BIG BLEACH

Fast and feisty....and super fun. DEAD MILKMEN vibes with modern DIY vigor, and the ability to make instantly recognizable covers sound completely original. Only thing better than blasting this demo on a spring morning was when I watched them rip through a set of their own creamers in Oklahoma last spring. Hattiesburg, Mississippi is (apparently?) where it's at right now....road trip?

UNDER THE BLEACHERZ

BAGHEAD // BIG BLEACH

You read the shit I said yesterday about FORMALDEHYDE JUNKIES? Well, replace a few of the date-specific cultural references and fast forward 12 years and that's me watching these Hattiesburg, Mississippi bands wreck the joint in Oklahoma City last spring. Fukkn crucial. 

IT'S THE BIG BAG SPLIT

JERRY CLOWER

As anyone who's spent time on the American South is well aware, there's a difference between the denizens of the deep Southeast and the hillbillies in the Smokey Mountains, the big city Texans and the generations old Virginia clans - "Southern Culture" has countless layers, and the people of Mississippi are certainly their own breed. I spent chunk of my early summers at my grandparents' outside of Lorman, Mississippi until I was in high school (technically, Mamaw's place was just off a rural route between the villages of Red Lick and Coon Box...seriously...but the address was Lorman), about 50 miles roughly south of Liberty, where the subject of today's post was born. JERRY CLOWER wasn't a comedian, per se, he was an incredible story teller and anyone who's spent time (or has family) from rural Mississippi will sure appreciate his gift of gab...just stories, but these stories put places that no one had ever heard of on the map in the early '70s. Sweet and endearing, pure and wholesome...and yes, funny, Jerry's first two releases are collections of tall tales and legends, the same kind my Uncle Sammy and Papaw traded back and forth with neighbors when I was a kid. For further reference, I don't think there would be a Jeff Foxworthy without a Jerry Clower...though I'm not sure that's the most rousing endorsement. More punk stuff tomorrow.

MOUTH OF MISSISSIPPI // FROM YAZOO CITY MISSISSIPPI TALKIN'

Due to an organic cassette defect (time does have its way with Terminal Escape's medium of choice), the last few tracks of each release are...well, altered. Time has degenerated these stories into blips and blurts of nonsensical redneck lingo, giving the impression that you are on drugs. 

WHITE TRASH SUPERMAN

FUCKFACE crossed paths with WHITE TRASH SUPERMAN twice on our 1995 US tour. First in Biloxi, Mississippi, where we played with five touring bands and a couple of local ska acts in a rented hall, and then in New Orleans on afternoon that followed the most exceptional (frightening) displays of alcohol consumption I have ever seen (participated in) and our drummer was still talking to his dead friends (out loud) while we were playing. The following year, we got towed to a show they arranged for us sometime near Christmas (I can't recall if it was in Starkville or Columbus, and I don't remember if WTS or Jayson's next band THE GRUMPIES played...I just know it was real close to Jesus's birthday, and kids got crazy - perhaps because they were crazy). WHITE TRASH SUPERMAN are from Starkville, Mississippi, and their songs will seep under your skin and melt your icy jaded veins...this tape and their other demo were on heavy rotation in the van for many tours to come, and we were happy to spread the word to friends back home. Their sound is dredged through '90s poppy punk, but their delivery is all adrenaline and alcohol, placing them somewhere between HICKEY and SUPERCHUNK on my "awesome melodic bands from the '90s" meter. These tracks became WHITE TRASH SUPERMAN's only two EP's, Punk Rock Hero and Couldn't (If I Tried) b/w Wheaties, both released in 1995 or so. "Couldn't (If I Tried)" is as close to a perfect song as I've ever heard, and the words still get stuck in my head on a regular basis. The other two songs on this tape, "Can Man" and "Staring At Your Walls," never made it to wax, but they are both brilliant in the same innocently mature manner as "Couldn't (If I Tried)," and shows a band years more advanced than their actual years. In a different world, WHITE TRASH SUPERMAN would have (should have) been playing to hundreds of college punk fans for the last half of the decade, but in our world, they recorded brilliant songs themselves on a 4-track, released the songs themselves on cassette and EP (using the imprint Did It Ourselves Records), and filled a handful of lives with memories. That's a pretty nice legacy.

PUNK ROCK HERO