Minute by Minutemen
The jazz-power-punk trio from San Pedro
is trying its damnedest to sell out - sort of.Article © Byron Coley - December 1985
reproduced with permission of the author
Birthed in the backyards of San
Pedro, California, at the dawn of
the '80s, the Minutemen were
weaned on a pablum of juices milked
from the brains of Blue Öyster Cult
and Wire. Back then, the standard
Minutemen song would nastily pebble
your head like a short burst of fire from a
BB machine gun. Lyrics were composed
in a dreamy political shorthand that
thrust a naked, pimply rump in the face
of that New America taking shape
under Reagan's malignant tutelage.
"I believe that when General George
A. Custer - American Indian fighter -
died / He died with shit in his pants,"
went one of their more verbose early
numbers. Reading the lyrics, you got
the impression that every other word
had been removed. Symbol rubbed
symbol without the protective casing of
articles, verbs, or adjectives; bared
nerve touched bared nerve and the
listener shivered. The group's early
music was equally stark.
Bassist Mike Watt and drummer
George Hurley threw out chunks of
sustained beat, while guitarist/vocalist
D. Boon spazzed atop this writhing
platform like a whale undergoing
electroshock. His guitar would spit out
a riff, suck it back in, gag on it, stutter
for a second, repeat the process once,
and the song would be over. See,
when the Minutemen began, their name
referred as much to technique as it did
to politics. They were literal sixty-
second men.
And then they weren't.
"We sold our souls to the dollar,"
recalls Watt. "We knew we'd never have
a hit unless we wrote some longer
songs. So we did." Canny capitalists
that they are, the Minutemen's drive to
snare a buck included such sure-to-
please titles as "Futurism Restated,"
"Mutiny in Jonestown," and "Dreams
Are Free, Motherfucker!" Need I add
that the band's concept of compromised
ethics has little to do with yours and
mine?
While infra-unit arguments over which
member is selling out harder and faster
continue ("Watt easily," says Boon. "No
question - Boon," says Watt), the
point is still basically moot. True, the
band's appeal has expanded as its sound
encompassed funk and jazz elements,
grafting these onto a sturdy, rockin'
body already in place. Even to suggest
that they've made anything
approaching a full-fledged commercial
move, however, is to ignore their
original material's basic spiritual fiber.
The band's last record, Project: Mersh,
featured a cover painting by Boon that
pictured record-company executives
trying to figure out how to boost the
Minutemen's sales. From the standpoint
of pure sonics, a casual listener might
think this search had borne fruit. Mersh
contains a sock-it-to-me remake of
Steppenwolf's "Hey Lawdy Mama"
(which the band had hoped to record
with original vocalist John Kay) and
some playing that's funkily catchy in
extremis.
A video of "King of the Hill"
graphically demonstrates just why the
band sits so far from the mainstream. In
it, D. Boon portrays the tyrant of a
small country who tosses barbeque
scraps to his people and sucks up to
both the US and the USSR. Eventually,
King Boon is overthrown (literally)
and rolls down a hillside while his
former subjects dodge his careening
carcass and sing the praises of one-
worldism. Its message is potent, direct,
and far too radical for these namby-
pamby times. You'll not likely see it on
MTV soon.
It's equally unlikely that you'll soon
hear the Minutemen on your big local
FM station, either, for no matter how
snappy their material sounds, every
syllable they sing begs you to shuck the
chains that bind. Unforunately, this is
an activity for which few radio stations
can find commercial sanction, so
you'll probably have to investigate the
Minutemen's powerful mojo in the
privacy of your own home.
Start your reeducation with the band's
latest, Three Way Tie for Last (SST).
Choice cover versions of Creedence's
"Have You Ever Seen the Rain?" and
Blue Öyster Cult's "Red and the Black"
provide easy handles with which to
aurally grasp the slab, and it's the
Minutemen's most profoundly populist
effort yet. You really oughta hear it.
