Hear It Is - The Flaming Lips

This is the 1986 debut full length album, following their self titled 1984 debut Ep, by Oklahoma City neo-psychedelic band The Flaming Lips. I've heard this album once before and I wasn't huge on it. I thought that it wasn't that exciting and that I don't exactly know what more to say than I was let down. Well here is my second chance to this album.

1. With You: This song starts out quieter with Wayne singing along with an acoustic guitar. They were obviously going of a Wish You Were Here Feeling to the intro of the song. Then the song exclades into an all over the place, actually I think they did a shit job of doing what they wanted to, punk rock part that reminds me a little of The Cure. Though the Cure isn't really that much of a punk band. I think that it's a decent intro but I'm not as impressed as I thought I would be.
2. Unplugged: This song is more of a Cure punk song. This song also reminds me a little of The Cult. Not Cults, but The Cult. I don't like the open space of this song. They tried to make a psychedelic solo in it, but if you really wanted to do what they wanted they should have made everything tighter together instead of making it sound like it's in an open room.
3. Trains, Brains and Rain: This reminds me too much of The Cure to intrest me enough to really, really get into this song. This actually kind of sounds like the last song.
4. Jesus Shooting Heroin: With a title like this you have to make it a decent song. And guess what, they didn't. I think that the song is ok, but I feel like it could be more dramatic. The open space really hurts the song for me. There is a part in this song right before the solo, where it reminds me of Spike by the band Hunt Club. I actually did a review of them with their album Hunt Club Lp and look forward to hearing more stuff by them. I also feel this song could be shorter.
5. Just Like Before: I don't really find this song that interesting to myself.
6. She Is Death: This song just kind of sounds like an attempt at a Pink Floyd song.
7. Charlie Manson Blues: This song isn't that different than the others, but a little faster tempo.
8. Man From Pakistan: This song is like a punk song. This song is pretty much like the others.
9. Godzilla Flick: This song reminds me of Bob Seger's 1978 song Still The Same. The guitar does, but not the lyrics or anything else. But only in the beginning.
10. Staring At Sound/With You (Reprise): I wish the song was shorter. And the most upbeat song would be the last one.

This gets a 6/10. I think The Flaming Lips are a little over rated. But that's from what I've heard. I still am going to further my listen's on their discography. If you're a fan of The Cure or maybe The Cult or other bands that are contemporaries you might just like this.

The Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny - Mr. Bungle

This is the first demo album by my 3rd favorite band Mr. Bungle. This was released around this time in 1986, so why not review it now. I was obsessed with this band last summer. I still love these guys, and they helped me so much in my taste in music. I know that this, being a demo, is a little different from most things that I review, but this is special. They released it and it wasn't released as a bootleg, so it goes on this blog. Now I have to do this fast, so I won't put a ton of background info in this one but I'll still put some.Bungle is an avant-garde metal band from the 80's hailing from Eureka, California. The members, at the time, consisted of Trevor Dunn bass, Mike Patton vocals, Trey Sprence guitar, and Jed Watts as the drummer. They all did more than just than on this demo but that was their main instruments. This was released on a cassette demo and was mixed by Trey. I NEED THIS ON CASSETTE!!!!!

1. Grizzly Adams: This is an instrumental intro to the album. The first time I heard this song I thought that it was weird because I thought that this was so different from anything else that I heard off any other release. I knew that they had variation, but this song has this overall depressing, rainy day feel to it. This song kind of makes me feel down, so to say. It isn't the funny sarcastic Bungle, but more of a sad. It is a sole guitar doing arpeggios that sad thing. It's kind of hard to tell if someone else was playing along or not, but it is a sad intro to this mix tape. After a little bit in the song, like at the end, all the instruments come in and play one last like verse of the song.
2. Anarchy Up Your Anus: This is a good example of the "death metal" I was talking about. Mike had in the past said that this was death metal. The quality on this isn't very good. There is a spoken word going along with the guitar. Everything kind of sounds muddy. The screech in the beginning sounds super far way. This is like a punk feel to the chorus of the song. This song kind of sounds like something that would be off Slayer's 1983 debut album Show No Mercy.
3. Spreading the Thighs of Death: This continues that death metal thing. It is hard to understand what Mike is saying and to hear the bass on this track. There is like, what sounds like a solo on guitar, but sounds like there is electronics in there to. I know that in the credits Trey is credited guitar, backing vocal, trumpet, video games, and vocals on track 4. So that might have something to do with that. This 
4. Hypocrites: This is the track where everything is mixed up. Trey does vocals, Mike plays bass, and Trevor plays guitar. This song has more of a party feel. It still has that metal feel to it but it feel poppy. Trey's vocals kind of remind me of Boredoms. They put La Cucaracha on this. This song is more of a classic Bungle genre shifting song. When they say the title of the songs it has this reggae feel to it. Mike gets a little bass riff in here. This song is actually fun to listen to, and I think that they covered the Pink Panther theme song, and also  La Cucaracha. Like during the solo of the song.
5. Bungle Grind: This is back to the metal sound of this. This really kind of reminds me of a low quality, muddy sounding, Slayer album. Like seriously, this kind of reminds me of the 1986 Raining Blood album. This also has that video game sounding solo in it. You can hear Mike blowing the train whistle on this song.
6. Raping Your Mind: This song is just like the other songs on this. This is fast, mixed together and not good quality. I think that it is an ok song. This isn't the best song on this but its not terrible.
7. Evil Satan: This is a fun song. It is kind of silly, and more upbeat than the other songs on this, excluding Hypocrites. This song is also on their 1987 demo Bowel of Chiley. There is train horn on this song and trumpet. This is a really fun song,  There is a bongo intro that is backed up by bass. This is just a really cartoonish fun song. This is really silly but it's so good. This is my favorite song on this, and it's super hard to get out of my head. I can't understand what he's saying, but it doesn't matter. This song is still really good.
8. Sudden Death: This is the last song on this and it still reminds me of Slayer. This song is in the same line of songs that I feel Raping Your Mind is in. I don't think that it's amazing, but I like it.

Overall I give this a 7.9/10. This isn't Bungle's biggest and best release, though it's not bad, but it's different. All of their albums are different from each other, and so are all the songs on each album. The thing that's cool about this is that it shows where Bungle started out. They had more of a death metal feel on this album. I don't think that you NEED to check this out, but if you check out Bungle this is a definite thing to listen to, along with everything else they did.