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:: Artless - How Much Punk Rock Do You Hear In Russia? ::

:: Artless - I Am A Rock ::

Whenever I'd read Maximum Rock N Roll back in the day, the first thing I'd turn to was Mykel Board's column, "You're Wrong!" Provocative, brutal, and hilarious, he'd breach the boundaries of accepted norms by mostly being a wise ass. Even if the content of his columns pissed me off, I'd still always have at least one good laugh with the inventive first sentence, stuff like, "I felt more out of place than a butthair on an Oriental..." or "It was more disappointing than constipation at a shit-eater's convention..."

As different as his writing is, so is his music. In the liner notes, Board notes that he "formed Artless as a Republican punk band, an alternative to the I-Hate-The-President-and-Anybody-Else-Who-Wears-A-Tie and My-Mother-is-a-Nazi-Because-She-Makes-Me-Clean-Up-My-Room so prevalent in punk rock." Artless was sloppy and snotty, but its the lyrics and the ideas behind it that make them worthwhile and somewhat refreshing, agree with him or not.



This was the first Artless release, coming out in 1984, though he did put out a single by his first band, Art, in 1980. This 7-inch was produced by Dr. Know (Gary Miller) of Bad Brains. Of course, after ripping this I found that Board has compiled a career retrospective, available for $9 on his site. I was only going to put up "Punk Rock in Russia," but see that the Simon & Garfunkel cover, "I am a Rock," isn't included on the CD, so I'll throw it in here even if it is sort of heinous. He's also got an mp3 of the other song on the record, "We Want Nuclear War" on site, so the whole 7-inch can now be yours. If you dig what you hear, throw the nine bucks his way and buy the CD. I'm sure it'll make him happier than Tom Cruise in a bag of wasabi dicks (groan).


Phil

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