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I approve all of the above Mekons recommendations. Did 1/4stick re-release the mid-80s stuff? If you can only download music from after 1992 ('cause I thought Quarterstick only started releasing Mekons music with the execrable Retreat From Memphis), avoid everything through Journey To The End Of The Night. Journey is a quieter than usual affair, but has some lovely folky tunes (my faves are "Last Weeks of the War," "Cast No Shadows," "Powers & Horror," and "Neglect"). OOOH! has some real gems - "The Olde Trip To Jerusalem" is one of the best songs they've ever done, plus there's "Take His Name In Vain," "Winter," and "Bob Hope And Charity." Punk Rock is a re-recording of some of their early songs, and your best bet there is "32 Weeks," "Never Been In A Riot," and, above all, "Dan Dare." If the two Hen's Teeth collections are on there, get "I Have Been To Heaven And Back," which is an alternate version of the track from Mekons Rock & Roll, and DEFINITELY "Orpheus," the best song they've ever made, hands down. Be sure to get the version from Hen's Teeth, though, because the Mekons United version is awful. Oh, and Misha and I disagree on I (Heart) Mekons, which, now that I think about it, is another Quarterstick release. I say yes to "I (Heart) Apple" and "Millionaire" and a resounding NO to the rest of the album. Misha thinks otherwise, though.

I figured they're talked about so much here, how could they be LOST?

In the crazy bizzaroland of Buffista Music The Mekons are as big as The Rolling Stones. In the rest of the world, they sell in the high dozens.

Few people appreciate a band that, for instance, will record a retelling of Jude the Obscure crossed with the Beatles' "Hey Jude" ("Hey! Susan"), write a song about the story-within-a-story from Red Harvest ("Flitcraft") or work telling details from an obscure overtly Marxist historian's best work - The Making of the English Working Class by E.P. Thompson - into a fun song about the oldest pub in London ("The Olde Trip To Jerusalem"). I don't know why.

Back on the rap covers by non-rappers, I think I have a new champion. Jonathan Coulton covers "Baby Got Back."

Weird. I'm, this very moment, listening to a tongue-in-cheek power pop song of his.

In the rest of the world, they sell in the high dozens.

In the words of one of their contemporaries' recent album titles, fifty thousand Mekons fans can't be wrong!

Corwood, you are so wrong about [Heart], we will just have to pass over it in silence. And "Orpheus" is not their best song - "Sympathy for the Mekons," "Memphis, Egypt," "Fletcher Christian" and possibly "Take His Name In Vain" are at least as good.

Corwood, you are so wrong about [Heart], we will just have to pass over it in silence.

Hey, I know it's controversial, but (Heart) nearly put me off the Meeks for good. I appreciate the album more with time, but, well, this is the point where silence and peace are the best options.

And "Orpheus" is not their best song - "Sympathy for the Mekons," "Memphis, Egypt," "Fletcher Christian" and possibly "Take His Name In Vain" are at least as good.

Those are all wonderful, brilliant, stunning, perfect songs, as are a few dozen other Mekons songs. "Orpheus," to my mind, is so great that even the guy who came over after my band played "Memphis, Egypt" a few years back to ask if we knew a second chord, even that philistine of a jackass would have to scrape his jaw off the floor afterwards.

The very last song Bauhaus performed at the concert tonight?

Bela Lugosi's Dead.

All is right with the world.

Did Peter Murphy do his little chest-wiggle move? Were there fishnet shirts to be seen?

Did Peter Murphy do his little chest-wiggle move?

Ohmyyes.

Were there fishnet shirts to be seen?

Not on the band, but in the audience? You betcha. Including two *darling* deathrocker boys complete w/ big spiky hair, skin-tight black jeans, pointy boots, leather jackets, and smudgey eyeliner. I wanted to keep them as pets.