Pere Ubu “390 Degrees of Simulated Stereo” 1981. Rough Trade Records. Live performances from ‘76-’79 in Cleveland, Brussels, London and Massachusetts. I think this LP is currently out of print.

Disclosure: I do not like Pere Ubu but it’s my husband Joe’s birthday today and he really likes them so I’m giving this live recording a full listen. AllMusic’s John Dougan writes “it is a warts’n’all snapshot of their career…[it’s] of a very lo-fi quality – I’m talking portable cassette recorder quality. But that doesn’t mean it impossible to enjoy the music; quite the contrary, the grubby sound enhances what were probably grimy, claustrophobic gigs.” Well, I’m going to disagree a little about the “enjoy” part, but Pere Ubu does occupy an important place in the evolution of post-punk art rock, placing an emphasis on dissonance, anti-melody and aural experimentation. “30 Seconds Over Tokyo,” Pere Ubu’s debut single from 1975, appears on the LP, recorded in ‘77 at Pirate’s Cove in Cleveland, where, according to the album’s back cover notes, the band played nearly every Thursday for a year. I do like the bass line, but at certain points the live version totally dissolves into a frenzy of high-pitched whining noise, punctuating the destruction conveyed by the song’s lyrics:

Flew off early in the haze of dawn
In a metal dragon locked in time
Skimming waves of an underground sea
In some kind of a dream world fantasy

Sun a hot circle on a canopy
‘25 a racing blot on a bright green sea
Ahead, the dim blur of an alien land
Time to give ourselves to strange gods’ hands

Dark flak spiders bursting in the sky
Reaching twisted claws on every side
No place to run, no place to hide
No turning back on a suicide ride

Toy city streets crawling through my sights
Sprouting clumps of mushrooms like a world surreal
This dream won’t ever seem to end
And time seems like it’ll never begin

30 seconds
And a one way ride
30 seconds
And no place to hide
30 seconds over Tokyo