Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Are We Not Men?


Q: Are We Not Men? A: We are Devo! - Devo - 1978

There is so much I want to write about this album, found in a thrift shop in Langley Park, but I really have no idea where to start. Any ideas VVer #2?

Yea Yea YeaYeaYeayayayayaaa!!
Sorry busy with the uncontrollable singing.... wow that was corny, but so is this song!

So everyone knows Devo as that silly band wearing red plastic hats and yellow jumpsuits but did you know they were on the tail end of the first wave of American PUNK?! That puts them in the same ranks as Iggy and the Stooges, the Ramones, Velvet Underground, Television, Patti Smith, and New York Dolls! This album (Q&A) has all the hallmarks of a great punk album from this era, its fun, noisy, creative, and oddball. Songs you should check out immediately are "Uncontrollable Urge", "Jocko Homo", "Mongoloid"... David Bowie and Iggy Pop were directly responsible for DEVO getting a record deal with Warner Brothers. Nice to have famous fans.

I think its appropriate to add that the VVs recently checked out a band called the Polysics play at the Rock N' Roll Hotel in DC. The Polysics are a Japanese band that get their name from a brand of synthesizer the Korg Polysix, and are heavily influenced by DEVO. Think Devo, heavy synth, in Japanese, plus extra punk, plus LOTS of jumping around, oh, and dressed in Devo-esque jumpsuits. Pretty awesome.


The hunt for further Devo vinyl has proven rather difficult. Only their most recent super synth records are in the bin. Still, a copy of "Freedom of Choice" is probably out there somewhere, in some forgotten pile of some dusty thrift shop...

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