Crazy Rhythms [Bonus Tracks]

1	The Boy with the Perpetual Nervousness 5:10
2	Fa Cé-La 2:03
3	Loveless Love 5:05
4	Forces at Work 7:05
5	Original Love 2:55
6	Everybody's Got Something to Hide (Except for Me and My Monkey) 4:06
7	Moscow Nights 4:24
8	Raised Eyebrows 2:59
9	Crazy Rhythms 6:08
10	Fa Cé-La Single Version
11	The Boy With the Perpetual Nervousness Carla Bley Demo Version
12	Moscow Nights Carla Bley Demo Version
13	Crazy Rhythms Live
14	I Wanna Sleep in Your Arms Live

Barnes & Noble

The Feelies invented a nerdy version of cool '80s rock that critics dubbed "geek chic." Four guys from the Jersey 'burbs who tucked in their shirts and buttoned up their collars, the foursome arrived in 1979 with epic guitar rave-ups augmented by a one-man polyrhythm named Anton Fier. Borrowing clean, pretty guitar sounds from the Byrds and the Velvet Underground, axe-men Bill Million and Glen Mercer took off for Zen planes formerly reserved for free jazz musicians and Tibetan monks. Their debut, CRAZY RHYTHMS, is one of the strangest, wildest guitar records ever recorded, boasting titles like "The Boy With Perpetual Nervousness" and "Raised Eyebrows" and featuring a clinically insane cover of the Beatles' "Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey." Mercer and Million's singing suggests David Bowie after a dozen cups of coffee, while Fier's unbelievably fast, impossibly complex drumming gave the music a rhythmic intensity worthy of James Brown. Years later, CRAZY RHYTHMS would influence scores of bands, especially R.E.M. (whose Peter Buck produced the band's belated follow-up, THE GOOD EARTH), but in 1980 it was a genre unto itself, and a masterpiece. Jon Dolan

All Music Guide

Even the cover is a winner, with a washed-out look that screams new wave via horn-rimmed glasses, even more so than contemporaneous pictures of either Elvis Costello or the Embarrassment. But if it was all look and no brain, Crazy Rhythms would long ago have been dismissed as an early-'80s relic. That's exactly what this album is not, right from the soft, haunting hints of percussion that preface the suddenly energetic jump of the appropriately titled "The Boy With the Perpetual Nervousness." From there the band delivers seven more originals plus a striking cover of the Beatles' "Everybody's Got Something to Hide" that rips along even more quickly than the original. The guitar team of Mercer and Million smokes throughout, whether it's soft, rhythmic chiming with a mysterious, distanced air or blasting, angular solos. But Fier is the band's secret weapon, able to play straight-up beats but aiming at a rumbling, strange punch that updates Velvet Underground/Krautrock trance into giddier realms. Mercer's obvious Lou Reed vocal inflections make the VU roots even clearer, but even at this stage of the game there's something fresh about the work the quartet does, even 20 years on -- a good blend of past and present, rave-up and reflection. [The 2009 reissue of the album on Bar/None removes the bonus track, a cover of the Rolling Stones' "Paint It Black," that had appeared on a prevoius edition of the album and adds 5 bonus tracks. The tracks are available as a digital download and include two Carla Bley-produced demos, a single version of "Fa Cé-La," and two live songs.] Ned Raggett