Track Listing

1. Dish It Out - Contortions
2. Flip Your Face - Contortions
3. Jaded - Contortions
4. I Can't Stand Myself - Contortions
5. Burning Rubber - Teenage Jesus & The Jerks
6. Closet - Teenage Jesus & The Jerks
7. Red Alert - Teenage Jesus & The Jerks
8. I Woke Up Dreaming - Teenage Jesus & The Jerks
9. Helen Forsdale - Mars (3)
10. Hairwaves - Mars (3)
11. Tunnel - Mars (3)
12. Puerto Rican Ghost - Mars (3)
13. Egomaniacs Kiss - DNA (2)
14. Lionel - DNA (2)
15. Not Moving - DNA (2)
16. Size - DNA (2)

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #123693 in Music
• Released on: 2005-09-26
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Dimensions: .17 pounds

CD Description
NO NEW YORK is one of the definitive compilation albums notonly of the post-punk era, but of rock-&-roll history. It is perhaps the only album to completely define a musical subgenre by itself. While James Chance & the Contortions, Mars, Teenage Jesus & the Jerks, and DNA made later recordings (infact, Lydia Lunch and Arto Lindsay, leaders of the latter two bands, would have long and prolific careers), the 16 songs on the Brian Eno-produced NO NEW YORK encapsulate the No Wave movement. Its defining lack of musical sophistication--or even basic instrumental competence--could not be sustainedfor long. The Contortions, led by Chance's stuttering, squawking saxophone and hectoring vocals, were like a bizarre parody of 1970s funk, right down to their demented cover of James Brown's "I Can't Stand Myself". Teenage Jesus & the Jerks were arguably the closest to a conventional punk band, with the 35-second blurt "Red Alert" sounding like an early precursor of what would become hardcore. The artsy minimalism of Mars and DNA strips the music down to basic building blocks of rhythm and noise, to very different ends. Together, they sound both of their moment and timeless.

Customer Reviews

Key No Wave compilation...
The late 1970s saw an art-rock inspired scene develop in New York, 'No New York' is Brian Eno's selection of four of the bands at the time - Contortions, Teenage Jesus & the Jerks, Mars & DNA - each act contributing four tracks apiece (only Mars worked directly with Eno - those four tracks should be considered alongside Eno's collaborative work with Talking Heads, Devo, & Bowie at the time). This album became very hip in the late 1970s/early 1980s and was seen as an indicator of cool, a now-Nuggets for the late 70s - it's even ironically namechecked by Lester Bangs in an article collected in book form - itself quite hip these days...Perhaps this works as a historical document like the book 'Please Kill Me' which focuses on some of the acts here (as does a chapter in the excellent 'Rip It Up & Start Again')

The four acts found here weren't the sum of the No Wave scene - the 2003 compilation 'N.Y. No Wave' (released on ZE records) is more balanced - adding names like Rosa Yemen, Arto/Neto, the legendary Suicide, Lizzie Mercier Descloux- as well as the performers here and in slightly different contortions (Lydia Lunch solo, the shifts Contortions took). That collection is probably a better primer and paved the way for the whole Ze-scene that followed (Kid Creole, Was (Not Was)) and the harsher NY sounds a few years later (Sonic Youth, Swans). The Lydia Lunch track on 'N.Y. No Wave' is proof she got better as an artist and that Teenage Jesus & the Jerks might he historically significant or good for a track or two, aren't necessarily more listenable than acts such as Minor Threat, The Germs & Nation of Ulysses. Her 'Queen of Siam' LP is excellent, as is the material collected on 'Stinkfist' and the fantastic LP she recorded with the former Birthday Party member Rowland S. Howard, 'Shotgun Wedding.'

'No New York' is a key record of the era and a record of historical significance - the 'N.Y. No Wave'-compilation is more obligatory and an ideal companion...