A Baby, A Blanket, A Packet of Seeds
Jupa, 1990
This weekend I saw Franklin Bruno do a performance in a small art gallery/performance space not far from my house. I took great comfort in the fact that not only is he a brilliant, insightful songwriter -- he is also a riveting performer and, in our limited interaction, a very nice guy. You know never know when you meet someone you admire or see a favorite musician live for the first time. They could be jerks, they could be lousy performers, they could be both...I've seen it all!
As usual, seeing Bruno live sent me scurrying through his discography which has quietly grown quite sizable, when one considers things under his name, with his band Nothing Painted Blue, and his new outfit, the Human Hearts. He doesn't make bad records, so you can jump in anywhere...
This curiously-titled platter is the self-release debut of Nothing Painted Blue. The little insert boasts "Sixteen hours in the studio, sixteen songs...", which explains the stark, unadorned sound quality. You have to wait four songs to even get a harmony vocal overdub! It sticks pretty closely to the guitar-bass-drums format, with the great, underrated Kyle Brodie pounding the skins. (I actually asked the drummer who played with Bruno this weekend what his name was, on the off chance it WAS Brodie -- it wasn't but he did a great job nonetheless.)
It's definitely a nascent effort. The songs have a lot of future Bruno hallmarks: a sort of nervously skittering intellect, endless wit, bluntly catchy hooks, etc. Bruno's voice isn't quite the bold bleat it is now, and the songs lack a certain depth and nuance, but it's a very exciting debut, and has aged quite well. Plenty of bon mots to go around, like:
She was as subtle as a raw fish
She was as stable as a drug
If she'd been any less standoffish
She would have been a bearskin rug
From what I can gather, this isn't an easy record to come by. It was apparently pressed twice, the second pressing including a bright yellow tour poster -- which is the pressing I had. I got it from a dealer at a record show...it looked like he'd bought the stock of a failed indie distributor, as he had a lot of weird early '90s and late '80s indie rock and punk records. I think this one was $8.00, and it was still sealed. I also got a red vinyl Happy Flowers record and the first self-released Bob Paisley album (which ain't exactly indie rock -- not sure how that got in there).
Most of Nothing Painted Blue's oeuvre is easy to find. I especially like their most recent album, the hard-rockin' Taste the Flavor and the brilliant Monte Carlo Method. But you can't really go wrong with anything Bruno's done...
Here's a shot of him in action from the other night:
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