Rebel Waltz “The Last One To Die Is A Rotten Egg” 1991, Erosion Records on 10″ blue vinyl. The Vault boy and I are heading up to the Fox Valley for a few days (he’s off school for the summer) so I thought I’d dig out some local late 80′s/early 90′s music. Rebel Waltz hailed from Oshksoh, WI and were active from ‘85 to ‘96. I know I saw them a few times opening for other bands around Oshkosh, Appleton and Green Bay, though for whom I can’t recall – most likely at least one of those shows was Soul Asylum (probably more like 10, it seemed that Soul Asylum passed through every other week in the late 80′s). Their stated influences are bands like The Byrds, Stiff Little Fingers and their namesake, The Clash (the song “Rebel Waltz” appears on Sandinista!). From their Facebook page: “We played a ton of gigs during the height of our popularity. The fact that we had a PA probably helped a ton with that but we got to open for Social Distortion, Soul Asylum, and The Tragically Hip to name a few. We met hundreds of great musicians over the years.” The band did reunite to play a few shows in 2015 and 2016, including one for the locally infamous Rev. Norb’s 50th birthday.

Rebel Waltz recorded The Last One To Die Is A Rotten Egg at Smart Studios in Madison, WI around the same time Nirvana was doing some of their recording for Nevermind. The grunge influence on this 6-song EP is obvious, though much more melodic: Midwestern-nice punk/grunge. If I didn’t know these guys were from around my hometown, I’d guess that they were from the Minneapolis area, with a sound that is very Replacements-esque (and Soul Asylum-y). Audio links to the record, or any single track, seem to not exist but their album Rubber Walls from 1990 does so if you are so inclined, you can listen to that.