If you haven't yet already, scroll down and read Menlo's excellent post on the Good Samaritans. It will provide some background information about the people involved with Precision Bearings and prevent me from having to reiterate a lot of the things he's already written.
As with most things on this blog, the information I have is skeletal, at best. Most of the information I do have about this record comes from an interview of Precision Bearings/Black Humor member George Miller from the fanzine Z Gun, issue #1. (The interview was originally posted on the now-defunct Dragnet Records website for those of you who may have read it there and didn't know it was available again.) You can order Z Gun from S-S Records.
From what I understand, like Black Humor, Precision Bearings was more of a loose art collective than an actual band. Besides George Miller, members included: Dan Houser - co-founder of Fowl Records, member of Black Humor and Good Samaritans; Mark Brendt - another BH contributor and GS member; Patty Costa - same as above; and Quentin Llorente - also same as above. Tom Mallon, who produced the GS record, is credited as recording and mixing the PB record (with the exception of Don't Fall Down which was mixed by Mike Fox at Subterranean) and designing the graphics. Not to editorialize too much but it seems they really 'kept it in the family,' so to speak.
As eluded to above, this record is one bizarre musical exploration. The record starts out with the aptly titled Roller Funk-a funky, progressive, upbeat, harp-laden instrumental number. Although I can't tell if the music meant to be taken as ironic, I know the inspiration for the music is not. According to the interview, Dan Houser was a huge Roller Derby fan. In fact, at least the way George Miller describes it, Dan's primary mode of transportation around San Francisco was his roller skates. As a side note, the Black Humor song To Stupid To Die is about Dan's parrot who he would sometimes let ride around on his shoulder when he'd go out skating. On one unfortunate day, the parrot was blown off of Dan's shoulder and into the street where it got run over by a car. In the end, the parrot lived. I wonder if the parrot was the inspiration for the name Fowl Records. I digress...
The next track entitled Roller Bliss shifts gears into industrial/ambient territory. According to the sleeve this is essentially a solo effort by George, with him playing both keyboard and guitar in... well... blissful, shimmering, flange-washed repetition. Very pleasing and-clocking in at only about 1:15-very to the point.
The final track entitled Don't Fall Down is the most like you'd expect from this collective: creepy vocals by Patty Costa chanting the track's title over spooky, sci-fi sounds and what could loosely be considered a beat(?). Very much in a similar vein to the material on the b-side of the BH LP or to IXNA's Ixna Portal Exo track (see other post). Probably my favorite out of the bunch.
George Miller currently lives in Berlin and performs/records under the name Das Verkannte Modul. Check out his myspace page for more information.
According to his discogs.com entry, Dan Houser wrote some music featured in the Grand Theft Auto: Vice City video game. When I poked around on the web to try and confirm this, I found contradicting information. It seems that whoever added that piece of information to the discogs entry got this Dan Houser confused with the British video game producer and Rockstar Games co-founder Dan Houser.
As far as other relevant information goes, I found this Black Humor page, and their myspace page both which appear to be run by George.
As always, if you can shed some more light on this record, the people involved or have any other relevant information, please share.
Zip includes 320kbs rip from the original vinyl and high quality scans of the packaging.
1 comments:
Hi, nice artikle. I think that the Rollerfunk track was not intended ironically, it was just a riff I made up and we had some time at Mallons studio.Dans Harp playing on this is the real treat. I still have 50 of these things in my moms closet. I would like to include them on the first copies of the Vinyl re-release coming from Parts Unknown records but I have not heard much about that project in the last few months. Read Bob Pittmans myspace page and you can find out a bit more history of Good Samaritans and that time period - George
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