Jay's Reviews for the Pissy Monsta

I am subbing for Jay as he is technically challenged......

June Reviews

Cheap Trick – Cheap Trick had a great four studio album run to start their career. Each record was a superb combination of power pop rockers and ballads with In Color, their second, being the high point as they modernized the sound of the Raspberries to great affect. Every release during that period was a must buy for me except the miserable live album that turned them into rock stars. And that was the problem for me when Dream police came out. I was sick to fuckin’ death of that lousy live album and listened to Dream Police with jaded ears. Too bad, because listening to it now for the first time in 25 years, it sounds fresh and exciting. It suffers from too much synth on the title track, some over-production issues, but it still sounds great 30 years after the fact. 4

Band of Horses – I found this a bit tedious at first, but subsequent listens (something that doesn’t always happen when I’m not immediately enthralled) revealed great melodies and overall solid songs. A sneaky record that seems to get better each time lI listen to it. 4

Dirty Projectors – Didn’t listen to it much, but it can be both an interesting and tough listen. Just not enough there, but it could change as I force more listens on myself.

Jesse Malin – A surprise to me. I’ve always seen his name, but never heard anything and I thought it would be more singer songwriter than rock album. A bit too much of the same thing, but a solid 3.5

Dire Straits - Yeah, I get that he’s a good guitar player and this hums right along with pretty consistent quality – everything easy to listen to. It is just a tad too smooth for my tastes and I found myself drifting off at times. Certainly nothing to complain about, but the best I can offer up is a 3.

Zappa – Went missing, but I looked at the play-list when Alan gave it to me and I knew much of it despite having a very small collection of Zappa. Almost anything you could put on this collection would be good and/or interesting, so I’m hoping I find it soon so I can listen to it.

Record Stores - The last decent record store I was in is Brass City Records in Waterbury, home of one of the region’s other cool stores – the Phoenix. Haven’t found anything in CT even remotely close to these. Any good record store must have the following – vinyl, both 45 and 33; posters and old magazines; a concentration on either the British invasion, ‘70s punk or both and a single clerk/owner who is a combination of all three of the main characters from High Fidelity (Rob’s passion, Barry’s dismissiveness and Dick’s nerdiness). Brass City has it all, including Walter, who is partial to the 60s music and recent jangle pop/power pop. The coolest store I have ever been in was Hideo’s Discodrome, a scene-making record store in Cleveland owned by Johnny Dromette (nee Thompson) and frequented by the likes of David Thomas, Peter Laughner (of Pere Ubu) and other members of the Cleveland Akron music scene in the late 70’s – Bizarros, Waitresses, Rubber City Rebels, Tin Huey, Pagans etc. Johnny was a friend of a friend and I got togo to his house once and there witnessed the largest record collection I have ever seen – 15,000 by his estimation – covering three entire walls of his apartment from to bottom.
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July Reviews

The National – Can you sound just a little bit more morose? This sounds depressing even when he might not be singing about something depressing. Who the fuck cares, though? I don’t get the critical acclaim – I couldn’t get through it twice. There are a few moments when it is poignant, but mostly it’s a depressing sounding mess. 2


Grease Band - So Lowell George comes back from the dead, grabs Billy Payne and Paul Barrerre from his old band Little Feat and off they head to Levon Helm’s studio in upstate New York. On the way they call Helm’s old pals from The Band, invite them to meet them there and when they all get to the Barn in Woodstock they spend about 24 hours listening to Exile on Main Street. Then they make a record and this is it. An endlessly entertaining mix of those three bands - 4


Altered Beast – When Girlfriend came out it was an absolute revelation to me. Wow, somebody is making exactly what I want to hear. Pop songs with great hooks and harmonies set to loud guitars. Then came Altered Beast, but bout a week before Altered Beast was released, a Chicago radio station aired a phenomenal live recording that included the best from Girlfriend and most of Altered Beast. No sooner had I bought Altered Beast, Shape Shifter, the live show from Chicago, was available and quite frankly, the live versions of everything Sweet does blow away the originals. So Altered Beast was shelved in my household – no reason to listen to the studio versions when I’ve got these. So this was great to listen to in again after all these years and to be reminded, that although Shape Shifter overshadowed it, Altered Beast is phenomenal. Stunning guitar work from Ivan Julian, Robert Quine and Richard Lloyd, great songs from Sweet. 5



Hot Hot Heat - Can’t tell if this takes more from early ‘80s new wave or from the latest wave of catchy Britrock from bands like Kaiser Chiefs and Arctic Monkeys. They’ve been around longer than the latter, but this is a newer release, so it’s hard to tell. For some reason, despite some catchy stuff here, its really never gets beyond the gimmicky sound and so it gets no better than a 2.5



Willie Nile – Willie Nile comes highly recommended by a number of his fellow artists, among them Bruce Springsteen and Lucinda Williams, so I figured I should check it out. I’m a sucker for songs about rock, so I love the title cut and there are 6-7 other really good songs on this, but there are times when his vocal urgency just doesn’t match up with his songwriting ability and there are also moments, though rare, when he veers closer to John Cafferty than I’m comfortable with. Still, I leave my car humming the songs and they stay with me for long periods of time so he must be doing something right. I’m sure it can be criticized for being slightly derivative, but there is an energy that leads me to believe that he would be great live. 3.5















I keep virtually everything. I like having lots of stuff, although it’s really hard to tell what I have because so much of my recent acquisitions from the group are slim-line cases – they suck. Anyway – here’s the system:

5 – All time top 30 album for me. I’ve awarded 4 or 5 of them
4.5 - Top 30-75 all time
4 – I’ll listen to it again and probably put a song or two on a mix playlist
3-3.5 pretty good. Has songs I like.
2.5 Some good, some bad
2 – Mostly bad
1 – 1.5 – Atrocious
.5 – worse than atrocious
Don’t give out 0’s

Why I’m cool - Volume, vinyl and vintage punk