Junq Tour 2018: Austin

I had never visited the thrift store in Austin, and they were obviously waiting for my arrival to rescue them from the shitty music that's likely been rotting there for years. Prepare yourself...


The Musical Warriors - Movin' On



These guys look like they're ready to go all gangsta on your shit! They've got ties, and they're not afraid to .... look presentable.  One has a mullet, and he's not afraid to... listen to Amy Grant. And their music sounds exactly the way they look... Boring and untalented, with a lack of production values. It's almost like barber shop, but they shaved a little off the top of their talent. Lyrically, it's corny Christian music.

Listen to Musical Warriors


Smash Hits Cash Style



I can picture Mr. Bored Johnny Cash impersonator sitting in a chair in the studio, head perched upon his fist, microphone positioned in front of him, uninterestingly reading the lyrics off the sheet in front of him.

The performances on this Johnny Cash tribute album are uninspired, but what the fuck did you expect from the Arc record label? People who love their job? People who get paid for their performances? People with talent? I think not.

Remember how much feeling Johnny Cash poured into I Walk The Line? Well, replace that feeling with a desire to go horseback riding. And Folsom Prison Blues? It's happy as Pharrell Williams after three caps of ecstasy.

Listen to I Walk The Line
Download the whole piece of shit



Hank James Chevillard - The Truth



At first, it sounds okay and then it hits you... Holy shit this guy is a lousy singer. This is one of those albums who's songs are each terrible in their own unique way. The writing is bad, the mix is bad, the playing is bad, and the singer is bad. Each song comes across as a crippled country song that's ready to lose it's balance and fall on it's face.

What on earth possessed this guy to record this thing? I could think of better uses for the recording tape that was used to make this, like flossing shit from my ass crack.

Thanks for the headache, Hanky. Keep running free as a pony, away from the recording studio.

Listen to Goodbye
Listen to Run Free

Only three albums, but they're all equally shitty. Our next stop is Neepawa, and if you've been reading this blog for a few years, you'll know that the pile from Neepawa is going to be huge.

Junq Tour 2018: Somerset

The Somerset thrift store was pretty bare when it came to interesting albums that I wanted to hate. I had a couple other qualifiers, but they turned out to be plain mediocre, so I threw them in the trash. Here's what we have left...

Country Pride Band



You'll never run out of twonky goodness when you get an album like this! It's exactly what it says on the cover, nothing more. The guy on the accordian obviously takes his job far too seriously. If Weird Al took his job seriously, he'd be an unemployed (and dead) vegetarian.

The production is very nice and the performances for the most part are very average.

Listen to Your Cheatin' Heart


Heiner's Country Classics II - Memories of an old Cowboy



Old men make the best terrible albums! Perhaps they lose their talent when their pecker refuses to stand up straight anymore. They have nothing to be proud of, so they try and make an album to redeem themselves and get groupies. Trust me, this piece of shit isn't going to attract any groupies...

I can't exactly pick out this guy's accent. Perhaps he's from Jupiter or maybe he's just really drunk. The songs here are pretty lousy, and he should consider smoking banana peels before he decides to venture in to the reggae genre ever again.

As for the album cover, it appears the band's official name is "Heiner's Country Classics II". I can only guess that they put a "II" in their name because there was another band called "Heiner's Country Classics".

Listen to Citygirl
Listen to Everybody Got Something


Well that was short! Trust me, there are more meatier entries coming your way, but first we need to take a visit to Austin.

Junq Tour 2018: Plum Coulee

Long time no see! Well, if you follow the blog on Facebook, you've probably already seen the Junq Tour video. If not, then you're missing out. That one took time to edit, and my summer's been busier than I'd want it to be, so that's why I've been absent. Also, the shit continues to pop up in my life. The easiest way to get more entries posted is to quit my job and just steal the things I want to write about, but that's probably a bad idea.

Anyway, I'm back with the deep-rooted cavity search of all the crappy albums I acquired during this year's Junq Tour. I'm quite sure there was more this year than last year, and it's taken quite a bit of time to get everything digitized and uploaded. speaking of which, I've started doing portable blogging at the Folio Cafe in Winnipeg! Lots of room, snacks, and plenty of outlets to plug in my laptop & 8-track player.



Anyway, let's get to our first stop in Plum Coulee...


Sharon & Rob Wedding CD



There's nothing quite like the joy and happiness of re-living someone else's wedding day with their home-made compilation CD. How the hell does things like this get donated to the thrift store????

...oh yeah... Divorce. That's what happens when you get married on Friday the 13th.


Encyclopaedia Britannica - Like You, Like Me



This is a collection of filmstrips and cassettes that were used in elementary schools in the 1970s and 1980s. All the cassettes were sealed which means none of this stuff saw the light of day. The one that I chose to put up on youtube had a cassette that sounded like it was badly eaten at one end, so I don't know what happened there. Maybe someone at Encyclopaedia Britannica felt the need to chew on some ferric oxide.



Speaking of Encyclopaedia Britannica, do they even exist anymore? Wikipedia and Google must have put them out of business by now, haven't they?

Anyway, scanning this filmstrip was a real nightmare. If the scanning light is hitting the film at the wrong angle, it looks like shit. On the plus side, I ended up buying four filmstrip machines for dirt cheap off Ebay to make future endeavors in filmstrip-land a little easier on my end. Anyway, if you haven't seen the Junq Tour video, I glued this filmstrip into it. I didn't feel that it warranted it's own video, but perhaps I'll put the others up in the future.


Ron & Kay Rivoli - Rivolivin': The Rivoli Revue



Hey everybody! Let's take our guitar into the boat and sing songs that will scare the fish away! I thought for sure this one was going to be a huge steaming pile of rural Canada cow shit. Surprisingly, it's not all that bad. It's country music, but it's performed, mixed, and produced really well. The cover and the name is bloody stupid though.

Listen to I'd Be Someone Too


Gospel Echoes Harvest Team - You're The Apple of His Eye



Look at the fuzzy hair on the dad. You could wash ALL the walls in the church with that! All I gotta say is I love Gospel Echoes' thrift stores, but I hate this album. Terrible gospel music that I could care less about.

Listen to Tell Me


Pierce Arrow Theater - Sold Out



I swear that Branson Missouri is the shit music capital of the USA. These are some country guys who apparently put on some kind of a live show, and this is the soundtrack. The band is comparable to a corn-chunkie-speckled turd, but how could you expecting anything different? This is Branson's hottest steaming pile! And why the hell is every member wearing a racing jacket? They should stick to racing cars instead of performing this garbage.

Anyway, their Elvis medley is awful. Awful, awful, awful. There's some guy with a low voice on here who sings so low that I'm pretty sure he's just farting out the words. I'm surprised Elvis hasn't come out of hiding to put an end to all of the shitty cover versions of his songs.

Listen to Elvis Medley


Matt & Robyn Rolf



I can't tell if these two kids autographed the album or someone just scribbled some random shit on the cover. Anyway, this one include the hits such as "I'm Little But I'm Loud", "Waterloo", "Hey Good Lookin'", and lots of other songs that I don't care exist.

The boy is fucking awful. He's trying to sound like John Wayne or some shit, and he doesn't hit the notes very well. The girl is a much better singer, but for the most part she's been delegated to backup vocals. I'm only guessing that the boy wanted to record this piece of crap and the parents threw the girl in there because she threw a hissy fit, but she would have been a better lead on this recording.

Listen to Hey Good Lookin'
Download the entire album!

Plum Coulee has a pretty damn good thrift store if I do say so myself! Somerset will be coming your way, hopefully tomorrow (unless I'm lying).

A Much Needed Update!

You guys deserve an explanation of why there's been little to no activity. There are lots of reasons, so I'll let you into a bit of my personal life (again).

First of all, there's a lot of work to do on my new property. There are four buildings on my property that look like this:



They are salvageable, but they won't be for long if I let them fall into any further disrepair. So my goal over the next little while has been to get these buildings up and functional as proper storage. I'm doing all the work myself.

Second, I picked up a camper for cheap:



It has also needed repair. After much work, it's become functional as a bed on wheels, and we're going to be using it on this year's Junq Tour which is all planned! It came with an 8-track player installed, and I'm hoping I can get that repaired before the tour (which is at the end of this week)

Third, I went to visit my brother for a week. I have a pile of stuff I picked up to blog about, and it's sitting in queue.

Now, as far as the queue goes, I usually try to work on stuff while I'm stuck in the city for work. I had a satellite blogging station set up at my mother's place to get entries accomplished.

A couple of weeks ago, the shit hit the fan with my mother. Now before I go any further with this story, I must explain that my mother is kinda messed up in the head. I mean that. She says and does crazy-ass shit. When I was a teenager, she once accused me of stealing her clip-on earrings and giving them out to the girls at school.

Another thing about my mother is her memory is worse than that of a goldfish. She can forget things she's been told over the span of a few minutes. She had a better time with her memory when my dad was alive reminding her of everything. Since he died, her lack of memory is becoming extremely obvious.

Now for what's happened...

She mentioned that she was going to have some "missionaries" staying with her who would require a desk to work at, so she asked a few weeks back if I could take down my blogging station for a couple of months when the Fall came. However, I ended up tearing it down sooner.

Now let me explain this... My mother doesn't drive (and that's a good thing). Since my dad passed, the driveway at her house has been vacant. She has told me that I can make use of it whenever I need it. So I've been doing that.

Last weekend, she was at a religious convention and I had brought my camper into the city to spend the night in (parked somewhere else obviously). I parked the camper in the driveway because I don't want to be hauling it all over the city while I'm running errands. Now, my mother has seen what my camper looks like, and I let her know that I was going to be doing this.

On my way to go pick up the camper, I received a voicemail from her. After she had returned from her religious convention, she saw the camper in the driveway and became absolutely livid that it was parked there. When I showed up to pick up the camper, she freaked the fuck out on me.

Here is the voicemail she left. Absolute crazy shit.

Since she didn't want me leaving my "junk" at her place, I figured it was best to come back the next day, pack up my blogging station and take it home. I have a nearly completed entry sitting on there, and I have a nearly completed episode of "Tech of the Century" on it as well. Those are now on hold until I can get some time to either transfer them off that computer, or hook it back up and finish those projects.

So here's where everything is sitting right now... I need to start blogging "on the go" when I'm stuck in the city. That requires a laptop, a cassette player, an 8-track player, and a location. I'm likely going to be touring the coffee houses in the city and find one that I like. Before that, I need to find the tape players I need and do any needed repairs to them. That requires even more time.

So that's where everything's sitting at. I'll get entries out whenever I can, but they probably won't be regular until the summer winds down. I'm really sorry everyone. I still enjoy accumulating things to review and write about, but life gets in the way sometimes. If I were to guess, I should be back to making regular entries by August or September.

Life may kick me in the balls once in a while, but I always come back. See you all soon!

Donald Bradburn: The Gospel Collection

This was absolutely irresistible when I saw it at the thrift store for 25 cents. It's not just one album from Donald Bradburn, it's a whole fucking box set of TWELVE albums! That's a bargain of just over two cents per album! It doesn't matter if the albums are shit, it's the fact that it was so damn cheap! I hit the gospel jackpot!



Here's something to put all of this in perspective... Donald Bradburn recorded more albums than Roxy Music. Suck on that Brian Ferry, Donald Bradburn is a true music making machine!

Donald Bradburn's wife and child are on the cover of this box set, and since there's no other credits listed, it's my guess that the lineup goes something like this:

Donald Bradburn: Vocals & Guitar
Mrs. Bradburn: Bass Guitar
Baby: Drums

The quality of the recordings are.... Well.... they range from kinda shitty to kinda not shitty.



When I bought this, I had no clue how the hell I was going to tackle it. There's so much music here! I eventually decided to pick one song off each cassette and feature it here as a collection of Donald Bradburn's greatest un-hits. Let's go over some of these songs...

(All featured songs can be downloaded in one zip file here!)


Album: A Prayer For My Children
Song: My God is Real

We had to start it with a catchy number, muddy quality, and a drum that sounds like someone beating their brother's head into the wall. The lead guitar is buried in the back yard as if it doesn't matter, and Mr. Bradburn is slightly off-key. Great fucking song.


Album: Sweet Anointing
Song: Sweet Anointing

The tape recorder appears to have eaten some of the beginning of this song for lunch which is fine since none of the band seemed to know how the hell the song started anyway. The band members fall asleep on and off throughout this one, and I can't say I blame them. It's over six minutes long and would be boring as shit if it weren't for all the mistakes in it. The keyboard solo sounds as if a drunken fool tripped over the power cable, landed on top of the Casio, and engaged in an intoxicated makeout session. This song is terrible, and would have been better left in the trashcan after the tape player chewed it up.


Album: Never Be Alone
Song: Not Just An Old Story

If you're going to mix your drummer louder than everything else, he'd better be a damn good drummer. I can fall down the stairs with better timing than whoever's pounding that fucking thing. This song is depressing and boring, just like most of the other shit on this album.


Album: Heaven Bound
Song: Jesus Is Your Healer

The chords and beat are the exact same as the last song, the lyrics simple and awful, so the gold star for effort will have to go to somebody else. On the plus side, the band isn't drunk this time.


Album: Songs of Comfort
Song: There Is Coming a Day

Hello? Mr. Bradburn? Are you outside, or is your microphone level just a bit too low? The album should have been called "Songs of Southern Comfort". On the plus side, the quality of the recording is fairly crisp here. The song is still slow and boring though. Remember the good old days of the first song and how upbeat it was? It seems so long ago now...


Album: Only Thru The Cross
Song: True Lord

The album should have been called "Only Drive-Thru The Cross for a McJesus Meal". This time, we get a raw recording of the band with minimal effects. There is also a drop-out in the right channel during the song, and I have no clue if it's on the recording, if it's a faulty wire in my setup, and I really don't give a shit either way. You get what you get. It's five minutes long and I'm not listening to this slow piece of crap again just to make sure I got a good transfer.


Album: When I Crossed That River
Song: A Million Tears or More

All the songs on this album are slow, boring, and interchangeable so you're not going to miss anything by not listening to the rest of it. Unlike the last album, we have some nice reverb on Mr. Bradburn's vocals, but the rest of the band seems to be playing at the bottom of the river they were crossing.


Album: The Lighthouse
Song: My Jesus I Love Thee

Try as he may, Mr. Bradburn cannot seem to stretch his vocal chords enough to reach those high notes. Also, I think the right channel is there, but perhaps someone accidentally stuck the speaker into their rectum, causing the sound to be shitty. According to my notes, this is the worst album of the lot so if you happen to find this magnificent box set, you can throw this cassette into the trash or record some Porter Wagoner onto it. You get to hear the song "At Calvary" twice just because it's so fucking awesome.


Album: Not Now But In The Coming Years
Song: Glory To The Father Son & Holy Ghost

You're getting two songs off this one!

Here's Mr Bradburn singing in Cree! He sounds like he's had a couple of beers to make this one go down your ear canals a little smoother.


Song: Draw Me Nearer

Pick up those boogie shoes and fall onto the dance floor! We have an upbeat one here and it's about fucking time!!! It's in Cree so you can't understand it, but who gives a shit? The guitar player is drunk as fuck and the beat is catchy as hell. Play this one twice because it's better than the last 8 songs I gave you.


Album: Tears
Song: If You Ain't Living For Jesus

The entire box set should have been called "Tears". This song is kinda catchy until you get to the middle part where everybody seemingly gets run over by a tractor. As for the lyrics, I can find better lyrics in the ingredients list of a bag of Peanuts. This is by far the worst song of the bunch.


Album: It's Happening Now
Song: It's Happening Now

Surprise! This song is actually pretty good! The production is nice, the mix is good, everybody is sober, there are no tractors killing people, and the song is actually pretty damn enjoyable with it being slightly upbeat. This might be where my whole 25 cents went. The rest of the album (or even the whole box set) doesn't live up to this track.


Album: He Paid The Cost
Song: He Paid The Cost

I have to admit that I was done at this point. The song starts out as if it had just finished throwing up after a night of drinking wine, but that isn't why I chose it. I got sick of listening to all this shitty music and this is the first song on the tape. I just decided to say fuck screening the rest of the album and went for the first piece of shit on this tape.


So there you go! This is the first box set I've reviewed, and after the daunting task of going through each of these damn cassettes, I hope it's the last one I review. I'm truly exhausted from this one.

Again, sincere apologies for the lack of updates. My new homestead needs quite a bit of work, so I'll be focusing a lot on that over the summer months. Fall and Winter should see more blog entries. There's always lots of stuff sitting in queue for me to cover, so I've slowed down a bit on my purchases and only buy things if they look truly terrible. Until next time....