Violent Femmes ??

Went to see them last night ... bloody marvellous. An unfeasibly large man in a kilt on bass, a guy who looked just like my Dad on stand up drums and Radar from M*A*S*H on guitar, singing songs about throwing your kids down a well and getting stoned - among other things. The crowd had a riotous time.

I'd never heard anything by them before and know nothing about them. Any recommendations people??

 

Try and find the first self titled album on vinyl (Rough Trade 55) - its superb attacking acoustic stuff with amazing acoustic bass work and its a stuning recording that simply leaps out the speakers at you. The CD is hopeless by comparison and sounds compressed.

Tony.

 

Cheers Tony, I'll keep an eye out. Glad to hear about the bass playing. Have to say it was one of the highlights of the evening. The guy really could play bass and not in some sappy Mark King kinda way

 

Hi,

The Violet Femmes were formed in the early 80s. They never had any major success but did have good core support. They had songs that dealt angst & cathartic subjects. This appealed to the darker side of the indie crowd in the early 80s.

The first album is the one to go for as far as I'm aware. I have just sold a vinyl copy on ebay. The first album did build up sales for a platinium disc. There is a copy on ebay at the moment.

You can get the cd 'Add it up' which features the first ten years of material plus some live stuff.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos...3263/sr=2-2/ref=sr_2_11_2/026-3002174-9739612

Other albums include 'Blind leading the naked' &' Viva Wisconsin' seem to be popular choices.

SCIDB

 

Thanks for the info, May well put in a bid on ebay

s'funny though you saying they wrote angsty songs that appealed to the darker side of the Indie crowd. The impression I got was that they had a great sense of humour, everyone thought they were funny and that they meant it that way - even the song about murdering your children (mind you that is a bit dark I s'pose, even if it is funny). Is this another Smiths style - "they're miserable" - "no, they're funny and ironic" type thing?

 

There's a reissued version of their first album available with some demos, live and unreleased tunes on.

Tis a fantastic album, by far their best.

 

Hi Uncle Ants,

I would say the darker side is with some of the lyrical content as the music is quite melodic. The lyrics cover a wide range of emotions it seems. I do remember that some people who were into them in the early 80s were a mixture of goths & indie kids.


SCIDB

 

One of the finest albums! Both musicaly and lyricaly great! I was sure there was another thread I'd started a while back, but can't find it now.

I'd heard of them when younger, but had never really known much about them. I think it was after watching Reality Bites in the mid 90's that I remembered them again.

Heard little of them again for a while. Then a couple of years ago a mate was playing a CD in his car!

I'd go for "Add it up" as a good place to start.

Have a look here for MOre on them....

http://www.vfemmes.com/ and http://www.violentfemmes.net/

 

As for angst and dark. I'd go along with that, but they certainly give it a funny edge. There's also some MOre political stuff too.

One of my fa'vs has to be Gimme The Car, where he's begging his dad to borrow the car so he can go out and get it on with a girl!

 

This is the Violent Femmes lyric:

The line 'Why can't I get just one ****, I guess it's something to do with luck' is arguably the best rock 'n' roll lyric ever!

Tony.

 

PS Wow, Michael has got the vBulletin 'swear filter' on, the asterixes in the above all begin with a F!

Tony.

 

**** that.

-- Ian

Edit: Yes, you're right. What a bunch of arse.

 

That be the one off Reality Bites.

 

One of those serendipitous moments. The other half was down in London for a couple of nights and staying at a friends. She mentioned that we'd been to see them and her friend dug out said first album and said she could have it because they don't listen to records anymore It really is very good indeed. Also borrowed a copy of Add It Up from a friend - I will have to explore them some more no doubt.

TonyL, you weren't wrong about the acoustic bass on the first album and as you pointed out, comparing the tracks on the Add It Up collection which are also on the vinyl, its clearly an example of what not to do with CD, like listening in the next room or something.