
James Chance is a pretty important part of New York's experimental music history, and yet I rarely meet people who have heard him. James Chance's career started with him playing in Lydia Lunch's band
Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, one of the groups alongside Chance's own Contortions that appeared on the notorious compilation
No New York (produced by Brian Eno). That comp is cited as a collection of some of the most important New York No Wave bands.
Chance left The Jerks to pursue his own ideas, and most of these ideas were taking some form of jazz and funk and drugging it with punk and noise. Chance would scream in a sort of James Brown a-la Darby Crash way and play saxophone much akin to Arto Lindsay's skronk guitar playing (Arto Lindsay appears on a song on this collection, "That's When Your Heartaches Begin").
Buy Contortions is probably the most notorious of the albums in this box set. It's definitely the most punk of them. Pat Place plays an open tuned guitar with a slide, and it sounds pretty gnarly. The lyrics are very nihilistic and mean (titles like "Throw Me Away", "I Don't Want to be Happy", and the anthem "Contort Yourself"). Some stuff from the James White and the Blacks era gets pretty silly with backup singers and dated production, but the silliness is very intentional. James Chance had gotten this obsession with disco music. He said he hated it and that could be why he insisted on playing his botched style of it for three albums worth (Sax Maniac, Melt Yourself Down, Off White). My personal favorite of all the albums is The Flaming Demonics. It's much more instrumentally focused and has some hints of bop song structure ("Rantin' and Ravin'" is a good example) and has a medley which throws in a sped up and freaked out Duke Ellington tune. "I Danced with a Zombie" is kind of stupid though.
James Chance moved to Paris and is still playing music today. He played All Tomorrow's Parties a few years back and I hear he's still pretty incredible. Kicking at the audience and still on the attack.
TRACK LIST
CD1: Buy The Contortions / Theme from Grutzi Elvis
- Designed to Kill (Buy The Contortions)
- My Infatuation (Buy The Contortions)
- I Don't Want To Be Happy (Buy The Contortions)
- Anesthetic (Buy The Contortions)
- Contort Yourself (Buy The Contortions)
- Throw Me Away (Buy The Contortions)
- Roving Eye (Buy The Contortions)
- Twice Removed (Buy The Contortions)
- Bedroom Athlete (Buy The Contortions)
- Throw Me Away (Live at CBGB's, spring 1978.)
- Twice Removed (Live at CBGB's, spring 1978.)
- Jailhouse Rock (Live at CBGB's, spring 1978.)
- That's When Your Heartaches Begin (From Grutzi Elvis Soundtrack)
- Schleyer's Tires (From Grutzi Elvis Soundtrack)
- McGraw Army Base/Munchen (From Grutzi Elvis Soundtrack)
- Theme From Grutzi Elvis (From Grutzi Elvis Soundtrack)
CD2: Off White / Soul Exorcism
- Contort Yourself (Off White)
- Contort Yourself (August Darnell Remix)
- Stained Sheets (Off White)
- (Tropical) Heat Wave (Off White)
- Almost Black #1 (Off White)
- White Savages (Off White)
- Off Black (Off White)
- Almost Black #2 (Off White)
- White Devil (Off White)
- Bleached Black (Off White)
- Christmas With Satan (A Christmas Record)
- Don't Stop Til You Get Enough (Soul Exorcism)
- Exorcise The Funk (Soul Exorcism)
- Disposable You (Soul Exorcism)
CD3: Sax Maniac /Melt Yourself Down
01. Irresistible Impulse (
Sax Maniac)
02. That Old Black Magic (
Sax Maniac)
03. Disco Jaded (
Sax Maniac)
04. Money To Burn (
Sax Maniac)
05. Sax Maniac (
Sax Maniac)
06. Sax Machine (
Sax Maniac)
07. The Twitch (
Sax Maniac)
08. Super Bad (
Melt Yourself Down)
09. Melt Yourself Down (
Melt Yourself Down)
10. Hell On Earth (
Melt Yourself Down)
CD4: Flaming Demonics / The Judy Taylor Sessions
01. The Devil Made Me Do It (
Flaming Demonics)
02. Boulevard of Broken Dreams (
Flaming Demonics)
03. Rantin' and Ravin' (
Flaming Demonics)
04. The Natives Are Restless (
Flaming Demonics)
05. Caravan/It Don't Mean a Thing/Melt Yourself Down (
Flaming Demonics)
06. I Danced With a Zombie. (
Flaming Demonics)
07. White Meat (
The Judy Taylor Sessions)
08. Town Without Pity (
The Judy Taylor Sessions)
09. Hyp No Tease (
The Judy Taylor Sessions)
Try it.
Buy the ContortionsOff White/Soul Exorcism Sax Maniac/Melt Yourself DownFlaming Demonics/The Judy Taylor SessionsBuy it.Unfortunately this box set is out of print and hard to find. The cheapest I heard was 90 dollars and was missing a CD. Though I think they're releasing each CD on their own through an import label. This is, as far as I know, a rumor. It would make sense though with Chance living in France.