Neptune's Car

by Doug Gillard

In 1980, Doug Morgan was about to begin a short run as touring bassist for Human Switchboard, and had just released a collaborative 7" with Charlotte Pressler under the name Pressler-Morgan ( "You're Gonna Watch Me"/"Hand Piece" - Hearthan Records, 1979). He formed Neptune's Car with Pere Ubu/Home and Garden drummer Scott Krauss, guitarist John Freskos, and bassist Brian Cox, and went into Cleveland's After Dark studios to churn out the jarring avant-pop found on this single.

This 45 epitomizes the best of Northeast Ohio's short-lived "post-punk underground" sound. It comes from a time when men weren't afraid to use chorus pedals - not the smooth Roland JC sound of the mid-80's, but the off-phase, piercing, early chorus pedal sound. The record also benefits from the co-production of The Mirrors' Jim Jones, then just forming the great band Easter Monkeys. Both of these tracks were thankfully included on the Pere Ubu box set Datapanik in the Year Zero, on the included CD Terminal Drive- Ubu-related Rarities. (Geffen/Cooking Vinyl, 1996)

"Baking Bread," with its semi-ska drunken sailor intro led by a repeated Krauss fill, quickly gets into the meat of its angular modern garage pop. Morgan's slightly Verlainian vocals overlay chiming guitars not given to typical strumming or chord voicings. Okay, it's a little like Television, but takes that approach a step further; a little more obtuse.

"Lucky Charms" is almost as strong as the A-side. Propelled by Krauss's forward leaning straight-4 beat, this faster, danceable rocker exhibits the same unexpected chord changes, along with some nice, quirky guitar improvisations along the way, not too far removed from the likes of what Pylon was doing in Athens at the same time. Krauss's beat style here is consistent with the flavor he demonstrated in Pere Ubu and would use in the future with Home and Garden. The guitar parts Morgan devises to fill holes between vocal lines are ever-interesting, never typical.

Neptune's Car changed its lineup and carried on another few years, with Gary Lupico (ex-Kneecappers, pre-Dr. Bloodmoney & California Speedbag, and inventor of the name "Dead Kennedys") coming in on guitar, and Jeff Benik (pre-Ca. Speedbag, The New Ceasars, more) replacing Krauss.

Morgan moved to New York, formed/quit some bands, moved back to Cleveland, and in the 90's formed the New Caesars. Koolie--in fact, Morgan's own label--compiled and released the EP Peter Laughner in 1982.

I saw a later version of Neptune's Car in '82 at an outdoor college radio festival when I was 16, not knowing I would play in some capacity with its members in a few separate outfits years later. (Gary Lupico, Brian Cox, Doug Morgan, Jeff Benik)

In 1996, Doug Morgan was living back in Cleveland and asked me to record 2 songs with him in what would come to be called the New Caesars. "Flame" and "Lou" were 2 very different songs, but have Morgan's melodicism and gift for well thought-out lyrics. Practicing the songs with Doug and the band was fun, and I stayed late those couple nights at a studio in the Flats adding backup vocals and extra guitar. One night after recording I found my car window smashed by a thief who tried to get the crappy radio/cassette player inside. It was worth it, of course, because the songs came out great! You can hear the New Caesars stuff HERE.

(Dedicated to the memory of Gary Lupico and Jim Jones. Thanks to Mike DeCapite and Brian Cox)


Download:




"Baking Bread" mp3
by Neptune's Car, 1980.
Koolie 240
out of print



"Lucky Charms" mp3
by Neptune's Car, 1980.
Koolie 240
out of print


top photograph © Ted Barron
Doug Morgan, Grand Street, Brooklyn, circa 1990.

French Symbolist Rock! (from Cleveland)

Nevertheless, there it was, land with its noises, its passions,
all its wares and its festivities; it was a dazzling, a magnificent
land full of promises, and from which a mysterious perfume of
musk and roses came drifting out to us, like an amorous whisper,
the myriad music of life.

Charles Baudelaire
"Already!"
from Paris Spleen, 1869.

Download:

"Baudelaire" mp3
by Peter Laughner, 1975.
available on Take the Guitar Player for a Ride
out of print

Listening Party

By Mike DeCapite

Jim Jones, who died last week in his lounge chair, at the helm of his unparalleled archive of music and videotape and movies and memorabilia, in his house on Lake Erie, played with three of the best bands that Cleveland produced (or that produced themselves in spite of Cleveland)—Pere Ubu, Easter Monkeys, and Home and Garden—and he influenced most of the rest of them. Whether by way of the music he made or by way of the music and sensibility he introduced people to as resident DJ and clerk/consultant at Record Rendezvous, or one-on-one, through mix tapes and listening sessions at his home, Jones opened people’s minds. He was a connection to the wider world. I called this “Listening Party” because Jones was always having people over and setting them up with chili and whatever they needed to drink and putting them in that chair—the one he died in—and playing them records and showing them clips from movies and the Three Stooges and Ghoulardi and the early Stones or whomever and opening up the world. And he did this at Record Rendezvous, too: He’d stand at the turntable and play you things for as long as you’d stand there and listen. The last time I saw him he gave me a stack of CDs he’d burned for me, including Max Richter, Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky score, a Captain Beefheart radio show, and Erik Satie, and we hadn’t even really been in touch in years. A full description of his career (Mirrors, Electric Eels, Styrenes, Foreign Bodies, Easter Monkeys, Home and Garden, David Thomas & the Pedestrians, Wooden Birds, Pere Ubu, and solo work, but minus his work with Speaker/Cranker and King NXN) can be found in an interview posted at Ubu’s website. I’ve never felt a more immediate or unmediated connection to a musician’s work than to Jones’s. He was the first person I met whose work made me think, “Wow, I want to make something that good.” I realize that by writing about him, I’m setting myself up as a prime target for a pie from beyond the grave, so I’ll end this quick and then duck. Nothing I can say about his work can convey the hundredth part of what I feel when I hear the songs posted below, but I’ll just embarrass everyone, me and Jones included, by saying it’s something blazing and senseless and pretty close to love.

Download:

"Emerald Necklace" mp3
by Foreign Bodies, circa 1980.
CLE magazine 3A flexidisc
out of print
all instruments: Jim Jones

"Marco Polo: City of Kin-Sai" mp3
by Home and Garden, 1984.
available on History and Geography
guitar: Jim Jones

"Underpants" mp3
by Easter Monkeys, 1984.
Splendor of Sorrow
out of print
guitar: Jim Jones

"Nailed to the Cross" mp3
by Easter Monkeys, 1984.
Splendor of Sorrow outtake
previously unreleased
guitar: Jim Jones

"Heaven/.357" mp3
by Easter Monkeys, 1984.
Splendor of Sorrow
out of print
guitar: Jim Jones

"Miss You" mp3
by Pere Ubu, 1988.
available on The Tenement Year
guitar: Jim Jones

"Forever Lost (Nocturne)" mp3
by Jim Jones, circa 1990.
News from the Firelands
previously unreleased
all instruments: Jim Jones