CRIME : “CADILLAC FAGGOT” CD….This brand-new, fully legit live CD from “San Francisco’s first and only rock and roll band”, recorded around 1978 (no one in the band knows for sure), really ups the ante for new highs in collector scumitivity. Not only is it pressed in an ridiculously limited edition of 100 (why?), but it’s available in even more limited quantities, 20 each in “green”, “red”, “orange” etc. Yes, the very same color-tinted blank CDs you can buy at Walgreen’s for a few cents more! Wow! Well, fact is, this is some real knockout original punk rock music from four of its genius purveyors, and if you can still snag a copy from Red Legacy Records, I’d recommend the old college try. It’s one of the best documents of their power to engulf a room, almost as good as the “Terminal Boredom” bootleg from a decade ago. The 13-song set is recorded very loud and is mixed quite well, and the band sound like they’re on the verge of blowing out the room’s circuits. CRIME were maybe the only band to take such an aggressive rockabilly/50s rock-based stance, fully shed the goofiness inherent in the genre, and port it over to the nascent punk era with stellar results. The tracks speak for themselves, and not only does this live set bring you “Murder By Guitar”, “Frustration” and “Crime Wave”, but you get a full SEVEN unheard-before tracks from the band, including titles that I’m sure they just knew were the apotheosis of detached, leather-clad cool: “Rat Rhythm”, “You Ain’t Nothing” and “I Don’t Care”. And about that CD title? Hey, don’t ask me. It’s one of the unheard-previously tracks on here, #7, and I believe the band were engaging in some down-home late 70s intentional political incorrectness – very popular in punk at the time vis-à-vis our gay brothers and sisters. And in San Francisco to boot!

posted by Jay H. at 6:34 AM