The Fugs First Album
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Artist: The Fugs
Label: Ace Records UK
Category: Music
Average customer rating:
Media: Audio CD
Number Of Discs: 1
UPC: 029667411929
EAN: 0029667411929
ASIN: B000007Z1F
Release Date: 1993-06-01 |
The Fugs First Album
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Proto Punk
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Tracks:
- Slum Goddess
- Ah, Sunflower Weary of Time
- Supergirl
- Swinburne Stomp
- I Couldn't Get High
- How Sweet I Roamed
- Carpe Diem
- My Baby Done Left Me
- Boobs a Lot
- Nothing
- We're the Fugs
- Defeated
- Ten Commandments
- CIA Man
- In the Middle of Their First Recording Session the Fugs Sign the Worst
- I Saw the Best Minds of My Generation Rock
- Spontaneous Salute to Andy Warhol [From Rehearsal at the Peace Eye Boo]
- War Kills Babies
- Fugs National Anthem
- Fugs Spaghetti Death (No Redemption No Redemption) - A Glop of ...
- Rhapsody of Tuli
Similar Items:
- The Fugs Second Album
- Virgin Fugs
- Electromagnetic Steamboat: The Reprise Recordings
- The Moray Eels Eat the Holy Modal Rounders
- The Fugs Final CD (Part 1)
Customer Reviews:
One of a kind.......2007-04-22
I'll just get right to describing the disc. Shorter songs than normal, on average. Songwriting style (lyrically) that could be considered very artisitic or just guys screing around trying to be vulgar in a pop-music format, dependign on your perspective.
Singing: Too many people singing at once, with no attempt at perfection, or slick-ness.
instruments: Standard pop-rock instruments, but a little heavy on the odd percussion (but so was Bo Diddley). Some guys know how to play. Some do not. Bassist John Anderson is fascinating in his "I know a little" approach, and would have been a famous musician in backwoods string bands in the early 20th century. I love his stuff. His style tends to "country folk" here, just a wall of noise there.
production: They must have done this all in one take. This is raw. Heavy, in a primituive "pre-metal" way. It was the 60's. Could not be done today.
Don't get too excited.......2003-07-19
The Fugs were fun. The Fugs were cool. So were the Kingsmen at one time. Sadly, I'm old enough to have listened to the Fugs in the '60s. Putting William Blake to lame music was not radical even then. The Fugs couldn't play, they couldn't sing, and -- I'm sorry -- they couldn't write. I loved "Saran Wrap" and "I Couldn't Get High," but I also loved Playboy's "Little Annie Fannie." All were equally subversive. Please don't compare the Fugs to the Ramones or the Mothers of Invention. Save your five stars for "London Calling."
The Album That Made It Okay To Be Political.......2003-06-16
There was no one person in the world prepared for The Fugs in 1965. It never got this radical before. The Fugs began a lyrical revolution (among others). Arguably, they made it safe to sing about anything in pop music. The album charted at #142 when first released(some sources list that "The Fugs" charted at #95, which is true, but that is the title of the album now referred to as "The Fugs Second Album") and was probably the most radical charting record at the time. "The Village Fugs Sing..." was re-released on ESP-Disk in 1966. From the first few lines of "Slum Goddess" you pretty much realise what Ed Sanders, Tuli Kupferberg, Ken Weaver and their friends have in store for you. Lyrics of things that obviously they relate to, and they speak on them in explicit terms. Next is "Ah Sunflower...", poetry set to music, I don't like it that much, it sort of dulls the album out too early. "Supergirl" could surely become a punk anthem today if put in the hands of proper artists. "Swinburne Stomp"...don't know what to make of this one. "I Couldn't Get High" is Ken Weaver's supposed "anti-drug" statement, with lyrics that were so far out for 1965 "threw down my bottle/whipped out my pipe/stuffed it full of grass/give myself a light", no one hearing this at that time could stand still. Then it's followed by more 'musical poetry' - "How Sweet I Roamed From Field To Field" this is better executed than "Sunflower", so it's not too bad. "Carpe Diem" is the song here that could be their serious 'masterpiece'. It's pretty psychedelic and trance-like in it's own way. "My Baby Done Left Me" was done a little more interesting on the 1968 recording "Golden Filth".Finally, "Nothing". Another candidate for 'punk anthem'. The additional material is pretty much hit and miss. "We're The Fugs" probably would have been a good intro to the original album, "Defeated" could have fit somewhere but "CIA Man" is just too goofy. "In The Middle Of..." chronicles the group's contract signing by setting mood music over a recording of the event... it's scary! "I Saw..." is a portion of Ginsberg's "Howl" set to rock 'n' roll and "Spontaneous Salute" was recorded at Peace Eye. Then there's live tapes from 1965, again hit and miss. Finally, "The Tuli Tapes". Sanders narrates segments of Tuli's home recordings, which might make you want to hear the entire recordings... Maybe they'll be released one day, who knows? Is this album a good buy? Sure it is, although it won't go down as (or at least in the books) a groundbreaker, it no doubt influenced millions of minds into speaking their feelings on every issue. Your collection needs this.
Truly Original.......2002-11-18
I had this album and The Fugs Second Album in the LP collection I inherited from my older brother who bought them when they were first issued. Sadly, the disappeared years ago from the collection (I suspect a step-brother, tho he denies it). So for years I've been wanting to buy them again and finally did so recently on CD.
Was not disappointed. What can you say about songs like "Ah, Sunflower Weary of Time," "Supergirl" (perhaps my favorite), "Swinburne Stomp," "I Couldnt' Get High," "Boobs A Lot" or "Nothing"? They're too hilarious for words. This album and The Fugs Second Album are really historical snapshots of the Beat Generation coming into the hippie age, brilliant, totally irreverant, intellectual (two poems of William Blake put to music) and juvinile (e.g., "Boobs A Lot") at the same time.
Don't expect musical genius. The quality of musicianship is crude, and studio conditions are garage, but the energy, wit and spontineity of these tracks couldn't be improved upon.
Listening to them again now, I totally hear the Fugs in the music of the Ramones, Ween, the Residents, the Jazz Butcher, Robyn Hitchcock and others. I'm surprised I haven't heard more (or for that matter any) contemporary covers of these songs. "Supergirl" or "Nothing," for example, would be very stylish for some neo-punk band to cover.
Better than the original LPs I had, these two CDs have great liner notes and lots of extra tracks.
This is definitely not to everyone's taste. My wife, for example, was appalled when I put this on. But if you appreciate humor in music and are interested in the sound of the irreverant '60s anti-establishment, by all means go for it.
Still waiting for the re-release of "Virgin Fugs".......2002-10-08
I believe Lester Bangs once compared this album to a bunch of Neanderthals sitting around a fire beating on logs and baying at the moon. That's pretty accurate. Anyone looking for musical or production sophistication should look elsewhere. But if your looking for that primeval yalp that created music, and probably initiated procreation itself, you'll find it here.
As a teenager I owned all the Fugs' LPs on ESP. "The Fugs Second Album" is more polished. It should be since actual musicians were playing on it. Ed, Tuli, and Ken are writers, not musicians (unless you want to call Tuli's erectorine a musical instrument). "Virgin Fugs" was my all-time favorite ESP album by the Fugs. It's musically as crude as the "First Album", but the lyrics were more blantantly obscene and simply hilarious! I hope some bold recording company will re-release it someday.
Music Album:
- Paradise ~ Billy Fury
- Rough Diamonds and Pure Gems ~ Billy Fury
- Waste of Skin ~ Spike 1000
- The Sound of Fury ~ Billy Fury
- In Search of
- Thru the Glass ~ Thirteen Senses
- Skins and Punks, Vol. 3 ~ Various Artists
- Feelmazumba ~ Agony Bag
- Wild at Heart ~ Colbert Hamilton & The Hellrazors
- Generation Action ~ Plan 9
Music Album
Music Album
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Indigo Blue ~ David Cullen
The Best Band I Ever Had ~ Buddy Rich
Elusive ~ Glenn Wilson
A Swingin' Affair ~ Danny Moss
Coleccion 78 RPM: 1930-1944 ~ Orquesta Tipica Victor
Musique & Cinema Du Monde: Proche - Orient ~ Various Artists
Love Songs of the 70s ~ Donny Osmond
Comando 97 2004 V.6 ~ Various Artists
Big Beat Mind ~ the Neatbeats
Grande Espirito ~ Sagrado Coracao Da Terra