I visited our nation's capitol twice during the second Reagan term but about all I remember is the Smithsonian, "the Wall," the Italian restaurant, the metal detectors in the swank hotel, and pictures of Ollie North EVERYWHERE. Of course, at the time, I was just a junior high schooler, and it is safe to assume that even if I had lived in DC, I would not have given a fuck about Pussy Galore or their departure for NYC. Likewise, I would not have known anything about Rites of Spring or the fact they were probably DC's finest at the time. But in my imaginary neighborhood in this pretend hometown of mine, there were probably kids finishing high school who did know about such things. These kids knew about the DC in harDCore. And perhaps inspired by the DIY ethic and the Dischord example, some of these idle teens probably formed their own band. And despite growing up with the DC music scene, the kids could have had enough other musical influence and interests to make themselves different from "yr typical DC band." Most importantly, however, they were probably just enthusiastic kids who had fun with what they were doing. Ponder this.
While you're thinking, we have Fuck Pussy Galore, a reissue of Unrest's first album (1987), "Tink of S.E.," along with some early singles and other cuts for the CD. This was supposed to come out a long time ago, but no matter. There is room in the post-Perfect Teeth world for this, as it is both great and entertaining in addition to being an important historical document. This CD has some hardcore influence, some Dishord-like anthems, early 80's British postpunk (Factory, 4AD etc.), pop melody, dark atmosphere, and much more, including a King Crimson cover, weird percussive stuff, a ridiculous German sing/strum song . . . etc, etc, etc, In other words, this CD has the eclecticism Unrest became known for but gave up to get Perfect Teeth. Mark E. Robinson's recent Wedding Presenty strum guitar is but a frantic punk noodle here, sounding very jazzy/funky and loose. In fact, "frantic" and "loose" describe much of this early Unrest stuff. Although Unrest 1986 wasn't terribly experienced or tight, this CD shows us four guys having a ball making music that is worth your time. I do believe I am blushing (Tim Ross)