The Mekons Story.

"Destroy your safe and happy lives, before it is too late/ The battles we fought/ were long and hard/ just not to be consumed by Rock 'n' Roll" - the Mekons, Memphis, Egypt

Back in... oooh, say 1989? 1990? I read a Rolling Stone Review of The Mekons Rock 'N' Roll, the major label debut of a band that had been knocking around for some years. The review identified them as a favorite of the late Lester Bangs, and essentially said the album encapsulated the spirit of Rock n Roll while at the same time being a scathing indictment of the Rock Music Industry. Interesting choice for a debut album, I thought.

It took a while in those pre-iTunes days to locate the album, finally buying it from Atomic. Upon first listen, the opening track "Memphis, Egypt" blasted out of the speakers and twisted itself into my cortex. I stopped the disc to listen to that again. The album followed with Club Mekon (featuring longtime Mekons chanteuse Sally Timms) and Only Darkness Has The Power, both standouts. Cocaine Lil is the story of a party girl; Learning to Live on Your Own, Blow Your Tuneless Trumpet, Echo, all great songs. Empire Of The Senseless, for which this blog was named. Amnesia talks about Rock n Roll being brought to America in the holds of slave ships; finally, When Darkness Falls wrapped the whole thing up.

The disc became one of my favorites; personally, I rate it up there as an example of post-punk development as good as London Calling. Maybe better; it does the job in one disc rather than two.

Not too much later, they came through town and played the Shank. I went by myself, because I wanted to see how this stuff translated into a live show.



Well, it translated like it should. With fire and anger, humor and passion. The band spent some time bantering, but when you saw Rico Bell take the stage with his accordion, you knew it was not going to be a normal punk rock show.

A couple of years later, the band was touring in support of the major label swan song, The Curse Of The Mekons (the story is that the Mekes did the album the same way they did the previous effort, figuring that was what the Company wanted; when they submitted the tapes, the Company thought it was a joke, since it had come out so different. The album remained unreleased for a year, and was not released in America for several more years. Needless to say, it's one of the strongest). So my wife and I went, by that time I had turned her on to the Wonder of The Mekons.

God. The band was so off. The music was poorly chosen, mostly seemed to be droning mishmash. Later, Jon Langford said "Some nights, we can be focused like a laser beam. Other nights, we're complete crap." This must have been one of those nights. We left. Later, I found that they had been dumped by their record company mid tour.

That was it. For a while, I just thought they had the one good album in 'em. In 94, they came back again, in support of "Retreat From Memphis". I thought well, I'll just go and give them one more chance. That first show was so good.

They were a laser beam again. It was another jaw dropping show. Damn. I bought the new CD; by this time they were on an independent (again). The Mekons have been on at least 12 different labels since 1977.

Yes, 1977. They released their first single in '77, inspired by the Sex Pistols. After a couple of released albums (upon which they never learned to actually play their instruments) they spent several years finishing college and woodshedding, practicing and listening to music: Gang of Four and old Country music. The Result was Fear and Whiskey, the album that has been acknowledged as creating the alt/country genre. There is no Wilco without the Mekons.

Since then, the band has been unwilling to stand still. Although they may not appeal to everybody, They have been on the cusp of guitar based alternative, they have toyed with country, folk, reggae, pop, electronica, even re-recording their first songs and releasing them recently on Punk Rock. They have performed and exhibited collaborative art shows. They did an anarchic lesbian pirate musical. They have released books and art. And always, always invented new amalgams of music. The most recent album, Oooh! (Out Of Our Heads) was released with a coordinating art show, and melds English folk traditions with rock and punk.



In 2000, the somber The Edge Of The Night was released, an they toured with a mostly acoustic lineup, re-invigorating the "unplugged" genre. They played for thirty of us at the Cactus Club.

In 2002, they performed three nights in Chicago in honor of their 25th year; each night celebrating a successive decade.

Although Langford premiered his retrospective art-performance piece The Executioner's Last Songs, here in Milwaukee, the Mekons have not been back since that unplugged show at the Cactus Club. Until now.



Next month, they release a new album, Natural, and the American leg of the tour kicks off here at the Pabst on September 27th. I popped for tickets already; look for me in the front rows. Although from all accounts this is to be on the mellower side, rather than the raucous 'loud' shows, it promises to be a stellar evening. I'd go twice if I could.

They may even practice.

EDIT: It needs to be said, and the author of this Salon piece does, that the Mekons really started evolving when women were added to the band, a virtual rarity in 1980. Ever egalitarian to the point of socialist and beyond, the band is a true collaborative; no one writes songs until they get together, and everyone present participates.

"There's no peace/ On this terrible shore/ Every day is a battle/ How we still love the war." From the latest album. How can you resist couplets like that?

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