Screaming Trees: Anthology: SST Years 1985 - 1989 (1991)

 

VAN CONNER, the bassist who cofounded the influential hard-rock group Screaming Trees

alongside his brother, Gary Lee, and singer Mark Lanegan, has died. “Van Conner bassist and songwriter of Screaming Trees died last night of an extended illness at 55,” Gary Lee wrote on Facebook. “It was pneumonia that got him in the end. He was one of the closest friends I ever had and I loved him immensely. I will miss him forever and ever and ever.”
                               

Van Conner (March 17, 1967 – January 18, 2023) was an American rock musician, best known as the bassist for Screaming Trees. As a bass player in high school, Conner formed the band

Explosive Generation with his brother Gary Lee Conner and Mark Pickerel. That band later evolved into Screaming Trees with the addition of singer Mark Lanegan in 1985. The band moved from their native Ellensburg, Washington to Seattle in the late 1980s to join that city's burgeoning alternative rock scene. Conner played on seven studio albums with Screaming Trees until the band split in 2000.
                               

While he was with Screaming Trees, Conner formed the side project Solomon Grundy, in which he

MARK  LANEGAN

performed lead vocals and guitar. That band released an album in 1990, and during that period Conner also joined a live lineup of Dinosaur Jr. He later formed another side project called Gardener, which released an album in 1999. After the breakup of Screaming Trees, Conner worked as a session musician and had formed several additional alternative rock bands, including VALIS and Musk Ox.
                             

                                 
Screaming Trees was an American rock band formed in Ellensburg, Washington, in 1984 by vocalist

Mark Lanegan, guitarist Gary Lee Conner, bassist Van Conner, and drummer Mark Pickerel. Pickerel was replaced by Barrett Martin in 1991. Screaming Trees became known as one of the pioneers of grunge along with the Melvins, Mudhoney, U-Men, Skin Yard, Soundgarden, Green River, Malfunkshun, among others.
                           

                      
Although widely associated with grunge, the band's sound incorporated hard rock and psychedelic

elements. Screaming Trees was a unique voice in the Pacific Northwest "grunge" scene. Their sound was more psychedelic, garage-rock, and '70s hard rock influenced which made them stand out amongst their peers.
                          

The Conner brothers formed Screaming Trees with Mark Lanegan and Mark Pickerel in 1984 in

Ellensburg, Washington, a small town a little over 100 miles from Seattle. The band was drawn together in high school by an interest in punk, garage, and classic rock. 

                                

The band rehearsed at the Conner family's video rental store and recorded their demo tape Other Worlds

in the summer of 1985 with Steve Fisk at Creative Fire recording studio in Ellensburg. It was initially distributed by the independent label K Records. Other Worlds then got a wider release through the independent label, Velvetone Records (also based out of Ellensburg).
                                 

Screaming Trees – Anthology: SST Years 1985-1989
Label: SST Records – SST CD 260
Format: CD, Compilation
Country: US
Released: 1991
Genre: Rock
Style: Alternative Rock, Psychedelic Rock

TRAXS

                     

01. Barriers    2:53
02. The Turning    2:46
03. Other Worlds    2:39
04. Transfiguration    3:55
05. Don't Look Down    2:55
06. Cold Rain  (Backing Vocals – Rod Doak)   3:36
07. In The Forest    4:06
08. Back Together    2:15
09. Other Days And Different Planets    3:14
10. Walk Through To This Side    2:34
11. Smokerings    3:45
12. Ivy    3:19
13. Grey Diamond Desert   (Piano – Steve Fisk)   4:24
14. Night Comes Creeping    3:54
15. Invisible Lantern    3:04
16. Subtle Poison    3:51
17. Windows    2:42
18. Black Sun Morning  (Backing Vocals – Jack Endino)   5:01
19. Flower Web    3:41
20. End Of The Universe    5:48
21. Where The Twain Shall Meet    3:28

MP3 @320 Size: 171 MB
Flac  Size: 458 MB

            

Screaming Trees on Urban Aspirines HERE  

Screaming Trees : Uncle Anesthesia 1991

After a long career with independent label SST, the Screaming Trees arrived at Epic Records with little fanfare (and would leave in much the same way) with 1991's Uncle Anesthesia. Produced by Soundgarden's Chris Cornell and metal specialist Terry Date, the album lurches to its feet on the military shuffle of "Beyond This Horizon."

Despite offering a few glimpses of the group's punkier side "Story of Her Fate," "Alice Said," "Time for Light" -- most of the material emphasizes the Trees' mellower inclinations. As its title and disturbing, Alice in Wonderland-inspired cover artwork would suggest, the album also finds the band delving deeper and deeper into their psychedelic tendencies.

Gary Lee Conner's lysergic guitar textures gently frame Mark Lanegan's rough, whiskey-drenched vocals on such highlights as the title track, "Caught Between," and "Something About Today." And while "Bed of Roses" and "Lay Your Head Down" betray a strong R.E.M. influence, songs like "Before We Arise," "Closer," and "Disappearing" (with its Mexican funeral horn section) possess a sense of despair and hopelessness that only Lanegan's voice can convey. The last album to feature original drummer Mark Pickerel, Uncle Anesthesia also set the stage for the band's breakthrough, Sweet Oblivion.

(all music)

TRACKS

01 Beyond This Horizon      4:13
02 Bed of Roses             3:02
03 Uncle Anesthesia             3:52
04 Story of Her Fate             1:41
05 Caught Between             5:03
06 Lay Your Head Down             3:32
07 Before We Arise             2:26
08 Something About Today     3:02
09 Alice Said                     4:11
10 Time for Light             3:50
11 Disappearing             3:12
12 Ocean of Confusion             3:05
13 Closer                     5:48

 
BEYOND THIS HORIZON

Count the miles before they pass you by
Shadow of the sun has crossed the sky
Fill your head with everything you find

Beyond this horizon
Beyond this horizon
Beyond this horizon

Somewhere in the valley where you lie
Pray for those whose sun will never rise
Ghosts are laughing everywhere you land
Take another step and then you can

Beyond this horizon
Beyond this horizon
Beyond this horizon

Flac : Size : 306 MB

Screaming Trees : Sweet Oblivion : 1994

 

 Where many of their Seattle-based contemporaries dealt in reconstructed Black Sabbath and Stooges riffs, Screaming Trees fused '60s psychedelia and garage rock with '70s hard rock and '80s punk. Over the course of their career, their more abrasive punk roots eventually gave way to a hard-edged, rootsy psychedelia that drew from rock and folk equally.

"Sweet Oblivion" is Screaming Trees' 6th full length album that was released on September 8, 1992. The recording was the band's highest landmark in terms of album sales, and was the closest they would come to ever achieving mainstream success.

Although widely associated with grunge, the band's sound incorporated hard rock and psychedelic elements.

Sweet Oblivion's lead single, the jumpy hard rocker "Nearly Lost You," proved itself a highlight on the hugely successful, Seattle-themed Singles soundtrack. But even though The Screaming Trees stacked up quite well against their more famous peers in that particular showcase, the exposure didn't make them stars.

Perhaps it was because "Sweet Oblivion" had been released several months before Singles, and the band thus couldn't build a sense of anticipation for a new album release.

For whatever reason, Singles didn't push sales of "Sweet Oblivion", as the latter only scraped the lower reaches of the Billboard charts. And that's a shame, because the record is quite good ."Nearly Lost You" is a standout, of course, but "Dollar Bill","Shadow of the Season" and "Butterfly" are nearly as impressive.

Mark Lanegan's raspy voice conveys a weary wistfulness that adds an unexpected dimension to the group's otherwise macho garage-psych grunge. The Trees no longer sound all that punkish, trading in some of their early, noisy fury for a more '70s-indebted hard rock sound, but it's done with a graceful power that proves they were at least the equal of their more famous fellow scenesters.

Unfortunately, the four-year hiatus between "Sweet Oblivion" and its follow-up "Dust", ensured that the band would be forever relegated to cult status.


               TRACKS

     01. Shadow Of The Season  4:34    
    02. Nearly Lost You       4:07    
    03. Dollar Bill       4:35    
    04. More Or Less       3:11    
    05. Butterfly               3:22    
    06. For Celebrations Past 4:09    
    07. The Secret Kind       3:08    
    08. Winter Song       3:43    
    09. Troubled Times       5:20    
    10. No One Knows       5:13    
    11. Julie Paradise       5:05    

NO  ONE  KNOWS   LYRICS




Don't turn away, you haven't yet awakened
Why don't you stay, remember what you said
Ten thousand miles and everyone's mistaken

Look where you've been

Where every woman's wasted

All the while you've been sleeping
Drifting on a wind never blown
Tomorrow you'll wake up aching
Wondering how, when no one really knows

Don't speak a word of all that you've been saving
If there isn't time then you should let it go

Into the fire and bring back all you've taken
Once more alone you'll never let it show

All the while you've been sleeping

Drifting on a wind never blown
Tomorrow you'll wake up aching

Wondering how, when no one really knows

Now what have I done wrong
Can't you tell me what have I done wrong
Baby tell me what have I done wrong

Can't you tell me what have I done wrong
Baby tell me what have I done wrong
Tell me, tell me, tell me, tell me now

MP3 : # 320   Size :    111 MB

Screaming Trees : Dust 1996

All these dying days

I walk the ghost town

Used to be my city

I seen a holy man

Seen him crying with the mother Mary

All these dying days

Yes it's too late

This life is'nt mine

Lord hear me pray

Can you ease my mind

Now they're gone forever

Jesus I done gone over

Sleeping alone

Stay on your side

Like all of a thousand other times

If I could'nt lie

I would'nt be on this highway

Taken on down this highway

Take it Here Flac

Tracks

1 Halo of ashes
2 All I know
3 Look at you
4 Dying Days
5 Make my mind
6 Sworn & broken
7 Witness
8 Traveler
9 Dime Western
10 Gospel plow