This is a compilation of very rough demos from 3 cleveland bands of the period: MIRRORS, ELECTRIC EELS and the STYRENES. It was compiled by Paul Marotta, who played with all 3 bands at some point, from his personal tape collection (lo-fi). It is all previously UNREALEASED. Iwas familliar with the Elctric Eels already, because I own GOD SAYS FUCK YOU, a collection of some of their recordings from 1975. The stuff here is mostly from the same period, but goes back as far as 1973. NO NONSENSE and SPIN-AGE BLASTERS are repeated here, but live. This is all really demented guitar noise similar to what is on GOD…
, but the highlights are SAFETY WEEK and WRECK& ROLL. Most of the songs are from rehearsals, although there are 3 or 4 which I believe are from one of the infamous Extermination Nights at the Viking Saloon.
I really was curious about the mirrors. Before the release of this cd/lp, I think they were the only undocumented band from the Extermination Nights. I was surprised to discover they are a Velvet Underground rip-off band. That’s not bad, but I was hoping for something something equally asx amazing as the eels, or R.F.T.T. (although maybe being a VU style band was pretty
shocking). Mirrors tend use VU riffs, and/or a phrase from Lou and build a song around it (Hands in my Pockets). A theremin pops up in a couple of songs, but that’s it. My favourite song is Annie, a garagier number about a sexually experienced 12 year old.
I don’t know anything about the Styrenes except what I’ve heard from this, and it’s CRAP! This is the stuff, that Marotta claims nobody else wanted to play, so he formed his own band.
One cool feature about the cd, is that it comes in a cardboard case that is bolted! together. It looks pretty cool. There’s also an interesting sectino on what happened to everyone involved after 1976. The whole package is filled with Marotta’s insight as to what was going on at the time inthese people’s (mostly his) lives. If you happen to own alot of the Cleveland music from this time, you can re-create your very own Extermination Night. This is a great start.