Stabbed to the arms, ooh-la-la

When I moved back to San Francisco in 2005 I went to Aquarius Records to find out what was going on here, and the record they were all recommending was Deerhoof's Milk Man.  I bought it, took it home, listened to it, and thought, those people are nuts.  

The record made no sense to me.  It was chaotic and loud and abrasive, which are things that I like, but none of it seemed to work.  It just seemed like a pastiche of Frank Zappa and the Boredoms, and not in a good way.

I ran across this video last night.  I thought, "Oh yeah, I remember that record.  It was terrible.  This is exactly the kind of noisy pointless wanking that the people at Pitchfork lose their minds over."  And then I hit play.

This is fantastic.  I went back and listened to the original track.  It's just as good.  What the hell was I thinking?  I wish I could tell you.

Anyway, there's so much to love here.  The wild extremes in dynamics, which mostly seem to be cued by the drummer.  The lovely vocal melody, especially when it's doubled in the guitar.  That huge arena-rock descending chord progression.  (I could listen to the first 30 seconds of this over and over.)  The little blasts of feedback here and there that remind me of Pavement's "Stereo."  (Pavement casts a long shadow over the whole thing.)  The "Interstellar Overdrive" guitar duo, and Satomi Matsuzaki's great little cutoff gesture that puts a stop to it.

This obviously won't be to everyone's taste.  After all, it wasn't to mine, for some reason, until it was.  I hope you like it.


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