White Pages on Can't Stand Ya Records

Boston's White Pages raise an interesting seven inches dilemma. Is it cheaper to press a single sided 7" at 33 or press those same tracks on both sides of the disc at 45? Not that these guys needed to extra rotations, they manages four songs on the one side...and it's easier to not go over and flip this thing before running back to my keyboard then I'm all for it - although isn't that a CD then? White pages are treading on some weird ice. I'm torn. They did send me some WCW cards, Flyin' Brian who will take you on an aerial journey to "Hurt City".
In the end though I just wanted more of their raw, garage-y sound that takes me back to the best kind of shows. The ones that you can't get tickets to or read about in the paper.

A-Side's "Peace or a Nice Apartment", the eternal question. I love that there's some kind of bleeding over of a pick on strings into the thin jangle coming out of the right channel as it blows up into a real tossing and turning river tube ride. The back and forth of Joe and Christine is where this reminds me of the Yips or Times New Viking on hardcore mode. Playing with tempo and each other's rhythms and vocals, the call and response of this sweaty see your breath basement. That tiny heater in the corner never worked anyway.
"Terms of Endearment" opens on a bass line, cruddy and thin, the guitars are warmer here, the treble almost sucked out of this layer. Joe's in the back of this one covered in distortion, but not yelling, there isn't a sense of frantic trying-to-get-above-it-all sound, he's calmly back there having a good time. No aggressive punchout feel from these guys either just an all ages DIY good time. "Pill Poppper" like Tony Molina you capture this sound for just a brief amount of time and it just has to be this length. Christina is crying behoind Joe's vocal, waaa waa waaa. They have a stumbly, fast as hell delivery in and out of sync with this impossible to keep straight spastic guitar strum. The drums are off in their own path hoping the rest of these guys will follow. Push those limits, close your eyes and see what happens when the dust settles. On "No Hair No Flair" I love the mix they have going with the low end brittle sounding guitar and crashy cymbal percussion section mic'd in a rehearsal space with that telltale concrete echo when they stop. It's a little like the Minutemen, just keep it simple having more in common with garage then hardcore. A solid, blinders-on punk plow. Joe and Christine trade the track title lines, you can hear the connection of these guys and this bonkers out of character solo part takes this into an unexpected place. Not your usual punk but neither was Lex Luger, a.k.a. "The Total Package"

I love a Helvetica Bold font on single sleeves, letraset on an actual size foldover xerox cover and then sit around and handstamp the center label. Get this from Can't Stand Ya.