Finally, after much bullshit talk and procrastination, I give you ‘American Buckle’ in all of its……glory? I apologize for taking so long with this, as this stuff has only been heard by a few. I doubt Johnny Ether has heard this since it was created over a period between 1989-1991. I had Tommy Hamilton mix this stuff before he moved to Virginia. I can’t remember when that was but I think it was in the mid to late 90′s.
This project has been discussed many times over the years since the band imploded(thanks to me a dumbass) and originally was intended for posthumous cd release. None of that came to fruition, so we’ve just put everything here. There are multiple versions of some songs, some filler, some ludicrous stuff and some very sad, downbeat stuff. The Singing Spoons hope that you will enjoy their labors on what would have been a fine album and a worthy follow up to ‘Resin Cabin’.
The Sessions
The recording sessions for ‘American Buckle’ began almost immediately after ‘Resin Cabin’ was completed. The Spoons were prolific to a fault which meant that we weren’t too good at editing ourselves. All of it was recorded by Tomy Hamilton over about two or three marathon tracking sessions and multiple overdub sessions at Georgia Street. We laughed, we drank, we smoked and we unfortunately passed out on Tommy’s bed a few times. Tommy was a patient man and always gracious toward our antics. Georgia Street Studio was located right between Duval and Bronough streets in Tallahassee. It was a run down house where Tommy lived as well as at various times Wayne Gleasman(owner of Manufacture Sound), Chris Gleasman(bassist in Gruel), Barry Stock(of Grecian Formula/Bone Ranger), Tom Lewis (engineer and member of Grecian Formula/Bone Ranger), Lee Folmar(Insect Fear), Bruce Hamilton (drummer in Gruel). This place was the breeding ground for most of the stuff coming out of Tallahassee that was influential to us at the time. Tallahassee’s scene was thriving back then…Gruel, Grecian Formula, Insect Fear, Human Scarecrow, DVC and others. Our sessions became somewhat mythically self important to us and we started operating in our bubble. There was a lot of emotional stuff going on with the young men of the Singing Spoons and our music reflected the dual personality of alcohol saturated good times and alcohol saturated psychosis and depression. Those were the two worlds I operated in at least!
Our recording sessions never featured heated arguments about artistic direction. we really collaborated well and the material shows that. John H. had really stepped it up and was contributing a lot to the song writing and was pretty much the band’s arranger. On ‘Resin Cabin’ I had a lot of songs left over from the intensive writing of college, but by the time of these sessions, I was writing more with the band’s input in mind and we would collaborate a lot. It was a fun time and we really enjoyed playing. The guitar playing during these times took on a life of its own. Josh and Chris developed a sound that Kelly Shane described as “massive”. He described the band as lurching forward as one big chord as Josh’s slabs of distorto-neil young in the cheesgrater guitar sound meshed perfectly with Chris’ Bob Mould is in your ceiling Marshall high end crunch. As for me I did my usual primitive flailing and John held it together with tuneful and supple bass playing. ‘American Buckle’ saw some experimentation as John and Josh played some horns. The ARP String Ensemble was used on a few songs to cool effect and Chris played slide guitar (!?!?) on at least two songs! One with a beer can of course!
This was a pivotal time in our lives, as within a year or two some of us would form new bands, leave town, get married etc. At the time, this was the most important thing to all of us. At some point the bubble ruptured….
Here are some thoughts on the sessions from John H. when I first approached him about doing this back in ’04!
John
“The house was green, and the beer was cold. The original artwork for the
Resin Cabin album cover was framed in Wayne Gleisman’s (the president,
founder, and chief-executive officer of our record label, Manufacture Sound
Output Company) bedroom. We had each assembled badass guitar-amp combos,
Josh with his Les Paul/Fender Twin, Chris with the Gibson SG/Marshall stack
(a very temperamental wall-of sound), and me, with my Gibson RD Artist
bass/Crate-Peavey combo amp (okay, so the Crate-Peavey combo won’t get me
into the indie rock hall of fame, but it was loud and bright as hell). It
was evident from first listenings of the tracks that the sound of ‘American
Buckle’ was going to be fatter and heavier than anything we accomplished on
‘Resin Cabin’. In short, everything seemed in order. Tommy Hamilton was as
easy to work with as any producer a bad could ever hope for. He basically
sat and grinned, seemed to like everything, and when the tracks were played
back, he had instantly transformed them into thunder. The recording sessions
went very smoothly. For a notoriously sloppy band, we set down a surprising
majority of the songs as tight first tracks. Mike was singing better than
ever, staying on key in every song and as always, emptying his tank of every
molecule of emotion on every track. There was little to be weary of, except
perhaps, the overwhelming feeling that this was the last meaningful thing
the band would ever accomplish. While I have no intentions of divulging the
morass of intra-band personal issues that led to this apocalyptic mood, the
sense of doom proved justified. A few months later, after a brief (really
brief, like one week) attempt at keeping the band going as a trio, we were
done. Mike and Chris moved on to form Ultraboy and continue to juice up the
Tallahassee scene for a couple of years (Mike is actually still quite active
in the scene), while for Josh and myself, this proved to be our Tallahassee
indie rock swan song. None of us, I think, really held profound or at least
long-lived regrets about the Spoons’ demise. Although ‘American Buckle’
contains much of the best work we ever created, I also think that we were
devastatingly close to becoming a rather formulaic songwriting machine. Most
of the best songs on American Buckle were the older ones; the later tunes
felt stilted and comparatively uninspired. It was almost as if (if I may be
so bold) we were transitioning from the frenetic-inspired mode of the
Replacements Let it Be/Tim era to the slightly lost,
doing-it-for-the-sake-of-doing-it mode of Paul Westerberg’s early solo
career. All this said, I am ecstatic that the Buckle is finally being
released. What’s amazing to me is how fresh the tunes sound, well over a
decade after they were recorded. I am not claiming that we were somehow
magically ahead of our times or anything – these songs still resonate of
early 90s indie power-chord heart-rock (?) – but I do think that there are
lots of folks out there who’ll find these songs catchy, intense, heartfelt,
and worthy of multiple listenings. I certainly hope I’m right. I know “Loofa”
still kicks my ass. ”
I appreciate John’s honesty. When he first wrote this a few years ago, I suggested he was being too harsh, but now I think he was right. We prided ourselves on being prolific, but occasionally this meant a dip in quality. Looking back, maybe it ended for a reason when it did. I know that sounds cliche’, but it had run its course and we were pretty exhausted as I remember. I would also like to say that we did attempt to continue without Josh, but I wasn’t into it very much as I was more into personal destruction at the time.
Other Spoons! Contribute your memories if you’ve still got ‘em!
SOUND
A few of these were from the first sessions with Tommy and were done pretty much for free. He used a reel labeled “shitty work tape” for about 4 songs. “Colorado”, “Business trip”,”Backrub” and “Buzz”. All of these were taken from a rough mix cassette because the original reel had disintegrated when I had Tommy mix these. So the sound on these is rougher than the others but are included here because the songs are good, except for “buzz” which was totally lost(see below).
“Colorado” is the original version and not the one on the ‘buzz’ single. It is superior I believe to that one, but for some reason this one wasn’t used.
“Buzz” has been lost and this was the original version as well and possibly better than the single version. (FOUND!!!!!! 12/13/06 see below)
SONGS
Hello, Mr. Shovel
Red Onions
You’re Broken
Balloon Song
Dress of the Dream Girl
Dress of the Dream Girl (version 2)
Gold 100
Gold 100 (version 2)
Theme from Larry Csonka
Answer for Doofus
Rhyme Hag
Backrub
Colorado
Business Trip
Lilly’s Pad
Lilly’s Pad (version 2)
Loofa
Loofa (version 2)
Side
Windshield/Disaster
J’s and J’s
J’s and J’s (version 2)
Drops
Hall Killing
Permanent Mountain
I Had to tell You (Roky Erikson/13th Floor Elevators cover)
Always Fuss (mike duets with the lovely Jen Kermeen)
Too Awake
Here’s a Wall
Here’s a Wall (version 2)
American Buckle
Closet Call
Buzz (original version) -added 12/13/06
