Mission of Burma: Snapshot & The Obliterati

Um, can someone please tell me where the hell I've been?  Mission of Burma's had a new live EP out for over two months and I hear about it for the first time today?  Snapshot is only available as an iTunes download (standard Apple pricing, so it's $7.92 for eight songs).  Here's a track by track review on first (and second) listen:

• Tremolo: Great stuff.  More...thoughtful than the version from The Horrible Truth About Burma.  I wouldn't say it's better, but it's a worthy addition to the canon.
• Mica: In the same vein.  Not quite as urgent as the kick-ass original on Vs., but still solid.  Bob Weston fills in for Martin Swope really well almost everywhere, but I do miss Swope's work here.
• Youth of America: Cover of a Wipers song, which I think Burma might have played when I saw them in May 2005 in DC.  Sounds vaguely familiar, at any rate.  A nice psychotic break by Roger Miller mid-song, but otherwise just so-so.
• Absent Mind: The only song from 2005's ONoffON, and not the cut I would have chosen.  I always want to like Peter Prescott's songs more than I actually do.  I don't begrudge him the airtime--I have to assume that Burma's egalitarian approach to songwriting has a lot to do with their overall aesthetic and even helped get them back together.  But...oh, well.
• Red: The neglected gem from Signals, Calls and Marches.  Great song, great version, with an outstanding Bob Weston/Roger Miller freakout.
• That's How I Escaped My Certain Fate: Can I say "anthemic" without calling down the Poseur Police?  OK, then: anthemic.  Gets my sclerotic heart racing every time.
• Max Ernst: Solid effort--very heavy and dark.  It's a bit overrated because Rykodisc left it off that compilation years ago, and only elderly punks who bought the original 7" had heard it...but I digress. 
• Dirt: Great song, one of my favorite Burma tunes...and I know I sound like a dipshit math rock nerd when I say this...but the version here--basically the same as the one from ONoffON--seems just a little slower than the one from Mission of Burma/Peking Spring.  Doesn't it?  It doesn't?  Well, I just like the old one better--my sclerotic heart needs the boost.

Bottom line: Probably only for obsessive Burma fans--but are there any other kind?  David Raposa has a good review in Pitchfork as well--I think he went a little easy on them (8.2!), but it's a well-written piece.

And on top of all this Burma's new album, The Obliterati, will be released on May 9th, and they're about to start a tour that will bring them to little old San Francisco on February 23rd.  See you there.

tag: mission of burma

Comments

[Peter Campbell]

Funny - came to this post via NPTech, a web site I host, on a topic that's extremely tangental, but, hey - I'm from Boston, was active in the early 80's music scene, and am a long-time obsessive MOB fan (have some connections to them as well, as the drummer from my old band, who, unlike me, remained a musician, played with Roger in No Man).

Snapshot has been up on iTunes for, I don't know, maybe six months or more? If you go to the MOB website you can sign up for their very low volume email list which alerts you to this sort of thing. I was very happy to get a post at midnight one night offering free tickets to their San Francisco show to the first respondent, and got to see them again for the first time in about 23 years. It's amazing how much onoffon sounds like the album they made a year after Vs., as opposed to twenty-odd years later.

Another tip -- MOB, and all of the awesome artists on Matador, are up on eMusic.com. If you haven't checked it out, eMusic has a huge selection of indie labels, spanning a lot of genres, in unadulterated, high-quaility MP3 format at very afforadble subscription prices (about a third of iTunes cost with no DRM). No Britney Spears or U2, but most of what I listen to.

[Ed]

Hey Peter,
I was the first Executive Director of N-TEN, and someone must have added my feed to NPTech. I stepped down at the beginning of 2005--it was a great experience, and N-TEN had reached sustainability, but I just needed some new challenges.

I'm currently the E.D. of another technology-related nonprofit startup, AttentionTrust, and I continue to write on nonprofits and technology here (although I certainly don't limit myself to those topics, as you can tell from the MoB post.)

Thanks for the tip on eMusic. I'm generally not a fan of the subscription model, but I'll check them out.

Nice to run into you this way--I'm sure we'll cross paths again.

Ed

[Peter Campbell]

Maybe in March, in Seattle?