So back in 1992 Love/Hate got Wasted In America and as much as I loved them I was too busy spending all my hard-earned dishwashing money on getting Wasted In Wales to buy LP secundo at the time.
So I came to Wasted In America at the ripe old age of 38 rather than 20 and despite my terminally arrested emotional development it makes a difference. Tastes move on, sensibilities change and try as I might, you never inhabit the LPs of later life as much as you get to live every second of every album you have as a teenager; mostly for weight of numbers reasons coupled with job, family, DIY – all the good stuff.
So after spinning Wasted In America a few times and shrugging my shoulders I pretty much forgot about it, which coincidentally is kinda what the rock buying public did back in ’92.
Following their debut LP Love/Hate reallocated from California to New York and then got involved in the most bizarre argument any 90’s hard rock band EVER got into with their record label. The label kept rejecting the band’s offerings as being too commercial and worried that they were losing their heavy edge. This is such an inversion of the normal order of things that I can only surmise it must have been an as yet unrecognized piece of high performance art. So it goes.
My first thoughts on spinning Wasted In America is just how busy it sounds, bassist Skid Rose was the songwriter for the band and his bass dominates the overall sound; which would be fine if occasionally he didn’t edge towards that worst of 90’s rock obscenities, the F-word*.
Out of the restlessly twitchy nature of the tunes here some great tunes do emerge, ‘Time’s Up’, ‘Spit’, ‘Tranquilizer’ and the title track stand out here. Where Love/Hate stand out is when they allow their slightly artier streak to infect their rock. The odd echoes of Jim Morrison’s ‘and he walked on down the hall’ spiel in the psychedelic sex strut of ‘Cream’ and the weird audio laminations of ‘Yucca Man’, being two cases in point.
It might be the legacy of having to work with a more confused bunch of tracks but throughout Wasted In America John Jansen doesn’t give Love/Hate the same heft and venom that Tom Werman managed to conjure for them on their debut. As a result its an LP that can wash over you, rather than clout you upside your head. I can’t help yearning for a more uncluttered heavier version of ‘Time’s Up’ for example.
Also bringing Wasted In America down a bit are the last four tracks on the album, which are real also-rans, especially the woeful yet promisingly titled ‘Don’t Fuck With Me’. I am torn between thinking the LP sounds like it was made in haste, or whether it was overcooked.
Still there are some real good times to be had inside these covers, although you do need to overlook some sex lyrics that I would have found gauche even as a lusty 14 year-old horn dog, to do so; I’m looking at you ‘Spit’ and, umm, ‘Cream’. I mean that can sometimes be very much a big part of the naïve charms of music from this era but Love/Hate still have the capacity to make me wince at times^.
The band were sensationally good players all, the rhythm section do that thing that only the very best can by sounding loose and tight simultaneously and Jon E. Love is a great guitarist, absolutely stand-out so on the ‘Cream’ and ‘Tranquilizer’ in particular. Jizzy Pearl does his thing well too, I prefer his singing on the heavier numbers than on anything softer here.
So the quest for the great lost rock LP continues^^, Wasted In America isn’t quite it, despite being an album that merited more attention that it got/gets and still sounds good today.
Plus its well worth getting for Skid’s cover art, which is the other thing he did when he wasn’t writing all the band’s songs. A talented dude.
1179 Down.
PS: Wasted vs Blackout, in a video format –
*you know the one, surely. Four letters. Come on, don’t make me spell it out for you. Okay, okay it begins with an F ends with a K and in respectable journals is usually written thus, ‘F–k’. **
**Yeah, funk.
^who’d ever have thought it of a band with a singer called Jizzy Pearl?
^^as does my personal quest for the great lost sock with LPs on. Last seen with its, now bereft twin in the laundry.
I was thinking the f word might be fretless.
Some brilliant songs on this. But it’s a bit too long and a bit too funky.
It’s the curse of CD-era albums. Plus in the future please have the common decency to censor yourself, I’d prefer it if you wrote ‘f***y’.
It’s so sad how rare 90’s vinyl is now.
On a side note, that panda photo is cool as f-k
Thanks Bop (re. panda).
On an utterly selfish note I’m sad how rare the 90s vinyl I haven’t got is, but secretly despite myself gloat about the rare ones I have got; its not a nice fact about me, but it’s a true one, if I am to be completely honest.
As is common with vinyl collectors, I also complain about what I do not have and (mostly internally)gloat about the deals I find.
You fiend!!
Debut was good… never heard this one but I heard its good….
It’s pretty good. The vinyl has risen steeply in price, but the CD is worth grabbing if you ever see one in the wild.
I will look for it on Apple Music ….
Agreed, the first album was great, the second album…they did a second album? Well, that sums it up for me.
Gotcha. It’s pretty good up to a point, worth checking out if you see it reasonably priced.