Meat Puppets - S/T Vinyl

This 1999 remastered edition of MEAT PUPPETS is an Enhanced CD [ECD] that includes bonus tracks, the 1981 7-inch release IN A CAR and a video for "Walking Boss," filmed at a concert at Target Video in San Francisco, California.
Meat Puppets: Curt Kirkwood (vocals, guitar); Cris Kirkwood (vocals, bass); Derrick Bostrom (drums).
Additional personnel: Steve Thomsen (keyboards).
Producers include: Laurie O'Connell, Ed Barger, Montior.
Engineers include: Spot, Ed Barger, Darrell DeMarco.
Recorded between 1980 and 1999. Includes liner notes by Derrick Bostrom.
All tracks have been digitally remastered.
The Meat Puppets were one of the very best bands to rise from the American punk/indie underground (and the SST Records roster) in the 1980s, but they didn't get to be brilliant overnight, and their self-titled debut album is the sound of a talented band still scrambling to find its voice. Most of the elements that would make the Meat Puppets worthwhile are here -- the shared fondness for the speed and energy of punk rock, the space and flexibility of psychedelia, and the twangy amiability of country -- but they sure hadn't figured out how to work out the proportions and fit all the pieces together, and on most of Meat Puppets the band sounds like a bunch of kids all cranked up on Mountain Dew, bouncing around the room but not sure what to do as a group. When in doubt, here the Puppets simply charge forward as fast as they can, and this is easily the most "punk"-sounding album they would make, but the clarity doesn't make a virtue of this, not surprising from a band that so cherished eclecticism. And when Curt Kirkwood isn't sure what direction to take with a song vocally, here he opts to attack it with an indecipherable bray or by blubbering like a mush-mouthed yokel, and he ends up shooting his own performances in the foot. The band was already tight and emphatic, and Curt's guitar work is fluid and muscular on these tunes, while his brother Cris Kirkwood on bass and Derrick Bostrom on drums give him the proper support whether he's meandering through "Walking Boss" or "Tumblin' Tumbleweeds," charging at hardcore velocity through "Melons Rising" or "Playing Dead," or taking several paths in between. Meat Puppets isn't a bad debut, but considering how much better and more interesting they would become in a very short time, it's more of a curiosity in their catalog than anything else. ~ Mark Deming

• Format: Vinyl
• Genre: Rock