I gotta admit, this little ditty sat for far too long on my desk here at the Ripple office. Why? Didn't I want to spin this treasure of maximally-fuzzed garage madness? Of course I did. Those of you in the know are already aware that over at last.fm, I run a little group called From The Garage with the very intention of celebrating this exact sort of oil-in-your-eyes, lubricate-the-inner-ear, garage rock. My friends over there like Theelongplayer and Findeerror are gonna dig every brief passing second of this retro throwback.So why did it take me so long to play it, you might ask? Well, as embarrassing as the answer is, my turntable was broken. Here I had a beautiful scuzzed out, amped up 45 single just begging for a spin, and I was turntable-less. I hang my head in shame.
But as you may have figured out by now, that's been corrected and now I got this mass of distorted three chords and singing into an empty oil can vocals playing non-stop. Both of these tunes are can't miss blasts of pure '60's superfuzz, garage bliss. "Make it Last," races along a charging guitar riff, thudding bass and tin can drums. No two ways about it, this is a stark mad raver. Melody heavy, big backing vocals, screams of joyful anguish. It's one fricking glorious mess of garage nirvana.
And don't worry, the B-side, "Won't be Ashamed," is just as gorgeously constructed. Mining a slightly slower, more melodic, mid-tempo vein, the vocals reign here in all their shredded glory. Again, big fuzzed guitar bits and a drummer beating on everything within arm distance bring this baby to life. If you're a fan of modern garage, don't miss these treats. Find them at myspace http://www.myspace.com/theomens
Now, before I sign off, I just gotta say one word about my new turntable; the ION TTUSB05xl. Yes, I guarantee you that you can find a higher quality turntable with better (insert whatever audiophile quality you wish here) but damn, for the money, this is freaking brilliant. I picked this up at RadioShack, not exactly audiophile headquarters, for a paltry $100. $100! With a USB hookup, I plug it right into my laptop and play and record all my vinyl, converting it instantly to mp3. From there it's only one more step to burn it down to CD or upload to my ipod.I can't tell you how amazingly happy this little thing has made me! I swear, it's the best invention since the discovery of fire. Suddenly, all that old vinyl that I've had stored in my garage is relevant again and I'm burning through it like crazy! Now, I know most of you folks in the know have had a USB turntable for years, but I haven't and now I'm happier than a little pyro in a fireworks stand.
If you don't have one, go buy one. You won't be disappointed.
I swear, suddenly, my life has meaning again.
Comments
I'm very interested in your experiences with EZ Vinyl Converter (assuming you're using it and not Audacity or something else entirely).
It's the only vinyl ripping software that automatically identifies the music, something people accustomed to CD ripping take for granted.
On the other hand, it is so simplistic that when something goes wrong, you need an additional program to fix it.
I'd love to get your take.
Jeff
Jeff - I've only ripped a couple of albums so far and I haven't had any major issues. I'm totally thrilled with having to sit in front of my computer and hit the little button to record each track individually, but to have the ability to go back and listen to the music from my youth, I guess it's a small price. If anything comes up, we'll drop you a line!
Pope