Send "The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Pitchfork |
 1994's Orange finds the Blues Explosion at the exact moment they left behind the pompadour-and-sideburns Crypt Records trash-can garage-rock universe and sidled their way into the Beastie Boys/Beck/Cibo Matto downtown genre-fucking cosmpolitan party. Beck actually shows up on Orange, literally phoning in a guest verse on "Flavor", and they toured with the Beasties soon after. It's easy to hear what those guys liked in the band's assault. The Blues Explosion were honest, organic experimenters-- fusing tons of different styles into their musical assault without compromising their ferocity or making any of it sound forced. These influences are fully internalized, rather than self-consciously stapled on. So we get Isaac Hayes disco strings on the drawn-out "Bellbottoms" intro, feral James Chance-sounding sax squawks on "Ditch", Meters/Booker T organ grease on "Very Rare", g-funk keyboard whine on "Greyhound". But we also get a scuzzed-up, pigfuck-descended rock band working at the absolute peak of its considerable powers.On Orange, everything falls into place like it never had before and never would again. The band's gnarled, borderline-cartoonish gutbucket roots are proudly on display, and its delirious self-glorifying goes way further than it had before. (As the liner notes of this new reissue point out, Spencer didn't yell out "Blues Explosion!" too often on Blues Explosion songs pre-Orange. Here, he yells it constantly.) But most of the greatest moments on the album aren't the go-for-broke blasts of adrenaline; they're the points where the band pulls back and sticks to the pocket. It's a bit of a surprise to learn, via the newly fleshed-out liner notes, that the band was in a pretty dysfunctional and drugged-out state at the time they recorded it. Guitarist Judah Bauer floats the theory that he might've played behind the beat throughout the album because he was "junk sick." Instead, on Orange, these three guys sound able to anticipate each other's moves way ahead of time. The tracks groove hard, and every change feels totally intuitive. Only a couple of songs on Orange have what could even loosely be considered choruses. Spencer is the unquestioned frontman here, but his vocals are more hypeman exhortation than actual song. A few instrumentals turn up, and all the songs could really work without Spencer's vocals, fun as it is to hear him whoop out the names of different cities or scream about how much his wife likes to fuck. Even with all the smart, well-placed studio embellishments here, this feels like an excerpted version of a long, on-fire jam session. Spencer and Bauer pile on layer after layer of stomp-riff, while Russell Simins' drumming is a natural wonder: an absurdly funky push-pull with some of the thundercrack heaviness of John Bonham. Next to the spidery, introverted indie rock of its day, Orange sounded like a revelation-- an absurd burst of swagger and libido, as rendered by three total expert musicians. Even Beck sounds a bit taken aback when Spencer starts wailing, "You got the flavor!" at him after he gets done laying his verse. The thing sold 100,000 copies, and yet it didn't really go on to influence anyone, possibly because nobody else could do it like this....full text |
| Kingblind |
| On October 19, Majordomo and Shout Factory! wrap up their series of Jon Spencer Blues Explosion reissues with two-disc editions of 1994’s Orange and 1998’s Acme. Orange is packaged with the Experimental Remixes EP, featuring Beck, GZA, the Beastie Boys Mike D, and others, as well as more rarities....full text |
| Elbo |
| The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion Orange | Acme [Reissues] Majordomo Records [2010] Fire Note Says: Another two Jon Spencer classics reissued and remastered for your collection! Album Review: The expanded versions of Orange [1994] and Acme [1998] officially wrap up the Majordomo/Shout Factory reissue and remaster campaign, that has been absolutely stellar in taking care of fans, by providing everything and then more, on these double CD releases....full text |
The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion lyrics
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