Back in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the pre-grunge Pacific Northwest was all about quirky pop and jangly guitars with a tiny bit of menace underneath. The Young Fresh Fellows and the Posies were a couple of the standard bearers that come to mind. My group, The Young Brians, were the first in the Spokane area to be able to play original music in bars and we gained a huge local following and lots of radio airplay, etc., with one of our 7" singles (remember those?) charting in the Rocket's Top 20 for several weeks alongside bands like Mudhoney, The Screaming Trees, Nirvana, and our beloved Fellows. The band broke up in 91 amidst the usual recriminations and acrimony, but the four of us have remained good friends over the years. I went on to Pophead and Anyface, Jamie plays guitar in the Makers, Brian formed Burns Like Hellfire, and Larry played for a number of groups such as Junk Train before becoming a full-time daddy.In the wake of the Subteens successful reunion show, we have decided to pull a similar move by playing a show in the Summer of '08 in Spokane. We are all very, very excited and have created a new MySpace page to celebrate. Although the music is fairly dated and our influences are on our sleeves, I'm still pretty proud of this stuff for being written and recorded in the 80s. We got much heavier later- hopefully I can post some of that stuff when I get it digitized. In the meantime, enjoy the tunes and especially the pictures of the artist as a young man.
14 comments:
Very cool! Please put some Young Brians on the Flying Triple Paddywagon when you can. I've enjoyed the Pophead, I'm actually listening to Handgrenade Waltz right now, a song that has made it onto several mix CDs I've made. (You did get those royalties, right?) Glad to hear the 'teens provided the inspiration.
As per your request, the album 'Andy's Warehouse' has made its way to the Flatulent Typewriting Probe.
That's awesome, Dave. And clearly the band's fashion sense was as progressive as the music. Clearly.
I've downloaded it, and I'm looking forward to giving it a spin. I've still got that 45 that's mentioned on the MySpace page - 'Around Above Beyond Below' (b/w 'Bowling Shoes') ...
Very nice stuff, holds up quite well. Googling around for the scattered bits of your following, I found a girl's MySpace that mentioned The YBs. But guess what music was playing on her page? Four-letter word beginning and ending with A.
Great pic, btw, didn't realize Ozzy was in the band.
And why no mention of Dynamo Hum, Dave?
Ha! That's hilarious. To be fair to Larry though, when this pic was taken, Ozzy looked more like a poodle and wore things that resembled Satanic spangly mumus. Larry was just seeing into the future. For a picture of Larry now, go to the pophead myspace site, and look at the picture labeled: Larry and I do what's right.
To answer Joe, Dynamo Hum is best forgotten. You Stole My Brain.
Oh fuck. You did not just say that.
Didn't you tell me that Martin got in touch with you not too long ago? How is his brain these days?
I've got another blast from your past on the way ...
Weird, there's a band calling itself Dynamo Hum in Tulsa. I think I DH at Automatic Slims once, did you guys play there? With Big Ass Truck maybe?
No- we were never that cool. Dynamo Hum comes from a Frank Zappa tune, so I'm sure there are others out there.
But none compare!
Hell yeah. The Young Brians were my friends and drinking buddies while we were all at EWU in Cheney. Dave, you guys were great. I can (vaguely) recall many nights at some Spokane bar hearing you guys do "End of the World as We Know It" and dancing to the words circa 1987-1988. Fun times. Keep the faith, buddy.
Yours,
Jack Van Horn
(now based at UCLA in lovely West Hollywood, CA)
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