Soophie Nun Squad-- "Dino" 7" (FCH009)

Soophie Nun Squad-- "Dino" 7" (Harlan Records #9)
DOWNLOAD HERE with extra songs! (click ONLY on the light blue box that says "click here to start DL from Sendspace")

5 songs.
Recorded July 23, 1996 by Barry Poynter in Little Rock, AR.
500 copies pressed, April 1997.
With this release (and through 1998), Noah Young joined forces with me, contributing essential funds to breathe life into Food Chain Records, on the condition that the label be renamed Harlan Records in memory of his late father.

Credits:

Dustin Clark-- guitar
Mark Lierly-- drums
Mike Lierly-- voice
Eli Milholland-- bass
Nate Powell-- voice
Mikael Wood-- voice, dancing
Noah Young, Emil Heiple, Billy Grubbs, Lindsey Wilson-- backing voices
(Tim Scott joined SNS in Summer 1996, but was absent for this recording.)

Track Listing:

1. Dino
2. Peru/ Hardcore Peru
3. Five Ninjas Strike Back!
4. Hulk Can't Be Denied
5. Ghost Town/ Drop The Bass!

Notes:

* This was SNS's first time in a proper studio. Dustin had already done studio time with Shake Ray Turbine and Eli had with Christopher, but it never occurred to any of us to double guitars, do vocal overdubs, or to record ANYTHING outside of a raging, live house-party take in the control booth on two microphones. Which worked amazingly well for this record, I admit. "Ghost Town/ Drop The Bass!" is easily one of the best songs Soophie ever recorded.

* We had almost finished setting up for the session when, in a typical Soophie fashion, Mark realized he hadn't brought a single cymbal or stand. We found nothing in Barry's studio, and were saved at the last possible minute by running down the street and fishing a forgotten 14" crash out of Chris Wilson's (Shake Ray Turbine, Ted Leo) closet. So give that crash a listen-- it's basically half a hi-hat.

* Band members' opinions on this record vary, but generally we feel these are the most bizarre song choices we've ever settled on for a record. Not a single serious song, but it's weirder than that: none of these songs had a single lyric written down for their inception. I find it really funny that I transcribed the lyrics to what is essentially a freestyle 7", and actually paid extra money to have those lyrics printed on the insert. I personally hate "Hardcore Peru" (which is confusingly an Oi spoof)-- it adds nothing to the "Peru" experience, isn't necessarily funny, and we just sort of stuck with it once we added it. But really, "Hulk" is maybe the worst song in the entire SNS catalog (second only to the unrecorded "Untie The Kids")-- I should point out that we had no real feelings or interest about wrestling, the Hulkster, or whatever. With different lyrics, it would be a decent Gorilla Biscuits song. But my god. I should note that Eli still thinks this 7" rules, and he was also the major force behind vaguely conceptual interest in The Hulkster Going Bad on WWF in 1996. We went along for the ride. (Confession: a year later, we kinda tried to write a Ric Flair song for a Flair-themed comp that never came out. So we're all to blame here.)

* Mike mentions his genitals on every single song, and also mentions the nematode living in his foot at the time of recording, as well as the yeast infection he'd recently gotten after swimming with a plastic bread bag tied around his parasitic foot.

* The extra songs on this download include a version of "Tomorrow" from this session, meant for Stewart Isbell's unreleased compilation CD of Arkansas bands (including SNS, Red Forty, The Big Cats, Full Service Quartet, Benchmark, Ricochet Rocket, Class Of Eighty Four, Red Brigade, Shake Ray Turbine, and No City No State). Some of those tracks wound up on the Towncraft DVD/2xCD boxed set in 2007, and we rerecorded "Tomorrow" for Don't Let Them Take You Alive, but this version is still kinda the best. Also included is a cover of James Brown's "Goodness Sakes, Look At Those Cakes" recorded in 1998 for an unreleased compilation of James Brown covers. I think we were the only band to ever turn in a song for it.

* Members also in Humanbeast, V Manuscript, Sand City, Universe, Pallbearer, R.I.O.T.S., The Evelyns, Divorce Chord, Wait, The Insides, Tem Eyos Ki, Sugar And The Raw, Rainy Day Regatta, Boomfancy, Gioteens, Shake Ray Turbine, Revolver Red, William Martyr 17, and K.

SNS's legendary show with Assuck & Encyclopedia Of American Traitors in a front yard at 3 a.m. in Columbus OH, during the 1998 More Than Music Fest.

SNS's first show outside of Arkansas. College Park MD, July 1997.

SNS at Club Soda, Washington DC, June 1998.