Unfortunately, every now and again here on Friday Night Jukebox I feature a band whose Wikipedia history is, shall we say, not all that entertaining. I'll take nothing away from Pere Ubu, though--they formed in 1975 in Cleveland, Ohio and lasted until 1982, at which time they took a five year hiatus before reforming in 1987 and they are still performing and touring to this day. And that's all without ever having a single or an album that so much as sniffed commercial success, let alone hitting any of the charts. Lead singer and keyboardist David Thomas is the only member to have lasted from beginning to end, though many others in the band (I counted 29 current and former members) have come and gone a few times. For their career, Pere Ubu has released 18 studio albums (the latest in 1979), 8 live albums, 3 compilations, and six (!) box sets. They've also released 19 singles and EPs. The band has collaborated with other artists and has had more side projects than I cared to count. Any way you slice it, the band has managed to make a living playing music for just about thirty years and that's a whole hell of a lot more entertaining than any job I've had.
"Final Solution" was released as a stand alone single in 1976, and was added to their 1985 compilation Terminal Tower. As noted above, neither single nor album came anywhere near the Billboard charts (though the single should have, goddamnit).
Though its title suggests it, "Final Solution" has nothing to do with the Jewish holocaust perpetrated by Nazi Germany during World War II--and instead is more of a reflection on teenage (or young adult) angst. What stands out most for me is how far ahead of its time this song was--it was recorded in 1975 and you have to remember that at that time The Clash, The Ramones, the Sex Pistols, or even the New York Dolls were all little more than blips (if that) on the music scene. The lyrics could have been written by any of the aforementioned bands (or frankly any punk band of the 70's) yet was written a couple years before punk exploded. The music is...well, let's just say the drums are a punch in the gut, the bass is an angry thump of contempt, and the guitars are a back of the hand to the face. Thomas' vocals are a bleak howl caught between a laugh and a kick in the ass. And the kicker? Turns out the "final solution" is...wait for it...rock and roll. How the hell can you beat that? An incredible song from an incredible era.
Lyric Sheet: "Buy me a ticket to a sonic reduction/Guitars gonna sound like a nuclear destruction/It seems like I'm a victim of natural selection/Or maybe just another slide in another direction..."
Enjoy:
210,000+ Dead Americans
Fuck Donald Trump,
emaycee
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