JACOB THE TERRIBLE - "Sings Songs of It's Complicated" - 7" EP - 2014

    When I wrote about JACOB THE TERRIBLE's demo, I said just about everything I could possibly say about the band. By the band's account (not mine), that demo sounds like dog shit, but I like to go back to it to listen to the timeless and now-classic songs that didn't make the cut for the jump to vinyl. So first off, I'll tell you what you're missing with the vinyl. Oh, you wanted to sing along to "Twin Elephants" in a well-produced, studio-recorded fashion in the privacy of your own bedroom? Nope. Sorry. You'll just have to imagine the chunky guitar and pounding drums as you scream out "The world can be so fucked!! But there's only so much shit you can shit....ON A FACE!!!"  You're also missing the gripping story of waking up in the morning to face another day of working at the Hello Kitty factory. Look, every JACOB THE TERRIBLE song is a perfect fucking snowflake but you can only cram so much music onto a 7" record before it starts to sound like a 9th generation Misfits dub from 1982.
   I'm gonna assume you didn't click over to the demo since I said the band said it sounds like dog shit. JACOB THE TERRIBLE is a band from Providence and Worcester. THE TERRIBLES are a pre-existing band. Jacob is a pre-existing human. They all got together to make full rock versions of Jacob's pre-existing songs, which had previously existed in more minimal forms. They ended up being one of the most charismatic bands I've ever seen. Any band can write a good song (JTT has many) but not many can engage you in their live performance in ways that feel real and inviting to nearly everyone in attendance. They also write good songs. Some are anthems in ways that I didn't perceive when I was first hearing them. Nary a week passes when I'm not singing "Things mean things! From Milwaukee to Osaka, does the postman know the joy he brings?"...usually in the post office. As I said in a print review, Jacob manages to fit ten pounds of words into five pound word-capacity songs. In other's hands, this might sound clunky and awkward, but Jacob lets it flow out of his lungs with an ease that sounds nearly effortless. I love the way he bends the word cigar to make it rhyme with roar. The song title "What I Love About You (I Hate About Myself)" is an easy comforting genius line and the song can fit that description as well.
   Okay, I'm done babbling. The record is great. I like all of these people who wrote it. It's not leaving my head anytime soon. I'm gonna go over to the bass player's house and screen print in his living room while listening to this to annoy him. You should order this record so that you can play it on your turntable while gazing into the beautiful Mike Taylor-penned art. I'm not sure where to order it though because the record label's site is down. Maybe try here or maybe here or just send some cash in an envelope to Corleone Records at P.O. Box 65, Providence, RI 02901 and hope for the best. I know that I could go back and erase that stuff I just typed, but I just got a text that said that the record is SOLD OUT, so don't send money anywhere for anything ever, okay? Okay. Enjoy this digital file instead.

DOWNLOAD

Thanks to Jacob for the digital files

Thanks to THE TERRIBLES for not being terrible.

 

RIOT SOUNDS PRODUCE RIOTS - Tape - Timeless

   Rioting. It is important. It is crucial. Some say it's the unbeatable high. Many want a riot of their own. Where do you find your anger? What makes you flip the switch from simply walking down the street to punching a pig in the fucking face like that crudely drawn human above? What drives you to jump onto the hood of a police car and smash feet first through the windshield, like I once saw someone do on Mission Street? I can't answer those questions for you. It's up to you.
   A few months ago, my friend Jacob handed me this tape in the kitchen of his big, drafty warehouse in an undisclosed area of Rhode Island. He only explained that this tape is intended for rioting. It should put you in the mood to destroy. The whole concept was Mikey T's idea, but maybe ML was the one who was doing the most bugging to make it happen...but then Jacob made it happen. I know that none of those statements made a question, but just act like they did. I can't answer those questions for you. It's up to you.
   Back in San Francisco, my band got booked on a punk show in an art gallery by the ocean. I was borrowing a car and I drove it out. I put this tape in and listened to it LOUD with the windows down. By the time I arrived at the show, I felt crazy and wanted to destroy that entire area of town. I wanted to rip the art off the walls, punch my friends in the face and then walk away from the whole scene in slow motion while an entire city block exploded behind me. I didn't do that though because my friends are great and I really like that part of town. What I'm trying to say is, use this tape wisely and appropriately. Do not trifle with it. Listen responsibly.

DOWNLOAD

WORK//DEATH - Interstitial - Tape - 2012

   WORK/DEATH is an entity that has been sitting on the back burner of Remote Outposts for quite some time now...not because it's any less important or sonically pleasing than other tapes on this blog, but because I just don't know how to talk about it. I don't really know how to tell you why this might be relevant to your life or even life-changing, but I really, truly think it is.
   I remember one night, Pars and I were trying to explain the importance of WORK/DEATH to a friend, which is always an exercise in futility, because if people don't like something, they just don't like it...and that's fine. If you were to combine both of our explanations into one big glob, it would go something like this: WORK/DEATH is noise, but it's more than noise. It's calculated. It's intentional. It's no fucking joke and there is no fucking around. Also, to some extent, it's the modern day equivalent of classical music for our era.
   I didn't really "get" WORK/DEATH until I saw it live. Scott, the core member of W/D, stepped up to his mess of pedals, keyboards, homemade gear and wires to start his set without fanfare. Watching him compose for the next 25 minutes, creating a wall of noise that completely enveloped every inch of the room, floored me. Many times when I see people create noise music live,  I'm bored to goddamn tears and I can't wait for the idiot with the fucking pedals to stop wasting my time. That feeling doesn't even begin to surface with WORK/DEATH.
   This tape may not be the best start for your journey with WORK/DEATH, if this is your first time hearing them, but this is what I'm giving you. I got this one delivered to me in a stack of tapes from Providence, RI. When I opened up this tape for the first time, a toenail fell out. It seemed fitting, somehow.

DOWNLOAD

As of now, this is the extent of the WORK/DEATH internet presence. 

Scott told me in an email that he believes that part of the process of listening to music is engaging and interacting with the physical object. I agree. His tapes are sometimes difficult to track down, but maybe you can send some money to Three Songs Of Lenin at P.O. Box 29680, Providence, RI 02909 and see what you get. 

You can also order one of his LP's right here

I'm still upset that I didn't get to see him play in a 19th century mill or completely annihilate a piano in a Rhode Island alleyway. .

FERAL CHILDREN - Tape - 2006

   This tape showed up in a box of stuff sent from the east coast a few months ago and it sat in that box until today. Last week, I was in the home town of FERAL CHILDREN, saw this tape for sale in a record store and thought "Oh yeah, I should dig that tape out when I get home."
   This tape was written, performed and recorded by my friend, Mikey in a house named Little Pancakes. Once, I was there and ate some homemade pizzas after painting a bunch of blue shit on my face. These days, I'm pretty sure some freak-o's still live there. I've walked by and thought I should just knock on the door and hang out, but I never have.
  FERAL CHILDREN sounds rudimentary and wonky...on the verge of collapse and decay. Industrial at times, but never machine-like. Some conventional song structures at times, but like, alternate-reality conventional. Truthfully, I don't know what the fuck I'm talking about right now..I went outside for a while and wanted to kill every motherfucker on the street, so I came home, closed my door, listened to this and it made me feel better,,,like there's other people in the world who just can't take it sometimes and sit in their house and make weird music because it keeps them from randomly punching strangers. Or maybe I'm just projecting.

DOWNLOAD

RUSSIAN TSARLAG - "Decrepit Gas Station" - Tape - 2013

Today's entry is written by my good friend, E.R. Conner.

   I've seen Carlos (of RUSSIAN TSARLAG) play a bunch in other bands and I've even seen Russian Tsarlag play too. Once, he and my friend Dorey played a show where they recited this story/play thing and then passed out soup to everyone. The soup was cold and I was very afraid to eat it. In the end I ate the soup and it was pretty alright.
    Carlos does a thing where he seems really disconnected when he performs...like maybe he's a quiet guy already. I mean, once I saw him pretty much naked fighting on some train tracks in an alley and that was music too. I think that time there was also some kinda food but instead of getting passed around to eat, it was getting thrown/rolled around in??? Or maybe it was shaving cream? My mind does not remember these kinds of details. So maybe it's just different every time.
   I have some other RUSIAN TSARLAG recordings. They sound different from this. ​This tape about The Gas Station sounds like shoegaze music but maybe a little more fucked up. I mean, on purpose the way that people do when they make art things or music things. Not like it was an accident which is what sometimes people mean when they say "fucked up". I'm trying to say, I think this dissonance you hear in the recording or this kind of collapsing of sound, I think this guy thinks that sounds cool. He's right!
   My favorite song on this tape is called "ON THE STREET". I like it because I like sentimental songs. Like, it seems cool to have an interaction with someone where you want to write a song about how you "wanna see them sometimes on the street". But maybe that's all you wanna do! Just see them around? I like that. Even though in real life my biggest pain is running into people I know on the street because maybe I was just having a conversation with myself inside my head and other people are distracting. Most of the other words are hard to make out, so it could be like that Sting song everyone thinks is like *really sweet* and *super cute* but really it's about a stalker and then it got REALLY awkward when they turned it into a song about BIGGIE'S GHOST WATCHING EVERYTHING YOU DO.
    I wouldn't say that this is darker than other RUSSIAN TSARLAG tapes or more in line with conventional pop song writing but there is a way that it's that stuff in a different way than older tapes. Like maybe this guy found a COCTEAU TWINS tape or broke his little heart up or something. Or maybe he found out about some other more delicate part of life and that made shit more mysterious. I don't know what happened to this guy. His music sounds different now. You could call this maturing. Ok, let's call it maturing. He's mature now.

DOWNLOAD

To keep up with RUSSIAN TSARLAG, try this.

FUNERAL CONE - "Peel Back The Foil" - Tape - 2013

  I already knew I liked FUNERAL CONE before I ever even heard them because the band was comprised of total winners in life. My band played three shows with them in New England last year and I liked them more each night they played. Besides the fact that the band played chaotic, melodic, fucked up, fun punk, they also seemed immune to outside forces...meaning they just kinda brought their world on stage (or to the floor or basement) and you had to just deal with it. Like, the whole show could be boring and the other bands could be soul-sucking (luckily not the case in New England), but then FUNERAL CONE would just be this bursting bubble of total fun. Deal with it....or don't.
   After seeing them three times and hearing absolutely no recorded music, I told them I would set up a West Coast tour for them anytime they wanted it. Then, they surprised me by actually agreeing to it so I had to stick to my word. Before the tour, the band was asked by 100% Breakfast Records to put out an EP. This was really exciting to some members of the band because the label is run by Doug from FAT DAY, who were really influential and important to a bunch of New England punk/weirdos (I'm still baffled that FAT DAY is not as well known and highly regarded as many other seminal 90's punk bands.) They recorded these 6 songs at Doug's house, rushed it onto some tapes and flew out to SF for a week long tour of the Northwest.
   I went with them and it was the best tour I've ever roadied for. Besides the fact that they're a great band, they're also a wonderful group of people to travel with. I loved getting to watch them win over a room full of people every night. I would turn to the audience to watch them apprehensively approach the band as they started every set straight away with an abbreviated cover of "Louie Louie". Then, I would watch the crowd's look go from concern to wild abandon as the band launched into their original songs. So, so much fun.

  I got copies of the songs before the tour and thought they were great, but they grew on me even more after seeing the band play them live over and over. They had new songs that were even better. My favorite on here is "Dental Plan", but all of 'em are great. Towards the end of "Blindfolds", there is a freak out part that not only sounds like a freak out part, but (to me) sounds like the musical equivalent of walking around a bustling city while everything is exploding, crumbling, falling apart at the seams in a cacophony of guitars, farfisa organs and screaming. It's cool.

Fuck it, just DOWNLOAD it

The tape is sold out, but it has been pressed onto vinyl by 100% Breakfast. Please order your own copy of it right here before they're all gone. 

Members of THE TERRIBLES, BONEZONE, BLISTER PACK, ANCIENT FILTH, POISON CONTROL, DUNGEONEERS, SKIMASK, FRENCH IN ACTION and GUNS N ROSES.

Peter Bagge art on the back of the tape is an original. The artist drew it for singer Dan Wars when Dan watched his table at a comic-con for a while so Bagge could take a break. 

OLNEYVILLE KARAOKE VOL 2 - CD-R - 2005

   In 2006, I found myself in a junk shop called Happy Birthday Mike Leslie in Worcester, MA, which was run by my friend, Jacob. As I perused the racks of army men, bad cassettes, broken stuff, homemade stuffed animals, Chuck Norris comics and re-purposed M.U.S.C.L.E. men, I came across this CD. Upon seeing me looking at this, Jacob yelled "Oh, you have to buy that!! It will change your life!" and then I think he gave it to me. Did it change my life? Well, yes, but just about everything in the world changes your life in little ways.

  From the description inside the CD, this is....well, just read below. I don't think I can explain it any better than Mike Taylor did here:

   After I left the junk shop, I was thrust back into the reality of the total summer bummer, 3 month  punk tour that I was on. We were headed to play a lackluster, last minute show at a VFW hall in Hartford, CT while all of my Worcester friends were driving an hour south to go see LIMP WRIST. I put on this CD as soon as I got in the van and it lasted three whole songs before my band mate ejected it, dismissing it as some "weird Providence crap that feels like a joke at my expense." This is weird as fuck and maybe not meant to be listened to all in one sitting, but here it is....

DOWNLOAD

   Features members of THE TERRIBLES, COUGHS, TEENAGE WAISTBAND, YONI GORDON AND THE GOODS, PASSIVE AGGRESSOR, REACTIONARY 3 and more.

 I thought things were getting a little normal around here, so here ya go. My favorite song topics are "My Favorite Colonel", "????", "Things I Do Not Like To Eat" and "The Next Level"

Oh yeah, there's no real track listing because as the insert states "Just relax and don't get hung up on following it, okay?"

FRENCH IN ACTION - Demo - Tape - 2005

   Since I know next to nothing about this band, today's installment of Remote Outposts is brought to you by their old bass player, Mike Leslie....

   French in Action (named after the French language textbook) was a Worcester/Providence trio that I joined as replacement bass player when Mike Taylor moved on to become the band's visualist. I had lived with the singer, French born Matt Coe, on and off for years, who, though admittedly tone deaf, had a knack for pop hooks. He asked me to join, even though he described the band I had been in since I was 13 as "maybe not music." (Editor's note: that would be THE TERRIBLES) Differences aside, we were really tight friends, and we even lived in a shack together and I liked the band, so I enthusiastically joined. The frustrating part to me is I had never really played three chord pop at this time and had no understanding of musical chord progressions, so I would constantly get mixed up moving around the same part of the fret board and get songs confused. Rounding out the rhythm section was Dan Langlois. When I had met him when I was 14, he was the punkest person I had ever seen He even lived in a cabinet under the counter of a laundromat for a short time.

This demo was recorded at a practice space in Olneyville, I borrowed a car from a friend and got two parking tickets in about two hours. We ate breakfast at New York System Hot Weiners, where the home fries are just chopped up french fries (how appropriate). The whole tape is in French! And though I took it in high school, I'm still not really sure what he is singing about. I ended up having too much on my plate, the band got a new singer, became a four piece, and toured as "Frenching Action,", which is what people thought we were named anyway.

   (Editor's note pt 2: I'm sure I massacred the spelling of the song titles, but so did their artist, Mike Taylor. I never took French lessons and Mike explains on the tape insert, "I don't speak French and Matt has handwriting like a little baby chicken."

 (Editor's note pt 3: Don't ask me what happened to the font sizes on this entry. I tried to fix it and it didn't work. Whatever. Blogspot has a horrendous editing program that defies all logic.)

Download FRENCH IN ACTION
Link updated Dec 2017

JACOB THE TERRIBLE - Demo - CD-R - 2010

   Okay, I admit, it's been a while since I updated this but that's not because I've been burned out or lazy. On the contrary...I worked 14 days in a row at my job while simultaneously practicing with my band, helping to put out a tape, booking a US tour, getting together t-shirt designs, trying half-assedly to find a subletter, buying a bike and celebrating another year of being alive on this weird rock we call Earth. I also spent a week in Worcester, MA, visiting some good friends and getting some much needed time to relax, read and drink coffee.
    While out east, I was lucky enough to roadie for one of my favorite bands, THE TERRIBLES and got to see a punk show in a state where I had never seen such a thing....New Hampshire. It was weird. It was in a martini bar. I also ate the worst taco I've ever eaten in my life. When the band got to their show in Providence, they morphed into one of their few alter egos, JACOB THE TERRIBLE. You see, the band has a long time friend named Jacob Berendes, who has been performing solo for years (You can order one of his CDs here) and also publishes the monthly newspaper, Mother's News. In addition to this, he runs a distro called Chipsylvania and formerly manned the massively missed mission, Fujichia. Anyhow, Jacob wrote many songs that should be (and still could be) classics, but haven't had much of a life to speak of outside of the greater New England area. At some point, he (or perhaps they) decided to turn his formerly quiet songs into full-on rock songs, using THE TERRIBLES as his backing band. Thus, JACOB THE TERRIBLE was born. This shoddy and hastily recorded demo is not quite the representation that the band had in mind when they went down to the basement with the four track, but this is what they got when they emerged a few short hours later. I think the true strength of this band lies in their live performance because Jacob is a front person to end all front people and the TERRIBLES are just a great fucking band.
   Take the Providence show for example...They were slated to play second, just after the smooth indie-garage rock stylings of some hacks with half of JTT's energy or charisma. Instead of discussing the lineup with JTT and talking about how they didn't want to play first, the boring indie rockers just did that thing where they simply disappear and make everyone's lives a little more difficult by not being available (emotionally or otherwise) when it is time for them to play. Berendes and THE TERRIBLES are no strangers to chaos and are well aware that the show must go on. They set up and started the proceedings with no temper tantrums or complaints (the rockers not-so-mysteriously re-appeared just as the band was gearing up for their first song). By the time Jacob yelled "The world can be so fucked!! But there's only so much shit you can shit....ON A FACE!!!", the audience was sold. The next half-hour was filled with wildly flailing, dancing bodies and impassioned sing-a-longs. Simply, they killed it. I briefly peeked in later when the indie rockers were playing their coveted time slot and the crowd was barely managing to stay awake (I know that this isn't a competition but when a band can't manage to do the simple thing they are expected to do on tour [i.e. play the show when asked, interact with the other people involved, not be unavailable], I have little-to-no sympathy for them).

   Since recording this, JACOB THE TERRIBLE has re-recorded some of these songs at Machines With Magnets and the new versions sound a billion times better. They are currently looking for someone to release it (like, say, Corleone Records) and I, for one, would greatly appreciate it's existence in this world.
   When not being in this band, drummer Matt Carroll takes amazing photographs, greatly analyzes seemingly pedestrian endeavors and performs dramatic readings of Victorian-era erotica while dressed in period clothing. Guitarist Jamie Buckmaster enjoys a charmingly bizarre sleep schedule (others might call it insomnia), works on beautiful art and almost effortlessly plays any instrument at an expert level. Mike Leslie, the bass player, skates better than you, works tirelessly on meticulous art and is one of the better people that I am lucky to know in this world. After downloading this, be sure to also listen to THE TERRIBLES and then smack yourself for not having them in your lives for the past 15 years.

Download JACOB THE TERRIBLE
Updated Jan 2013

Taken from a comic by John Isaacson

CRUDE HILL - "On Stiltz" - Tape - 2007

   I saw CRUDE HILL play a cramped basement in Indiana back in 2007 and I remember thinking that they sorta sounded like "Noise Cumbia" or "Experimental World Music". Once I got this tape into the player, I realized that I was wrong and there was something else going on entirely. This 40-something minute tape (split into 6 sections) explores improvisation, noise landscapes, experimentation and droning bliss.

Download CRUDE HILL

Features members of  TEENAGE WAISTBAND, FORCE FIELD and URDOG.

RUSSIAN TSARLAG - "Let Your Dreams Touch Air" - Tape - 2007

    When I lived in Indiana, I used to tell people that RUSSIAN TSARCASM (this band's former name) was my favorite local band, which was true. One day, I realized that I didn't even know if Carlos (the brains and braun behind this project) knew how to play any instruments at all. You see, RUSSIAN TSARCASM was more of an experience and performance than a sonic onslaught. Sometimes, it could be dangerous, like the time Carlos jumped into piles of broken glass and ran into the crowd screaming and bloody. It could be confusing, like the time he just sang along to a recording of a toddler singing accapella. He was swinging a hammer the whole time and at the end of the song, he smashed some glass bricks with cassettes taped to it. Afterwards, he said "I have some tapes for sale" and he tried to sell the bits of broken cassettes to people. Once, RUSSIAN TSARCASM played 12 shows in one day in 12 different outdoor locations. I only went to the last one and it consisted of a shirtless Carlos being dragged around by his legs while I ran after him and spit on his chest. Another time, he played a show in a basement for 24 hours straight. I went to it about 16 hours into the show and he was in the basement alone chanting in a pile of glass with a steak taped to his chest.
     After saving his money from working at a Rally's drive thru (Carlos said he took the job so he could see how "normal people" lived), he took a logical step for once and moved his weird ass out to Providence, RI. It created a void in the Bloomington noise scene that could never be filled. Carlos changed the name of the band to RUSSIAN TSARLAG and actually started playing instruments It was mostly Carlos playing a stand-up drumset and singing his songs which brought new meaning to the word "minimal". He put out some tapes and an LP or two (I can't keep up). One of his LPs featured a BEACH BOYS cover song and it was paid for with a grant...which basically means that the state of Rhode Island paid for some weirdo to interpret Brian Wilson.
     This tape is hard to explain and I'm not going to try. Fuck it.
                                  RUSSIAN TSARLAG

TEENAGE WAISTBAND - "I Saw What I Wanted To See" - Tape - 2007

   TEENAGE WAISTBAND is hard to describe to someone who has never heard them. Art damaged punk with an 11 year old boy for a singer? Minimalist noisy skronky shit? What happens when people in Providence decide "We're just gonna start a normal punk band"? I don't really know. I do know that I like them a lot and that their singer is neither 11 years old nor male. Maybe you should just listen to this for yourself and make your own weird descriptions...or fuck the descriptions altogether and just blast this out of your speakers. Features ex-members of BLOOD TRUCK, COUGHS, REACTIONARY 3, and THE FOREHEADS.

TEENAGE WAISTBAND in Brooklyn. Photo by Daniel Arnold.
  

                        Download Teenage Waistband here