If you know the The Flying Lizards, you likely first became aware of them from their cover version of “Money (That’s What I Want),” a wonderfully deconstructed take on the original. Their self-titled first album includes this “hit” but is also a wonderful venture into lo-fi recording.
Aside from the “Money” there are two other covers included. The album kicks off with a, let’s call it, “spirited” version of “Mandalay Song” by Bertolt Brecht. That’s an unusual choice to open an album to be sure, unless it’s some sort of Brecht-themed album which this is definitively not. And then there is Eddie Cochran’s “Summertime Blues,” with deadpan vocals and sparse instrumentation that seems to be barely able to keep up with the beat. The song doesn’t end so much as fall apart.
The original songs tend to be more low-key and less focused than the covers but include some nice bass (a couple times moving clearly into dub territory), spare drums, and a female vocalist who often sounds like she’s afraid of the microphone. Overall it gives the impression of someone who listened to a Lee “Scratch” Perry production once and decided to give it a go. As an added bonus, after several songs end there are slight sounds of movement and extraneous noise (voices, doors). Hey, someone forgot to turn off the tape!
Does all this sound like a disaster? For me it’s quite the opposite. It’s certainly off the beaten path, but it’s funky, dubby, disjointed, weird and wonderful!