ABOUT A SONG- CHERUBS

How often does music absolutely change you? Even more specifically, a single song. It's quite epic the power these song crafters have in bearing enough talent to alter someones consciousness and make them a completely different person while standing in the same spot they were standing in just minutes ago. But great music and the makers of such are one of the things that make our lives less pointless and more orgasm inducing. Music equals orgasm.

I always remember the first time I hear bands and songs that have changed me somehow. Case in point for this edition of about a song...

Cherubs.

A little known trio from the Austin, Texas domain that existed briefly between the years 1992-1994. They released two proper studio albums along with churning out and un-tuning in several compilation appearances and seven inchers. Though only having a blink of an eye existence their cult following was cultivated by the sheer intensity and disregard they exuded from creating noise that would happily burst eardrums and blood vessels along with snuffing anyone within splitting head distance of their agonizing  cacophony of reverberation. These cherubs were a beautiful thing.

Back in the early 90's my friends and I used to frequent all the cool underground music and video shops of the Greenwich village area in New York City. One particularly happening cultured pot of purchasing mirth and musical malady was Kim's Underground.

 Underground indeed. Some of the finest hard to find cult items the scene had to offer freaks like us who were always searching for something way different whether new or old.

One thing I have always loved about going to underground shops is that they seem to have no regard for common eardrum etiquette and just blast their shit at a level both foul and mind numbing to the average mall rat and sheep fucker. Employees in the big mall music chains clock their hours by hanging posters and displays of what is radio friendly and doo rag popular that week. The process of picking some harsh music to play at ear bleeding level is a sacred thing to the underground record shop employee. After all, those who continue to browse the store through volume that could make a growing boy sterile must certainly be worthy customers. Hail to these customers. True lovers of real music.

I remember I was standing in the cd aisle checking through the piles and piles of filthy plastic encased cds and this song came on over the speaker. Just drums to start. Sounded like the guy was banging on trash cans and table ends. The vocalist started wailing. Not singing. Not screaming. This fucker was wailing like he was being stabbed in the gullet with a tuning fork. My first reaction was "WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?!" Not always a bad thing. I just had never heard anything quite like it and was simply screaming my query instead of pondering it. The vocals sounded like the guy was being tortured alive. Not anything perverted like having his dick shredded by eager cannibal babes and bards. No, this was more like he was having the very lifeforce crushed in the bung of his lungs and pressed up through his larynx then ripped through that hole he calls a mouth and spewed into the air like a bowl of regurgitated gut chili. This all before the bass and guitar had even kicked in.

So, yeah.... about that bass and guitar.... you see, as a writer myself I have long harbored an intense passion and meaningful appreciation for lyrics. Ever since I was a young music lover whenever I would buy a new record or tape (and even still with a cd) the first thing I did even before hearing one note of music is break open the lyric sheet and enlighten myself before I rock my bones. Although sometimes I just like to rock out and... well, you know that sometimes those songs we love so deeply might have lyrics that are confounding or downright silly. The song I heard that day in Kim's Underground in the fall of 1994 shall stand as a perfect testament to this. In fact, I don't even think I was paying any attention at all to the lyrics that day and even now when I hear this song, I still don't.

While the vocalist was being tortured all I could recall thinking while standing dumbfounded in the middle of the aisle was "man, it sounds like the band is putting a hurting on that poor son of a bitch." Maybe the guy was standing right in front of the amps and wasn't wearing ear plugs. I don't think that people started becoming fascinated with ear canal protection until somewhere around 1999. Whatever the case, after babbling lyrics along the lines of

"Bessie-
you've got a little left-
what's wrong with that?
Old lady giving up-
stuuuuuuff-
Who'll feed the pets?
When I'm giving-
give 'em a little less"

-the bass kicks in. Not just any bass. Not your grand pops complex lounging around smokey jazz band bass. Not your dads best John Paul Jones reincarnation of blues manitou bass licks either. This isn't even your older pot smoking brothers smooth and funky good time Doobie brothers pop rocks. Fuck that shit. This bass is like a hammer in your skull that is grinding through bone and tissue on its way to carve the teeth out of your mouth and make you have to eat nothing but soup from a mush friendly bread bowl for the rest of your life. It won't stop there though. This bass blows the gore out of your ear holes in chunky crimson confetti and then chisels down through your torso where it will ultimately land like a sledgehammer blow stopped in the pit of your stomach.
Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Then the guitar starts. The guitar is tuned down so low that it sounds like the strings are gonna commit suicide and jump off the fret board onto the floor and when the guitar player strums something that resembles a dis-chord it sounds like a razor blade slicing through the air and chopping off what is left of your head.

Yeah, okay.... the lyrics about "Bessie" and "who'll feed the pets?" and something about being "wrapped too tight" ..... I don't know, man. But holy shit. That song sounded like boots were coming out of the speakers overtop of the counter and getting ready to crush my skull inwards right down the middle. When I think about what I was feeling at that very moment and how excited I was I imagine that I must have pooped, peed... or spooged in my jeans even. Since an underground shop would probably hand me a paper towel roll and make me clean up after myself and I know this did not happen I guess that must have been my mind that soiled itself. I felt all tingly though. Best believe that.

I raced over to the nearest person who looked as if they actually worked there and not just patroned the place with my jawbone stammering and my hands shaking.

"What the hell is that you guys are playing?"

Dude turned his head and looked up at me from the floor stacking new music and said one simple word.

"Cherubs."

Maybe when you are at Sam Goody or Fye they will stop what they are doing and smile walk you over to the Cherub section, but at Kim's Underground.... he wasn't getting up and I wasn't standing around. I raced over to the C's and grabbed a copy of the only cd I saw there. Cherubs. Heroin man.

 I held it up for his approval. He nodded. Purchased. Deal done. Time to play. I didn't even know what song I was listening to and I never got to find out until later that night when I got home from hanging in New York all day long. I didn't care. I had never heard anything so filthy and noisy and sick and I knew that now it was mine.

The song is called "Mr. Goy". It's on the second Cherubs cd, "Heroin man". The band is long gone. They even have better songs in my opinion. Personal favorite Cherubs song ever? "Carjack fairy". Although, let me tell you that this band does a sleazy and mean and cover of that old pop tune "I want candy" that must be heard to be believed. Be careful with that one. The bass will kill your speakers and your liver.

Obviously the Cherubs sound is an acquired taste. I have always enjoyed extreme and brutal music personally. I have been front and center for more revolutionary musical moments than I can begin to call off. One scene that I was proud to be a part of was the noise movement of the 90's. Bands like Pain Teens, Unsane, Hammerhead, Today is the Day, Ed Hall, Janitor Joe, Guzzard..... and them Cherub guys. The list goes on and I could probably do an entirely different blog about that altogether.

I'll be perfectly honest that as much as I love my song lyrics I had no idea what half of these bands were singing about. But none of that seemed to matter when they could still produce an overall intensity that could blast your balls right out of your pocket and strip the paint off the walls in the name of brain pain over lyrical depth. It was like dying a beautiful death and then coming back to life. Reborn through waves of non-melodic nausea inducing bedlam blast that fried your egghead into submission and oblivion. An eargasm.

Cherubs were one of the first bands that I heard that had this effect on my rock beginnings and nerve endings. They threw me down in the middle of a crowded store and bludgeoned me until I screamed in perfect harmony from that not so fresh feeling. This band would indeed change me somehow because up until that point I had never heard anything so mind numbingly chaotic and yet it made me feel like smiling deep within my soul while pumping my fist straight through the ozone layer and stomping my feet onto a piss ant farm until nothing but dirt and bug carcasses lay frayed and trampled at my trembling hooves. One should never forget music that makes you feel this way. This is why I never do.

*****From Musicequalzorgasm blog page. Original post date 12/1/2011*****