Monday, March 16, 2009

Flowers Of Discipline

If I see a record I don't have on Teenbeat, I buy it.

Which is how I come to have this record by Phil Krauth's old band. I was happy to see what was probably Mark Robinson's home phone number in the mid 80s listed as the booking contact on one of the inserts (all of which have been scanned and included in the download).

After I originally posted this I received an email from Michael Cluff, the guitar player. I asked him if he would tell the story of Flowers Of Discipline, and he said that he would:

"To be honest, there's not much to tell! Much of the story can be found here (which came from an email I sent someone, who put what I wrote in third person and posted it).  That story pretty much captures how alienated we were: Reagan era punk fans two and a half hours' drive from DC playing in a country town in the middle of the Shenandoah Valley.  Phil had already played in Unrest and Clarence in high school, and met Dave Park and me when he started at James Madison U. 

We played for two years in the small campus scene (with great bands like The Rational Herdsmen, DT and the Shakes, and Narcoleptic Lenny).  Just after I graduated in '87 and before I headed off to graduate school, we played our last show at DC Space opening for Dischord's Happy Go Licky (a re-tooled Rites of Spring, just before Fugazi was formed).  Phil and Dave (bass, songwriting) continued with Unrest, a line-up that recorded the amazing albums "Malcolm X Park," and "Kustom Karnal Blaxploitation" (both of which made me feel like the Pete Best of indie-pop -- an average musician who was lucky to play with some truly talented guys).   

If you're a Phil Krauth fan, you should know he plays bass on the untitled song.  We had a few more minutes of studio time, so just for fun Dave and Phil swapped places, and we improvised straight to tape.

Perhaps our only claim to fame was that one side of the EP was 33 1/3 rpm and other was 45 rpm.  (Some claimed the 45 rpm side sounded better at 33!) 

I was never happy with the sound of this EP; we recorded it in a gospel studio in a very rural town, and I think the engineers weren't familiar with distorted guitars.  (To me, the guitar sounds like a rotisserie grill.)

Again, thanks for posting the record.  Having been so close to the music, it's impossible for me to assess whether or not this stuff was any good.  So it's nice to see others enjoying it years later..."

Ladies and gentlemen, for your listening pleasure, Flowers Of Discipline.

Flowers Of Discipline EP (Teenbeat)
1. Song One
2. Sight
3. Chances
4. Looking Back
5. Untitled

3 comments:

wllmtwd said...

thank you VERY much for continuously posting such great music here.. i truly love ye blog.

-wllmtwd

Brat Brains said...

really cool! thank you for making historical HBURG punk available to everyone!

Pool Thrasher said...

God, my girlfriend bought me this record for my birthday last year, ITS SO FUCKING GOOOOOODDDDD!!!!!!