A quick one this afternoon. This is The Five, a Pittsburgh band that was featured on Bloodstains Across The Midwest. Is Pittsburgh in the midwest?
Anyway, this was sent to me by Otto. I was only familiar with the Bloodstains cut Death Chord, but the standout here is the 6+ minute A Side, How Many Times. This is one seriously acid-damaged piece of swamp-punk. Kinda like No Trend meets The Scientists or something. Jesus, I get a contact high just hearing it. It was released in 1981 and contains fittingly enough, a completely damaged Juice Newton cover as well on the B Side.
The Five ended up moving to Boston where they languished in obscurity for a number of years. They released a full length LP which is still available here. It is good but singer Reid Paley’s vocals start to grate after a while.
This 45 though, is pure unfiltered solid-gold, though….
The Five - Act of Contrition 7inch EP
Reid Paley who went off to have a career as a singer-songwriter and put out some records on Sub Pop in the ’90s. Also, “Angel of the Morning” was covered by The Pretenders in the mid ’90s.
Tony, pls post the first 7″… I agree it is better than this one. I lost my copy somewhere, somehow in my travels. Napalm Beach is a killer.
Yeah Tony…hook us up!
Matt/Mr Poopy - regardless of what you guys say, Angel of the Morning will always be a Juice Newton tune to me!
//Joe “Playing With the Queen of Hearts” Stumble
Now that I’ve listened to this whole EP I have to say that I personally don’t dig it much except for good ol “Death Chord”. Oh well. Maybe I need to give it a few more listens. I’ll try to post Napalm Beach to my blog within the next few days.
The Five are one of my favorite bands of all time. I saw them play many times in the early 80s in Pittsburgh. The “Excite Me”/”Napalm Beach” 7″ is a classic. The album came out too late after the band had broken up, but at least it documented their existence. There are also 2 great tracks on a compilation of Boaston bands call Suffer This.
Reid Paley released one 7″ on Sub Pop in 1995, “Time For You”/”Best Of All”. And he has released 3 full length CDs in the years since. He is probably best known as a collaborator of Frank Black. His web site is here:
http://www.mindspring.com/~themonkeyspaw
The main musical activity of The Five’s guitar player, Tom Moran, has been The Delibrate Strangers for many years:
members.tripod.com/Deliberate_Strangers
A+
Got linked over here from punkbusinessmanager.com. Thanks for putting this up. I was born and still live in Pittsburgh, and as a younger dude (25), it’s good to hear these EP tracks since no one in this city has them. LP isn’t one I ever put on (maybe once?), but still, always happy to hear old Pittsburgh punk tracks. We do claim to have the rarest punk EP ever (Fingers - Isolation), after all! Great site, keep it up!
Also, that Angel in the Morning song does indeed ruin this.
C’mon Steve….Don’t let Mr Poopy sway ya. Its not RUINED by Angel of the Morning! Just seriously undermined…..
I got some other Pittsburgh rarities on the horizon so stay tuned. Oh- and check out the Real Enemy stuff I posted.
More like double-damage ‘cuz Angel of the Morning was an old 60’s tune that Juice Newton managed to butcher in the 80’s. Pretty sure Merrilee Rush & the Turnabouts did it first. That lame cover ruins this thing.
Not if you only play the A side!
I like “Deatch Chord” the best. Nice trippy little 7″ I ‘ad ‘ever ‘eard ‘f ‘efore.
Cool EP, thanks for posting- I’ve been wanting to hear this whole EP since first hearing “Death Chord” on the Bloodstains Across The Midwest comp 12(!) years ago. But the Five’s best song was “Napalm Beach” on their other 7″ from ‘81– killer art crunch! (with references to the famous “I love the smell of napalm in the morning…” scene from Apocalypse Now). I will post the track to my blog when I get a chance. I bought that Five LP years ago and haven’t listened to it in years either, I should break it out again and see how it sounds after all these years. Copies of the LP turn up quite often but both of their 7″s are real pissers to find.
Saw them many times in Boston and they were always great. Sadly, it was a case of the right thing at the wrong time. That Green Street flyer brings back so many memories. I haven’t seen it for years.