Mars – 3 E // 11,000 Volts (ZE Records) 1979. I bought this one as a teenager solely for the reason that I thought the band on the cover looked like the coolest band ever. I had heard Mars’ contribution to the No New York compilation and it had been my least favourite. To my teenage ears, it sounded like pure noise and not in a good way. So why then, would I subsequently go out and buy this release? Because I, like everyone else, am susceptible to marketing and like I said, they looked like the coolest…band…ever. Well joke was on me cuz I got it home and tried to play it and viola, it sounded like pure noise. Dammit! Tricked again by cool packaging! Flash forward, twenty years and I pick this thing up yet again. This time it’s because of the bands’ “historical significance”. I’m more mature now, y’see. And wouldn’t you know, it doesn’t sound so much like noise anymore? In fact, the A Side is dare I say, rather conventional. Sure it’s noisy as fuck but it is not just noise in and of itself. Kapiche? Mars really made a truly evil sounding No Wave racket. In fact, when either of these songs pop up on my iPod while I am on the train, the city suddenly morphs into something existentially evil and foreboding, which is ironically enough, just how I like it.
Hardcore Podcasts
September of 2010 I put together eight Hardcore Podcasts. You can check them out here if you are interested. For more insight into how I came up with the years 78-90 for the First Wave you can read about The Hardcore Superiorty Myth.
I know what you mean. I had heard Mars only fairly recently and hence dug it. I know that as a teenage metal head I would have made fun of them and just dismissed them as noise. I know I did that with a lot of less noisier bands than them.
I can’t stop listening to 3E, i just want to here the bass opening over and over and over until its a Neu song
Wayne Payne — Brilliant! I agree completely.
Mark Early – But would you have secretly agreed that they look like the coolest fuckin’ band ever?
Looking at it now, I say they look like the coolest band ever. Back then I might have been looking for more spandex or saying “Dude, where are the pentagrams?”
It does have to be one of the best band photos ever, though.
Im gonna photoshop in some pentagrams
Such an amazing record…propulsive, stylish.
Am I remembering this wrong, or did the band play Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” live, in its entirety? One of those NY no wave bands did, anyway.
You are not wrong, Jeff. Well, anyway some of NY scenesters did a no wave version of “Don Giovanni”.