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daniel_v

"Sharks of Downtown" Discussion

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Just thought I'd start a thread for people to discuss the song and their thoughts.

Given how long a lot of us waited to hear it I kind of wondered if it was possible for the final product to meet my expectations. It happens sometimes that you build something up in your mind so much, based on a small section of something, that the end product ends up being a bit of a let down (Vampires, from OLP, comes to mind).

And yet, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked this. At first, despite being ecstatic that I was finally getting to hear it, I thought to myself that I could kind of understand why it was never recorded as a studio song. The song structure is very unconventional and probably not something that would be easy for many to catch on to. And yet...I still think it's a fantastic song for many different reasons, most of which apply to a lot of songs from Matt's early career. The barely containable energy and fast rhythm of Matt's guitar playing, and his vocal performance (loved the brief moments of falsetto when he sings "Guys like me" and his lead vocals after the bridge that were extremely reminiscent of his pre-LOTGA days) are just a few of those things. Another is that the song showcases a lot of the other band members talents. Dave's thick, skilled and creative keyboard playing add such a texture/depth to the song and Ian's drumming, as was the case with most of his early work, is so busy and lush. And then Geoff, as usual, provides such groovy and soulful bass that was, as usual, very defining for a lot of those early songs from Matt. 

Then there is, again, the song structure. Despite it being unconventional, I think that's what makes it so great. The long intro, the unexpected joining of the full band, the bridge (which has such a great feel and progression) being placed in place of where you would expect the second chorus, and then the lead vocals Matt does after, which lead into the last chorus, and the outro- all of it is like one big "fuck you" to the traditional verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus song structures. To me, that's exactly what makes it so much fun to listen to- because everything is a fresh surprise.

I honestly can't listen to it without having my mood lifted. It's honestly like listening to magic for me. 

As a slight aside, I've talked to others about this before, but I honestly can not wrap my head around how Matt can hate these songs so much, especially given how creative and soulful they were. I mean, something like the Audio of Being being hated by him, despite it being a fantastic album (from a listeners standpoint anyways) makes sense because he has such bad memories associated with recording the songs, but the LOTGA material/era was never talked about by him as a time period where in fighting and ego were a big issue, so I've always found his hate for it bizarre. But, each to their own guess. 

Anyways, just my thoughts. What did everyone else think of Sharks? 

Edited by daniel_v
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Unconventional is definitely the key word.  It is such an unusual approach.  I remember dissecting those brief snippets for years and wondering where the song would go based on that, safe to say I did not expect what actually does happen.  I agree with your appraisal that it would not have worked as a radio song, which is so interesting because they chose to focus on it as one of the songs from this performance. Geoff always claimed they played two songs that day, but apparently only Sharks was broadcast.  I suspect the other song played was something more traditional for this kind of show, which makes the choice to go with Sharks for broadcast an even more unusual one.  Thankfully for us they did, or we'd still be waiting to hear it.  But what compelled the band or the network to push this song which A) was very unconventional and B) was not about to be released?  It would be very interesting to hear Matt's thoughts on this song, why it was played that day and why it was never recorded or potentially abandoned.  One has to imagine if they played it for this show it was probably being played live at other shows at the time although no recordings or proven setlists exist from that time period to verify that.  

The song has some very unusual lyrics, very over the top which is fairly characteristic of some of Matt's early writing.  I wonder if that is part of the reason he disowns this time period for the most part?  Perhaps when he looks back its for him like an equivalent of one of us going back and reading scribbled messages in an old high school notebook.  One thing that is interesting is that after years of completely ignoring this period of his music he has started to revisit it and play some of it in his sets.  During his last acoustic tour there were some shows with three songs from LOTGA and another from Raygun.  I don't think Matt has had any concerts with three songs from LOTGA since probably 1998, maybe even earlier.  Given that his back catalog has only continued to grow since then it was pretty encouraging to see that.  

Back to Sharks, I do think it fits the bridge nicely from the LOTGA/Raygun era to the Underdogs one, but while I do like the song, I do think that part of its appeal is because it is the great lost MGB song.  Had it been recorded and released on an album I think many of us would just think of it as an average track at the time.  I wonder if it will be the last "new" MGB song we'll ever get to hear?  With Matt being very much against revisiting anything from an archival release standpoint from that era, it's unlikely something will slip out...then again Sharks was broadcast on National television and it took us over 20 years to get it to the masses, so maybe someday Revenge will slip out.  

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6 hours ago, adam_777 said:

 One has to imagine if they played it for this show it was probably being played live at other shows at the time although no recordings or proven setlists exist from that time period to verify that.  

You know, listening to the end of the Town Pump interview, if one listens closely enough as the interviewer is going into the bar- though perhaps this is just my imagination transferring something I had just listened to- the bass line there almost does sound like the bass line that Geoff plays after the bridge of Sharks from the 2:40-3:12 mark. 

In fact...I just listened to it again after writing the above sentence and I'm sure it's the same bass line. Compare the bass riff at the 2:40-3:12 section of the Sharks video to the bass line in the background of the Town Pump video at the 5:40-5:51 section (just as the interviewer enters the Town Pump). It's the same bass line which means that it was at the very least played twice live, if not incorporated into their set on a more regular basis during that period. Makes one wonder if there were other unreleased songs from that time period that were played live too. 

6 hours ago, adam_777 said:

One thing that is interesting is that after years of completely ignoring this period of his music he has started to revisit it and play some of it in his sets.  During his last acoustic tour there were some shows with three songs from LOTGA and another from Raygun.  I don't think Matt has had any concerts with three songs from LOTGA since probably 1998, maybe even earlier.  Given that his back catalog has only continued to grow since then it was pretty encouraging to see that.  

Even though I know he hates the original version of Fearless (which is still beyond me to fathom how anyone could not like that song), I agree that it's encouraging. I would love to hear an acoustic/full band version of his new rendition of that (similar to what OLP did with their I and I at Much back in 2000). Not that I don't like his new stuff as well- I really do- but it's nice to get a mix of everything from an audience's stand point. 

 

6 hours ago, adam_777 said:

Back to Sharks, I do think it fits the bridge nicely from the LOTGA/Raygun era to the Underdogs one, but while I do like the song, I do think that part of its appeal is because it is the great lost MGB song.  Had it been recorded and released on an album I think many of us would just think of it as an average track at the time.  I wonder if it will be the last "new" MGB song we'll ever get to hear?  With Matt being very much against revisiting anything from an archival release standpoint from that era, it's unlikely something will slip out...then again Sharks was broadcast on National television and it took us over 20 years to get it to the masses, so maybe someday Revenge will slip out.  

That's a fair point. I think it's just human nature to appreciate and chase after things that are difficult to attain simply from the standpoint of curiosity.

But, again, given the unconventional nature of the song, and the extremely uplifting mood it brings about, I still do think it would be a stand out track regardless (for me anyways). Kind of makes me wish it had made it onto Raygun. Then again if it had I probably wouldn't have been as hysterically thrilled to have finally heard it after all these years this week, lol. 

And yes, "Revenge". By God...everything about that song (at least from the brief snippets we heard of it posted on Geoff's memorial page) suggested it was a stand out track. To this day the bass line he was playing is one of my favorite bass lines ever. It's so oxymoronically relaxed and yet leading to something explosive at the same time as was evidenced by the intense rhythm guitar Matt was shown to play during the brief shot of the chorus that was recorded. That's not to mention both Ian and Charlie Quintanna doing what looked like some wicked drum work in the studio. Everything about that video- getting to see what it was like for the band to work on it and discuss it's progression- was so cool and appreciated.

Who knows, maybe if a concert from that time period ever surfaces we could get lucky and see it performed. I don't think they would have bothered recording it if they hadn't tested it out live before given that in the Sharks interview Matt mentioned they had been playing LOTGA songs live for a year and half before the album was actually released. 

Edited by daniel_v
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I really enjoyed Sharks. I think when your starved for these lost songs, I agree, it’s hard for them to do any wrong ha. But I still thought it was really good. The performance was super inspired too I thought. Those more aggressive Matt vocals always brought me closer to the songs for some reason, though I understand that was causing some vocal issues later on his career. 

Didn’t know anything about the song Revenge, that would be amazing if ever found. Its a shame demos or alternate tracks from any of the MGB stuff never surfaced. There has to be some outtakes or work in progress versions. What a dream that would be. 

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On 5/25/2019 at 1:54 PM, daniel_v said:



Cheers ? 

Thanks I missed the original thread. I honestly can't believe I watched Native Son and She's Got A New Disguise played live. Pretty amazing.

Those are really awesome clips. Thanks for going to the trouble to digitize them. Is Matt aware they're available? I know he hates looking back at some of the old material so he probably would cringe.

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6 hours ago, Gomo said:

Thanks I missed the original thread. I honestly can't believe I watched Native Son and She's Got A New Disguise played live. Pretty amazing.

Those are really awesome clips. Thanks for going to the trouble to digitize them. Is Matt aware they're available? I know he hates looking back at some of the old material so he probably would cringe.

I know. Getting to hear/see old tracks like that live was mind binding/exploding, lol. Even AMR was pretty damn cool too considering there are no live versions of it online save for the traded version of the one where he adds in lyrics from Giant (before it was released on BM) during the bridge. 

And while I'd love to take credit for this, Adam, Chad, and Sue Lloyd are the ones who deserve all the credit. Adam for doing all the leg work of contacting Sue and getting the tapes from her for digitization, Chad for hosting them, and Sue of course for finding them and getting them to Adam despite the tapes being so old. I literary had no part in this. 

With regards to what Matt thinks, obviously none of us are psychic, so we can only speculate unless he eventually sees this thread and chooses to comment, but hopefully considering that this was all published live on TV decades ago with his consent, and that it meant/means a crap load of happiness to more than a few of us, he'll be okay with it. Don't get me wrong, given that he hates a lot of MGB's work on account of his shitty memories with the band, it's completely understandable that he doesn't like looking back on some of their work, but again, this is from waaaay early on (before the infighting really got heavy) and one can only hope that would mean he wouldn't begrudge others from appreciating the performances from an outsider's perspective. 
 

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OMG - THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR ALL THE WORK YOU DID TO GET THIS!. I've been hoping to hear this for 20+ years!! Teenage me wanted to hear it so badly when I found out about it in the last 90s. I have goosebumps from the nostalgia of all these videos. Thank you thank you thank you.

I love that the t-shirt Matt is wearing in the Sharks of Downtown video is the same one he wore 3-4 years later for the Load Me Up music video!

 

I LOVE The song. It could be recency bias or just the fact I've been so keen on hearing it, but I love how it feels like 3-4 different songs mixed together. THANK YOU!

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On 6/8/2019 at 10:56 PM, NationofCool said:

OMG - THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR ALL THE WORK YOU DID TO GET THIS!. I've been hoping to hear this for 20+ years!! Teenage me wanted to hear it so badly when I found out about it in the last 90s. I have goosebumps from the nostalgia of all these videos. Thank you thank you thank you.

I love that the t-shirt Matt is wearing in the Sharks of Downtown video is the same one he wore 3-4 years later for the Load Me Up music video!

 

I LOVE The song. It could be recency bias or just the fact I've been so keen on hearing it, but I love how it feels like 3-4 different songs mixed together. THANK YOU!

 

On 5/29/2019 at 5:53 PM, Gomo said:

Thanks I missed the original thread. I honestly can't believe I watched Native Son and She's Got A New Disguise played live. Pretty amazing.

Those are really awesome clips. Thanks for going to the trouble to digitize them. Is Matt aware they're available? I know he hates looking back at some of the old material so he probably would cringe.

You two should check your inbox next time you're online here. And yeah, Adam talked to Matt about the videos during a Q and A session last year. 

Edited by daniel_v
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