Down By Law were a band I discovered through a Punk-o-rama CD that came free with some surfing/skating magazine. When I first heard them I had no idea that the singer was Dave Smalley from Dag Nasty and was at one time fronting ALL.
At the time I was familiar with his work on Can I Say.
It came as a shock to me to recently learn that Epitaph records put all the Down By Law albums on their label out of print. However Dag Nasty albums are still in print. This may or may not be because Epitaph is owned by a Bad Religion member and another Bad Religion member is the Dag Nasty guitarist.
This album is the first album to feature Florida native, Sam Williams on guitar. Sam has been a stable band member ever since. On a more personal sidenote, Sam has recently became a father to twin daughters.
Many consider this Down By Law's best album. I haven't heard them all but I like the music on this album more than a lot of melodic punk that's around today. Haircut is somewhat dated lyrically with its Pearl Jam clones and grunge movement references. There is also a punked up cover of The Proclaimers song 500 miles. Edit: Found this youtube video clip of their song Hit or miss which is featured on this album: Check it out.
Songlist:
01. Punk Won
02. Hit Or Miss
03. Flower Tattoo
04. Sympathy For The World
05. 500 Miles
06. Brief Tommy
07. Bright Green Globe
08. Minusame
09. Drummin' Dave, Hunter Up
10. Punk As Fuck
11. 1944
12. The King & I
13. Haircut
14. Chocolate Jerk
15. Sam I
16. Heroes & Hooligans
17. Soldier Boy
18. Goodnight Song
Get it.
5 comments:
Did you know of his political leanings? See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Smalley.
Still, he's sung on some records i really like.
Cheers
Greg.
great band, great album, thanks for the post , i only had it on cassette!
Greg, I read the article he wrote for Conservative Punk ( seems to have disappeared now) a while back. I thought his Masters Degree was in English Literature for some reason. Seeing that it is actually Political Science comes as a surprise.
Went to see The Hasselhoff Experiment last night. Man, they must be one of the noisiest two pieces ever. They're a great live band.
Nazz, which other DBL albums do you recommend?
I've only heard this album and Last of The Sharpshooters.
Thanks so much!!! I used to hear this album all day long back in highschool. That was in cassette. Now I will hear it all day long once again! Good vibes
Brazil band !
Post a Comment