I'm Gonna Find Myself Another Place That I Can Leave

"A Girl Named Yes" compiled a buttload of Prisonshake's '80s output onto one convenient LP for the Aussie crowd, basically serving as a companion to the Scat-released 4 x 7" and "I'm Really Fucked Now" 'box' sets, which is where most of the tracks here were taken from. This is about as close to a Prisonshake 'greatest hits' LP as you're gonna get, and a pretty hefty thing to own in its own right even if you already have all the singles (as I do), because you can just drop the needle on Side A and let track after track of solid rokke action steamroll by you. I'm obviously repeating myself with the majority of the rips here, but it's not like any of you have been paying attention since the beginning anyway, so here's your chance to grab some of these tracks again. "Ask The Bartender" is the one not-really-found-anywhere-else song on here, presuming I'm not forgetting something, and it ranks in the top half as far as the Prisonshake catalog goes -- not quite a "Ron Kinda World" but at least a "Someone Else's Car", if you get what I'm saying. "Fall Right Down" and "She Talks Trouble" are two gems from the "120 Days" EP (you'll note that the crummy compressed cymbal sound carried over from the 7" to the LP), while "Deanna" is simply one of the best American rock singles sides you could possibly own in my opinion, even if you'll never own the one with all the poker chips in it. The blistering "Elijah" -- a song about waiting for a 'friend' to bring some 'stuff' -- is a beast, and one that practically by itself made "Hotel Cleveland" a compilation worth owning. Listening to these five tracks in a row also serves to remind you that Prisonshake certainly had one hell of a drummer.




Prisonshake -

"Ask The Bartender"

"Deanna"

"Elijah"

"She Talks Trouble (Ginn Slips In version)"

"Fall Right Down"

The World Would Be Wonderful If It Weren't For Certain People

This isn't my favorite of all the Prisonshake singles (read: not enough hooks), but as far as excessive freakin' guitar stuff goes, it's pretty alright. "Then She Prayed" could be the closest the early Snack ever came to sounding like The Pontiac Brothers, which is fine as long as you don't mind the extended 'blues' part taking up the whole middle -- and I don't, really, because it's one more example of Prisonshake doing whatever the fuck they wanted and trying something different each time. "Little Pink Ribbons" sounds even more ferocious, with Doug's vocals buried deep within the mix, like he just woke up underneath a big pile of dirt or something. I know some of you won't dig this, and that's fine, cuz as I was driving home late last night with the highway lights ticking by, both these songs sounded great.




Prisonshake -

"Then She Prayed"

"Little Pink Ribbons"

I'm Gonna Kill It Before It Kills Me

This messed-up lookin' rig is a box set that Scat put together of the first three Prisonshake singles (even though not all of them came out on Scat), plus an extra 7" of unreleased tracks, "Loaded Deck", that was included just for the fuck of it. I've already posted most of the material on the first three singles, which leaves "Loaded Deck"-- self-described as "a bunch of weird stuff that wouldn't have fit on a regular Prisonshake record", although as it turns out most of the songs were later included in some variation or another on "I'm Really Fucked Now" and "A Girl Named Yes".

Of the four songs on "Loaded Deck", "I Hear Your Name" is the one that sounds the most like your average straight-ahead Prisonshake rocker, though it's actually an Offbeats cover. "Kill That Bottle" is a stab at falling-down country, and can easily be passed off as something that could've been included on the second disc of "All For Nothing, Nothing For All". On the flip, "Greasy Chicken" slides in your ear like an Alex Chilton solo track (in fact, you can practically sing "Boogie Shoes" from "Flies On Sherbert" right over it), while “Hanging Eyeball Noose Trigger” is Prisonshake as Sockeye and Pain Teens (i.e. “Here’s Where The Sockeye Comes In”).

Not everyone is gonna think this stuff is great, of course, but keep in mind that this was just an add-in to a box set that came with three better-than-great Prisonshake singles to begin with, plus the box set as a whole was yet another in a string of flipped-out early Prisonshake releases that proved them to be a band that was pretty much willing to try anything... sorta like pre-Homostupids in that sense (calm down, that's just a joke). By the way, the weird-sounding compression on “I Hear Your Name” is from the record, not my mp3, so go pick your nits elsewhere.


Prisonshake -

"I Hear Your Name"

"Kill That Bottle"

"Greasy Chicken"

"Hanging Eyeball Noose Trigger"

I Figured I'd Shoot Myself In The Foot

I'm not sure if the "Della Street" 10-inch counts as the odd duck among the Prisonshake catalog ("If you want rocked out stuff, you might want to wait til the next record... we know not everyone digs ballads and 8-minute moody workouts" --Scat label blurb), but even if it does, it's a pretty good songwriting exhibition on their part. It may not be their best record-- the "Deanna" 45 is the one I'd grab if I had to run out of the house all of a sudden, if not one of the compilations-- but it's possibly their best batch of songs... at least, as far as the three "real" songs go. I kinda wanted to post vinyl rips of all three of them here, except that you can still pick up the CD version from Scat for four bucks (I have the CD, also-- the sleeve is exactly like the vinyl version), so I'll only go with two: "Carnival Game", which is sorta rocked but not entirely, and "Molly London", the so-called ballad which has a deep, deep hook for the chorus. I really love how "From Down Here" sorta lopes along, too, thanks in part to Scott Pickering's always rock-solid drumming, but like I said, the CD can be had from Scat for cheap if you wanna hear the whole thing.




Prisonshake -

"Carnival Game"

"Molly London"

God, I'm Really Fucked Now

The seldom-seen "I'm Really Fucked Now" multi-format set (combining a CD, 7", clear-vinyl LP, and cassette all in one package) stands as an early testament to Prisonshake's strong "bow to no man" ethic, especially if you consider a band with barely three 7"-ers to their name choosing a box set for their next jumping-off point as being somewhat of a head-scratcher. I had no problems with the concept myself, though much later I would find trouble with something else: the hollowed-out piece of 12" square green foam that was used to hold the cassette in place and make sure that all the other odd pieces would fit together in the same bag without getting all scuffed up. While I'm sure it seemed like a great idea initially, eventually foam does dry out and get crumbly, meaning that now-- decades later-- the records have a good chance of looking almost like they've been coated with asbestos or something. Luckily, out of the handful of sets that I own (with #0040/1000 being the lowest number-- I think that's the one I bought at Brass City Records), one of them is made up of only the 12" and 7", without the foam. I'm guessing that it might've been a budget edition for mailing out as a promo to reviewers and so forth, though that's only a guess.

To post the entire set here would be kinda daunting anyway, so I'm using the one vinyl-only set that I own as an excuse to post just the 12" and 7" now and maybe get to the cassette and CD later. Don't worry, you should still be able to hunt down the other half of the material fairly easily, if you're interested; just look for the identically-titled "I'm Really Fucked Now" 23-track CD that came out on Rubber Records in Australia a year or two after the original Scat set was released, as it contains most of the material from the original cassette/CD and on top of that is fleshed-out with a bunch of other goodies, representing a planned-for double-LP that was never finished.

The 12" included in the box set is a compilation of previous singles sides, and while I know I've posted a good chunk of the original 45s already, some of the tracks here were re-mixed for the box set or had a new vocal track added ("She Talks Trouble" includes a little bit of "Ginn Slips In" as a coda, which is different from how it was on the original 7"), plus now you can hear them with the different fidelity that a 12" LP offers... not to mention the "120 Days" b-sides, which were originally split-channeled (one song coming out of the left speaker, one song coming out of the right speaker) but the ones included in this set have been converted back to stereo. The 7" is a collaboration with Mark Edwards of My Dad Is Dead, a collaboration that the band sorta abandoned later on (saying it "wasn't really all that spectacular" in the liner notes to the Rubber CD), which means the Scat set is the only place where these two songs can be found. I sorta like the 7" myself, especially "Redeye", although both songs are merely re-works of previous Prisonshake/MDID songs.

The eight-page booklet that comes with the set pretty much nails down any of the other details you may need, and you'll also find a handy sheet of early Prisonshake fanzine reviews, which are mostly clueless. I'd sorta forgotten how badly Fred Mills sucked, though I know that Jim Testa won't like me saying that (I don't think he reads this blog anymore, anyway). There's also a show review for Prisonshake's May '89 opening slot for Mojo Nixon, the live tape of which I posted back in '08, and you can read the Gerard Cosloy and Tim Adams reviews back-to-back and figure out which one was the original and which one was the soon-to-be disgruntled imposter. A lot of the other reviewers keep trying to label Prisonshake as being some sort of Americana crap, which is as hilarious as it is depressing (remember when people actually thought the Del Fuegos were a good band?).

I may keep posting other Prisonshake stuff as I go along, but Scat does have a complete CD box set and a best-of '87-'92 overview in the works, so do take notice.




Prisonshake -

"Fairfield Avenue Serenade"

"She Talks Trouble/Ginn Slips In"

"Fall Right Down"

"Ode to Abe"

"Downtight"

"Redeye"

"Take My Wife, Please"

The Way I Look At It, You Were Asking For It

Here's a Prisonshake picture sleeve that I can guarantee no one else has, mainly because I made it myself. The original "120 Days" EP came in a cardboard box that was too big to fit into a typical 45 storage box, so I took it upon myself back in 1988 to make a standard-sized 2-color sleeve using the pictures and stickers that came with the original packaging. (Don't ask me to pull out the original packaging-- I've been searching for it for two days now, and haven't found it.)

"120 Days" was Prisonshake's second 7-inch, and listening to the two A-level rockers on the a-side reminds me all over again on why I dug this band so much right out of the starting blocks; "She Talks Trouble" is understatedly great (love the ending bridge after the guitar solo), and "Fall Right Down" mines a mid-tempo Stones vibe while aping "Another Girl, Another Planet" fairly effectively.

Prisonshake was full of weird product ideas back then (like the point-of-sale sealed baggie that their first single came in, or the "Fucked" box set), so things get a bit different on the b-side, where you'll find 8 separate songs-- 4 in the right channel, and 4 in the left. There's actually some decent songs buried within the gimmickry (well, "Ginn Slips In" and "Downtight" are sorta interesting, at least), but I doubt that any of you will have the patience to listen to it all the way through. Admittedly the whole record sounds a bit wonky at times, probably because there's 6-1/2 minutes of music pressed onto both sides of a 7-inch. Still, this is a heckuva EP, even without the box it came in.




Prisonshake -

(these files are now listen-only)

"She Talks Trouble"

"Fall Right Down"

"B-side tracks"

right speaker:
Fanchon
Champville
Ginn Slips In
Sanctuary

left speaker:
This Night
Dèsgranges
Somebody to Love
Downtight

Could You Take Doug Out?

It's been a while since I've posted anything 'Snack-related, so here's the third Prisonshake 7-inch, which is potentially my favorite indie rock single of all time-- plus it's Scat One, which means, well, probably nothing I guess. I seriously own about a half-dozen copies of this, partially because when I'm out buying records I'm too stupid to remember which records back at the house aren't whipped, and partially because the individual playing card sleeves are all just slightly different enough to make me want to buy it whenever I see a copy. Plus, the second pressing has a little playing card sticker on the front (and even those are different colors, too), which makes it look even cooler. Not to mention the version that comes with the poker chips... ahh, what the hell.

The rippin' a-side is what makes this single such a keeper, of course, but it's the moody "Shook Like Roses" that really completes things here. Perfect as a Prisonshake b-side, "Shook Like Roses" would probably be the a-side for any of the above-average '80s jangle/psych bands you could name-- or in the case of The Leaving Trains, their only good song. I'm not gonna post the b-side here, though, thinking that maybe you'll go out and buy this yourself (despite the high quality being offered, copies are still relatively cheap and plentiful).

Since I bought my copies at various times, some of them came with different inserts, so I'm scanning all of them here... including an elephant picture from a newspaper that someone-- the original owner, perhaps-- stuck inside one of the copies. Hardy har har!




Prisonshake -

(this file is now listen-only)

"Deanna"