na: wire
Just a quick post to point out the arrival of the most recent batch of EPs (along with a few other titles) by post-punk legends Wire. Like a lot of people, I’d had an aggressive disinterest in anything Wire did post-Bell is a Cup, but I thought that the Read & Burn series recaptured much of their old fire. It’s a different sound to be sure — grinding, industrial charge instead of icy deconstruction — but something about the sheer punishing relentlessness of the music completely suckerpunched me. Also in the Wire haul: On the Box, which is perhaps the most noteworthy, featuring vintage Wire TV performances from the late ’70s; The Scottish Play, which features live recordings from 2005 and pf456 Redux, which appears to be comprised of alternate takes/other go-rounds on the Read & Burn material.
Holy cow, this is huge! I’ve got some of these already, but now I can get the others to help prepare for the Wire show in DC this weekend. Thanks, emusic!
any idea if we’ll get the old classics? It seems they’re all on the Pink Flag label now . . .
“any idea if we’ll get the old classics? It seems they’re all on the Pink Flag label now . . .”
If there’s any chance of this, please let us know. (e.g., I might refrain from picking up the rehearsal disc (Three Days), if I thought we’d get the actual Pink Flag album).
This is excellent. Aside from the On the Box stuff, I had somehow managed not to acquire any of these titles through other means. I love it when this happens!
the read & burn EPs are excellent. “99.9″ on #2 is one of the ten greatest guitar-based tracks of all time, in my unhumble opinion.
Doesn’t Send cherry-pick the best of the Read & Burn EPs? Is it better to get all the EPs?
Send came out before Read Burn 3.
Are you guys aware that comments (including really old comments and trackbacks) are showing up in your RSS feed? It’s kinda weird.
Yeah, Daniel, you’re better off getting the individual EPs — it’s pretty much all gold.
Will do, Joe. Also, I really like the samples for Third Day. I know it’s just rehearsals, but — surprisingly, I guess — I’ve never heard these songs before (e.g., Pink Flag).
Hilariously, the Christian Rock group Third Day apparently has a record called Wire. When I was Googling yesterday to try to see what the Wire record was, that kept coming up in search results.
Yeah, that happened to me, too. And there’s virtually no reviews of Wire’s (the non-Christian Rock group’s) Third Day disc (except on a Wire fan-site).
Don’t knock Third Day too much…their first (self-titled) album was pretty kick-ass for mid-90’s Christian college-rock. They were the Christian equivalent to the love child of Pearl Jam, Hootie & the Blowfish, Stone Temple Pilots, and Jesus–all of whom were rather big at the time. It was rare to find such quality in the CCM market…unfortunately everything they did after that was a little too praise-and-worshipy for my taste, but I still hold that debut rather close to my sentimental heart.
Re; Wire’s Third Day:
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:dvfoxq80ldse
(I’m sold.)
and from ab-cd.com, the closest thing I could find to a review of pf456 redux:
… “In typically oblique fashion, the vinyl version of Send is very nearly a different record. Famed in the past for taking the stage with completely revised arrangements of their recorded songs, Wire have extended that principle to Send/PF456 Redux, and present a limited edition vinyl release conceived in the spirit of the polar opposite of the now traditional ‘DJ Friendly Triple Album’ concept. All songs from the CD release of Send and both Read & Burn EPs have been truncated, edited, and reduced to their barest essentials to create a fast-cut stop-frame version of Wire’s current phase of activity. 16 tracks colliding with each other ‘just like real life, only faster’.”
@ptolemyclark: don’t get me started on mid-90s christian alt-rock. that will be a long, long discussion. i am biding time until we get michael knott records on the site.
More the former than the latter for me. I am consistently surprised how much of that stuff shows up here.
I didn’t listen to much CCM after the late 80’s/early 90’s; too early for any of it to be alt-christian yet, but I loved some Christian Hair Metal - Whitecross, Barren Cross, Stryper. I also once saw mid 90’s alt biggies DC Talk when they were still rappers.
I, uh, saw DC Talk at least four times between Nu Thang and Jesus Freak. I also saw Whitecross in a school gym that had less than 20 people in the audience…and two of them were my parents.
We has all those Barren Cross records at one time; we also had an improbable amount of Bride. And if you catch me at the wrong time, I’ll still make an impassioned defense for the title track on this record.
Oy, I liked Against the Grain so much better.
Man, we may have to take this discussion off-list. Forever Mercy was when Stand was doing his quasi-Westerberg thing. It’s like proto-Gaslight Anthem.
stephen curtis chapman, folks. stephen. curtis. chapman.
I hear you yancey but he just wanted to be Michael W. Smith
ptolemy, my parents would never have gotten near anything as loud as Whitecross - for them the volume was part of the evil - Christian lyrics or not.
honestly, we all just wanted to be carmen.
I second the wait for Michael Knott. I think I read somewhere that there’s a new LSU album out or soon to be out.
I might also be interested in seeing some 77’s here, but in all honesty I haven’t been interested in anything Mike Roe did since Sticks and Stones.
And Altar Boys peaked at Gut Level Music.
I could go on and on, but this was originally about Wire, right?
So, hey, since we’ve hit that point (and since neither are available on eMusic), two mixes I made that may interest some. Or none.
The 77s, Collected 77s
Michael Knott/LSU, Michael Knott is Not Fucking Around
All of this stuff is way out of print so… enjoy.
Adamm–it’s even funnier to think of considering that these were the same parents that banned the radio after I said that “Uptown Girl” was a good song. Basically, they respected my music as long as it was Christian. They even took our youth group to Christian music festivals many times after I got into CCM…most of the time they’d just drop us off, but I do remember sitting on the grass and eating PG&J with my mom at Sonshine before jumping into the mosh pit during the One Bad Pig set.
Joe, you are totally my hero today. You have no idea how happy that 77’s is making me right now.
I’m glad! Enjoy. It’s good weekend music.
yes thanks for these joe. I’m not really familiar with either of these but looking forward to hearing it when I get home.
Saw Wire last week in NY and while they sounded great, they played too much new and unreleased material, almost completely alienating the sold out crowd. This is the 2nd time I’ve seen them do this. I may not go to see them again.