6/24 - Dolly Mixture

I hope you don't like this band too much. Because I love Dolly Mixture, and I don't need all of you adding value to their WAAAAAYYYY out of print records (or out of print re-release CD). So, please hate this band, and tell all your friends that they are terrible. Then maybe, just maybe, one day I can score a copy of one of their records without having to sell both kidneys and my extra special Gidget Fortune Telling board game, and then consequently have to live my life pretending like it's not depressing that bodily organs and board games are the most valuable things I currently own.

Dolly Mixture began its short tenure as a band in 1978. The three UK lassies got their first taste of the music biz singing occasional backup for Captain Sensible. Though they are often mentioned in the same breath as the C86 bands I'd call their sound part punk, part new-wave, and part Shangri-La's - perhaps even a more accessible Raincoats with a pop spin. Any of that is kind of a cheap comparison, though, because when I first heard the strains of "Been Teen" on a date's scratchy cassette deck, I liked it so much that despite my general lack of interest in him, I kept him around for more than a month hoping he'd make good on producing a copy of that mix tape for me. No such luck, though, and eventually the desire to receive the tape was far outweighed by his general undesirability. (Note to readers: no matter how much you like music, meeting someone with great music taste can only take you so far, even with the stereo up loud and the lights off) And here I am, a good six years later, still suffering the sad lack of Dolly Mixture in my collection.

One has to wonder how a band that once opened for the Fall, and had U2 open for them...who had a champion in Saint Etienne's Bob Stanley (who released 1983's DEMONSTRATION TAPES on CD in 1995), and whose name gets whispered in many a girl-rock fan's blog confessional would drift into such unavailability. However, it surely has. So, if anyone out there happens to have one of the 1000 original DEMONSTRATION TAPES (aka WHITE ALBUM) pressings and feels like making a humble blogger a mix CD, she (observe me pointing my thumbs in my own general direction here) sure would appreciate it.

For the time being, I'll just keep visiting myspace and listening here.

(not the best quality on this first clip, but hell, it's Dolly Mixture performing live...I'm just happy it's out there in any form)