Those Bastard Souls - Twentieth Century Chemical (+7 bonus tracks)

Darla is pleased to reissue our 1996 classic by Dave Shouse (The Grifters) with the addition of seven Grade A bonus tracks. Six of these bonus tracks are previously unreleased. Most amazing as these six tracks are definitely among the very best Dave Shouse has ever written and recorded! The Liner notes, with insightful history, are by the man himself.

Those Bastard Souls is Dave Shouse of The Grifters. Doug Easley of Easley Studios Memphis played bass and did final production and Grifters drummer, Stan Gallimore, laid down the Bastard beat. TBS don't sound too much like The Grifters and this is no side project. This is high-fidelity, American rhythm & blues, spiked 100 proof as if Bolan, Bowie, Cale and Lennon had holed up at Stax and made their first record together ...Holy Sinsemilla!

Those Bastard Souls touring band consisted of Grifter Dave Shouse, Red Red Meat bassist Matt Fields, Trenchmouth drummer and then future Saturday Night Live cast member Fred Armisen, longtime friends Joan Wasser of The Dambuilders on violin, The Flaming Lips' multi-instrumentalist and drummer Steven Drozd and Steven Golub on Saxophone.

Tracks:

1. Introducing Those Bastard Souls
2. These Things Will Slay You Every Time
3. Curious State I'm In
4. Subterranean Death Rides Blues
5. The Train From Terminal Boredom
6. !#*#!* (I'm Takin' Off)
7. Dirty Looks
8. Good Luck Split Town Today
9. Remembering Sophie Rhodes
10. What Am I Gonna Do Now
11. The Top Ten Zen Offenders
12. 21st Century Chemical

Bonus Tracks:

13. Spaced Out --previously released on Darla 100 compilation CD (2000)
14. Here in the Ocean --previously unreleased
15. Mercury --previously unreleased
16. The Golden Age of Paranoia --previously unreleased
17. Venus in Rags --previously unreleased
18. All You Get --previously unreleased
19. The Coldwater Freak Show --previously unreleased

Liner notes:

I made this record during the last months of 1995 with help from Doug Easley, DavisMcCain, Stan Gallimore & Jim Spake. Also gotta send out a thank you to Sherman Willmott who allowed me to cut all the lead vocal tracks in the bathroom at Shangri-La Records. At some point during the recording I decided that fiction would trump reality, and I concocted the world of Those Bastard Souls: a lone, young American brings his Harmony guitar Hoochie-Koo to a gang of glam-worshippin' Amsterdam punks.

By March of '96 I was busy touring with my main gig, The Grifters, for our Sub Pop debut, Ain't My Lookout. As much as I loved making 20th Century Chemical I really had little or no expectations for it commercially, or as the catalyst for live shows. Over the summer I got a call from my friend Matt Fields, who I knew from his days in God & Texas and Red Red Meat. He wanted to put together a Those Bastard Souls touring band. Seems Lou Barlow of Sebadoh had heard the record and wanted "The Souls" to support his band on a two-week east coast tour. Meanwhile The Grifters were getting  the cold shoulder from promoters about securing similar support slots on other fall tours. (We would later turn down a two-month winter tour with Weezer.)

So Matt & I put a band together: The Dambuilders' Joan Wasser, Steven Drozd from The Flaming Lips, Matt's old friend Steve Golub & a drummer I'd never even met named Fred Armisen. Matt & Joan would continue with me through four more personnel changes and a major label record deal.

As for the bonus material: "Spaced Out" appears in demo version, recorded to 4-track cassette in the lounge at Easley/McCain Studio in 97 as Sub Pop pressed me for more Grifter songs. Both bands would end up recording their own versions. "All You Get" & "Coldwater Freak Show" were written during '99 touring. "Venus in Rags," "Mercury" & The Golden Age of Paranoia" were written in 2000 between Memphis & Woodstock, NY as I tried to escape that major label deal (gone wrong), and recover from a vexing state of depression & illness. The 99/00 tunes were recorded at Easley/McCain between Dec 99 and Nov 00 with Stuart Sikes engineering. Matt & Kevin March were the rhythm section on these cuts. Thanks Jared & Lori McStay for singing. Thanks Doug Easley for playing a bunch of stuff.

I would also like to thank Michael Tighe, Kate Hyman, Kevin Salem, Miche Jette, Dan Ball, Suzanne McCarthy, Marc Attenberg, Liza Wakeman, Bob Pollard, Wayne Coyne, Sam Kraker, John Floyd, Richard Grabel & the handful of folks whose aid & comfort I was too self-absorbed then to now remember.

A very special thanks to James & Chandra at Darla Records and to my wife, Tammy, for sharing & bearing my ups & downs.

--Dave Shouse, February 2009

***Digipak printed with soy based ink on 100% recycled board with aqueous coating. No oil used! Even our plastic trays are made from 100% recycled material. Packaging made by Ross Ellis, a Forest Service Council certified business.

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