music post: Scruffy the Cat
fan_eunice has posted her absolutely delightful Doctor Who vid "Moons of Jupiter", which is the impetus for this post. I sent her the song for that vid, hoping that she'd vid it, and I could not be more pleased that she did. But one Scruffy the Cat song was not enough for her; she wanted more! And I am happy to provide.
Scruffy the Cat was a mid-to-late '80s Boston band that I knew about because they did quite a lot of touring and thus got a fair amount of college radio play in those years. I didn't actually live in a town that had a college radio station, although it was occasionally possible to hear the one about an hour away if the weather was right. (I still have the Peter Buck interview I taped off that station the week Green was released.) But of course there was quite the network of cassette tape circulation; I discovered StC via mixes and later had a couple of at-least-third-generation tapes of albums. (Of all the things I do not miss from my youth, tape hiss ranks right up there.)
The thing about StC is that they never actually put out a stellar album; the full records and even the EPs were always a pretty mixed bag. I mean, when they were on they were on, but the songwriting was pretty uneven (and probably even more so than I realized at the time), both lyrically and musically. As far as I can tell, the albums are long out of print, but I dug up a few of their best songs in the early days of Napster, and have treasured them ever since.
Now I share them with you.
From the High Octane Revival EP:
Land of 1,000 Girls
I really think that pop music may have made me gay. The only question is whether to attribute this to StC or Material Issue or one of the other bajillion bands I was listening to at the time.
From the Boom Boom Boom Bingo EP:
You Dirty Rat
This may be my single favorite StC song EVER. If you download only one of these songs, make it this one, I beg you.
From Tiny Days:
My Baby She's Alright
This is the other contender for favorite StC song ever. Bonus Batmobile reference!
Time Never Forgets
Fairly straight-up end-of-the-affair song, less quirky than some of their other fare.
From Moons of Jupiter:
I Do
From my current perspective, this song arguably borders on the stalkery, except that it's so bouncy and sunny and self-deprecating that even now I can't quite read it that way. I think the line that saves it for me is "So I won't hesitate / But if you do, well, I can wait."
Moons of Jupiter
If you're here because of the vid, you already know this one. There is pretty much nothing about this song that doesn't charm me.
Places
Okay, this is probably one of their more peculiar love songs, which is probably why I love it. I mean, how can I not love a song that starts "No dangerous animals can play in my yard"?
Everything
And this is another of their more peculiar songs. I think I disconcerted renenet a few months ago by singing it to her when we were on the phone as I weeded my backyard. Or maybe she's used to that sort of thing by now. She certainly should be.
And that concludes this music post. I'd love to hear if you download any or all of these, especially if there are any tracks you particularly like.
Entirely different music post(s) forthcoming soon(ish).
Scruffy the Cat was a mid-to-late '80s Boston band that I knew about because they did quite a lot of touring and thus got a fair amount of college radio play in those years. I didn't actually live in a town that had a college radio station, although it was occasionally possible to hear the one about an hour away if the weather was right. (I still have the Peter Buck interview I taped off that station the week Green was released.) But of course there was quite the network of cassette tape circulation; I discovered StC via mixes and later had a couple of at-least-third-generation tapes of albums. (Of all the things I do not miss from my youth, tape hiss ranks right up there.)
The thing about StC is that they never actually put out a stellar album; the full records and even the EPs were always a pretty mixed bag. I mean, when they were on they were on, but the songwriting was pretty uneven (and probably even more so than I realized at the time), both lyrically and musically. As far as I can tell, the albums are long out of print, but I dug up a few of their best songs in the early days of Napster, and have treasured them ever since.
Now I share them with you.
From the High Octane Revival EP:
Land of 1,000 Girls
I really think that pop music may have made me gay. The only question is whether to attribute this to StC or Material Issue or one of the other bajillion bands I was listening to at the time.
From the Boom Boom Boom Bingo EP:
You Dirty Rat
This may be my single favorite StC song EVER. If you download only one of these songs, make it this one, I beg you.
From Tiny Days:
My Baby She's Alright
This is the other contender for favorite StC song ever. Bonus Batmobile reference!
Time Never Forgets
Fairly straight-up end-of-the-affair song, less quirky than some of their other fare.
From Moons of Jupiter:
I Do
From my current perspective, this song arguably borders on the stalkery, except that it's so bouncy and sunny and self-deprecating that even now I can't quite read it that way. I think the line that saves it for me is "So I won't hesitate / But if you do, well, I can wait."
Moons of Jupiter
If you're here because of the vid, you already know this one. There is pretty much nothing about this song that doesn't charm me.
Places
Okay, this is probably one of their more peculiar love songs, which is probably why I love it. I mean, how can I not love a song that starts "No dangerous animals can play in my yard"?
Everything
And this is another of their more peculiar songs. I think I disconcerted renenet a few months ago by singing it to her when we were on the phone as I weeded my backyard. Or maybe she's used to that sort of thing by now. She certainly should be.
And that concludes this music post. I'd love to hear if you download any or all of these, especially if there are any tracks you particularly like.
Entirely different music post(s) forthcoming soon(ish).