Various Artists: This Can't Be Today - A Trip Through the US Psychedelic Underground 1977-1988, 3CD

• 3CD SET DOCUMENTING THE 1980s AMERICAN ‘PAISLEY UNDERGROUND’ SCENE.

• OVER 65 SCENE SETTING, TASTE MAKING TUNES INSPIRED BY ALL THINGS 60s, THRIFT STORE AND RICKENBACKER.

• FEATURING R.E.M., GREEN ON RED, THE BANGLES, THE RAIN PARADE, REDD KROSS, THE LAST, THE LONG RYDERS, THE DREAM SYNDICATE, R. STEVIE MOORE, HÜSKER DÜ, THE FLAMING LIPS, MEAT PUPPETS, THE THREE O’CLOCK AND MANY MORE.

• COMPLETE WITH INTRODUCTORY NOTE FROM ABSOLUTE GREY’S PAT THOMAS AND INSIGHTFUL BAND-BY-BAND BIOGRAPHIES.

• SCENE STAPLES, UNDERGROUND NUGGETS, LEFTFIELD GEMS AND EVERYTHING ELSE BETWEEN!

In 1977 punk gave American kids permission to explore music. Some had grown up in L.A., listening to the Sunset Strip bands in heavy rotation, others worked in record stores with old heads who taught them the secret history of the past, or educated themselves by digging through the vinyl library at their college radio stations. Thrift shops were full of paisley rags and fringed jackets, and young bands started dressing like it was 1966, dreaming of rewriting the history of rock, finding inspiration from songs that didn’t get played on the radio and discovering the forgotten weirdness of that decade.

‘This Can’t Be Today’ captures a snapshot of America’s second wave of psychedelia, a coast to coast phenomenon that saw bands as diverse as R.EM., The Dream Syndicate, Green On Red, Flaming Lips and Meat Puppets revisit a sound and aesthetic all but blown away by the pomp of 1970s heavy rock, AOR and disco. Knowingly backwards looking and infused with a pop sensibility, many of these bands became household names and legends in their own lifetime, whilst others produced one-off, scene defining classics or became a footnote in a later band’s origin story. Inspired by the seminal ‘Nuggets’ and ‘Pebbles’ compilations, often with one eye on “swinging London” and working to tight budgets with college radio listeners in mind, this was the polar opposite of Reaganomics, shiny movies and day-glo hair metal. Take a trip to an America the rest of the world rarely got to see.

Resplendent in artwork by the inimitable Cally, and compiled by American A&R, production, promotion and artist management veteran James Barber, this is both a time capsule for those who were there and an invaluable entry point for those with an interest in America’s response to punk rock and the post-punk scene.

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