LP - Chrome Cranks - Chrome Cranks 20th Anniversary Edition
"The Lower East Side of 1994 wasn’t the Lower East Side of 1976. Or
even the one of 1981. But back then, if you squinted hard enough under
the pale, hazy streetlamps of Ludlow Street, there were still glimpses
of ghosts to be had. Twenty years later, though, you could stand in the
exact same spot and squint ’til your eyes were ground to dust and much
of what you’d see was the glare of gleaming condos. Of course, ranting
against so-called redevelopment, especially in New York, is the
redundant errand of fools who no longer fit their leather jackets. In
the 1990s, however, there were still vivid fumes lingering from those
earlier epochs, stinking things up in all the right ways (piss, subway
exhaust) and infusing the neighborhood with all the raw adventure and
consummate coolness of certain suburban-Midwestern teenage dreams.
Dreams that some of us were determined to bodily inhabit, adding our own
voices to the mythic choir. It was William’s idea to move the Chrome
Cranks to New York. I thought it was crazy. New York was way too
competitive. Better to be, as they say, a big fish in a small pond. But
of course that was a joke. There was no audience in Cincinnati for the
stuff we wanted to play, and the bass and drums slots in the band—which
was more of a concept then, really—were rotating doors of distracted,
unreliable, or just plain clueless players. So in late 1992 he left to
sublet his sister’s Manhattan apartment, returning to Ohio a few months
later to record some tunes and help me move up.Once we were there,
things happened fast. Jerry joined on bass, and the demo we’d made in
Cincinnati started making a buzz. We found a drummer, Phil Rust, and
began playing out. We signed to PCP Entertainment and released the
“Eight Track Mind” single and a split EP/picture disc with Foetus (AKA
Jim Thirlwell, among other evil guises). We replaced Phil with Charles
Hanson and began converting our practice space, Funhouse, into a
recording studio. Renovations to Funhouse dragged on longer than
planned, though, so we recorded these tracks at Waterworks Studio on
West 14th Street. Charlie was a good guy and a fine drummer with a long
history (he’d played guitar in New Orleans punk pioneers the Normals),
but he was conflicted about being in a band by then and it never really
felt like he belonged—a feeling he shared, making his point by bucking
our shaggy-haired image and shaving his head just in time for our debut
album’s photo shoot. (Well played, sir.) But soon after he was gone and
it all worked out for the best: We were lucky enough to snare the
amazing Bob Bert and never looked back.
Until now, perhaps. And, since we are, I’m reminded of something
someone said to me when I was still in Ohio, frustrated as I tried
vainly to get the band going while digging myself an ever-deepening rut:
“Dude, there’s a lot of shit building up inside of you. And when it
finally all comes out—man, that’s gonna be something to hear.” So this
record is the sound of it all coming out, at long last, after many years
of festering deep inside. Loud and in your fuckin’ face, with these
dirty downtown hands tightening their grip around your ripe, choking
throat. The only way it could ever come out. The only way that feels
right.
-Peter Aaron
Hudson, NY, 2015
For Bill Liest.
Recommended If You Like: Scientists, The Birthday Party, Pussy
Galore, Cramps, Pere Ubu, Unsane, The Jesus Lizard, Laughing Hyenas,
Dead Moon" - Hozac
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