Scat Indierock | Alternative 17 Items

Same Place The Fly Got Smashed Transparent Red Vinyl Edition

LP | 1990 | US | Reissue (Scat)

27,99 €*

Release: 1990 / US – Reissue

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Originally released in 1990, Same Place The Fly Got Smashed was Guided By Voices’ fourth album in as many years. Roughly a concept album about an alcoholic named Joker Bob who goes on a bender, someone dies, and Bob gets the chair (“the electrifying conclusion”). From the moment the needle drops, the listener is served notice that this isn’t going to be an easy listen, as an argument taped off of a TV cuts to a basement recording of a lone, blaring electric guitar with someone yelling over the top. But for those brave enough to pass the opening hazards, there are wonders within.

This particular album has come to be held in higher and higher regard by fans, and they are correct to consider it a top-tier release. The story and sequence have a flow, and consideration for approachability is optional. Many of the crudest tracks reveal themselves as necessary stitches in the album’s tapestry. Yet it also contains all time greats like “Drinker’s Peace,” “Mammoth Cave,” the epic “Local Mix-Up/Murder Charge,” and of course “Pendulum” with its immortal opening line: “Come on over tonight, we’ll put on some Cat Butt and do it up right!”—a rare break in the clouds on one of the band’s darkest albums.

This reissue, like the previous ones in this series, is a mostly faithful reproduction of the original pressing of 500 on the band’s own Rocket #9 label. And like the others, the virgin RTI vinyl is housed in a thick tip-on jacket, and includes Robert Pollard’s original handwritten lyric insert.

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LP | 1987 | US | Reissue (Scat)

Sandbox

25,99 €*

Release: 1987 / US – Reissue

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Even back in 1987, Guided By Voices was not content to release just one album in a year—Sandbox was released in the summer of that year following Devil Between My Toes’ appearance that February. Likewise, in similar GBV style, the sound and approach of the two albums could not be more different. Where Devil mostly mines a darker, lo-fi psychedia, along with several instrumental explorations, Sandbox is sunny, direct, has a bigger, crunchier sound, and zero instrumentals. Where Devil has a murky and impressionistic black and white photo of a rooster for a cover, Sandbox sports a full color photo of the band relaxing on a lawn on a sunny day. Let’s also recall that unlike today, in 1987 a full-color album jacket wasn’t just a little more expensive than a black and white one, it was way more expensive. Right up front, the band was communicating that this was a more commercially ambitious endeavor, while behind the scenes they rented better gear for a bigger sound, and tackled more sophisticated arrangements and honed in on the hooks and harmonies of the songs. Of all the band’s early self-released albums, Sandbox differs the most from the sound fans would later associate with the group, which is in itself a recommendation. Nowhere else will you hear the perfectly rendered three-part harmonies of “Long Distance Man,” direct Beatles quotes, or Robert Pollard reveling in his southern Ohio drawl. It’s also true that one of the more enjoyable aspects of the record is finding all the places where the band’s future is indeed foreshadowed. Simply put, Guided By Voices just can’t help but be a little weird, even when attempting something like a power pop album. At the close of the opening track, Pollard announces, “Ladies and gentlemen! Back by popular demand for your entertainment and spiritual enlightenment...Electric Jam Soul Aquarium!” a truly “wtf is happening here” moment. Or the stripped down gloom of “Trap Soul Door”—a track that could be right at home on nearly any later GBV album wherein Pollard intones, “Just one spark can start a hell of a fire.” Little did he know how true that statement would become.

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Tape | 2021 | US | Original (Scat)

Propeller

10,99 €*

Release: 2021 / US – Original

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Propeller was the fifth album by Guided By Voices, and was intended to be the group’s last. Released as a limited edition of 500 LPs in 1992, the album featured handmade covers and blank labels to keep expenses as low as possible. Their other albums hadn’t sold much, why would this one? Robert Pollard had a family to support and his musical aspirations had not exactly been a boon to their bank account. As fate would have it, the band wound up releasing an album chock full of gems Pollard had stockpiled, and for the first time sounded distinctly like the band that fans have since come to love. Propeller also marks the return of Tobin Sprout to the GBV fold, along with an increased songwriting presence. From anthem-to-be “Over the Neptune” to the effortless melodies of closer “On the Tundra,” Propeller is a hell of a ride, and remains one of the most important albums in the band’s discography. The vinyl edition has been out of print for a decade, and features different cover art than previous pressings. The CD edition has been out of print for a minute as well, and is now housed in digipak format, also with a new, unique cover from one of the original pressings. And for the first time Propeller is available on cassette.

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Same Place The Fly Got Smashed Black Vinyl Edition

LP | 1990 | US | Reissue (Scat)

24,99 €*

Release: 1990 / US – Reissue

Genre: Rock & Indie

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LP | 1992 | US | Reissue (Scat)

Propeller

26,99 €*

Release: 1992 / US – Reissue

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Devil Between My Toes Black Vinyl Edition

LP | 1987 | US | Reissue (Scat)

24,99 €*

Release: 1987 / US – Reissue

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Devil Between My Toes was the debut album by Guided By Voices, originally self-released by the group in February 1987 in an edition of 300 copies. Disillusioned by the lukewarm reception to the band’s debut EP the previous year, Robert Pollard resolved that this record would be conceived for an audience of one: “(it) is strictly for me and me only. Because no one’s going to buy it, no one gives a fuck, but I’m still gonna do it. So I might as well put only what I want on it, for me. An album for me.” Even amongst the 30-odd proper GBV albums, Devil Between My Toes remains unique, and not simply because it was the first to be released. Much like its out-of-focus cover photo of the mean rooster next door (Big Daddy), the album’s vibe is dark, minimalist, and mysterious. Most of the album was recorded as a trio, and it contains more instrumentals than any other GBV album, but like the best LPs in their catalog, the sequencing renders these tracks essential to the flow and mood of the LP. While there are the expected Brit Invasion hook-fests sprinkled throughout, we’re also treated to career highlights like the monolithic “A Portrait Destroyed by Fire” (Tobin Sprout’s first GBV appearance) and “Cyclops,” a track that would be right at home on Vampire On Titus had it been recorded more crudely.

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Tape | 1994 | US | Reissue (Scat)

Bee Thousand

12,99 €*

Release: 1994 / US – Reissue

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Little introduction should be required here. Let it suffice to say that Bee Thousand is arguably the best, or at least among the top Guided By Voices albums in a copious discography. Accordingly, the album has stacked up accolades over the years, including being voted #1 on Amazon.com’s “100 Greatest Indie Rock Albums of All Time.” It’s a staple of such lists, and has also placed highly on those curated by Spin, Pitchfork, Mojo and Rolling Stone.

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Self-Inflicted Aerial Nostalgia Clear Yellow Vinyl Edition

LP | 1988 | US | Reissue (Scat)

23,79 €* 27,99 € -15%

Release: 1988 / US – Reissue

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Self-Inflicted Aerial Nostalgia was Guided By Voices’ third album, self-released by the band in 1988 in a pressing of 500. While both of the band’s earlier albums exhibit strong songwriting and plenty of vision, it is here that the GBV sound really begins to coalesce. While Devil Between My Toes is rife with contrasts, variety, and dark psychedelia, and its follow up Sandbox is a cohesive ’60s-influenced affair, Self-Inflicted Aerial Nostalgia marries the two approaches to outstanding effect. Unsurprisingly, recording began before Sandbox was even done pressing. These sessions would yield an aborted LP titled Learning To Hunt, but after personnel changes and second thoughts, Robert Pollard shelved most of the tracks, dismissing them as too similar to those on Sandbox. Fair enough, as many of Pollard’s more recent songs were simply on another level than previously. Here are the first of the classic Pollard slow-burners, often built on a simple melodic or rhythmic figure that circles itself ever outward, accumulating heft, variation, and inevitability as the song evolves into something unexpected yet inevitable. It’s the aural equivalent to watching a butterfly grow out of its cocoon. A few things are unique to this particular LP. Original powerhouse drummer Peyton Eric returns for nearly half the tracks, while engineer and lead guitarist Steve Wilbur shines at his brightest, resulting in some of the most thoroughly rocking GBV songs to ever be cut to lacquer, such as “Earful o’ Wax,” which simply explodes out of the speakers when the solo section begins. On the other end of the spectrum, you get Pollard recording perfect pop gems at home with just voice and guitar, which would become a calling card on later GBV albums. There’s simply a tremendous variety of material, all strung together in such a way that the album is all of one piece, a mosaic.

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Peace, Love & Murder Black Vinyl Edition

LP | 1987 | US | Reissue (Scat)

23,99 €*

Release: 1987 / US – Reissue

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Peace, Love & Murder was the second album by Cleveland’s My Dad Is Dead, originally released in 1987 by Boston’s Birth Records. Like the debut, ...And He’s Not Gonna Take It Anymore, Mark Edwards wrote and performed all the music on his own. While not a significant departure from that album, Peace, Love & Murder does differ from its predecessor and has some qualities that make it unique in the voluminous Mdid discography. While combining live drums with drum machine is a hallmark of the Mdid style, on this album Edwards introduced the Roland Tr-505 into the mix, and in a bold move recorded the live drums first, which had the effect of making the rhythm tracks feel a bit more organic despite the presence, and occasionally the prominence, of the Tr-505. Modal guitar tunings remain de rigeur here, but Edwards’ abilities as a guitarist display a marked increase in proficiency and imagination. While the debut album sprawls a bit, PLM is a tight and focused ten song set, buoyed by a more impactful production job by Chris Burgess. Just as the debut album had a few lighter (or at least slightly less grim) songs, so does this album, but here they shine with a bit more pop sparkle. “Babe In The Woods” and “Hill O’ Beans” would go on to be fan favorites for many years, as would the utterly harrowing unstoppable bulldozer that is “Like A Vise.” All these years on, the album’s closer “Fireball” has become oddly relevant and chilling. Sung from the POV of a mass shooter to a droning riff that evokes Middle Eastern modes, the narrator intones, “I’m gonna go out in a blaze of glory / today’s the day I’m gonna make it to the headlines.” The whole album has remarkable cohesion and pacing, as well as variety, and, not to mention ,what a god-tier track “Breakdown” is. So grab a black overcoat and “Open Wide.”

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Pow! Colored Vinyl Edition

12" | 2023 | US | Original (Scat)

20,99 €*

Release: 2023 / US – Original

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Here one has a reissue of a My Dad Is Dead record that never was. Recorded shortly after Peace, Love & Murder, The Pow! EP was intended to be released in the summer of 1987 on Cleveland’s St. Valetine Records, but that never quite happened. Newly signed to NYC’s Homestead Records, it was resolved that the tracks could find a home there, and they were later issued on The Best Defense outtakes compilation on that label. Now, thirty-seven years on, the EP as originally intended is being released. Like its predecessors, Pow! is an isolationist post-punk affair with Mark Edwards performing all musical duties. Pow! features three strong tracks in stunning 45rpm sound, or maybe one should just say it’s really freaking loud and sounds better than the last time around. First is a reprise of “Anti-Socialist,” a highlight from the 1985 debut album. But this is not a mere re-recording, but a new arrangement of the song with additional sections and lyrics, and a more aggressive feel with unmistakable undertones of violence (“I wanna fix ’em with my bare hands”). On the flip is the haunting “In the Morning,” in some ways a foreshadowing of the murderess later meet on “Nothing Special.” Wrapping things up is the instrumental “The Best Defense,” which is about as spritely and engaging as Mr Edwards gets during this era.

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12" | 2023 | US | Original (Scat)

Pow! Black Vinyl Edition

19,99 €*

LP | 2021 | US | Original (Scat)

Release: 2023 / US – Original

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Spike In Vain

Death Drives A Cadillac

25,99 €*

Release: 2021 / US – Original

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Death Drives A Cadillac was Spike In Vain’s second album, never officially released and unheard in its final form until now. Like many hardcore bands circa ’84 and ’85, the group was ready to further expand its palette and ease off the thrash tempos. Recorded roughly a year after Disease Is Relative with a bigger budget, the album is even more wide-ranging, and the songs are more fleshed out. “Despair grew inside her, I grew inside her. She named me Spirit Death, and this is my song” sings Chris Marec, the vocalist on half of this LP. Though less “young” than their debut, that album’s darkness lingers, but here has a more removed, observational quality, with many songs sung in character or in the third person, along with a tendency for anthropomorphic allegory. It has a bit less to do with screaming for death to come than with a growing resignation to being the other, a recognition of inescapable alienation and its relation to childhood trauma. —all with a heaping side of absurdity and a sense of wonder at the gradually unfolding endtimes. That said, many of the tracks wouldn’t be out of place on the debut, and some feature exotic tunings. Bits of roots music come into play as well—gospel, blues, and country figure to some extent in a third of the songs, sometimes in convoluted, Beefheart-esque ways, and at other times toying with genre archetypes as a cat does a mouse.

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... And He's Not Gonna Take It Anymore Colored Vinyl Edition

2LP | 1986 | US | Reissue (Scat)

43,99 €*

2LP | 2021 | US | Original (Scat)

Release: 1986 / US – Reissue

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Originally released in 1986, the debut album by My Dad Is Dead is remarkable not only for its strong and varied material, but also how the aesthetic of MDID’s music was fully formed and instantly recognizable from the git-go. Here are the open modal guitar tunings, the primitive drum machine paired with live drums, the complete rejection of the pentatonic scale and related 1970s guitar techniques, and the dry, journalistic language that brings a distanced, subdued pathos to the harrowing characters and their situations. Few artists who traffic in the darker realms of the human condition do so without some degree of melodrama; Mark Edwards’s penchant for understatement and distance brings even more gravity and impact to these songs of lost souls in a dying city. All these qualities would become hallmarks of the My Dad Is Dead sound for years to come. Like Edwards’s next few albums, ...And He’s Not Gonna Take It Anymore was performed and written entirely by himself, which only deepens the feeling of isolation that permeates the album. This 2021 reissue was remastered by John Golden Sr. and is a huge sonic improvement over the original pressing and early ’90s European editions. Best of all, it includes an entire bonus LP of rare 1985 recordings that were only issued on cassette at the time. These are raw, primitive 4-track recordings that ooze with post-industrial Cleveland malaise. They include nine previously unnreleased songs, and early versions of four songs that were re-recorded for the album. Fans are certain to find some new favorites here.

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Bill Fox

Transit Byzantium

29,99 €*

2LP | 2021 | US | Original (Scat)

Release: 2021 / US – Original

Genre: Rock & Indie

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These newly remastered editions of Bill Fox’s second album are the first since its 1998 release, including the first-ever vinyl pressing. Listeners will hear a wider soundstage, more detail, and improved listenability. Recorded on 4-track cassette, the fidelity belies the sophistication and nuance of the songwriting, This adept remaster by John Golden Sr helps bring definition to the intimate, at-home feel of the album. It sparkles. Very similar in feel and quality to Fox’s debut album, much of Transit Byzantium draws from the same group of recordings. It has the same feel of musical inevitability, that the songs exist beyond time itself, their eventual manifestation guaranteed by Apollo. He could’ve given them to the Everly Brothers, or the Byrds, or the Who, but instead they were channeled through an everyman from Cleveland with an aversion to the limelight. And while a traditional folk influence colors several songs, even those possess the indelible stamp of Fox’s charismatic voice and personality. Although nearly entirely acoustic and with minimal percussion, these eighteen songs cycle through a remarkable variety of textures and moods. While much has quite rightly been written about the god-tier songwriting here (“Song of a Drunken Nightingale,” “My Baby Crying,” “I’ll Give It Away” for starters), it should also be noted that this is a guitar player’s record, though more in terms of conception than flash. Lines of harmony and counterpoint wander between parts, sublime in their invention though sometimes crudely documented.

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Bill Fox

Shelter From The Smoke

28,99 €*

Release: 2021 / US – Original

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Scat Records offers up a definitive edition of Bill Fox's debut solo disc, Shelter from the Smoke, back in print after more than half a decade. Originally self-released in 1997 and reissued the following year by SpinArt, both previous versions featured different tracklists. This edition includes all songs from both versions, as well as the two tracks from a scarce 1996 Scat 7-inch. This reissue also marks the first time the album has been pressed on vinyl. Fox began his musical journey in early 1980s Cleveland with The Mice, who fused punk energy with British-Invasion-style songwriting and harmonies. He infamously dissolved the group on the eve of a European tour, then dropped out of the scene altogether, with an unfinished Mice LP in the can. In the early '90s, he began a series of home recordings which revealed a growing preference for acoustically based music, and formed the basis for Shelter from the Smoke as well as the follow-up Transit Byzantium (scheduled for a similar reissue treatment next year). Shelter also includes four electric tracks recorded with Fox's short-lived band The Radio Flyers. After a 1998 tour, Fox once again dropped out of music. Now he is performing again. For how long, nobody knows. Fox is one of those rare musicians who really does not enjoy the limelight, even declining an interview with Joe Hagan of The Believer, who went so far as to fly to Cleveland in hopes of meeting him. That and his refusal to "be on the internet" has probably only helped the growing cadre of music fans who sees his solo albums as mysterious, lost classics. Or perhaps they just delight in the ringing sound of Fox's perfectly pitched voice or his deft lyricism. Either way, Fox's two solo albums are jewels not to be missed by anyone who enjoys traditional songcraft or iconic vocalists.

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Self-Inflicted Aerial Nostalgia Black Vinyl Edition

LP | 1988 | US | Reissue (Scat)

24,99 €*

Spin Age Blasters Colored Vinyl Edition

Release: 1988 / US – Reissue

Genre: Rock & Indie

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Electric Eels

2LP | 2023 | US | Original (Scat)

41,99 €*