Katatonic" Glancy, and jaded junior Tommy "Gunn" Warner decided Punk Rock was the answer to their dying-of-boredom-in-the-'burbs collegiate blues - we didn't start playing out until our debut/debacle at Towson's Oddfellows Hall in April 1979.) Katie Katatonic and I (Tommy Gunn) are not on this CD at all, and that's why I like it...in fact, though Adolf probably didn't appreciate it at the time, Katie and I did him a big favor by quitting Thee Katatonix at the end (literally, as it was New Year's Eve) of 1980. When we stopped playing music, that's when the band really started to play music. (I'd like to think the Thanks Hon title is a subconcious salute to the Tom and Katie bailout. If so, you're welcome - we did it all for you!)


That Year's Model: Katie Katatonic, Tommy Gunn and Adolf K. in 1979

Adolf, for one, grew as a songwriter when he started playing with real musicians. And he started playing with a real good one named Charlie Gatewood (pictured right), a Peabody-trained guitarist who had been playing in rockabilly and reggae bands before he started going to see punk shows (like the Katatonix) at the Marble Bar and succumbed to Adolf's considerable charms (we all did - that's why Katie and I ultimately had to leave; otherwise, we'd still be driving around in Adolf's station wagon playing gigs well into our 50s! Adolf was a born salesman...in fact, the first time I met him in the TSU Glen he was dressed in his afterschool Macy's salesclerk duds - I'll never forget he wore a navy blazer with green plaid pants!).

Goodtime Charlie became "Mr. Urbanity" - Charlie claims I gave him this nickname based on his urbane culture vulture background (he read French Symbolist poets and knew how to tune guitars, which made him a Rhode Scholar in my eyes) - and initially played bass (a little Hofner, like McCartney) with the new "The Name But Not As Lame Kats." I honestly wish I had stuck around the Kats to be in that lineup, because I would have liked to have been one of the boys in this edition, but Katie and I were a package deal and, personally, I was frustrated with not recording; I wanted something to show for all the gigging; ironically, our 1979-1980 Edition Kats tunes would not make it onto vinyl until we moved on. It was as a trio (Charlie, Adolf and new drummer "Big" Andy Small) that the Kats released their first EP in 1983, which featured two Original Edition Kowalski-penned tunes "Valentines Day" and "Basket Case" as well as the new "Joie de Vivre." I dunno what started the French song title kick (see also "Maison le Rock"), but I liked it.

Then, in 1984 the new Kats, with Charlie firmly entrenched as lead guitarist and augmented by new bass player St. Anthony (he cured a ham), released Phase 1 of their psychedelic-makeover mission statement: Divine Mission. Though the sound was still predominantly punk during this transitional period (songs like "Beltway Beat" would have fit in our set lists from 1980), you could feel Mr. Urbanity's influence. His blistering lead guitar work refurbished the old Kowalski-Gunn chestnut "Fungus" as a psychedelic rave-up while the Urbanity-Kowalski two-guitar attack and vocal harmonies on "End of An Era" recalled the Pete Shelley and Steve Diggle formula circa the Buzzcocks' most progressive pop record, 1980's A Different Kind of Tension. Though credited to Kowalski/Urbanity/Small, I suspect Adolf was the driving force behind the album's best cut (and my 2nd all-time Kats fave song), "Maison le Rock," especially lyrically ("She's a junked-out girl/Like shoveled snow/But she was something to eat/She spent all my dough" - love it!). Still, Urbanity's "Shake Shake" and "Chain Letter" signaled a new sound and lyrical direction; small wonder they were the lead-off tunes on both sides of the album, etsbalishing a precedent that would be hard to shake (or shake shake).

By 1985, the punk-to-neo-psychedelic transformation was complete and singles like Charlie's A-side "Daisy Chain" were getting heavy rotation on WCVT, no doubt benefitting from a nationwide psych revival spearheaded by LA "Paisley Underground" bands like The Dream Syndicate, Three O'Clock, and Rain Parade. This was the band's Golden Era, with national tours, TV appearances and regular radio airplay and...I hate to say it, but the fact is, it was Charlie's songs ("Daisy Chain," "We Need a House," "Book of Love") that led the way and propelled The Great Leap Forward musically. Good as Adolf's songs were ("Not Excited," "Something For You") - and they were now incorporating retro-sounding keyboard parts as well as guitar power chords - they still seemed rooted in the old cock-rock punk 'tude; maybe this was because to these ears, it sounded too much like what I was familiar with the first go-round '79-'80. Adolf was a frontman and showman par excellance and this was always his band, so it took someone special to make him share the spotlight; Charlie was that person, and to Adolf's credit he let him shine. The result was a more perfect union of songwriting.

Thanks Hon: 30th Anniversary

Which brings us to the 30th anniversary platter on UK Spud which, just like 1984's Divine Mission, is "produced by money and Thee Katatonix."

Once again Mr. Urbanity bats leadoff, opening with the best song Thee Katatonix ever recorded, "Ordinary Sunday"; it also sets the track template as, from this point, Urbanity and Kowalski alternate songs until Adolf's 11th "bonus" track at the end.

1. "Ordinary Sunday" (Urbanity) *****

"Ordinary Sunday" was the tune with which they made their TV debut on Baltimore's latenight dance show Shakedown - I can still recall going to the TV party over at WCVT DJ Rod Misey's apartment (this was in the days before Tivo, when you actually had to stay up late to see shows on in the wee small hours) to watch Charlie and Adolf rock out in with their matching Gibson SG guitars, their faces hidden by cascading hair and their skinny-ass torsos draped in beads and psychedelic shirts. Charlie especially was the picture of cool, looking like Cramps voodoo guitarist Bryan Gregory as he blew the hair away from his face to deliver his biting opening refrain "I was coming undone, because of an experience..."


"Ordinary Sunday" on Shakedown TV show

Charlie's poetic imagery is delivered in stream-of-conscious shotgun blasts - "Late afternoon by receding shoreline, near the scene of an accident, Perfumed bedroom/ black shoes/you're doomed, keep in mind it was an ordinary Sunday...late afternoon by imposing skyline, industrial forefront of our hometown, smokestack/water black/black pool/we're cool ...keep in mind it was an ordinary Sunday..." Bathe yourself in local color; you may never pass this way again.

2. "Crown" (Kowalski) ***
Nice intro and great soloing between the verses highlight this bitter love song in which Adolf laments that he's the King of Sorrow Tomorrowland and wears a crown of thorns around his heart (ouch!). I like the lines "Oriental schoolgirl flash a smile at me, while she holds her boyfriend tight, she knows I think of her at night, but she crossed me out because I'm white" (double ouch!).

3. "We Need A House" (Urbanity) ***
A long, layered guitars-and-synths intro leads into a song about alienation that continues to mount tension, like Led Zep's "Kashmir," as Charlie explains to his daughter Eleanor, "...we need a house with a little room outside the rooms inside, one that we could hide away in a day or two..." Home fires burn while the world passes outside.

4. "Something For You" (Kowalksi) ***
Adolf's Farfisa-sounding organ dominates this mid-tempo ballad...

5. "Mexican Hat" (Urbanity) ***
Peppy oddity with interesting bridge.

6. "Not Excited" (Kowalksi) ****
Once again Charlie and Adolf's guitars evoke the pop-punk Buzzcocks sound (always a good thing) on this non-stop rocker that's interlaced with organ riffing.

7. "Book of Love" (Urbanity) *****
"I want to read the book of love/I want to know the things you've done between the covers/I don't want to read the story between the lines..." Great psych anthem with Charlie even throwing in a teasing reggae riff on the bridge (it reminds me of Jonathan Richman and The Modern Lovers' "Egyptian Reggae") and a kick-ass middle eight leading into Adolf's organ solo. Along with "Daisy Chain," perhaps the band's greatest uptempo tune, driven along nicely by Andy Small's big beat. Infectiously catchy.


"Book of Love" live on SFTV

8. "Home Alone" (Kowalski) ** 1/2
"Don't go home alone, we gotta have a bone..." Cock-rock bragadaccio ("You know we like them, we like the little girls...") about the boys in the band getting take-out. Nice work if you can get it. Redeemed by the dueling guitars slugfest. Originally appeared as B-side of the "Daisy Chain" single.

9. "Daisy Chain" (Urbanity) ****
"People come and go, there's some things we may never know/We all sleep, but no two dream the same..." Perfect pop, peppily-paced, with cool solo and backing chorus - all clocking in at 2 minutes and eleven seconds. Deceptively flower-powery until the "Hope you choke on your beautiful daisy chain" end.

10. "F*** You" (Kowalski, 2008) ***
Adolf takes the old Kowalksi-Gunn number "Stretch Marx," beefs up the guitars and disposes of my disposable lyrics (no loss there!), replacing them with this fricative-friendly snarling retort to any and all Kats kritics. A rose by any other name, still smells as sweet...

11. Super Groovy Bonus Track (Kowalksi, 2009) **
Interesting guitar motif anchors this introspective brooder that finds Adolf moaning like Ghost Host. "I'm a changer rearranger...I've been observed, I've been observed..." Far from super groovy, but then again, as Adolf K.'s previous ditty advised, if youse don't like it: "F*** You"!

Related Links:
Thee Katatonix website