Rub Me Out..
[another selection from the archives of my musical youth]
We’re heading back to 1982 again, a time long before CDs, mp3s, the internet, and the scary armchair convenience of the iTunes music store. A time when you couldn’t even listen to a snippet of a record before you bought it - at least not at my local record store. How times have changed, eh..?
Although you could easily end up with a dud, there was also a certain excitement in risking your cash on an obscure piece of vinyl you’d never heard before. And sometimes - with little else to go on - the decision whether to buy (or not) came down to one thing -
the cover art.
Yes indeed. Which is the main reason I ended up with this gem of a single. The fact that it was put out by Crass (my favorite indie-punk label at the time) also helped a little, but seeing as their releases often ranged in sucession from mind-blowing to un-listenable there was no guarantee you wouldn’t wanna smash their vinyl over your head once you got it home..
But what’s life without at least a lil’ risk? Lucky for me the Cravats were not only musical, they were also quite eccentric. And I like a little eccentricity in my music..
A little character..
A lil’ flavor..
And these guys didn’t just have a lil’, they had buckets full. They’ve often been described as “art-punk” but I’d say that’s because their music really defies categorizing. It’s certainly not cliche punk rock noise - there’s a jazzy vibe in there, some addictively angular grooves, some dystopian synth action, topped off with some seriously demented vocalizing not previously heard outside of a Victorian era insane asylum!
Why not check it for yourself - Rub Me Out - The Cravats.mp3
The band split up a good while ago, but it turns out they’ve started making music together again, including some tracks with Phil Hartnoll from electronic music legends Orbital. And seeing as it’s no longer 1982 you can now check out all kinds of crazy band info *here* on the internet. Ah yes, how times have changed..
