By the Fall of 1980, the Meat Puppets had a whole set’s worth of original compositons under their belt, fully rehearsed and ready to perform. We’d made our initial visits to the West Coast, garnered the beginnings of a fan base there, and done our first spate of networking. This show, in fact, was an opener for our new friends, Monitor. It’s the same show described in this post. The flyers for it can be found here.
This is an air recording, made by our sound man on a small portable tape recorder on a cheap cassette. I ripped it from the master, but the tape is 25 years old. You can hear the flaws for yourself, which I’ve left intact, just as they came through when I digitized it.
Flaws aside, it’s an important recording. It’s the first show we did where we started to show greater confidence in our showmanship. Our performances are solid for the most part, and while the vocals aren’t exactly intelligible, they are starting to show some style. We whip up a good stink on the ravers, and manage to achieve some depth on the number requiring a little more concentration. The crowd gets into it, in an early-punk-scene kind of way. That is to say, the twelve people in the audience pogoed, and afterwards there were offers to smoke us out.
A good gauge of our confidence at the time is the cover of Carl Perkins’ “Dixie Fried,” which occurs about halfway through the show. It was the first time we attempted what was to become a tradition, doing songs we only partially knew. After laying down the basic riff, we pretty much discard the song and take it wherever it happens to go. In this instance, Curt substitutes his own words for the ones he’s forgotten before meandering into a loopy instrumental finish.
I didn’t bother to break this show into individual songs, since they are so short, but I enclosed it into a zip file anyway (which means you’ve got to download it to listen to it), about 60 megs.
(Note: Please be advised that this is a large file, and some ‘net connections will be unable to handle it. The file has been tested on both Macintosh and Windows platforms and it work fine. Files on this site are presented “as is.†I can’t offer tech support, nor can I mail them to folks unable to download them. Let the browser beware.)
Download (60 mg)
Tracks:
1. Melons Rising
2. Blue-Green God
3. Saturday Morning
4. Fetus In Pus Sauce
5. Love Offering
6. The Gold Mine
7. Dolphin Field
8. Big House
9. Electromud
10. Reward
11. Wild Weekend
12. In a Car
13. Unpleasant
14. Dixie Fried
15. Meat Puppets
16. Hearts
17. Playing Dead
18. Foreign Lawns
19. I Had a Dream
20. H-Elenore
venham tocar no BRASIL
Left by brasil on February 26th, 2006
Derrick, I’ve really been enjoying all of the updates, features & etc. Thanks.
Left by jn on February 26th, 2006
excellent- old live – meat puppets show…¡!
Left by musidora on February 28th, 2006
Derrick, I’m loving this Tempe recording. Thanks for posting it.
Left by Greg on February 28th, 2006
Listening to this recording I felt like if I were in Tempe that November 7th of 1980.
You are a legend. Hope to see you soon in Argentina.
Left by Damián (Arg.) on March 2nd, 2006
These early semi-fidelity recordings will always be a welcome addition to the archives.
Trivia: Several years ago (ok decades ago) a guy named Brock from VA played me a tape he supposedly got from you (very close to this era judging from song selection). In between songs you can hear band chatter onstage-with Curt unmistakably saying “I dunno….I never tried to play this guitar on acid before”
Any clue as to the shows existance, location, circumstances? Your forgiven if the answers are “no. no, and no”.
Left by Mike Pee on March 2nd, 2006
Yes, yes and yes.
Phoenix, AZ – Church ZX-13 (7/2/81): Unpleasant, She Said She Said
I only saved the two tracks.
Left by Derrick Bostrom on March 2nd, 2006
The new upload is one of the best early shows I have. Thanks for sharing D! (and the prompt solving of a long running musical mystery)
Left by Mike Pee on March 4th, 2006
Love the shows. I prefer entire shows in one file over the track-by-track downloads, that way I get to do some work & feel involved, plus there are no cuts between songs.
I have an ’82-’83 set with some favorite songs of mine “Una Paloma Blanca” and “Astronomy Domine.” I love all those covers.
Please keep them coming.
Left by william on March 9th, 2006
I know this has been up a long time but i am just curious are “wild weekend” and “hearts” unreleased orginals or covers? If they are covers who originally did them?
Left by Steven on February 15th, 2007
“Wild Weekend” is by The Zeros (what a great band):
http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Push-Me-Around-Zeros/dp/B000003JFV
“Hearts” is indeed an unreleased Bostrom/Kirkwood original.
Left by Derrick Bostrom on February 15th, 2007
Derrick, thanks for posting this. I’ve been (was) an avid participant of the ‘nineties’ Tempe music scene and only recently have I dug a little deeper to uncover the Meat Puppet treasures. I sorely wish I could’ve experienced some of it. However, what you’ve helped revive is completely fascinating to me and completely appreciated. Don’t think for a moment that there isn’t a strong and continued interest in the legacy of the band, even if you don’t hear much about it. Please keep it up. The Valley needs more good, first-hand historians such as yourself. What are some of the other local clubs you guys played back in the 80′s?
Left by Kurt on February 18th, 2008