Marking 20 years
of bold journalism,
reader supported.
Music Picks

The Go's New Blast from the Past

Silencing today's noise of information.

Adrian Mack 20 Dec 2007TheTyee.ca

Adrian Mack writes a regular music column for The Tyee.

image atom
Have another.

I'm embarrassed! Detroit band The Go released its new album, Howl on the Haunted Beat You Ride, in July, and I didn't even notice. The single "You Go Bangin' On" was brought to my attention by my Internet this afternoon, when I was farting around on YouTube wondering what I should write about.

Obviously, I should write about The Go, who -- judging by those endearingly and I suspect deliberately wobbly harmonies, and the plastic psychedelic yowling in the chorus -- have gassed up their wayback machine again and landed in 1966.

This is even more hopelessly backwards-looking than the band's first album, Watcha Doin'. I actually bought Watcha Doin' when it came out in '99 because I liked the cover. I mean, I really liked the cover -- enough to slap down 16 bucks, sound unheard, at the now deceased Singles Going Steady on Main Street. I had no reason to suspect that the 12 inches of vinyl I had just bought was any good at all, and if it wasn't, I would have just hung Watcha Doin' on my wall.

Turns out the inside was even better than the outside. The Go were skuzzier than all hell, like stoner rock superfreaks Fu Manchu on a monstrous rat poison downer. But the hooks didn't suffer, and pretty soon most of my friends had Watcha Doin', too. It was almost precisely what we were looking for at the time, and so I chalked my daring purchase up to another clairvoyant episode. I had a whole bunch of them back then, the weirdest being when I dreamed about John Denver the night before he died in 1997.

My third eye has apparently gone blind these days, and since the ability to predict a person's fiery demise is frankly kind of a drag, that's okay with me. I'm behind the curve now: five months behind in the case of this column, and years behind everybody else in terms of my interface with popular culture. I've opted out because it's too noisy, accelerated and scrambled to be any good to me. I can do without the dissociative condition induced by a ubiquitous signal-storm, and no, I don't have an iPod.

So obviously, I have volunteered for less info-saturation in my life, not more, after years of believing that more is better. Not that I'm safe. A company called Holosonics has come up with a way of removing choice from the equation entirely, and can beam advertising right into my head without asking, thank you very much. This isn't a drill, either. It's already gone live, as they say. I encourage people to explain the advantages of this technology, while also considering the variety of nefarious uses it can be put to.

Let me wrap up by admitting I'm very satisfied with my new role as a grouchy asshole who wants to ruin everybody else's fun, and who still sees the value in pushing a band like The Go. Yes, they might be mired in a worthless fetishism for the past, but let me assure you -- so am I. And I don't intend to budge.

Related Tyee stories:

 [Tyee]

  • Share:

Facts matter. Get The Tyee's in-depth journalism delivered to your inbox for free

LATEST STORIES

The Barometer

Do You Think Trudeau Will Survive the Next Election?

Take this week's poll