Mercury Rev: Yerself Is Steam

     In my post "How Wayne Coyne Changed My Life", I mentioned how the Flaming Lips were my gateway back to rock music. I was lead on a journey of discovery back to bands I had missed in the 90's. So, it's not surprising that one of the first bands I checked out was Mercury Rev. Former Lips guitarist Jonathan Donahue (In A Priest Driven Ambulance, Hit To Death In The Future Head) and Lips producer Dave Fridmann were members of Mercury Rev. Donahue left The Flaming Lips right as they had achieved major label success, but he needed to get out of Wayne Coyne's shadow. He proved with Yerself Is Steam that he had the vision to lead his own band. And The Flaming Lips recovered nicely with Ronald Jones on guitar for a couple albums. I have all of Mercury Rev's cd's in my collection, but my favorite by far is Yerself is Steam (Your Self-Esteem).
     Yerself Is Steam was another amazing album released in 1991. You can tell from the packaging that listening to the cd will be a trip. I have the Mint Film UK version and on the spine it says "stereo fucked". Excellent! Then when you look at the back, all the running times end with 27 seconds. The credits are also amusing. Jonathan Donahue is credited with "vocals when left to himself". Producer credit is "two-inch band limited signals arrived at by Dave Fridmann". The lineup for the album is Dave Baker, vocals; Donahue, vocals, guitars; Fridmann, bass; Jimy Chambers, Drums; Grasshopper, guitar and Suzanne Thorpe, flute. Yes, flute and she's awesome on the opening track "Chasing A Bee". The song starts out like an outtake from In A Priest Driven Ambulance, then Dave Baker comes in with his creepy, unhinged vocals. Then the guitar freakouts begin with Thorpe's flauting(?) underneath. After the 5 minute mark the guitars sound like a shotwave radio being played through a Marshall stack. The next track, "Syringe Mouth" is very Lips-ian and I wouldn't be surprised if Donahue had been working on it during Hit To Death In The Future Head. My two favorite songs are "Sweet Oddysee Of A Cancer Cell T' Th' Center Of Yer Heart" and "Frittering". "Oddysee" sounds space-y and disembodied with lots of drum freakouts. It reminds me of Pink Floyd, somewhat. "Frittering" is a beautiful song that starts out with ethereal vocals and acoustic guitar strumming. This sets up the impact when the drums and electric guitars come in. Sometimes "Chasing A Bee" is my favorite Mercury Rev song, but push come to shove it's probably "Frittering". I wish I had the version with "Car Wash Hair" or "Lego My Ego", but I never run across it at any record stores. I would recommend Yerself Is Steam to my kids, but if they don't like it they should try Deserter's Song instead. The critics love Deserter's Song, and don't get me wrong it's good, but I prefer their earlier, guitar-centric albums. The last few albums have been boring, but in fairness I've only listened to them once each.

     Finally, here's what I've been listening to in the car- Black Sabbath Vol. 4, a metric shit ton of Bob Pollard so I can formulate a best of list and the new My Bloody Valentine. Yes, I've managed to get a copy with a little help from my friend. I'll probably post about it in the future, but I want to live with it for awhile first. I do like it though if that's any help to y'alls. I might even break down and order a vinyl copy off the interwebs. Peace.