Junq Tour 2022: St. Pierre-Jolys

We're gonna have a Holly Jolys blog entry! The Village Connection thrift store is usually lacking in anything interesting, but at least their prices are good.

From The Moon - The Cyclist

When there's nothing notably weird in the music section, I start grasping at anything that doesn't have much professionally going on. This album has a bar code, so that means something was done professionally, but not much else. Guess what? It's not too bad! It's a bit mellow in spots, but it's at least somewhat enjoyable. The first track is the best one on here. Things can get a bit stale as the album goes on, but it's still not awful. The band's website is dead and I can't find shit about them online, so I went to the Wayback Machine for some info.

The music is apparently in the "space folk" genre which I didn't know was a thing. They appear to be from Winnipeg and this is their first album. They appear to have put out at least one more album, and then the band just kinda fizzles into nothing. Why is it that the decent bands have such a short lifespan, but no-talents who pump out horrid garbage seems to live on forever? Anyway, I'm giving you a track from this one solely because you deserve something good once in a while.

Listen to Since Yesterday

The Mason Rack Band - Show Me Yours

No thanks, I haven't dried it off yet.

This one isn't all that horrible either.  I swear, I tried really hard to find some pure garbage at this thrift store! Anyway, these guys are from Australia. The singer sounds like he's part werewolf and has just finished enjoying a 20 pack of Du Maurier cigarettes. The audio is very compressed (which I hate) and the band scribbled all over this CD (which makes it $0.25 more valuable). According to their website, the band is still around. They've released five studio albums, two live albums, and a greatest hits album (which is kind of redundant).

Listen to Seen Her B4

Debra Barratt - Three Little Soldiers

When you buy a CD with only one song on it, it needs to be the best fucking song you've ever heard. Luckily, this CD has TWO songs on it; the second one being a distorted version of "Last Post" played on the trumpet. According to the back, this CD was "created in remembrance of, and in tribute to, our Veterans and their families." Does that mean that every veteran has heard this CD? The song "Three Little Soldiers" is kind of a miserable listen. For the record, I have nothing against people writing songs in tribute to our veterans, but could you at least make it half-fucking-good? I can't imagine anybody getting much replay value out of this thing. Proceeds from this CD went to the Navy League of Canada. Why not just give them the money instead of getting a hunk of plastic containing one shitty song that you're just going to throw in the trash?

Listen to Three Little Soldiers

The Crew - Just As We Are

The D*sney company needs to sue the fuck out of these guys due to Mickey Mouse being clearly represented on the album cover. Speaking of Mickey Mouse, this is some of the most Mickey Mouse Christian music I've ever heard. The way they look on the album cover is exactly how they sound... Lame, lame, lame, and lame. They're essentially a shittier version of the Spin Doctors who sing terribly written Christian songs. Little miss can't be listening to this crap for very long.

Listen to Learn To Listen

Listen to Great Is Thy Faithfulness

Listen to Look At My Hands

This is the musical high point in the Junq Tour, as there's not much to loathe here. But don't worry, we'll be falling off that hill very shortly. If you'd like to hear a sample of what's coming your way, you can check out my appearance on Amateur Hour. You can listen to that here while I prepare the next entry which will be sure to make you cry.

Junq Tour 2022: St. Malo

Hey! Long time no write! That's because I've been busy going through the massive amount of crummy albums I picked up during the Junq Tour and digitizing the bulk of what I intend to post. Theoretically, the entries should be flowing quite easily from this point on, but life has it's way of fucking with me from time to time. Things break and I'm the only one around to fix them. When I'm dead, the whole world will just explode and the martians will be happy that I'm no longer beaming these crappy songs across the universe.

Anyway, we went to the Family Thrift Store in St. Malo this year. It's a fairly new thrift store that is apparently going to shut it's doors anytime soon. Let's give a salute for the "amazing" music I found there...

Aloha Shapes - Hula Hawaii

The best thing you can get when you're in Hawaii is a compact disc in the shape of a mushroom. However, don't try to play this thing in your car stereo or it will self-destruct, and I don't blame it one bit. This CD is boring and there's only four songs on it. I don't know who the fuck is singing on this, but I hope somebody throws a coconut at him if he does it in public. 

As a side note, Weird Al has better Hawaiian shirts than the one this CD is supposed to represent.

Listen to Maui Waltz

Rock Power Drums

From what I can tell, this was a book & cassette kit that taught you how to drum. The best part about this tape is the crappy Casio keyboard that sings the lyrics for you. The drumming seems to be a bit clumsy on the Great White song, but maybe it's just me being too critical because I'm not sure that it's real drums. The high hat sounds very artificial. The Guns N' Roses song "Paradise City" isn't quite right. The spot where Axl holds his note goes on for an extra two measures, probably because you can't change time signatures on a fucking Casio.

I mean, I guess it's not terrible that things like this existed back in the day when there was no internet, no youtube, and no drum teachers. Instead, your hard-earned money paid for something that was just "good enough". You were most likely better off trying to figure out the drum parts yourself.

Listen to Paradise City

Listen to Once Bitten Twice Shy

Bullit - The Rap Game Raised Me

The rap game did a shitty job of raising Mr. Bullit.

The rap CDs I picked up on this Junq Tour are quite possibly the worst rap albums I've ever heard. This CD came in a plain jane blank CD case. I honestly don't think there's many copies of this out there. I like how Mr. Bullit colored the center of the CD label with a sharpie. I guess the rap game taught him how to color as well. 

As for the music... It's hilariously bad! I can't take a guy seriously who's just rambling on about his dead uncle. Nothing gives you more street cred than whining like a fucking baby. Yes, its sucks that your uncle died, but the rest of us don't need to suffer through your interpretation of it.

Listen to the dead uncle song

Doug Gabriel - Three Album Special

Nothing makes me more miserable than having a box set to review. This one isn't as intensive as the 12 album collection I review by Donald Bradburn, and I'm very thankful for that. These three albums were painful enough!

Hailing from Branson Missouri (because they've embraced birthing terrible music albums), we have this fucking hack trying to perform your favourite hits. One album from his wife or sister (or both) is included in this box set, and it's so unspectacular that I completely skipped over it. Doug's performances are crummy at best. His version of "Pretty Woman" (with the missing "oh" at the beginning) is enough to give Roy Orbison a second heart attack. Doug tries to do the growl in the song and it sounds like he's coughing up a hairball.

Doug's instrumental album is called "Exhausting & Exhilarating". He should have just left it at "exhausting". The lackluster version of "Sleepwalk" reminds me of trying to learn "Red River Valley" from my school's guitar theory book. It's the most bland version of the song I've ever heard.

And finally, I present Doug's version of "Wind Beneath My Wings" because fuck you.

Listen to Pretty Woman

Listen to Sleepwalk

Listen to Wind Beneath My Wings

On November 16th, I will be returning to Amateur Hour with Kent Davies to broadcast the worst garbage I found on the Junq Tour. Make sure you tune into CKUW 95.9 FM at 5:00pm CT for the glorious mess that will make everybody hate radio.