Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band's "Trout Mask Replica"

Are you making this stuff up?

At least ONE of those threads finds me pronouncing TMR one of my Top 5 of all time. (Clear Spot = Greatest "accessible" Beefheart LP)

Where do you live? Have you been to the big city yet?

Don't get me wrong, I've got TMR on cd and had it on vinyl way back, too. But when I reach for the Cap'n more likely I'll put on Safe as Milk, Lick My Decals Off, Mirror Man, Strictly Personal, and, yes, the Clear Spot/Spotlight Kid twofer before I put on TMR.

np: Michael Blake, Kingdom of Champa

As far as pop culture bizarro bombs go, nothing really matches it until PiL's Second Edition.

You might re-read James Joyce's Dubliners more frequently, but Ulysses is clearly his (more difficult, less frequently accessed) masterwork. I feel the same way about TMR in relation to the rest of Beefheart's output.

Funny, I used Joyce in a similar but different way in explaining it for the Beefheart tribute in Perfect Sound Forever several years back.

Though I grew up with the album and it obviously made an impact on me, I currently rate it my third favorite after Lick My Decals and Doc at the Radar Station. It barely beats out Clear Spot and Shiny Beast. It's just too bad that TMR is the only token Beefheart album that gets attention in album polls.

For those interested, here's the real story on how Mr. Van Vliet got his nickname and came up with the "fast 'n' bulbous" joke.

Also, I think "Party of Special Things to Do" (off "Bluejeans and Moonbeams", and previously covered by the White Stripes) is one of his best tracks. So fuckin bluesy.

Does anyone have the 180 gram reissue of this? I can get a fairly good deal on it through today, but it's still rather pricey. I know a couple of my vinyl reissues suck as far as sound goes (as discussed on other threads), but I wanted to check on this one since it's basically my favorite album of all time.

I haven't, but I *can* tell you that the original vinyl sounds *miles* better than the CD....

Blimey, does notifications still work on threads?

...and yet the "Clear Spot/Spotlight Kid" CD is still FAR worse!

yeah, Spotlight Kid/Clear Spot's remastering is way too low and a disgrace. Even at his mildest the Cap was pretty commanding. For some reason, a lot of those Reprise records from around that time are the same way, like Randy Newman's 12 Songs is mastered way too dimly.

So any road up, I play a bit of "Trout Mask Replica" to Amber and Alice (Alice's middle name is Ella..) just to see what they think..

A few days later, Alice comes in with a set of fridge magnets, front and back halves of animals.

She picks the front of the elephant and the back of the kangaroo, puts them on the fridge, and says "EleGaroo!"

Damn.

The Captain would love that

It seems so obvious now!

The men don't know but the little girl understands...

It's a play on "allegory" though, isn't it?

lol that's brilliant

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y161/MarkGrout/elegaroo.jpg

hahaha "Alice in Blunderland!"

So any road up, I play a bit of "Trout Mask Replica" to Amber and Alice (Alice's middle name is Ella..) just to see what they think..

A few days later, Alice comes in with a set of fridge magnets, front and back halves of animals.

She picks the front of the elephant and the back of the kangaroo, puts them on the fridge, and says "EleGaroo!"

Damn.

― Mark G, Tuesday, December 1, 2009 1:26 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

mind=blown

holy shit that is the greatest mark g post ever

and that jpg...i will never be able to listen to that song again without seeing it

This is obv the wrong thread for it but I just want to say that my lp of The Spotlight Kid has been getting serious play lately and I think it is sometimes unfairly overlooked. "White Jam" is one of the best moments in the Beefheart discography.

It's a play on "allegory" though, isn't it?

― E Poxy Thee Thule (Tom D.), Tuesday, December 1, 2009 5:33 AM (Yesterday)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_yellow

Funny - I just finished reading the 331/3 book on TMR last night (which was entertaining, but not the best of the series, IMO) and am currently blasting disc 5 of Grow Fins.

Lick My Decals.. has to be my personal fave.

xpost The Spotlight kid is sometimes unfairly overlooked.

Right, there's a single-disc remaster on the way..

Apparently, the cd available now was using a damaged master so they have gone back to Frank's safety copies of the original master. Hray!

and it is £23, according to Spin's website

EH???

Hm. Safety tapes could mean lower fidelity though. Hm.

i have only ever owned this album on cassette weirdly enough.

Actually, if you buy direct from Frank's "Barfco" website, it's $20, which is reasonable.

I ordered it, I'm curious, if a little skeptical. I have a Straight/Bizarre press of the lp, will be curious to compare the masters. The Zappa Family Trust vers of "Bat Chain Puller" from last yr was pretty great.

I am wondering about how the Zappa's can release this? Doesn't Warners/Reprise own the rights? Obv that could have changed, but seems like they would be unlikely to give up the rights to such a "name" record, even one that hasn't sold many copies...

I thought TMR was around as a mid priced cd as it was. Has that gone out of print?
& is Decals due on cd?

It's available in every branch of "That's Entertainment" for £5 or so.

Having said that, Amazon has 'new' copies of the old CD for £24, old/second-hand ones for £8

No news on "Decals"

Ok wait wait. The reissue for which Mark G bumped the thread. Is it Decals or Trout Mask?

Trout Mask.

LOL I am dumb.

Did anybody shell out for Trout Mask from "Barfco" or whoever?

Any Good? Any Different?

?

o ok.

I think we are all to cheap to plunk down the money without hearing a note.

At least that's my reasoning for skipping it thus far.

Mine reasoning, is that I have the orig 2LP, and I recently made a CDr from it.

It sounds pretty nice...

All I have is the late 80s CD. I'm tempted, but I'd love a preview of a few tracks first.

I've got it, it sounds basically the same as the original Straight/Bizarre lp pressings

lol opinions

I just heard the Faces' version of "Wicked Messenger" off their first album (in fact, off the "Good boys when they're asleep" comp)

And yeah, it's a Bob Dylan song, but whoo it's very like "Orange Claw Hammer"

lol

BUT TRUE!

Thank you.

If someone put TMR as their favorite album on their okcupid profile would you judge them? Someone had a perfectly serviceable profile but he had this at the top of their list and no matter what else we'd have in common I don't think we could hang. Is there another album that dog whistles "I care deeply about 'music'" more than this idk

you may be entering narcissism of small differences territory w/ yr canine hearing

when someone puts TMR at the top of their list they are very consciously trying to present themselves as a "music person," it's not an accident

What if they really, genuinely like it. Is that possible? Are you saying that all of your friends must share the same likes and dislikes as you? What are you saying?

I must know.

MUST.

haha, i remember the time a friend of a friend came round, pulled tmr off the shelf and exclaimed 'wow, what you doing with this? you must really know your music'.

xxxxp

if that's true, then you are both ppl who actually are invested in music taste/personal canons to a rare degree, albeit w/ ideological differences. he might be equally unthrilled w/ yr taste, mb you see it as dodging a bullet there, but you might be projecting yr own disdain & blaming him for it, who knows, it seems v trivial is all

I don't think there's much to say about the symbolic value of tmr ~in general~, but then using music in a dating profile like that seems v quaint, mb even to the extent of having gone full circle and become charming, but judging other ppl for their tastes to this extent def seems regressive

what's their myspace profile song?

listing yr cultural credentials in OKC feels pretty ropey in general

well, jeez, what are you "supposed" to list on OKC? as far as i could ever figure out online dating is a massive exercise in dart-throwing.

dunno, i've never had a relationship with somebody's record collection

and yet posting one's penis size is inexplicably frowned upon

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/45/Twelveinchesofsnow.jpg

what does a high hat beaver moustache man look like? is it a fur hat? if not, is it a beaverish moustache?

Moustache, I would assume.

it's a thrillingly vague image!

He is (sort of) making up as he goes along too.

was he seeing his own reflection at the time?

then who's the pirate friend?

maybe he's catching two different glimpses of himself, or twizzling a spoon

Frank Zappa (xp)

tbh this is possibly my least favorite Beefheart album (granted I've never listened to the Tragic Band stuff)

amend that - I guess it's better than Lick My Decals Off, Baby.

Perfectly understandable.

TMR is definitely the album I listened to the most times without enjoying while trying to get into it

cosign, except substitute Pet Sounds for Trout Mask Replica.

I know Bill Harkleroad has said he doesn't like the guitar sound, that they were just using some cheap amp, but I've always loved this album sonically, the sound of the four of them playing.

"It's a bush recording. We're out recording a bush."

Did he say that? I remember him saying, when they recorded "Moonlight On Vermont", which was the first thing he recorded with the band and was before the whole TMR saga, that Zappa turned all the knobs on the guitar amp way up and the sound was deafening.

This album rules how can you not love it on first listen?

how is it not enjoyable? It’s so much fun

“where’s the drop”

decals is better tho

Yeah, he said that when they were rehearsing in the house, they were all plugging in to one amp and then when they recorded, it was some solid state amp that he didn't like.

Ah, that's right, a solid state amp, I remember him talking about that.

don't get me wrong I like TMR fine, but I like some of his other records a whole lot more. I think its drawbacks include some of the failings typical of double albums - its overstuffed, with some lesser material mixed in (dumb sex jokes etc.) I don't really love that super-clean solid-state guitar sound. Everything is so clean and dry and close-mic'd that it often feels a bit claustrophobic. Beefheart's horn playing is bad.

If I had to chop it down to just stuff I love it would include all of side 1 (with the exception of Hair Pie - delete both of those actually), China Pig, My Human Gets Me Blues, When Big Joan Sets Up, and Sugar an' Spikes.

as a lil baby listening to TMR for the first time it was not fun bc I had no experience of jazz or blues or cross-rhythms or sense of really any of what they were up to so it sounded like an oppressive mess

I don't remember the first time I heard it tbh

it was definitely the first Beefheart album I was aware of though

"Doc at the Radar Station" was my first Beefheart, borrowed it out of the local library. I owe my first hearing of "Trout Mask Replica", to Phil, the singer out of the Stretchheads(!), he gave me a cassette of his dad's copy - I should point out his stint in the Stretchheads lay some years in the future!

I hated my first encounter with it because I was only into emo shit with heartbreaking melodies at the time.

maybe it's time to finally get into this album. i should probably spraypaint my windows black and crank up the heat if i want the full effect, though.

I wouldn't call the guitars on, say, "Moonlight on Vermont" super-clean.

side 4 was my gateway into this album, still love that whole run of tunes along with most of the rest

(xp) Yes, but that was recorded before the main body of the album - the, er, more problematic material.

also, probably not coincidentally, my favorite track on the album

I think "Sugar 'n' Spikes" and "Veteran's Day Poppy" are from the same session?

i'm guessing i got my first copy second-hand in my first year at college (1978-79), i definitely had it while i was a student

(saw him at the venue in london on the doc tour in i think 1980: doc is probably actually my favourite)

yeah my top 3 are Clear Spot, Doc at the Radar Station, and Safe as Milk

Can't argue with those choices!

Andreyev asks him about the Trout Mask guitar sound here at 43:40:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWgfVVbK4bA&t=3484s

ha I was just going to say - if a 30 minute compositional analysis of frownland by a man in a suit&tie sounds like fun to you then hoo boy does samuel andreyev have a treat for you:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FhhB9teHqU&

He's awesome and it's cool that Harkleroad and French were both appreciative. The MIDI transcriptions he does of the parts are so spot on.

I think the guitars were distorting somewhat on the Zappa sessions, Οὖτις. You can certainly hear it on "Dali's Car."

Guitars sound great on TMR, in fact the production is perfect because it's so straightforward and unadorned.

Trying toi think my chronology with beefheart.
Maybe it was Decals first after hearing the birthday party compared to them. Got it in a not brilliant state on vinyl in mid to late 83. Probably a few of the earlier late 60s lps after that then got given TMR for my 18th Birthday. So I think I had Strictly personal before it.
Odd very untimely stuff but still somewhat rooted in teh late 60s I guess.

Haven't heard the version that the zappa estate released a couple of years ago , is it very different?

OH & it was a record taht had started turning up on lists of the weirdest lps ever recorded by some time in the mid 80s. Which might be a lure in itself.

I can't listen to music from the 60's anymore, it's too old.

it’s not the music that grew old

I meant that very broadly, but it's true that the captain's Richard Brautigan shtick has not aged well.

Whatever floats your boat, but I only came to love the Captain in my 40s and his mutant blues still thrills me.

Now, if you mean you've simply heard it too many times, sure, I can understand that. Not everything can move us in perpetuity.

what's wrong with richard brautigan? i mean as a writer, not the crippling depression and alcoholism.

His reputation has fallen far, don't know how high it ever was, but I still have a soft spot for Dreaming of Babyon. Seem to remember something interesting about it being translated into Norwegian by the author off Naïve. Super about a decade ago. Also maybe the guy who wrote the book Angel Heart was based on wrote a biography.

And what exactly does he have to do with Captain Beefheart?

Richard Brautigan is still good, dunno about the 60s stuff, but So The Wind Won't Blow It All Away is devastating.

xpost
"B" last names and the word "trout"

“you either love or hate this album” no you don’t. it’s ok

Yes, I hate that 'love or hate' thing. Or maybe I love it.

So The Wind Won't Blow It All Away is devastating.

fuck it, i'm in a rambling mood today so i just made my latest response to this thread into a blog post

https://weirdthingsonbetamax.blogspot.com/2020/04/on-richard-brautigan.html

doesn't have shit to do with "trout mask replica" anyway. which is a good record i think. a little overlong, a little uneven, but some good songs on it.

xpost
"B" last names and the word "trout"

― chr1sb3singer, Friday, April 17, 2020 10:54 AM (one hour ago

rushomancy, that's great, I agree with you almost completely, the other novel I was going to list was The Abortion, only thing tou didn't mention which I love about it is like half the book is just their walk from the library to the car. If I share something it will usually be that or Hawkline Monster, which has dated a bit but is the most fun to read. IWS and TFIA are odd choices and I think put a lot of people off. From a biography I read I remember Brautigan was actively anti-Hippie, there's a short story or a chapter in one of his books about telling a girl not to go to Haight-Ashbury (of course she doesn't care)

i could listen to the guitars on “veteran’s day poppy” on a loop for hours. what a way to close a record.

LOL at the turn this has taken, I very nearly wrote "be honest, how old do I look?" in place of the Brautigan remark.
I chose this thread I guess because TMR is purportedly atypical of "60's music", posting that to the Ultimate Spinach thread would have been a bit hollow, way less ridiculous.

last names and the word "trout"

Really tho?

I enjoyed coming across this:
https://brautigan.cybernetic-meadows.net/tiki-index.php?page=Sorrentino+1968+Review+of+The+Galilee+Hitch-Hiker

xp could you be more clear about you’re trying to say tho ? i’m actually curious to know.

i could see somebody regarding both brautigan and beefheart as being early touchstones for aspiring young intellectuals, later set aside in place of more “mature” pursuits. is that the joke ?

The "joke" was responding to your post as though the implication in it was "it's not the music that grew old (it's the vocals)". I am now considering the horrifying/hilarious possibility that this is what you actually were implying, and this whole thing has been a trainwreck of misinterpretation 😂

The statement that I can't listen to 60's music anymore because it's too old wan't humorless, but wasn't entirely insincere either. There's an earthy masculinity about it that feels utterly remote at this point, particularly in earnest and absent of campiness and much of the 'exceptional' music of the period is unexceptional in this regard, etc.

The comparison to Brautigan was basically superficial, along the lines of "reactionary hippie". I've only read TFiA/the pill/IWS and I thought the similarities to Beefheart were apparent enough (zany, surrealist imagery, pastorial utopian idealism/dystopic disharmony) though Brautigan's masculinity is more aggressive.

Am I mistaken? It's been 15 years since I read it and also years since I've listened to TMR in full. When I want to listen to Beefheart I usully go for 'Decals' or 'Grow Fins' and I can't even remember the last time I played either of those.

1. brautigan as "reactionary hippie"? he was neither. brautigan's work, particularly his '60s work, is certainly suffused with what we can call the "male gaze", though his perpetuation of it, to my sensibilities, has more similarities to, say, mayo thompson's "corky's debt to his father" than it does to "trout mask replica", and like "corky's debt to his father" there's considerably more to it than paeans to women he would like to fuck.

2. brautigan's '60s work is also, as mentioned upthread, nowhere near to a complete repesentation of his work.

3. lack of camp? i don't even know where to begin with this. i mean, yeah, he's dead serious in "frownland" and "dachau blues", yeah, "hair pie" is a crude and tasteless song title, but "ella guru" sounds to me not terribly far from walk on the wild side, his celebrations of women not terribly far from lou reed's. "pachuco cadaver", "pena", these aren't miniskirted hippie girls with creamy thighs. christ, we're talking about the album where, on one of its iconic tracks, he out and out envisions god as gender non-conforming! if this is what "earthy masculinity" looks like i figure we ought to have more of it.

4. but of course it is also terribly old and remote, he's from that generation of music that's informed by the harry smith anthology, he's got the spirit of hoyt "floyd" ming and his pep-steppers just as much as the holy modal rounders do, and why on earth would that be a reason to not listen to it? not everything has to be contemporary or relevant, you know.

not familiar with Brautigan really (I think I read Venus On The Half Shell decades ago?) but really feeling #3 and #4 there, thanks Kate

this is like my least favorite Beefheart album aside from Bluejeans & Unconditional and uh maybe Decals cuz I do love "Orange Claw Hammer" to death, more than "I Love You You Big Dummy".

This album inspired a lot of proggy Euro nonsense that I have zero time for, as well as informing the least memorable aspects of the RIO movement. Fight me.

When I want to listen to Beefheart I usully go for 'Decals' or 'Grow Fins''

Really avoiding the TMR soundworld altogether there I must say.

lol

plz also note that by "least favorite" I mean something more akin to "least amazing"

not everything has to be contemporary or relevant, you know.

streaming has sort of flattened and destroyed time for me wrt music, I start to just flip around through history and nothing seems really fixed

I think I read Venus On The Half Shell decades ago?

too much trout itt as it is, sleeve

Lol

I'm reading through the TMR lyrics booklet now with Kate's post in mind.

First thing I notice: "Well, I put down my bush. And I took off my pants and felt free. The breeze blowin' up me and up the canyon. Far as I could see. It's night now and the moon looks like a dandelion" would not sound at all out of place in TFIA or IWS.

ella guru" sounds to me not terribly far from walk on the wild side

This might be a stretch, but I think it's quite perceptive.

It's tempting to read the moon in "moonlight on vermont" as a symbol of the (divine) feminine. He says "gimme that old time religion" over and over again, Lifebuoy's pistol showin, etc. I think this is comparing female attractiveness to the Transylvania effect.

Point definitely taken about Paucho cadaver

This album inspired a lot of proggy Euro nonsense that I have zero time for, as well as informing the least memorable aspects of the RIO movement. Fight me.

― zoomer death circus (sleeve)

you talking like etron fou leloublan? i always thought of them as being distinctly gallic. i don't know how much prog music there is that i'd classify as being genuinely inspired by trout mask replica. Michael Maksymenko if you want to count that, and honestly i think he's pretty alright, particularly the tunes about ice hockey.

The line about God dressing you because he never had a doll is wonderful.

...it's also quite heavy. I'm not going to finish all of this tonight, it's heady and dense, and i'm not sure i find it campy (is he Lou Reed or PT Barnum on Pachuco Cadaver? I can't tell, this is walking some inimate/sensation tightrope) but it's been rewarding to read through it slowly and carefully.

*sensational

xps nah I can hang with Etron Fou, I was specifically thinking of Dunaj and related Czech stuff like Uz Jsme Doma and even carrying through to Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, the kind of hammering relentlessness that I find overwhelming, even the Art Bears sometimes.

Kate, great post above. (:

an earthy masculinity about it that feels utterly remote at this point...and much of the 'exceptional' music of the period is unexceptional in this regard

What kind of exceptionality are we looking for? Obviously, something greater than "Under My Thumb," and I know there are plenty of other problems. But I will say that, growing up in the '70s/'80s, an awareness of rock music going back to the '60s was a significant thing for me in seeing suggestions of a more feminine way of being for those born male.

All I'll say is they know how to do breakfast TV in Sweden.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-kH_aNnNiA

I wasn't aware of that iteration of the Magic Band. Who needs coffee when you have music like that?