doG

It was 1991, and it came from Ardmore, Oklahoma.  "It" was THE SYMPHONY, and when they arrived in Norman it seemed to my relatively small and unworldly-wise group of friends and acquaintances that they were "the real deal."  They wore all black, all the time, and they seemed to actually enjoy DIAMANDA GALAS and EINSTURZENDE NEUBAUTEN, as opposed to most of us who just talked about how mysterious and cool they were. They played dark and brooding post rock music, and they always seemed relatively serious even though they were all very nice once you got to know them.  It was a far cry from our small world of joke punk bands and throwing confetti and peanut butter at the audience and taking our clothes off instead of writing songs...not that one avenue is better than the other, mind you...they are just different.  One half of THE SYMPHONY also gave me this tape by "doG," which might be the first piece of musical 4 track experimentation I ever properly laid ears on, and some 16 years later it's still a pretty damn good listen. While the repeated "satan! satan! satan!" sample in "Freezin' Beez In The Summer Time" might get a little old, the backwards Roy Orbison samples in "Tribute To Roy O" are mesmerizing, the "Intro To Psychedelia" really did sound like drug music to a dude (this dude) who had never taken drugs, and "H" sounds like an elevator's muzak soundtrack on a really really bad trip. I'm not going to try to pretend that doG were visionaries or that they were light years ahead of their time, but these 7 tracks are pretty fucking ace, and I challenge you to listen to "The Side Song" and not either chuckle or smile knowingly at the simple and poignant brilliance of its lyrics.  I had occasional arguments with my girlfriend in 1992 about how I was not nearly as fun-loving and fun to be around as the fellows from THE SYMPHONY (specifically Jesse and Derek, who collaborated on this doG recording), and I'm pretty sure that the girlfriend in question is now happily married to one of them. So I suppose things worked out pretty well for all involved, don't you think?

Indian Clayton's Brown Dog Back Yard Habitat: The Album