Search - Urinals :: Negative Capability

Minimalist punk rock masters

Chris bct | San Diego, CA USA | 12/18/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Holy smokes! I can't believe you can get this on Amazon.com. Finally, American freedom and capitalism bring to fruition the possibility that the average person can just get on the Internet, onto a mainstream, very extensive and cool commercial site and purchase one of the finest CD's ever made. That is, assuming you are into punk rock. If yer not, you probably would hate this thing.

Just 3 guys, from UCLA, still in existance after like a 6 year hiatus. This CD contains their original 3 7"s done in 1978 through 1980. In fact, "I'm White and Middle Class" was actually the first punk rock song I ever heard in my life. It came on a one hour a week radio show near midnight and they played some cool New Wave and indie music and stuff like the STOOGES so I kept listening and then, WHAM! this song hit me. It had speed I'd never heard in a song before. It was raw minimalism. A classic trio, impassioned vocals and, well, I was never the same again. I was a punk from that moment till, uh, till now actually. Still listenin' to the stuff. And this CD is one reason.

It's a musical breath of fresh air, again, only if you like slightly quirky, urgent, impassioned punk rock. Included on this release are many punk rock classics including what I've always considered to be the best punk rock song ever, "Ack, Ack, Ack, Ack". The MINUTEMEN made it a staple of their live set. It's a stripped down song that just elevates you (well, it does me, I guess I can't speak for you) with it's total speed, delivery, drive and rush from beginning to it's strong end. And, a course, a classic punk time of like 2 minutes. "I'm a Bug" is another amazing song that just jumps out atcha.

Try to get these original three 7"s. It'd be mightly hard. No need to anymore, the songs (+ more) are all on this magnificent document of early L.A. punk rock. Haven't heard the URINALS? Their latest release is them 20 (heck, more like 25) years later, a more mature presentation, still fun, but it ain't this stuff. And the boys, live, still do some of these songs and, lemme tell ya, it still brings you (yeah, you, me, the dog, all of us) to a state of ecstacy. In fact, these guys are so tight live now, that when they do these old late 70's songs, I believe they sound actually better today, live, then they did back in the late 70's/early 80's cuz Kevin and John, the original drummer/vocalist and guitarist/vocalist have, somehow, actually figured out how to do these classic songs live even tighter than they did back in the day. Yer blowin' it if you don't go see them live.

If you don't buy this CD, sometime, well, you'll just have to do without and I'll be a little sad for you. What I know is that, over the years, even in punk rock, the URINALS have not gotten even close to the recognition of what they accomplished. They were recently mentioned in the great UK music magazine, Mojo, as bein' one of the classic bands from that period. And, to top it all off, this is a true discography. It's got, far as I know, all the vinyl ever released by the URINALS before they became 100 FLOWERS and then, in the later 80's returned to the URINALS name. And, it's got some choice live tracks including some they never released on vinyl. Get this. Or don't and live slightly less completely."

31 Chunks of Punk!

T. Davis | Seattle, WA | 05/17/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Boy, does this disc bring back memories! These guys, dorm-mates of mine at UCLA, got their start at a talent show in 1978. They followed my roommate, Fred Velez, who wore a Hawaiian shirt and straw hat and strummed Jose Feliciano's "Light My Fire." The Urinals came on in Hawaiian shirts and straw hats, too, but they played fast and loud. John had a threatening edge to his voice, Kjehl beat on his axe like he wanted to break it, and Kevin played a drum kit that looked as if it had once belonged to a 10-year-old boy.

On Halloween, Vitus Matare of the band "The Last" caught their act at another dorm show and offered to record an EP for them. The boys have been "struggling with their instruments" ever since, but the rawness of these early tracks, both from studio EPs and live performances, has an anarchic joy, a fierce vitality, and a quirky cleverness that's hard to beat. Bring on your favorite punk performances; the Urinals' work, well-respected among rock cognoscente, will stand proudly in their company. Buy this CD, packed with delicious slices of frenetic, snarling, home-made, lo-fi, head-banging goodness, and recall what punk once was!"

An Experiment Gone Wonderfully Wrong

Matt Neff | 01/07/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"John Keats (y'know, like, the poet) described negative capability as that elusive state of mind, ideal for understanding poetry, "when man is capable of being in uncertainties, mysteries, and doubts without any irritable reaching after fact & reason."

The Urinals were dead on in using that term. This record contains some of the most passionate, mysterious, hilarious punk rock I've ever heard, and after listening to it nigh on ten thousand times it still floors me. As Byron Coley enthuses in the liner notes, the Urinals started out as a three piece joke band in the fall of 1978, playing a few shows in their dorms as an ironic commentary on pop culture, and then got so damn into it that they kept going. Eventually they went all Marxist and changed their name to 100 Flowers ("the Urinals" just wasn't cutting it with the Californian proletariat) but not before cutting this glorious swath of devastation onto wax from 1978-1981.

What we have here are fifty-eight-second shards of punk haiku, deep pseudo-psychedelic meanderings awash with feedback and reverb, howling squalls of murderous, eyes-rolling-furiously-and-teeth-set-on-edge buffoonery ("Salmonella," "Don't Make Me Kill Again") and rumbling, jagged bursts of of subterranean intellectual discontent. And the best cover of the Jetsons theme ever performed.

They floored the Minutemen at the time (who covered "Ack Ack Ack Ack") and if you have any kind of ears on your head they'll floor you. One of my all time favorite records.

P.S. If you like this, go find "100 Years of Pulchritude" (sadly, out of print) by the Urinals Mach II, AKA 100 Flowers. DIDI MAO!"