POST LOCK DOWN THEATER NIGHT 2

A double feature tonight because I ran into Desperate Teenage Lovedolls and the sequel, Lovedolls Superstar both on YouTube. Both were made on shoestring budgets by Dave Markey and both have band members from L.A. punk scene. I forget all of them. Some of the soundtrack cuts are below. The video directly below is the first film, Desperate Teenage Lovedolls. The sequel is linked below.

[Cut and paste snippet from old post because you're lazy like that.] This stuff is perfect for tonight. It speaks to me. It instills in me the spirit of the rascals singing. Sloppy and a little reckless, without a care in the goddamn world. It says to me, make it short asshole, and get back to goofing off.

~ NOTE: ALL MEDIA IS HOSTED BY THE BLOGS & SITES NAMED BELOW ~

Watch:
Lovedolls Superstar at YouTube Full film, director's cut, sequel to above.
Listen:
Redd Kross - Lovedolls Superstar mp3 at We Got Power Films
The Lovedolls w/Redd Kross - Beer & Ludes mp3 at We Got Power Films
The Lovedolls w/Redd Kross - Rex Smith (I Want to Be A Cholo Chick) mp3 at We Got Power Films
The Lovedolls w/Redd Kross - Sunshine Day mp3 at We Got Power Films
Sonic Youth - Hallowed By Thy Name mp3 at We Got Power Films
Lawndale - Wing Tips mp3 at We Got Power Films

AND THE WINNAH IS

Some friends were posting links to a gig by the Nashville Ramblers, who rarely play out. They're playing at Tiki Oasis this year. Tiki Oasis is like a convention for people into all that tiki stuff. They have other stuff too, burlesque, exotica and assorted retro stuff and I've never been. The thought of seeing the Nashville Ramblers appealed to me enough to check out the event site. Once there I saw the other bands that are playing. One of the bands was the Toumaliners, who I'd never heard of. There's a old man's surf spot a few miles north called Tourmaline, so I figured they were a surf band, although curious as to why the picked a not-so-challenging surf spot to name their band after. What the hell, I headed to their site to see what they were all about. One song and already dismissed. A "surf" cover of a Coldplay song. What. The. Fuck. Bad idea all around. Then I looked at their photos and saw that their keyboard player had a laptop in here set up. And done.

I started thinking about contemporary surf bands and how the bulk of them always have something that they just get wrong. I don't mind if the equipment's isn't all vintage or how their dressed, shit like that. The real surf bands can still pull it off. And the ones that can't sure as hell shouldn't cover Coldplay. No surf band should. And it's not because it's not a vintage song. It's just so, well, nothing. It has no punch. It's Chris fucking Martin. There are thousands of songs that would make good surf covers. Never mind the band's name, the surf spot or the laptop. The song choice alone invalidates them for me. Adding reverb to a shitty overplayed and overrated song does not work. Unless you're mining for page views.

Here's a couple medleys by two instrumental bands that slay the Tourmalamers. Both irreverent in style (power chords?) and song juxtapositions. But they make up for it in their deal-with-it blasphemy. I'll deal with it, especially if it gets me the hell away from Coldplay.

~ NOTE: ALL MEDIA IS HOSTED BY THE BLOGS & SITES NAMED BELOW ~

Listen:
Tourmaliners - Clocks mp3 at Tourmaliners Orig: Coldfuckingplay
Surf Manchu - Pipeline Über Alles mp3 at Internet Archive  Orig: Chantays/Dead Kennedys
Lawndale - Interstellar Caravan (streaming) at YouTube Orig: Pink Floyd/Duke Ellington

THINK I'LL DO THIS NOW

Todays procrastination session began with a hunt for some elusive Lawndale mp3s. A non-surf instrumental band that was on SST (home of Black Flag among many others), they're all but ignored online. It's as if they never existed. Well, today the hunt paid off, but not how I expected. I did find one Lawndale cut, "Wing Tips," but where I found it turned into a couple hour detour. It was on Dave Markey's We Got Power Films site. Markey is something like a punk rock renaissance man. He put out a couple fanzines, played in a couple bands, made some movies (both feature length and shorts), and did some music videos. You'd think that after all that, he'd be a household name (at least in punkier households), but that's not the case.

Trailer for Lovedolls Superstar Fully Realized

The first time I heard about him was in the early '80s. He had made a film called Desperate Teenage Lovedolls, about a fictional girl punk band, the Lovedolls. Despite the primitive quality (I think it was filmed in Super 8), it had a who's who of L.A. punk rock scenesters, notably Jeff & Steve McDonald (from Redd Kross), Dez Cadena ( Black Flag), Janet Housden (Redd Kross), and Annette Zilinska (Bangs, Blood on the Saddle). Among many cameo appearances were a young Saul Hudson (who would later surface as Slash, in Guns n' Roses), and Sky Saxon (the Seeds). The whole thing is so amateurish, the script so bad, the acting so limited, that it really is a hoot; like a friend's weekend film might be.

Middle Class - Situations and Above Suspicion, filmed by Dave Markey. Reunited after 27 years, filmed in November 2010. From Markey's YouTube page.

Markey's website is a full on multi-discipline time suck. Fanzines, fliers, short films, trailers for the feature films, music videos and music. Seriously, I was on there for a long time and still have only scratched the surface. Among the music videos, there's some choice stuff: Sonic Youth, Meat Puppets, Mudhoney, and the Posies. The Posies video cover of the Germ's "Richie Dagger's Crime" is remarkable in a "Relax you purist cynic, this is a tribute to the Germs, nothing more. Get your head out of your ass and enjoy it for what it is" sort of way. There are blue Circle One armbands and flags everywhere, and a nod to Shawn Kerri's Circle Jerks skanking kid logo. I'm going to avoid spoiling it for you, just dig the interpretation and prepare to smile. Punk rock has never been so warm and fuzzy.

The Posies - Richie Dagger's Crime (Note: a much better quality, ad-free version is on Markey's site, on the music video page (click on the "multimedia" tab).

The music that Markey has on his site is great too. The Lawndale song that started all of this meandering, "Wingtips," is one of 23 mp3s on his site that comprise the entire soundtrack of Lovedolls Superstar (the sequel to Desperate Teenage Lovedolls). On that one alone, there's Redd Kross, Sonic Youth, the Meat Puppets, the Dead Kennedys, Kristan Hoffman, and the Lovedolls themselves, backed by Redd Kross. On top of that, there's two other compilations. This shit is exhausting. Just go there and click on everything.

~ NOTE: ALL MEDIA IS HOSTED BY THE BLOGS & SITES NAMED BELOW ~

Redd Kross - Lovedoll Superstar mp3 at We Got Power Films
The Lovedolls w/Redd Kross - Beer & Ludes mp3 at We Got Power Films
The Lovedolls w/Redd Kross - Rex Smith (I Want to Be A Cholo Chick) mp3 at We Got Power Films
The Lovedolls w/Redd Kross - Sunshine Day mp3 at We Got Power Films
Sonic Youth - Hallowed By Thy Name mp3 at We Got Power Films
Lawndale - Wing Tips mp3 at We Got Power Films
Directed by Dave Markey:
Mudhoney - Fuzz Gun at YouTube
Sonic Youth - Cinderella's Big Score at YouTube
Desperate Teenage Lovedolls trailer at YouTube
Get lost, really lost:
We Got Powers Films - The site of Dave Markey. Note: Most of the films and music are on the multi-media page.
Markey's YouTube channel
Additional info:
Dave Markey at Wikipedia
Dave Markey at Internet Movie Database