SLUGFUZLE

Every small town with any kind of underground music scene, especially college towns, probably had the same murmurings in 1991. There would be some rumor about some label talking to some band about how our little town was about to be The Next Seattle and every band worth a shit was going to get signed, and then just enough things would actually happen to make all of those rumors seem plausible. We already had THE FLAMING LIPS (who were in the process of making the jump from Restless to Warner Brothers) and CHAINSAW KITTENS (who would release their second full length on Atlantic, though they were more successful in the press than the real world), bands that were several years older than us and kinda put Norman (and Oklahoma City) on the map. But of all of the bands that people whispered about "making it," SLUGFUZLE was the only one that seemed realistic at the time - more than that, it seemed like a slam dunk. Their churning, low end, hard ass rock was fronted by vocals that sounded like Ultramega OK-era Chris Cornell (which was a very good thing), and these dudes were just so far advanced...a total machine. But it never happened. This six song demo was the entirety of their output, and while major labels did indeed do a little snooping around our fair city, the results of their efforts were paltry dollar bin fodder from FOR LOVE NOT LISA (who pilfered a couple of CHAINSAW KITTENS members and moved to LA to get discovered and succeeded....in making a few forgettable CD only releases and appearing on a soundtrack or something) and THE NIXONS (a fourth rate frat party cover band who seemed to discover grunge to get them more laid than they probably already were, and who sound even more awful twenty years later than I thought they were at the time) instead of recognition for the bands that were actually good. I wasn't sure what to expect when I put this tape on since there have been hundreds (thousands?) of bands crammed in my ears since I last listened to SLUGFUZLE two decades ago...but it's still good. The vocals will probably turn some people off, and I cannot really imagine too many Escape readers who didn't live through grunge digging this without appropriate context, but these twenty minutes are legit. Even if they never made it.

SLUGFUZLE

Worthwhile Norman/Oklahoma City bands from the same era not already shared on Terminal Escape include: GLUE, 9mm DILAUDID, CAPTAIN EYEBALL EXPERIENCE, JANIS 18, DEATHROW BODEAN (though I think they only played one show), SYRINGE, CLOVIS...I'm not talking about punk and hardcore bands here, because I wasn't a punk then. At least I didn't know I was.