Acid Horse

Good band name!

This band is a one-off. Literally. They seem to have just created this one song. It's the only one I ever heard, at least, and as far as I can tell the only thing they ever released, as a single in 1989. I heard it on that Wax Trax records box set. There's something kinda cool about a band, a project really, only releasing one song ever. The song is good, sure, but does it justify the existence of the band? Considering the inclusion of both Industrial music heavyweights Al Jourgenson and Chris Connelly it's easy to see how it would be difficult to live up to expectations.

I like how Wikipedia refers to the track's "serious, yet slightly comical tone - a trademark of many Ministry side projects" and compares them to another Ministry side project, PTP. AllMusic reveals more: that the single had two completely different versions of the song; one is in the style of Ministry and the other more like Cabaret Voltaire, which also shares members with this band.

So here's the version I heard, which sounds like a tamer Ministry:

And here's the  b-side remix, which as the YouTube image suggests might also be available on anther Wax Trax collection :

Now you've heard the band's entire discography chronologically too!

To see how they fit into the whole Wax Trax family tree, including previous blog selection 1000 Homo DJs, here's a hand drawn diagram that I made when I purchased the box set from a little record store in downtown Lake Charles,LA in 1994. (Although, based on what I've learned, Acid Horse is missing a link to Ministry.)

Adam Payne

I feel bad because this guy probably got in my music library because he is a friend of a friend, or something. Someone thought enough of him to think that I might like it, so it hurts to have to spurn that effort. He might be from the Massachusetts area, or he might be from Georgia. There might be multiple guys named Adam Payne around, so I'll try to be specific about what I listened to. It's unclear if he's still active. He's got a definite early-2000s feel about him. I have to be honest - I'm not a fan.

To be even more honest, the first album I listened to was awful fucken music. Just Me, as the title suggests, is just him and guitar. In his defense, I am always far more interested in a full band sound than this sort of thing, but singer-songwriters on their own need to really impress with both their singing and their songwriting. And that just doesn't happen here. I just don't find the voice salient. I was already cursing his name before the end of the first song, which--at six minutes--felt like it was a week long. By the end of listening to the second song I was  yelling, and before the album ended I was screaming at him: "Oh! Come on! Shut up!" The emotive over-singing was unendurable. Every forced rhyming couplet was irritating, predictable, and trite. For example, he rhymed "calculating" with "waiting" and "hating" and "manipulating" in consecutive lines. When he rhymed "girl" with, "just like the Duke of Earl" I literally screamed. The lyrical themes were hackneyed and brought no original insights to tired topics. The song writing, like the vocal style, was aimless and redundant. I literally thought the track was skipping multiple times, but no- that's just a thing he does. Musically, there is nothing impressive either. He doesn't do much to that acoustic guitar. For me, the album was a completely disappointing failure.

Then there was a single song "Chiclets in My Pocket," which was at least better in that it had some interesting electronica elements, but it was still irritating, especially the rapping, and commits all the same sins of the earlier work.

Then I listened to an EP of sorts called Organ, that was actually fine. It's not great, but the instrumentation is a million times better than the raw solo stuff. The band jams well and even gets a little spacey. It showed a lot of potential and made me realize there's probably other material out there that wouldn't disappoint me in the same ways that the solo record did. Just those three things were streaming though. It's not really enough.

A Facebook profile says his influences are "Alcohol, Women, and Bacon," and I just wanted to puke about that. However, that might actually be the other Adam Payne because this one, at least, seems to be actively associated with multiple worthy causes. That confusion has got to hurt both of their chances at success though.

I'm sure he has talent that others might appreciate more. Nonetheless, I never want to hear any of this ever again.

The Acid Gallery

This relatively obscure band does not even make it to Wikipedia. Even Discogs only reference their one single. According to the guy responsible for posting the YouTube video of their only single playing(!), The Acid Gallery began life in the mid 1960s as The Epics, but changed their name in 1967, better reflecting the psychedelic scene of the time. However, their sound is more British Invasion pop than psychedelic space out. As their brief biography at AllMusic points out, they never met the expectations set-up by their daring name. If only the band evoked some sort of organized display of LSD freak-outs! Alas they do freak-out, but ever so gingerly, on their one and only extant song, "Dance Around the Maypole." There's some evidence of at least a b-side ("Right Toe Blues"), but nothing else makes it to the streaming music catalogs of the 21st century.  It also gets another rock history footnote for having been written and produced by Roy Wood, from The Move and co-founder of both ELO and Wizzard; both he and Jeff Lynne contributed backing vocals to "Dance Around the Maypole." People might recall the song from Nuggets (actually it's on Nuggets II: Original Artifacts from the British Empire and Beyond, 1964-1969); even buried on disc 4 and clocking in at less than 3 minutes, it distinguishes itself. (Or maybe I've just heard it more than other songs on the collection because it made my Summer Playlist.) It's a delightful number that, after just a single listen, can easily lodge the cheery chorus into my mind for a full day.