Joggers & Smoggers

Description

Even in a trajectory that was filled with drastic bends and turns, Joggers & Smoggers came as a surprise. If Aural Guerilla (1988) was an attempt to catch the band's manic live energy in the studio, with seething results, follow-up Joggers & Smoggers was an attempt to ignore nearly all limitations. These 34 songs brim with a limitless eclecticism, combining the band's legendary intensity with playful detours, literary inventions and references, and successful collaborations (from noise-rockers Thurston Moore and Lee Ranaldo to Amsterdam-based improvisers Ab Baars and Wolter Wierbos, and a string of already familiar friends and allies). What you get is no longer a tightly executed batch of songs, but a generous burst of creativity. On this double album, The Ex combines restlessness, playfulness, ethnic influences and improvisatory ideas of the kind that were already hinted at on releases such as Dignity Of Labour (1983) and Blueprints For a Blackout (1984). The result is their most sprawling and unique album up to that point, perhaps one of their true 'key releases', and one that provided the foundation on which their upcoming collaboration with Tom Cora could flourish. Tracks>> 1. Humm (The Fullhouse Mumble) 2. At The Gate 3. Pigs + Scales 4. Coughing 5. Morning Star 6. Wall Has Ears 7. Invitation To The Dance 8. Tightly Stretched 9. Ask The Prisoner 10. To Be Clear 11. Gentlemen 12. Make That Call 13. The Buzzword Medley 14. Shopping Street 15. Crackle Engines Vrop Vrop 16. Greetings From Urbania 17. Wired 18. Got Everything? 19. Waarom Niet 20. Courtyard 21. Burst!Crack!Split! 22. Brickbat 23. Hieronymus 24. Nosey Parker 25. People Who Venture 26. Watch The Driver 27. Let's Get Sceptical 28. Tin Gods 29. State Of Freedom 30. Provisionally Untitled 31. Kachun-K Pschuh 32. The Early Bird's Wo r m 33. Catkin 34. Upstairs With Picasso