I have recently been reading a fascinating book entitled 'Our Band Could Be Your Life (Scenes from the American Indie Underground 1981-1991) written by Michael Azerrad. It's basically a potted history of the DIY American indie revolution that ultimately lead to bands like Nirvana and their cross over into the mainstream. It's focuses on 13 bands - most of which I was familiar with before reading (Big Black, Butthole Surfers, Husker Du, Mission of Burma, Sonic Youth etc) - but one of the bands featured, were a band I had never heard before. That band was Minutemen. I was vaguely aware of them prior to reading the book - but I had them down as a shouty hardcore band. They existed between 1980 and 1985. The band coming to an untimely end when core member D. Boon was killed in a car crash just before Christmas 1985. The other two members of the band were Mike Watt and George Hurley.I was so intrigued by the story told in this book that I instantly wanted to hear the band. Luckily their stuff is available fairly easily and I plumped to download a couple of LPs from the Emusic site. I didn't regret it. The band were nothing like the hardcore band that I had imagined. They were a powerful band, in the sense that their songs often came across like short, sharp, shock treatment. The band were also great musicians. It showed. The drums they use move effortlessly between straight ahead rock'n'roll to more complex rhythms. I can now hear their influence across bands I grew up loving in 1987 and 1988 (Big Black, Butthole Surfers and Sonic Youth all spring to mind).
So after buying Post-Mersh, Volumes 1 and 2. I chanced upon a cheap DVD of a documentary about the band that came out in 2005. Simply entitled 'We Jam Econo' - in reference to their low budget DIY approach to music making, fanzines and touring. It's a two DVD set - one being a history of the band pieced together from old interviews, live footage and talking head interviews. The other disc is 62 songs from three filmed concerts. I'd say this pretty much an essential purchase.
Here's 'Little Man with a Gun in his Hand' from the DVD:
The Fits and Starts blog has a more general post up about this period in American music - but it has a few Minutemen songs for download.
Thanks for the nod to Fits and Starts, and I'm glad you've come round to appreciate the Minutemen. They were one of a kind.
Keep up the great site.
Terry
Fits & Starts
yes, yes. The Minutemen are (were?) truly ace.
I'm sad that you have never heard of the minutemen, but happy that you have discovered them. They have recorded one of the best albums of all time: Double Nickels On The Dime. It is right up there with Revolver, Pet Sounds or whatever else people thing is great.
Please enjoy some fIREHOSE while you're at it. Start with Ragin' Full On, then go to If'n.
But stop what you're doing right now and get Double Nickels On The Dime. Drop everything. You won't be sorry.
love,
beach
Hey Beach,
Double Nickels on the Dime is on my list to check out. I'd already heard fIREHOSE, years back, they were around more when I was getting into good music.
Trev/Lostmusic