Dead Moon Calls It A Day
After 20 years, 15-plus albums and countless singles and hard-fought tours (mostly in Europe, where they're cult kings), Clackamas, Oregon's Dead Moon have decided to hang up their tattered black boots.
Though rumors of Dead Moon's demise have frequently crept up in the past, this break-up has been confirmed by Sub Pop, who released the fine Dead Moon 2-CD retrospective, Echoes Of The Past, last fall. While never rising much past cult status, Dead Moon garnered one of the most devoted followings of any band, and defined the very best of DIY aesthetics by self-releasing and most of the time even self-pressing their own records, touring when and where the hell they wanted to and basically ignoring all the tenants and rules of "the Man."
Their music was an inspiring mix of graveyard garage, AC/DC stomp and mid-century country-blues ghosts, all led by the warbly wail of Fred Cole. Cole has been making music since the mid-'60s his third band, the Lollipop Shoppe, is on the Rhino Nuggets Vol. I box set and he bent and sculpted his mad science through other unique combos over the years before forming Dead Moon with his wife Toody in 1987.
So there's a chance that this may not be just the end of the great Dead Moon, but a retirement for Cole. But don't bet on it, as anyone who has ever seen a Dead Moon show knows, Cole's stamina has no boundary.
Thanks for all the tunes, Dead Moon!!!
(from CMJ)
And, in the words of Fred Cole:
It has been a journey we will always treasure and feel that a worldwide family has emerged in its place. Dead Moon became much bigger than the band itself, it became a DIY underground hopeful for a lot of people. The candle is still burning!
I always try to put my finger on just what it is about Dead Moon that I love so much. I think it's that they're tough but sweet; hard but soft; and so fucking rock'n'roll--in ways that no other band is or has been. They bring DIY to an entirely new level and it's not out of any kind of forced aesthetic or subculture compliance--that's just the way they live. I guess I respect and admire their tenacity and individuality.
And god damn, I'm sad I'll never get to see them live again, but Fred's right, the candle is still burning--let's rock'n'roll!!
Dead Moon forever. [I'll drink to that].
1 comment:
This is so sad. I just watched Unknown Passage and it was really amazing stuff. I haven't seen anything that made me want to play music that much since watching "Instrument". It's not even that the filmmakers were that amazing or the narrative was that interesting, it's just that all the members of the band were such compelling, sincere people.
I guess I got a really different understanding of the idea of DIY from watching the film. Whereas the subculture and music scene that I'm entrenched in has this DIY ethic that is connect to some idea of "politics" and seems to be a reaction to the way that things happen in the mainstream music industry or the world. Even if it can be amazing and positive, it always defines itself relative to that normative. Dead Moon were DIY in a way that was so fiercely independent, that was beyond politics or scenes and just seemed to speak to the idea that if you want to live a life that makes sense, that is fulfilling, that is sustainable, you'll have to do a lot of things yourself. Whether it's their music, or Toody and Fred's marriage, or their crazy house and music store, the guitars Fred builds, or the way they decided to have a family (it is really surreal to see the Cole children who talk about their parents in the way that most parents talk about their rocker kids in music documentaries), there is an intention and originality to the way Dead Moon makes music or lives life as individuals that is pretty inspiring.
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