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License this music for commercial use through Pump Audio
The Scarlet Dukes
Certain General
Certain General
Certain General
Phil Gammage
Voodoo Martini
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A tribute to one of the most influential New York rock record labels of the 1980s.
1980s History (by Stephen Graziano) | 2000s History | Discography | Press | Audio Clips Sampler
The 1980s: Sourmash History
(Please note: This article was originally written by the late Stephen Graziano for the Sourmash USA website in 2002)
 It all began with an idea. After initial success with the managing/booking duties for the East Village, New York City-based band Certain General, I was approached by several other like-minded and neighborhood bands (most notably the Corvairs and Band of Outsiders) o handle their affairs. Thus was born East Side Artists in 1983, a management and booking organization. As Certain General's career progressed, it became apparent that the only way to satisfy the group's independently minded artistic outlook was the self-release route. It was also apparent that they, on their own, couldn't afford such a project, at least immediately. Thus was born SourMash Records, more a collective than a company. Stressing cooperation, sharing, and interdependence, both Certain General and Band of Outsiders, in partnership, financed, and organized, totally in-house, the first SourMash Records release, Far Away In America. Their partnership extended beyond the recordings themselves to feature self-funded cooperative tours of both the States and UK and an ongoing friendship and inter-band cooperation that has lasted the years. Phil, from Certain General, brought his side-project band, the Corvairs (who as transplants from the Boulder, CO and San Francisco new wave scenes actually predated Certain General) to the recording studio and soon after the 2nd SourMash Records release, Temple Fire was on the record store racks.
 Then one day a letter came in the mail from a certain French record label — I.A.S., who enraptured with Far Away in America wanted to license and release Certain General, the Band of Outsiders, and the Corvairs overseas. In addition, as a result of their conjoint UK jaunt in 1984, both Certain General and Band of Outsiders were receiving label and publishing feelers from England. SourMash responded to this interest in its bands by focusing on the production company end of the business, producing albums and EPs by the bands for the various foreign markets. Every such project received a SourMash catalog number, even if not specifically released on our imprint. So flushed with our success, the SourMash bands, with the exception of Certain General, who had found new management, all went into the studios to record follow-up releases, confident of promised advances and forthcoming royalties. In addition some other neighborhood bands, Floor Kiss and In The Vines were brought into the fold to spur on this sense of East Village musical revival.
As happens with many dreamlike fairytales, SourMash's sense of itself was brought screaming back to earth with the bankruptcy of I.A.S. records, who closed shop owing us over 5 figures in back royalties. Swamped with studio bills, I scrambled to find new licenses for SourMash artists. Band of Outsiders faired best and found a home on the prestigious French Barclay label (which ironically later signed Certain General). The Corvairs wound up on New Rose, but unfortunately the sinking of I.A.S. also doomed Floor Kiss and In The Vines. We issued a domestic vinyl version of the Band Of Outsiders second album Act of Faith but found ourselves at the end of the rope.
Here follows a reprint of the Trouser Press Record Guide (4th Edition) listing for the Sourmash family of bands. Though slightly garbled, it presents a fairly accurate overview of our thing in the 1980's.
Steve G.
CERTAIN GENERAL
Holiday of Love EP (Labor) 1982
November's Heat (Fr. L'Invitation au Suicide) 1984
Reissued w/ bonus tracks (Fr. New Rose) 1990; (Alive) 1999; (Fr. Fantastica) 2002
These Are the Days (Fr. New Rose) 1986
Reissued w/ bonus tracks (Fr. Fantastica 1999)
Cabin Fever (Fr. Barclay) 1988
Jacklighter (Fr. Barclay) 1990
Signals From the Source (CBGB) 1999
Closer To the Sun (Fr. Fantastica) 2000
Live At the Public Theater (Fantastica US) 2001
An Introduction to War (SourMash USA) 2002
Invisible New York (Easy Action UK) 2008
CERTAIN GENERAL/BAND OF OUTSIDERS
Far Away in America (Sourmash) 1984
Far Away in America (The Live Side) EP (Fr. L'Invitation au Suicide) 1985
BAND OF OUTSIDERS
Up the River EP (nr/Flicknife) 1985
Everything Takes Forever (Fr. L'Invitation au Suicide) 1985
I Wish I Was Your Kid EP (nr/Flicknife) 1985
Longer Than Always EP (Fr. L'Invitation au Suicide) 1985
Act of Faith (Fr. Barclay) 1986
Acts of Faith (Sourmash) 1987
Armistice Day (Nocturnal) 1989
THE CORVAIRS
Temple Fire EP (Sourmash) 1984
Sad Hotel EP (Sourmash) 1985
Rio Blanco (Cryptovision) 1988
Hitchhiker (Fr. New Rose) 1989
Denver Sessions '79 (MP3.com) 2001
Unsafe at Any Speed (SourMash USA) unreleased
PHIL GAMMAGE
Night Train (Fr. New Rose) 1990
Kneel to the Rising Sun (Fr. New Rose) 1991 *
Cry of the City (Marilyn) 1993
Lowlife Street (Fr. Last Call) 1999
Motel Songs (SourMash USA) 2002
MARC JEFFREY/PLAYTIME
Marc Jeffrey/Playtime (nr/Conviction) 1990 (Behemoth) 1991
While every one of these bands has indisputably defined its own singular identity, the restless, incestuous pool of members and intents forming the core of each renders them analogous to a single beast with multiple heads pointing in different directions. Evolving from late-'70s CBGB teenage power-poppers the Limit, Band of Outsiders began by self-releasing a no-big-deal '81 single of spiky two-guitar indie rock. A year later, hot downtowners Certain General came out with their five-song debut, Holiday of Love, a fresher and more immediate mix of spartan semi-funk, drifting/scattershot guitar and male/female vocals akin to a reserved Peter Murphy (admittedly a contradiction in terms) duetting with Exene. Despite a borderline tendency to then-typical new wave conventions, the songs still sound fresh — even refreshing — today, as befits what must be the only record in history to be co-produced by Peter Holsapple and Michael Gira.
Come 1984, with both bands established as NYC club regulars, they joined forces to form Sourmash Records and release Far Away In America, an album to which each contributed two live and two studio songs. By this point, the groups had grown closer in sound; Band of Outsiders in particular evincing an atmosphere and range barely hinted at on the previous 45.
Minus drummer/co-vocalist Marcy Saddy, Certain General eschews much of their jagged arhythm for a more straightforward pop moodiness on November's Heat, which includes new versions of several Far Away songs. (Actually, November's Heat was completely recorded by the time Far Away came out, but did benefit from a remix of some tracks) The album emphasizes the band's morose poetic imagery (especially vocalist Parker DuLany) in a manner paralleling R.E.M. (with whom they'd shared tiny stages) while continuing to chart a characteristically oblique course.
That same year, Band of Outsiders released the six-song Up the River, further developing a sound that compared favorably to both Television and the then nascent Calizona bands (True West, Green on Red, Thin White Rope): heartland songsmithery with guitars in uneasy collaboration and/or comfortable rivalry. Dropping the raucous but poorly recorded live cover of "Child of the Moon," the remaining Up the River songs reappeared on Everything Takes Forever, along with the two Far Away studio tracks and three outtakes from those sessions. (Up the River and Everything appeared simultaneously in France and England respectively, with Everything adding five older tracks (produced by Ivan Kral) to make a complete album. Both appeared a full six months ahead of November's Heat, which was a full year old before it appeared for sale.)
The all-new I Wish I Was Your Kid offered their best material to date, (recorded spring of '84, released that July) particularly the somnolent yet barbed title cut. Bringing all of the group's preceding efforts to a head, Longer Than Always (recorded in France summer of 1984, released that autumn) is a soft, sizzling set of songs to sing through clenched teeth while handcuffed in the back seat of a patrol car.
Certain General, meanwhile, had more or less crumbled, prompting guitarist Phil Gammage to nab a new rhythm section and take center stage in the Corvairs. (Phil had already reactivated the Corvairs, with whom he played in Colorado and San Fransisco prior to moving to New York — and was actually working with both bands simultaneously at the time. They recorded with the Kaufmans (The Nails) producing and had Temple Fire ready and released a few months after Far Away appeared.) Temple Fire is quite similar to latter-day Certain General, albeit less arty and tortured (thanks to Phil's Gene Pitneyesqe vocals). The latent/blatant Morricone/Scotty Moore rhythms retreated a bit for Sad Hotel, an undistinguished and ill-conceived extended dance track backed by a competent surf instrumental and little else of consequence.
Reflecting the bands' growing European following, New Rose released These Are the Days, a half-finished compendium of material recorded by Parker DuLany and a new backing group (notably Sprague Hollander), under the Certain General name. By 1988's Cabin Fever, the band had effectively condensed to just the duo plus incidental musicians; Hollander produced this slick and seamless set of lyrically haughty, musically specious tunes. Jacklighter offers superior material and comfortable production by (alternately) Fred Maher and Lloyd Cole, positing the band as neo-soft-rockers, com-parable to Giant Sand if that group were drained of all grit and attack.
 Back to Band of Outsiders: Act of Faith recycles all three tracks from I Wish I Was Your Kid in different versions, along with a new "Conviction" from the live half-album. Acts of Faith (the pluralized US edition) drops two tracks and adds the Longer Than Always EP in its entirety. Like the subtler concurrent New Zealand bands couching their pop in muted tones and colors, Band of Outsiders relied not so much on hooks or abandon as an ensnaring ambience.
Armistice Day catches Band of Outsiders in a November 1988 one-shot reunion - eighteen months after their split - airing the archives, but also doing a few newies and covers. Recorded in almostereo, the miserable US pressing undermines the relaxed versions of (inexplicably ) the band's non-hits, focusing mostly on less-memorable material. A visiting Nikki Sudden plucks a few guitar chords and warbles indiscemibly on the last two tracks; Jeremy Gluck did the liner notes. (Members of the BOO/CG axis had previously played on both Sudden and Gluck records and tours, and continue to do so.)
The Corvairs released their first full LP, Rio Blanco, in 1988, a distillation/reduction of Gammage's career to date, as produced by Fleshtone Keith Streng. With all the initial spikiness gone, the Corvairs here play familar rock'n'roll, from worn heels to fuzzy chins. Hitchhiker spreads out a bit sonically, allowing for a better-sounding version of the same old thing. In its finer moments, Hitchhiker presents a likable band playing forgettable material.
The opposite is true of Gammage's solo debut, Night Train, wherein a more fluid and versatile group (comprised largely of familiar gene-pool faces) puts some personality into oddly underwrought darkside Americana echoing Nick Cave's fascinations minus the melodrama. Which might well make Gammage this generation's Hank Williams.
Meantime, Band of Outsiders singer/guitarist Marc Jeffrey, on his way to becoming this generation's Nick Drake, delivered his best LP yet. On Playtime, he delves deeply into melancholy, utilizing axis backing for non-rock instrumentation and approaches, neatly avoiding any maudlin and/or baroque temptations. Playtime unfolds like a series of stark confessionals, morose romanticism curiously reminiscent of Peter Perrett's England's Glory; low-key, unfinished yet attractive blueprints just waiting for that dose of electroshock to kick them into the annals of greatness.
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