Lubricated Goat "The Great Old Ones" 2003

The great old ones is a compilation of lubricated goat songs (and one crunt song) that were re-recorded by the goat line-up that stu spasm (the band's only main-stay) had backing him at the time. being somewhat of an underground music legend in his homeland of australia, as well as establishing himself as musical royalty to a host of underground noisemakers all over the western world, stu has never had much trouble surrounding himself with top shelf and reputable players to compliment his whacky concoction of punk/jazz/psyche/blues/noise meandering. the line-up for this album is no different, most notably including jack natz of cop shoot cop on bass.....Having followed the goat's music for the better part of the last 20+ years, it was good to know that stu was still kicking it (in NYC), and, overall, i found the album very enjoyable. still, i couldn't help but consider the following:
It's not a big secret that stu has a mountain of great, unreleased material (eg, "heads are gonna roll," relief," "thing of need," "a call to you," "your big day," "the devil is a comin'," "lie come true," "johannes b. gut," "buggery," ad infinitum - a simple search on youtube supports this statement); (B) lubricated goat have not put out an album of new material in ~15 years (unless you count the 4-song solo EP/7" that stu put out - popular male vocal - which is almost a decade old now); (C) the first two goat albums (play's the devil's music and paddock of love) sound like glorified 4- and/or 8-track cassette recordings (ie, lo-fi, which is part of their charm, if not the main ingredient that make them such unique and inspired works); and (D) several of these re-recordings have already been recorded in a "legit" studio and officially released ~15 years ago (see psychedelicatessen and forces you don't understand, as well as the crunt album stu did with kat bjelland from babes in toyland and russel simmins from the blues explosion).
All of this being said, the time, effort, and money would have been better spent on an album of new, unreleased material, which, i am assuming, is what people like myself have been looking forward to for a long, long time. arguably, the great old ones could be deemed somewhat misleading if it were one's introduction to the band. basically, this album seems unnecessary, regardless of whether or not one deems these re-recordings superior to the originals. the only objective that this collection seems to have accomplished is to reinforce the idea that these are great songs, regardless of production values, and that stu can still play a mean guitar and sing his ass off. is this really such a surprise to anyone?
FYI: Lubricated Goat is still together and playing gigs, and there are people out there who are obviously still interested in what the band is up to, so the $50 million question for mr. spasm is: "what's up with the delay?" said the phaser to the fuzzbox. - Furry Man of the Midwesttrax:

01 Bad Times 02 Spoil The Atmosphere 03 Nerve Quake 04 Stroke 05 Frotting With Ennio 06 Snap Out Of It 07 You Remain Anonymous 08 Jason The Unpopular 09 Cannibals' Lament 10 Play Dea 11 You're Fading Out

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