From Bad Time Records comes THE SHAPE OF SKA PUNK TO COME: VOLUME 1, featuring 12 brand new / unreleased tracks from some of ska punk's boldest and brightest.
Like the Pogues before them, Ned Ludd after them, and their contemporaries the Shanes, the Ukrainians specialize in mixing punk and alternative rock with acoustic folk instruments and their respective indigenous musical influences. This is their second album, and like their debut it consists of predominantly original pieces sung in Ukrainian and played on mandolin, domra, accordion, and fiddle accompanied by a bass and drum rhythm section. Most of the songs deal with family, suffering, and situations common to Ukrainian life and are written in a way in which they could either be interpreted literally or in a deeper, symbolic fashion.
Inner Mystique seems to be the Chocolate Watchband album that fans and casual listeners know best, even though it was the one of their three records that was most disconnected from any active incarnation of the group. Slapped together in late 1967, in the wake of the virtual collapse of their lineup and rushed out in February of 1968, its original first side contained not a single note played or sung by the Watchband itself. Instead, engineer Richie Podolor assembled a group of studio musicians, playing a pair of languid psychedelic instrumentals - 'Voyage of the Trieste' and 'Inner Mystique' - in which the sitar flourishes and flute arabesques hung like jeweled ornaments, sandwiched around a new recording by singer Don Bennett…
Remastered, with the CD versions containing a whole host of addition extras including a double CD of the album, a live set and an additional DVD of live performances, rehearsals and photos all compiled from the bands own personal archives.