Album Review: Shadow 15's Days of Innocence 1983-85 (2023)

Back in the early daze of ye olde Gnashville, when Pilgrims were still burning witches at communal bonfires fueled by squid oil, the city’s corporate music scene was blitzed by groups of youthful guitar-wielding hooligans and sonic thugz whose idea of a good time was poking popular local DJ and armadillo farmer Ralph Emory with a cattle prod. Of all these shouty gangs of droogs commandeering the city stages, few had the original chops and songs to break out beyond the regional college concert scene. Shadow 15 was an anomaly, the band bringing the goods night after night, but they got little more than a sniff from the major label loan sharks, and only released a single four-song EP, Far Away, in 1985 for Tim Lee’s (The Windbreakers) independent Big Monkey Records label. An expanded 21-track version of Far Away was released on CD by Spat Records in 2008, receiving favorable-to-raveable reviews before Shadow 15 disappeared once again into the inky blackness of rock ‘n’ roll obscurity…

Shadow 15’s Days of Innocence 1983-85

Thankfully, Take The City Records from Spain has released Days of Innocence 1983-85, a ten-song vinyl compilation that hits the sweet middle spot between the Far Away EP and the previously-released CD. Collecting a representative sample of Shadow 15’s immense talents, Days of Innocence displays a band heavily influenced by Bob Mould and Hüsker Dü but one also jumping up and down with cool, innovative musical ideas of its own that stand tall even today. Album-opener “Time Dies” is one such example, with a rat-a-tat machinegun drumbeats and ethereal guitar licks leading into a general cacophony from which singer Scott Feinstein’s vocals leap out with punkish intensity. The short, sharp mid-song guitar solo is a thing of haunting beauty, and the entire melodic frenzy makes one wonder if label A&R drones had steel wool crammed into their orifices when first hearing Shadow 15.

Every track on Days of Innocence is equally, if not more compelling, Shadow 15 intuitively blending punk-rock fury with metallic Sturm und Drang to create incendiary performances like “So Far Today,” Feinstein’s guitar wonderfully intertwined with Shannon Ligon’s inspired fretwork (including a touch of Dick Dale-styled surf twang) while bassist Barry Nelson and drummer Chris Feinstein support the song with a Godzilla-strength rhythmic foundation. With its grungy, MC5 vibe and no-frills jive, “The Last Forever” is the great lost college rock hit, Shadow 15 kicking out the jams with an energy and enthusiasm that I’ve only witnessed from Sonic’s Rendezvous Band…and that’s just the first side of Days of Innocence!

Side two’s overclocked rock ‘n’ roll elixir will peel the wallpaper from your dingy walls, starting with the nuclear explosion of “A Room With You,” the band coaxing unnatural sounds from their axes, which ride below, above, and alongside the song’s melody, or “Endless Day,” which sports an alluring succubus six-string intro, or “Return,” which blends Detroit ‘guitar army’ lightning with British Goth thunder (think Ted Nugent shining Andrew Eldtritch’s boots), or…well, you get the picture.
 

The Reverend’s Bottom Line

Shadow 15 was a band a good decade ahead of its time, too raw and musically adventurous to appeal to the flocks of glam-metal sheep and too legit to fit into a hardcore straitjacket. They would have knocked ‘em dead in 1991 or ’92, but that was then and this is now and it’s not too late for fans of REAL ‘80s rock ‘n’ roll to rediscover Shadow 15. RIYL Hüsker Dü, The Wipers, Sonic Rendezvous Band, The Replacements, SST Records, Hammer Studio horror films, 1960s-era biker flicks (or any Russ Meyers movies), Mad magazine, or EC Comics. Grade: A+   BUY! (Take The City Records, Spain) 

Vintage Review: Max Vague's S.O.S. The Party's Over (1993)

Nashville is a hotbed of rock ‘n’ roll talent, but not in the way that one might think. Outside of the so-called “alternative” throngs – bands trying to chase the trend of the moment -- are a handful of musicians who are taking risks, ignoring the popular currents, and following their own artistic vision. One such artist is Max Vague...

A Music City immigrant by way of Los Angeles, Vague brought with him some curious baggage, such as artistic integrity, a distinct musical style and the tools and ability to bring his vision to fruition. Vague made a splash earlier this year with the pop-flavored Love In A Thousand Faces, his impressive debut CD. Hot on the heels of that musical triumph, Vague closes 1993 with the release of S.O.S. The Party’s Over.

Musically, S.O.S. draws from a veritable wellspring of influences: Peter Gabriel, Eno, Pink Floyd...all pulled together into a cohesive musical whole. Vague provides nearly all of the instrumentation here, creating a lush, complex landscape that is a wonder in its beauty, awe-inspiring in its diversity and breathtaking in its scope. Upon this soundtrack, Vague has embroidered his lyrical poetry.

Imaginative, colorful, and intriguing, the songs on S.O.S. are like a puzzle box whose solution awaits discovery. Whereas some of the cuts are more straightforward in their understanding – the title cut’s theme of modern alienation, for example – others, such as the haunting “Home” (with its fatalistic refrain, “we slide into obscurity with drugs and MTV, we know too much, we can’t survive, they’ll never let us out alive, our only option is to hide and let them roll on by”) require a bit more thought. The rose-colored glasses on the disc’s cover may provide Vague with a different take on life, but even they can’t hide the political reality presented in cuts like “Believe” (“we focus on the sleight of hand in some foreign land and when our minds return we’ve forgotten what we’ve learned...”).

Vague is one of the most exciting artists working in rock today, an uncompromising musician and songwriter following his own muse through a commercial no-man’s land, consequences be damned. As good as his debut disc may have been (and make no mistake, it is quite impressive), S.O.S. The Party’s Over is miles ahead of that effort, showing a remarkable artistic evolution and maturity. That Vague pulls off these recorded hat tricks with just a little help from his friends (MetroLord being his own, self-financed imprint) is even more remarkable yet. But then, the guy’s too damn good for a major label...they wouldn’t know how to handle something this original. (MetroLord Records, released 1993)

Review originally published by R.A.D! Review and Discussion of Rock ‘n’ Roll zine, December 1993