3Ds review, 1992
A New Zealand concept album about sounding like other bands who start with "V"
Doubt they really needed more Vanilla Ice, Gino Vanelli or Village People. Maybe Visage, Vapors or Van Der Graaf Generator, though… (Still suspect I underrated these kiwis.)
L.A. Weekly, 26 June 1992
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Jaz Jacobi
This is one of those albums I liked quite a bit in my 20s, sold off once it stopped seeming that cool, rebought once CDs tended to be found in quarter bins, and kind of liked it again. I go through this often, finding music pulls its own weight better the less I pay for it!
Chuck Eddy
I’ve still got it on a cassette (presumably the same one I reviewed almost 3 decades ago), for those rare moments that I can find a working cassette player around here. It didn’t quite make my 1992/’93 top 150 list, though I listed it as an also-ran in the intro text. I like the album artwork.
Jaz Jacobi
The cassette may or may not have the cool back cover art from the CD! I didn’t realize this label had a “pet band,” though they’d probably be the obvious pick of the bunch. That label also had these smart alecks (Drunken Boat).
David Mitchell's previous band Exploding Budgies bad a tune 'Just Like Kenneth Anger'. Old Ken happened to be in Auckland a while later, was told about the tune and marched up to the Flying Nun offices... the way I was told it, the man expected to be paid, using his famous name to get yr indie noise band over, fuck you pay me! Yeah... seeing the state of the offices he realized not only is there no money, these dodgy record guys might rob me... long story short, collector scum of America, there are Exploding Budgies discs signed by the magi himself.
Not sure if Dave Mitchell was cursed into toad form... looked like a dude you could bum a cigarette off of last time I saw him
3Ds being likened to the Fall? Never heard that. Dave Mitchell easily the guitar god of that kiwi post-punk generation... and they were my fave band 1991-93 for sure. Bx