My new summer jam...

Redd Kross
Born Innocent

I used to really like Redd Kross. Sometime around 10^th grade or so I read a blurb from Thurston Moore talking about how they really loved this band from L.A. who started as a bunch of kids, and wrote really great pop songs. So anyway, I bought Phaseshifter, decided that they were in fact a really great pop band that sounded like they could have written priceless ditties for TV commercials somewhere around 1977, and then at some point decided it just wasn’t really my thing anymore and traded it for some record in Little Five Points that I’m sure I’ve traded back by now. Mostly, I guess I just kinda forgot about them. Until today, that is, when I picked up their first record, from 1982.

Born Innocent clocks in at around 20 minutes or so, maybe a bit more, and within that short time encompasses just about everything you need in a good punk rock record. And maybe it’s not a real punk rock record in that not just anyone could have made it. There are moments on the record that sound just as accomplished and polished as something that Sebadoh might have done in their late 90s good period, before that really bad late 90s bad period. But those are just moments. Most of the record sounds like it was done in a basement, with everyone in the band singing regardless of talent, with a bassist who sometimes seems like he’s playing a different song (but still sounds right on), all with the goal of getting it right on the first take to save money for the drive-in afterwards. It’s the kind of record you wish your favorite band would make out of boredom if nothing else, though few ever do. And somehow, Redd Kross manages to pull more than a dozen kick ass songs out of it. If I had known about this record in 1987 when I skated I would have insisted they play it at Brickyard (our local half pipe) every time.