Monday, August 15, 2011


Paisley Underground Series, #21: Rain Parade- Crashing Dream (1986) / Demolition (1991) MP3 & FLAC


"Imagine all of your sorrows have left you behind."

The aptly named Crashing Dream was fated to be Rain Parade's one and only full-length studio album after David Roback's exit from the band, in early 1984, to work on the Rainy Day  project with his then-new flame, former Dream Syndicate bassist Kendra Smith. According to many accounts, Roback's departure was an acrimonious one; as fellow Paisley scene icon Steve Wynn recalls, "It would be like me being thrown out of Dream Syndicate [....] I never knew why it happened."  Roback's version: "It became a drag. I just had to get away and do something else [....] Musically it wasn't working out." Whatever the reason, Roback's exit left his former band-mates, including his brother Steven, at a crossroads in terms of what direction the band's sound would take without its lead guitarist. In addition, the band faced towering expectations from fans and record execs alike to replicate the brilliance of their classic debut, Emergency Third Rail Power Trip. For the time being, Rain Parade decided to proceed as a four-piece and recorded the Explosions in the Glass Palace EP, which, while missing David Roback's deftly subtle touch in places and showing an occasional proclivity for adopting a more traditional approach to song structure than before, suggested that Rain Parade was not eager to relinquish its place as one of the leading bands of the Paisley scene. Fatefully, it was during this time that Rain Parade made its jump to the majors by signing with Island Records, a move that would lead to the band's demise only two years later. Rain Parade released two albums during it's tenure at Island: a live LP recorded in Japan, Beyond the Sunset, and their final studio album, the aforementioned Crashing Dream, which functions as a strange epitaph for this seminal Paisley band, as some see it as Rain Parade's escape from the commercial ghetto of psych-revivalism, while others view it as another example of a great band sent down the road to creative ruin by a major label taking control of the creative process. Taken on its own terms, Crashing Dream is a consistently good, and occasionally brilliant, slice of late-eighties psych-pop that from the opening track, "Depending on You," suggests the band is looking to cut ties with the hazy psychedelia of its debut. The song's slick production and reliance on studio synthetics is a bit shocking initially given Rain Parade's psych-rock pedigree, but as soon as the vocals and lead guitar appear in the mix, the song begins to take form as a nice piece of shiny Power-Pop. The next track, "My Secret Country," moves in more of a country-rock direction, sounding not unlike a slower number by The Long Ryders, and by all rights, it should have become one of the most memorable anthems of the Paisley scene, but its emotional impact is marred by a meandering bridge and the production, which robs the song of much of its grit. Crashing Dream was unjustly ignored upon its release, and Rain Parade decided to call it quits soon after; however, they did briefly reform in 1988 to record a double album, which never materialized until the release of Demolition in 1991. The first half of Demolition is comprised of an alternate ("as originally intended") version of Crashing Dream, which, if nothing else, suggests that Rain Parade were not as eager to leave their psyche-rock roots behind as the over-produced Island version seemed to indicate. As the true epitaph to this legendary L.A. band, Demolition is both a revelation and a further reason to grieve over the untimely demise of a band that deserved a much better fate.

Crashing Dream  
(Lemon Recordings ~ 2009/1986 ~ Remastered Edition)

Tracklist-
 1. Depending on You  (3:32)
 2. My Secret Country  (3:15)
 3. Don't Feel Bad  (3:19)
 4. Mystic Green  (2:49)
 5. Sad Eyes Kill  (3:16)
 6. Shoot Down the Railroad Man  (3:23)
 7. Fertile Crescent  (3:38)
 8. Invisible People  (3:06)
 9. Gone West  (3:44)
10. Only Business  (1:45)




Demolition 
(090 Records ~ 1991)

Tracklist-
 1. Sad Eyes Kill  (3:08)
 2. Mystic Green  (3:16)
 3. Shoot Down the Railroad Man  (3:01)
 4. My Secret Country  (2:57)
 5. Invisible People  (2:17)
 6. Only Business  (1:55)
 7. Crashing Dream  (6:45)
 8. Depending on You  (3:20)
 9. Gone West  (3:48)
10. My Dog's Last Dream  (3:26)
11. Tranquility Base  (3:02)
12. The Sniper  (4:08)
13. Murder Boy  (3:23)
14. Got the Fear  (4:43)
15. TV Stone  (2:14)
16. Undermine  (2:30)
17. Novocaine  (2:44)
18. Power  (2:48)
19. Every Morning Does  (3:03)



My Apologies for the Crap Artwork Scan

34 comments:

  1. Nice you post these two. Despite having them already, this is especially good because if you find any Rain Parade, it's usually Emergency Third Rail Power Trip and/or Explosions In The Glass Palace which are shared. Explosions is still my favorite but especially Crashing Dream is really good.

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  2. Thanks for posting these! I thought I had them in flac but I was wrong.

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  3. Thanks to post these excellent albums, please could you post "Beyond The Sunset" live in Tokyo?
    Bye,
    Buckeye

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  4. Thank you. Fond memories. Stay cool. You rule.

    -Bas

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  5. I don't know if anybody else cares about songwriting credits besides me, but they are not readily available online for these two releases, and I'm not prepared to excavate my vinyl copy of "Crashing Dream" at this time. I've checked Discogs, AllMusic, freedb and Wikipedia, but am open to other suggestions. I did find a low-res but readable scan of the side 1 record lablel using Google Image Search, which yielded the following:

    1. "Depending on You" (Piucci, Roback)
    2. "My Secret Country" (Piucci, Glenn, Roback)
    3. "Don’t Feel Bad" (Piucci, Roback)
    4. "Mystic Green" (Piucci, Roback)
    5. "Sad Eyes Kill" (Piucci, Roback)

    Anybody happen to have credits handy for the rest of the songs on these releases (which I'm guessing are mostly Piucci & Roback)?

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  6. Well, never mind, I found full songwriter credits for both releases after all:

    Crashing Dream
    http://www.sa-wa-ro.com/RainParade-Pages/rp-cd.htm

    Other than "My Secret Country" credited in my previous comment, "Invisible People" is by Steven Roback, Matt Piucci and John Thoman; all other tracks just by Steven Roback and Matt Piucci.

    Demolition
    http://www.sa-wa-ro.com/RainParade-Pages/rp-demo.htm

    "Tranquility Base" (Piucci)
    "Power" (S.Roback)

    All other tracks as listed for "Crashing Dream"

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  7. Crapidshare was being generous this weekend and I found an old blog that hasn't been updated in a couple years with some Dream Syndicate and scooped them up. The albums were the Complete Live at Rajis and Ghost Stories. The only description it gave was this band is associated with the Paisley Underground. ^..^

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  8. peter, I agree, there is precious little Rain Parade available in lossless except for the first album. Before it's all over, we will change all that ;)

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  9. Buckeye, I'll post "Beyond the Sunset" paired with "Perfume River" later in the series

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  10. MAZE, I've seen that website; it's a good one

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  11. Morty, was there any other paisley stuff on that blog? I just shelled out for some crapidshare pro points or whatever the f**k they're called. I've got a shiteload of Dream Syndicate stuff to post. I'll get on that soon, probably post #23

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  12. Rapid was free this past weekend or something no waiting download one after another! No that blog didn't have any more Paisley but they do have some Birthday Party albums! Sometimes the format is alac or ape but that is still a lossless format. BTW do you have any Nina Hagen or Magma?

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  13. Morty, I found some nice Japanese remasters of early Magma in FLAC. I'll post several of those on PPP in the coming days. Which Hagen albums are you after? I have some of her early stuff such as "Nina Hagen Band" and "Nunsexmonkrock"

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  14. Any of the 80s Nina, Fearless, Angstlos, In Ekstasy, etc.. Nunsex is a good one :-)))

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  15. morty, I'll have all those up along with the Magma on PPP over the course of the next few days. I'll try to post the first Magma later tonight, great requests!

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  16. Wow, thanks... one of my favorite bands, and Emergency Third Rail Power Trip is among my favorite albums ever (and the later studio lp's are underrated). Been trying to track down Demolition forever.

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  17. Old Man Rocking, you're welcome! I'll post the live albums together a little later in the series

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  18. Funny how people complain about rapidshare. I have in the 3 years I download stuff NEVER had troubles with it. Megaupload on the contrary is regularly a pain in the ass, especially in the evenings. BUT... and this is IMPORTANT... the blogs I download from are made by people who love music and willing to spend time and energy on uploading so I am not complaining here. (even though I had to buy a program -easyhideip, to keep downloading from Megaupload (in Malaysia, where I nowadays live, Mgaupload, Filedeposit and Fileserve are banned due to, read this carefully AMERICAN copyright rules...). But where there is a will, there's a way. I can only thank you for all the great download on this blog.

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  19. peter, my big complaint with rapidshare is how typically impossible it is (at least for me) to download as a free user and their inconsistent (and often stupid) policies (for example, rapid points/shares.) Also, rapidshare is notorious for deleting files; I've only had three files out of 400+ deleted by MU. Ultimately, no file host is perfect for everyone, so I went with MU

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  20. Back from 2 weeks in Italy and what do I find? A fantastic double-bill from Rain Parade. What can I say? It's great to be back in the USA. Many thanks for Crashing Dream and Demolition. Kurt

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  21. But, truth be told, it was far far better to be in Italy. Kurt

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  22. Hi Kurt, good to have you back, though I imagine Italy was amazing

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  23. voixautre, you are right with the deleting policies of rapidshare. Still that does not take away that other systems have their equal flaws. For example. Fileserve is slow, really slow, until I figured out to redirect my IP to a Dutch IP address. Megaupload doesn't work at night time. Filedeposit.... well, you might deposit but not download.

    In fact Filesonic (I have obtained 6 month subscription as I have with rapidshare) and free version and subscribed are good. What I mean to say is that if blogs like this take the time to upload, who am I to complain? I am just grateful people do it. I do not have my offline music collection anymore as I moved to Malaysia and left all I had in Holland (to be sold by my family and not paid back to me but that's another story). For me it's wonderful and if you're a little inventive, you will find ways to get the stuff you want. Despite all the odds against.

    Leave alone all the re-issues with extra tracks etc we, as fans are supposed to keep buying. First vinyl, than CD, then re-issue after re-issue... and some stuff anyway is not available, like in this post, the Rain Parade. Nuff said... thx and keep rolling:)

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  24. Peter, I will confess that MU has been making things difficult lately with not offering DL counts (it's working again finally) and some downloaders having trouble completing downloads. If I were to switch, I'd probably try filesonic. Thanks for all the comments; I will definitely do my best to keep things rolling here :)

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  25. Does MU making things difficult? Don't know, I do know it's blocked here in Malaysia (hence my easyhideip program I bought for $20). Filesonic is terrific. But more important to me what you choose to share is the fact of sharing it in itself:) Keep sharing! MU,FS,RS... whatever...

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  26. thx for the FLAC, but here's some log check of your rip "Crashing Dream"

    The following properties decreased the score:

    Gaps not detected/appended to previous track, -1 point (does not affect audio data) [1]
    Does not fill offset samples with silence, -5 points [6]
    Ripped with EAC v0.95, -1 point [7]
    This rip was not done using test and copy, -10 points [17]

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  27. Anon., honestly, I could care less about all that minutiae. If you want it, then download it. If you want your "perfect" 100 score, then go buy it and rip it yourself.

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  28. i used the log check on purpose 'cause i know and you perfectly know from where the Rain Parade rip is coming from - i'm talking about a certain registered torrent site where the Rain Parade has the same log of 83% out of 100%.

    So maybe you don't care about all that minutiae but you know it is the common thing on that registered torrent.

    FLAC rips really need that minutiae or what would be the use of sharing lossless rips

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  29. Anon., the difference between 83% and 100% is something that I have little inclination to worry about. The original uploader needs to click a few boxes in EAC preferences and it would be 100%. Fidelity-wise, it sounds fine, and that is all I care about. Also, regarding the private torrent tracker I suppose you're referring to, here's an idea: Why don't you buy the CD, produce a perfect 100% rip to trump the existing rip, and then we'll all be happy :)

    p.s. BTW, Are you implying that one should only post 100% rips? If so, then what's the point of allowing sub-100% rips to be uploaded to a certain private torrent tracker you mentioned earlier?

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  30. Hi voixautre, I have to say, minutiae aside, this rip of the 2009 remaster sounds much better than I expected. A few of the reviews on Amazon talked about background noise and hiss. One said that it was probably a vinyl rip (like that's a bad thing?). I have to say I was very pleasantly surprised by the sound of this remaster and your rip in no way could have degraded it. I believe I'm fully qualified to give that assessment because I had a pristine vinyl copy of this album that I played on a very fine reference system (Rega turntable, NAD amp and Klipsch speakers). All the emotion from the opening "Depending On You" to the very end is still there as I remembered it from vinyl on this remaster and your fine rip. Enough said!

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  31. cudawaver, I read those Amazon reviews too, and have no idea what they are talking about. The remaster and this particular rip sound fine. However, it is not my personal rip, though "Demolition" is my rip.

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  32. Hey I know this is a lot to ask but because mega upload was taken down your links are dead :(, I just found rain parade and really love them and would like to listen to more but its really hard to find some of these releases... Do you have mediafire links or another shared link?

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