Kramer has been pretty boring and annoying of late, but this release (like last year's Kramer/Daevid Allen collaboration) is a slight exception. Here in addition to the coy samples and facile guitarrorism we have come to identify as that Shimmy-Disc sound, we are now presented with Kramer-as-folksinger, spilling his guts in semiautobiographical ditties like "Nine Minus Seven Is Two" ("I Call this place Noise New Jersey/This is my prison, it's true/I wish my father could see me now/See what a guitar can do") and "Midnight" ("Jesus said things that we should never do/But he never slept on the floor next to you") where the lyrics are actually in the forefront. It ain't amazing, but it's pretty cool. I still miss Bongwater, though. --K.S.

(first appeared in Reign of Toads #4)

last update 1/17/97

Reign of Toads PO Box 40498 Albuquerque NM 87196-0498 USA
info@rtoads.com