Speaking of things I haven’t heard for a while today also had me wallowing in the second best record that Girls Against Boys produced the repetive grinding lounge/hardcore of Cruise Yourself. I bought his soon after it was released and although it never quite reaches the heights of Venus Luxure No.1 baby, it still oozes with the double bass guitar sleeze attack that made the band so great. In fact the first half of the record may be up there with the best things they ever did. The second half lags in comparison but for those of us who were looking for something other than grunge in the early 1990’s Cruise Yourself did a mighty fine job.
There a couple of records that never leave my Top 10. Sister by Sonic Youth is a good example. One of the other ones is this, the mighty second record from Girls Against Boys. I remember buying this record in 1995. I’d just moved to a big city from my buttfuck, redneck, bullshit town and I knew no-one. Every Friday night on my way home from work I’d pop into my local indie record store and buy something for the weekend. One of my first purchases was this. Buying this record probably didn’t assist my isolation but it sure as shit made the bus rides to and from work alot more bearable.
Girls Against Boys really should have been a dischord band. Equal parts Fugazi, Shudder to Think and Nation of Ulysses (but somehow sounding a lot cooler than all of them), they were certainly one of the more unique bands coming out of the US in the mid-1990’s. They released three very good records, this, Cruise Yourself and House of G VS B before signing to a major label and releasing an absolute turd of an album Freak-on-ica. I still think the pick of them has to be Venus Luxure No.1 Baby, the songs are strong and the power of the twin bass guitar hammering away is very special indeed. Its the album that started their flirtation with lounge-noir. In fact I always thought of Girls Against Boys as the post-apocalyptic house band at some seedy martini joint. There are obviously limitations to their sound and I suppose Girls Against Boys are a great example of an excellent band that stayed around too long. If your only experience with this band is Freak-on-ica put that out of your mind and listen to this record. They really were one of the best things to come out of the US in the mid-1990’s and I only wish I’d seen them live.
This is the first single from the album, In Like Flynn, played live in 1993.
Ducks Battle Satan 