FOMM: Mitch Madness II

Continuing with last Friday's Mitch Easter extravaganza, here are a few more tracks from Two Dozen Easter Eggs. I just witnessed two fabulous shows by Mitch and his band the last two nights, at Amoeba Music and the Rickshaw Stop. His setlist was a 50/50 mix of tracks from his new album Dynamico and Let's Active songs from the "renaissance era", selected heavily from the Cypress LP. Old favorites like "Flags For Everything", "Ornamental" and "Waters Part" (yeah!) match up well with new favorites like "1.5 Way Street","I Want a New Scene", and "Timewarping" -- it was hard to tell the new songs from the old ones. Unfortunately I didn't record the shows, and my photos (taken on my cheap camera phone) didn't turn out very well, so my only recollection of these shows is my rapidly fading memory.

I also talked briefly with Mitch and his lovely bassist/wife Shalini. He drove all the way to California for the two shows in SF, one in Sacramento tonight, and one in LA tomorrow. It was also fun talking to Mitch about his glorious past. It's kind of like talking to God (if you can imagine telling God that you really like that Someloves record He produced back in 1990!).

Even though Mitch made his name back in the early 80s as the poster boy for the "new American rock underground ", he's also worked with a few less-heralded international (i.e. foreign) artists like the Someloves. Here are a few sample tracks, some (DM3, Hummingbirds) that I've posted previously and others that I haven't. The first four songs are by Australian artists, revolving around two songwriters (Darryl Mather and Dom Mariani). Mather and Mariani were both in the Someloves, Mariani formed the DM3, and the Orange Humble Band was essentially "Darryl Mather and friends". From talking to Mitch, I found out that the Someloves LP (which I always thought sounded like it was mastered at a slightly wrong speed) was recently reissued with the original recording speed restored on a CD called Don't Talk About Us, and that the Orange Humble Band cost $200K to make, which came entirely out of Darryl Mather's pocket.

1. The Hummingbirds - Word Gets Around
   (from Love Buzz)
2. The Someloves - I Didn't Mean It
   (from Something Or Other)
3. The DM3 - 1x2x Devastated
   (from One Time, Two Times, Three Red Light)
4. Orange Humble Band - Fanclub Requiem
   (from Assorted Creams)
5. Duffy - London Girls
   (from Duffy)

"London Girls" is from Stephen (f.k.a Tin Tin) Duffy's 1995 self-titled Duffy album. During the mid-90s, while his band the Lilac Time were on hiatus, Duffy flew to NC to add backing vocals to the Velvet Crush's Teenage Symphonies to God (produced by Mitch), and stayed around to make a solo album, with the Velvet Crush as his backing band and Mitch Easter behind the boards. This unlikely combination resulted in one of my favorite records of that decade, with the best parts of UK Britpop and yankee/rebel power pop all in one place.