HE'S DEAD JIM - Colour Climax/Monochrome World CDR: Aberdeen D.I.Y.-punk 1981-83 (Messthetics #215)
Messthetics proudly presents the should-have-been greatest hits of He's Dead Jim - from the first half of their four-year Aberdonian "rammy" of trash culture and lo-fi melodic punk. HDJ were one of D.I.Y.'s most obscure (and least likely) prodigies. Despite the evidence of their (charmingly aberrant) songs on Messthetics #105, He's Dead Jim were a complete pop band, and they were also prodigious songwriters, from their first lo-fi garage recordings to their very last ...lo-fi garage recordings. They released eight full-length cassettes locally - each of them elaborately decorated and bursting with hummable tunes - but they never darkened the door of a proper studio. (If they had, they'd be all over Bored Teenagers or This is Mod, but they weren't mods at all, so maybe that's just as well.) HDJ pay regular homage to all the usual school-band pop-culture icons from Fireball XL5 to Star Trek [obviously] to The Prisoner. Pure [trash] punk, a lot of Mark E. Smith and maybe some Billy Childish, as well, mixing it up with peeved-teen quips like "...got no dry ice / to hide the fact that we're quite nice... / We want groupies (give us a break!)" ...Etc.

Colour Climax/Monochrome World includes over an hour of music, a complete band history, photos, extensive artwork, and Messthetics' first 'reversible' cover.$9.00

listen:
'Fab Gear'
'Our Generation'
'Towel on the Radiator'
'We Want Groupies'
'Colour Climax (Monochrome World)'