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Staff pick of the week...
This week... Renter and Stick
My
first encounter with the then drummer extraordinaire for
the Reverbs (and now drummer extraordinaire for Velvet
Crush and Matthew
Sweet), Ric Menck, was on his first visit
to Champaign-Urbana. Everyone at my first record store
was so excited that we decided to make commemorative t-shirts
by taking a giant black magic marker, a half dozen white
t-shirts and draw a picture of hair and writing the words "Waiting
for Ric Menck" around it. I know, geeks. In the eighteen
years since, Ric has played in numerous bands (Velvet
Crush,
the
Tyde, Matthew
Sweet, Frausdots, and Aimee Mann to name a few).
I started Parasol
Records. Ric has moved from here to Chicago
to Providence and finally out to Hollywood. I've stayed
put. But, through it all, Ric and I have become best friends
and label partners (Reaction
Recordings).
"The
Ballad of Ric Menck" represents everything
I find endearing about Ric -- including his absolute love for
music and for his friends. It compiles 16 tracks of his non-Velvet
Crush material (mainly 7" singles, b-sides and compilation
tracks) including recordings by ChooChooTrain, The
Springfields,
and Paint Set. Paul Chastain is (of course) featured on about
half of the tracks. There are some great covers (Hollies, Matthew
Sweet, Primal Scream, Pastels and Syd Barrett) and an otherwise
unreleased demo for "Scatter Good Friends". This
CD is a great look into one side of what makes Velvet Crush
such a great band. Watch for a similar record from Paul Chastain
in the near future.
for
more info and to sample audio tracks visit: Ric's page
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