The school year is around the corner. Hundreds of thousands of kids wil begin high school over the next two weeks. They will walk gingerly through the giant hallways, hands on bookbag straps, eyes like saucers. A more frightened and awkward group of humans you will rarely see. I’d love to give all these freshmen a copy of Ziggy Stardust when they enter school. Bowie never gets much credit for being much of an open-hearted romantic, but Ziggy was always a very good friend. The story of an alien on earth rings true to aliens in their own bodies.

God, I’m so glad I never have to be a teenager again.

You try it. You like it. You buy it.

Long beards. Hot rods. Double guitars. When I was five, I thought ZZ Top were the coolest dudes in the world. Still do.

You try it. You like it? You buy it.

The one for me had brown hair and blue eyes. She was a grade older than me in grammar school, so I did whatever I could do to catch a glimpse. I lived for school assemblies because I could gaze at her uninterrupted. The best were the awards presentations. She would receive a ton of awards, so she was always up and back, up and back. She bounced lightly, as if she could float, toward the front of Briody Hall. I couldn’t breathe. And then they would get to my grade. I would receive a couple awards, and when I walked to the front I imagined it was to receive the Nobel Prize in Anything, or maybe even better, like an Academy Award. I would make a speech. Everyone would hush. After the prolonged standing ovation, I returned to my brown-haired, blue-eyed wife, wiping a tear from her eyes.

A dream, for sure. But a dream I sill remember and a dream that will always be the source of inspiration.

Thank you, brown-haired girl.

You try it. You like it? You buy it.

All routines eventually drive me mad. I can’t help it. My mind wants to do different things. My mind wants to explore. My mind wants to dawdle. You have no idea how exhausting this is. I lack discipline. I know this. Shambollocks! has definitely given me a discipline, a drive, a purpose. Without a doubt, this site is the best thing I’ve done since college. Shambollocks! got me the column gig at PopMatters. So I can’t let it get away from me.

This being said, it sure ain’t easy keep this place updated. In the web publishing world we live in, if it ain’t fresh daily, it’s foul. I guess what I’m trying to say is have a little patience with Shambollocks!. It’s very much a one-man show 99% of the time. Reinforcements are welcome.

Enough excuses, let’s get back to Shambollocks! 2.0.

You try it. You like it? You buy it.

‘The enemy within says that a body of work is just as strong as its weakest point.’

This is how a depressed writer feels, everyday. You think every single paragraph, every single sentence, every single word, every single thought of a word is absolute crap. The true feeling which you depend on as the source of all your instincts turns against you. And no lie, this will scare the shit out of you. Depression is a writer’s kryptonite, a disease which positively will suck the life out of you. It ain’t pretty.

‘The zebra’s afraid to take off her coat. She’s afraid she’ll lose her stripes.’

Every writer is intoxicated by their own talent. It’s impossible not to be. When you can use words to express not only your thoughts but the thoughts of others as well…Nothing in my life compares to that high. Yet once you start to doubt yourself, it becomes terribly easy to forget who you are. “I’m not a writer,” you think. “I can’t do that.” Meet your new best friend, the blank page.

‘The stone on the bottom of the ocean says, “This is not a cul-de-sac.”‘

There is no cure for depression. No magic bullet. And what might be right for you, might not be right for some. What all of us who suffer from depression must remember, though, is that you’re not alone. Geniuses suffer from it. As do the mentally challenged. Leaders suffer from it. As do followers. Depression, and all other mental illnesses, are universal. But you can get through it- by therapy, by medication, or by the love of others. That rut you’re stuck in is truly all in your head. Don’t let it beat you! Get help! Please, get help.

Happy 31st birthday, Molly. We love you very much.

You try it. You like it. You buy it.

Red- it's the color of the season.

Love Is A Wave by Crystal Stilts

The guitar is an amazing elastic instrument. The amount of color and shape you can create from guitar chords never ceases to amaze me. In ‘Love Is A Wave’, the guitar comes in as a scanner, picking its way across the rhythm. Finally, it settles into a groove with the ferocity of a Duane Eddy riff. The lead singer comes in with a great, imperial vocal. A synth haunts the background, reminding us that not everything is joy and wonder. This track is a gift to those of us deeply in love with psychedelia. Short, sweet, complete.

7″ out 3/31.

The Jam at Pinkpop 05.26.1980 in 320 mp3

Paul Weller is my favorite British rock star. True. Not only am I head over heels with his music with the Jam and solo (eh, not so much Style Council), but I also love his taste in music. The compilation he made for Mojo last year provided K and I with our first dance song. I love the fact that his dad still manages him, even after all these years. His politics are dead-on working-class and sensible. Whenever you hear him interviewed he flashes the kind of sense of humor which would only get better after a few pints (even though Paul himself abstains). And last, but certainly not least, there is his sense of style. Sure, everyone wants to be a rock star, but Paul is the only one I want to dress like. I have to admit it. I have a man crush on Paul Weller. I’m OK with that.

We all know about the Sex Pistols and the Clash over here in the states, but the Jam were the better pop band. Yes, they never recorded a ‘God Save The Queen’ or released an album as transcendent as London Calling. But for sheer amount of great tracks, the Jam blows away the work of those two combined. Never achieving hit single status here in the States, the Jam and Paul Weller are pop deities in their native England.

The Jam were a trio from Woking, Surrey and also included bassist Bruce Foxton and drummer Rick Buckler. Weller and his mates were in love with the mid-60’s Who and Small Faces, and they aimed to copy the mod lifestyle of that time. Weller played a Rickenbacker guitar and purchased a Lambretta scooter. While the punks dyed their hair and wore safety pins through their noses, the Jam showed up to their gigs in stylish suits and haircuts. They then tore the roof of whatever hall they were booked at with music which embraced ’60s r&b and pop, oblivious to the middle finger most punks extended toward that time. In the five years the band existed, it strung together eighteen consecutive UK Top 40 singles.

After the Jam’s initial success, they began to be dogged by certain press and peers as nothing more than mod revivalists. Nothing could be further from the truth. While most of the punks were slumming art-school drop-outs or upper-class twits, the Jam acted more like the striking laborers of the time in England. During the tour for their second album, This Is The Modern World, the band got into a fight with some rugby players in a Leeds hotel and Weller broke several bones and was charged with assault. The charges were dropped, but try to imagine any other British band ever taking on a bunch of rugby players. The rest of the tour was canceled and your to be sure the band lost a great deal of income.

I heard ‘Beat Surrender’ on XRT sometime in my ‘tweens and couldn’t get the song out of my head. I soon purchased Snap on cassette from Wind Records in Oak Lawn. How was this music not on American classic rock? I couldn’t understand. It fit right into the new wave sound of the early ’80s while swinging harder and having killer lyrics. Why didn’t the Jam catch on here in the States? Who knows, but I’m sure opening for Blue Oyster Cult, as they did in ‘78, didn’t help matters.

Our  show comes from the 1980 Pinkpop festival. Pinkpop is Holland’s answer to Glastonbury. That year the headliners along with the Jam were Joe Jackson, the Specials, and, ahem, Van Halen and the J Geils Band. A fairly mixed crowd of Dutch rockers, I imagine.. This show just makes me mad. The Jam were such a tight band with such an amazing collection of songs. Why did I have to be born too late? Listening to this set, you know why the Jam were such a great live draw. While the punks stole their riffs and slamming bass drums from the hard rock of bands like Thin Lizzy, the Jam wanted to sound like a Motown rhythm section. And although they don’t sound that good, they definitely sound like a unit. Live the songs which make up the three straight masterpieces the Jam released (All Mod Cons, Setting Sons, and Sound Affects) sound much more like their ’60s soul influences than they do on record. Foxton especially takes advantage of this opportunity to brandish his lead bass lines on almost each song. He even gets a lead vocal. On drums, Buckler was no Keith Moon, but no one was asking him to be. He keep Foxton on schedule with a steady, propulsive hand which would earn kudos from Charlie Watts. Highlight for me is the encore of ‘All Mod Cons’ into ‘David Watts’. I doubt the Van Halen Kinks cover was as impressive that day as the Jam’s.

This is nothing less than a prime document of one of the best pop bands of all time at the top of their game.

What d'ya mean some Jeff Lynne bloke will have us exiting a spacecraft?

Dont Make My Baby Blue by The Move

Whenever you think you’ve unearthed everything from the Golden Age of rock, there is always one more buried treasure lying blow. So much great music, such few outlets at the time. Many of these buried treasures had hits in England, yet never made a dent here in the States. A stellar example of these overlooked artists formed in 1966 with five veterans from various Birmingham rock bands. They were guitarist and principal songwriter Roy Wood, drummer Bev Bevan, bassist Chris “Ace” Kefford, singer Carl Wayne, and guitarist Trevor Burton. Calling themselves the Move, they signed with flamboyant manager Tony Secunda. Tony booked them as the replacement for the Who at the Marquee Club. The Move quickly made a name for themselves through an over-the-top live set with flash pots and Wayne smashing televisions. Dressed up in gangster suits, they should have been more flash than substance. Fortunately, Roy Wood loved American pop music and his songwriting fused this with the in vogue prog rock of the time.

The Move’s first four singles soared to the top of the pop charts. Secunda promoted the third single, ‘Flowers In The Rain’, with a cartoon postcard of British prime minister Harold Wilson in bed with his secretary. Wilson sued the band for libel and won. To this day, Wood earns no money from the song. The suit pushed the Move to fire Secunda, and marked the first in a series of unfortunate incidents which would eventually lead to the band’s dissolution.

The Move released their first album, hired Don Arden to replace Secunda. Kefford left the band, and Burton moved over to bass. After the release of ‘Blackberry Way’, their biggest hit, Burton left the band. Arden sold their contract to cabaret agent Peter Walsh and the band began to tour the cabarets of Europe. Bassist Richard Price signed on for the tour. I could only imagine the confused look of middle-aged couples wanting to hear Gershwin and Weil, but getting the psychedelia of ‘Blackberry Way’ and heavy metal of ‘Wild Tiger Woman’ instead. After the tour ended, they began to record their follow-up album, Shazam.

You need to have your ears opened to Shazam. With this album, Roy Wood plotted out an entirely new direction for prog rock. Where Pink Floyd, King Crimson, and the Nice steered pop music toward an alien, dark world stripped of many rock traits, Roy Wood and the Move glorified rock music. Shazam is a loving thank you to the first fifteen years of rock. The album skips through one rock genre after another, heralding the future work of genre-straddlers like Elton John. Want straight ’70s hard rock? ‘Hello Susie’. Romantic ballad? ‘Beautiful Daughter’. Orchestral power-pop? ‘Cherry Blossom Clinic’. ‘Cherry Blossom Clinic’ gives you a small taste of the treats that await you on the monster second side of the album. The second side of the album is comprised of covers where Wood and the band fuse the dexterity of the Nice with the sludge of fellow Brummies Black Sabbath and the pop sensibilities of the Kinks.

We find this week’s track on this second side. ‘Don’t Make My Baby Blue’ was a Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil song which beat group The Shadows charted with in ‘65. The Move version only shares a name with that track. Simply put, even Sabbath never rocked harder than this. If the opening riff and thuderbomb drums don’t have your devil horns out, well, I just don’t want to party with you. Carl Wayne “Whoah!”s in at twenty seconds. Wayne’s vocals here match Paul Rodgers at his soulful, chest-bared best. Whereas Sabbath’s grooves were much more suffocating, here the rhythm section backs off just a bit to give Wayne and Wood some room. And it’s utterly beautiful. I don’t care what Mike Damone says in Fast Times, side two of Led Zeppelin IV has no make-out track like this. Roy Wood’s guitar on this is plain off-the-hook. You’re with him on his guitar solo until about the 3.20 section when he just exits the atmosphere. Only to have Bev Bevan’s jackhammer bass drum yank him back down to terra firma. This song hits about every grace note I have. And then you pile on the three-part harmony at the end. Guh. Almost not fair.

The Move would release their next album, Looking On, with new member Jeff Lynne. He replaced Carl Wayne. The Lynne-Wood Move released one more album, Message From The Country, before Wood dissolved the band and formed glam-rock embarrassment Wizzard. Lynne formed the Electric Light Orchestra from the ashes of the Move, and ELO would have a hit in ‘77 with the Move song ‘Do Ya’. Roy Wood hides out in England and is one of the more elusive pop masters.

For those about to rock, we salute you!

The Shambollocks! February Mix

1) Come Saturday- The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart

2) Politicians In My Eyes- Death

3) Into The Public Bath- Cattle Decapitation

4) Punks In The Beerlight- Silver Jews

5) My Brain Is Working Overtime- Rivers Cuomo

6) Butterfly Kisses- The Depreciation Guild

7) Pump It Up (Live)- Elvis Costello and the Attractions

8 ) Nobunny Loves You- Nobunny

9) My Maudlin Career- Camera Obscura

10) Danger Bird- Neil Young & Crazy Horse

11) Pine On- Obits

12) So Human- Lady Sovereign

13) Most Likely You Go Your Way (Live)- Bob Dylan

14) Cradle- The Joy Formidable

15) Optimist Vs. The Silent Alarm (When The Saints Come Marching In)- Casiotone For The Painfully Alone

Numbers for the month after the jump.

Now for the stats. We continue to improve our numbers. In January, we averaged 136 users a day. In February, we averaged 166 users a day. That is an 18 % jump! Overall for February we drew 346 more users in a month which was four days shorter. This is great news! The not-so-great news is in our returning users’ #s and usage #s. The site is not drawing as many repeated views, and each user is using the site less and spending less time. I have a few ideas on how those numbers dipped, and will work to reverse them.

As usual, we want to thank all of our regular readers. We hope you get through this last sloppy winter mix, and we’ll see you in an early spring!

Sincerely,

Michael Brett

Shambollocks! Publisher/ Intern

Cradle by The Joy Formidable

The Joy Formidable hail from Wales. You can download their debut album for free here. Mix the Pixies and Weezer together, bake, and voila, you have their song “Cradle”. The driving rhythms will snap you wide awake.