The Misfit Jukebox

Album review

During the isolated days of the COVID-19 pandemic, Comet Gain leader David Christian found himself with a surplus of time on his hands and embarked on a deep dive into the band's archives. The result of the effort was a series of collections of demos, lost tracks, and rarities that he posted on Bandcamp. The group's current label Tapete decided it made sense to skim off the cream of the crop for release, and thus 2023's The Misfit Jukebox was born. Christian found worthy material stretching back to the early days of the band and running all the way up to 2019. It's an educational, often surprising, always thrilling collection that sheds light on all incarnations of the band, as well as finally uncovering songs from the lost third album that didn't get finished before their late-'90s split. Those two tracks -- both sung by Sarah Bleach -- are slick, sparkling indie pop: "Only Happy When I'm Sad" melds a baggy drum loop with chiming, Aztec Camera-inspired guitars, while "Letting Go" is a melancholy ballad that oozes tenderness. It's fascinating to hear dispatches like this from a past that never existed and is a solid step toward solving that particular mystery. If the rest of the set is less revelatory, it's no less interesting for it. Demos of favorite songs like "Fists in the Pocket" and "Skinny Wolves" are a glimpse into the creation process, and the two covers -- a bouncy traipse through the Would-Be-Goods' "Pinstriped Rebel" and a raucous, garage rock take on the Godz' "Like a Sparrow" -- show how good Comet Gain have always been at interpretation. Two unreleased songs cut during the early 2000s -- "You're Just Lonely" and "When?!" -- are so good it's almost unconscionable they were shelved, especially the latter, which bops along joyfully like something from Casino Classics. There are a couple tracks included from that early era. "Goodbye Part One" is the pick to click; with a little polish, it could have been a single. Of course, that particular element is often left out of the Comet Gain process, and raucous, rough-hewn songs like the alternate take on "Herbert Huncke Part 3" or the rare single track "The Weekend Dreams" make that fact gloriously clear. The addition of a song recorded in 2019 -- the home-cooked, fragile, and sweet "Even This Could Be Beautiful" -- brings the story up to date and shows that while the band have a back catalog so good that even its oft-wonkily recorded rarities knock the stuffing out of most of their contemporaries' best work, they are still going as strong as ever. This is essential listening for the true believers. and if one happens to chance across it by accident, it's also a fine tattered-and-torn intro to a truly inspired and inspiring group.

© Tim Sendra /TiVo