the afghan whigs: black love

as I throoooow the chaiiiins I foooorged in li-ay-ay-fe
toooo shaaaaater toooo the flooooor!!

and if you knew-hoo
just how smoo-hoooth
I could
stop
it
on
a
dime

holy shit @ that 2012 "blame etc." that josh posted

what a band

btw 'faded' > 'purple rain'

― mookieproof, Wednesday, January 31, 2018 8:12 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

wow, post of the year

put on yr rose fur coat baby, cause it's 1973

worth revisiting from a certain ilxor: http://lastplanetojakarta.com/articles/gentlemen.html

― mookieproof, Wednesday, January 31, 2018 7:10 PM (yesterday)

c/p:

By the time one gets through the ballad, “My Curse,” sung achingly by Scrawl’s Jody Stephens...

lol

yeah it's Faded

summer's kiss and didn't even have to think about it

at the 2012 show i saw they opened with "crime scene" and closed (pre-encore) with "bulletproof"/"summer's kiss"/"faded" and that was the moment i realized that black love was my favorite whigs album

oh yeah this really was the best show i've ever seen https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/the-afghan-whigs/2012/bowery-ballroom-new-york-ny-bdffd12.html

that setlist, my god. I only want for "my curse"

which i was lucky enough to see later that year, they invited marcy mays onstage

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jz11k12udBg

that was a really amazing atp too, it was really ideal to see godspeed playing in what felt like an empty airplane hanger. kind of entered a trance during the very late demdike stare set

Basically this album is like Let it Bleed if every song was trying to be Gimme Shelter.

just bought tickets for their show with built to spill oh my god i cannot wait

just got tix <3

wish we could somehow attend the same show spottie

aw me too!

somehow i never managed to see them in their prime, only ever saw them once and that was round the time of the sister brother single so yikes, 1990? still really good though

This is the best album, hard to beat the opening riff of My Enemy but I voted for Blame in the end.

Best part of this album is Rick McCollum's guitar, most notably his slide work.

For an album that is all about mood his presence is absolutely crucial

yeah there's no obvious standout to me, and it's kind of hard to think about the tracks in isolation, they're all a single darkly scorched thing

but also those last two minutes of "bulletproof"

― sophistipop 2 (stritram), Wednesday, January 31, 2018 7:21 PM (two days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Yeah for real. This record was definitely my soundtrack during Bad Times/Bad Choices and it fucking rules. UMS & I saw the Whigs on this tour, they were so fucking great.

Dulli: "We played this song at the Uptown Bar"
*someone in the crowd cheers*
Dulli: "Fuck you. Unless your name is Lori Barbero you weren't there"

Someone called out for "My Curse" and he said "baby not tonight, I can't do it tonight, you wouldn't me to fake it would you?".

Encored with "If I Only Had A Heart" and I think we all wanted to fuck him.

And haha unrelated but
The night after the Red Wings lost the '95 Stanley Cup, the Whigs played Detroit and Dulli's first words were "How 'bout them Devils?!" A beer ricocheted off his chest and he laughed it off.

― Andy K, Tuesday, December 15, 2009 2:05 PM (eight years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I once needled a crowd of Wisconsin townies that had stumbled into a show I was playing after a Packers playoff loss and the other band on the bill, some dudes who were very "confrontational" were scared we would get jumped in the parking lot. Haha.

i lived in minneapolis when this came out but was about to move to dc; the tour schedule was such that i managed to miss them in both places and didn't see them for another year or two

leaving the cities involved renting a truck, filling it with everything i owned, hitching my car to its back, and driving 16 hours straight to pittsburgh, during which i listened to this album ~several~ times on a boombox on the passenger seat while hoping my car hadn't fallen off

sometimes i miss having a car now just so i could drive at night with this on

here we go

get your ass up on the mountain, baby

I don't believe I'm ever gonna die

i just listened to a little bit of "bulletproof" and it made my arm hairs stand up
it has the most ecstatic vibe -- when he howls LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO-OOOOOOOOOOO-OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE the piano and drums and howling, it's the most potent combination of elements
i have spent a lot of time crying my eyes out and howling along with this song over the last 20 years

here we go

btw, while we've got all these Whigs fans in one place: I still haven't heard 2014's Do to the Beast. Is there anyone willing to make the case for why I should?

because it's good? In Spades is superior, though.

Do to the Beast sounds more like a Twilight Singers album than an Afghan Whigs one but has two real highlights in Lost in the Woods and The Lottery which are as good as anything Dulli's done

In Spades is definitely better yeah

They're both good though not really on par with the band at its prime. (And how could they be?) Still, each has enough killer tracks to make them worth your while.

I actually think In Spades is their third-best behind BL and Gentlemen

do to the beast has kind of a digressive second side but the first side is all classics imo

i think in spades gets really close to the narrative quality of whigs records like black love and gentlemen (or really probably more like the twilight singers' blackberry belle). i love so much of that record

Saw them in the mid 90s at the Town and Country. Dulli was aggro all night and eventually took a swing at someone in the crowd with his mic stand. He waded into the crowd shortly afterwards. Didn't drop a note. What a fucking show.

And Crime Scene for me. Faded is a close second.

God, the guitars on this album. Summer's Kiss makes me want to crash my car.
For no particular reason, other than the guitars I guess, I totally twin this with a Dust by the Screaming Trees.

Up in It and Congregation have become relatively undervalued over the years I think

It's weird, I would crawl over broken glass to defend this record but I don't really love any other Whigs records (except "Gentlemen" and even that is tempered compared to this one).

God "Summer's Kiss" is so awesome...I don't know if I can pick a favorite

1965 forever undervalued ;_; (i think it's only sliiiightly less good than this record)

I think Howlin' Maggie even opened the show we saw. Man the 90s were fucking great!

Inspired to play In Spades, yeah, it's pretty good.

I mean, I knew it was good, but I hadn't played it in a while. The Afghan Whigs are one of those bands that once I start listening I have trouble stopping. I have to be careful.

1965 is my favorite, it would sound like its cover if floating in space was unceasingly warm (and hot). also dulli singing "least that's what nas says" is the best thing ever ofc

as good as the guitar tones are on this record they are even richer on 1965. eric otm

cf. end of "crazy"

going through the same experience as when it came out, really want to like 1965 but there's something that keeps me at arms length

one the drumming (drum machine?) is that really "90s loop" feel, like Primitive Radio Gods I been downhearted babe since the day we met/Eels/Beck type vibe

i can't think of a moment on 1965 that isn't live drums. "66"? the '90s loop feel is way stronger on twilight

"crazy"'s got those super dilated prim radio gods drums i guess but the song is so beautiful

essentially i think the record has dulli's best pop songs

okay yeah i couldn't tell sometimes if he was drumming or it was a loop, like on crazy they are kinda squashed and give it a machine feel

at least part of it is i like black love way out of any common sense and i don't know if anything would have been good enough for me, but certain records are funny like that

I've been luxuriating in the Twilight Singers discography and the thing is Dulli is just a really consistently awesome songwriter

Considering some of the bands that DID get tons of FM Xradio play, I just don't get why they did not play these guys. I think that about a few of the other 90s bands too.

25 years ago today. pic.twitter.com/Xb9eBA9yNt

— greg dulli (@MrGregDulli) March 12, 2021

really it's about as perfect as rock albums get

Agreed

bought this the day it came out ffs

still an incredible record on every level

fuck

we should also be very thankful that Dulli's movie never got made, could have needlessly sullied this project if it sucked (which let's be real it probably would have)

It’s just Dulli in a belted leather jacket going for a ride/going to town in different settings and different times of day for 95-100 minutes

the weird thing about a movie is that presumably the characters would have to have jobs, whereas in greg dulli songs it always feels like everyone's occupation is "lover"

straight in

It was a Saturday
I came home early
Drunk with love
And other things