Oh Sees Retrospective #26: Live In San Francisco

The first music festival I ever went to was the 2007 Pitchfork festival in Chicago. Partly I was going since I had a good friend who lived there and we hadn't seen each other in awhile. Mostly I was going for the music, and specifically the first night which was presented by All Tomorrow's Parties and their 'Don't Look Back' concert series. Basically, ATP invited bands to play one of their 'classic' albums live in full. This edition had Slint performing Spiderland, GZA performing Liquid Swords (sadly wasted on me since I didn't like hip hop at the time), and Sonic Youth performing Daydream Nation. Ever since then, I've fantasized about seeing other bands performing their best records. When artists actually do a tour or a single performance of a 'classic' album, it's usually years after the initial release. Not so with Memory Of A Cut Off Head, which was performed in full during a short OCS tour in late 2017, including two San Francisco shows. While I would certainly give up my clear vinyl copy of Thee Hounds Of Foggy Notion to see Oh Sees perform Help or Face Stabber, it is nice to have one live album that features a beloved record.


Culled from shows on December 17^th and 18^th of 2017, Live In San Francisco would be released on June 28^th, 2018. One thing I can tell you right off the bat is that it's one of the modern releases with the hardest to find information, in terms of websites not reviewing/covering it. I don't see it discussed much online, even on Reddit and other fan/music forums. I get the sense it snuck out there and only the truly hardcore/record collectors were able to get their hands on the various limited edition vinyl versions. The other big reason it's a hard release to research is that its title is exactly the same as the Oh Sees Live In San Francisco, so if you put “OCS Live In San Francisco” into Google most of the results end up being about the Oh Sees one. Anyhow, the OCS lineup for these shows bizarrely didn't feature Nick Murray or Patrick Mullins, who contributed to the studio album. Instead the cast includes John Dwyer, Brigid Dawson, Tim Hellman, Tomas Dolas, and Paul Quattrone, supplemented by a string section made up of Emily Elkin, Eric Clark, Heather Lockie, and Heidi Maureen Alexander. Elzo Durt, who provided the cover art, also did the awesome art for Carrion Crawler/The Dream. I recommend checking out his website, he's got a fantastic 60s concert poster throwback style. The last bit of business I need to address is that I purchased the digital version from Bandcamp since it's not on Spotify and some of the track names are fucked up or weirdly shortened. Another instance where I can't tell if somebody was lazy or didn't doublecheck their work. 'Neighbor Ton None'? 'On & On Cooridor'? Hey, you know what one of my favorite songs off Thee Hounds Of Foggy Notion is? 'Dreadful Day.' You can't see it but I'm shaking my head right now.


Live In San Francisco is mostly a faithful performance of the studio versions of the Memory Of A Cut Off Head songs. As I said earlier, it's literally the album in full, in exact order, with some 'bonus' old favorites at the end. Like with the Pitchfork 2007 'Don't Look Back' performances I saw, there are a few little wrinkles here and there to make this live release a worthy companion to the studio versions. Dwyer uses a bit of echo/delay on his guitar, often between songs, and it's a cool effect. The noise/drone section at the end of 'The Baron Sleeps And Dreams' gets some big cheers from the audience, which always makes me smile. 'Time Tuner' gets a bit of David Bowie 'Heroes'-esque sustain guitar from Dwyer, giving it even more of a Nico vibe, and it's a bit slower and longer than the studio version. I enjoy the Dwyer banter sprinkled throughout, including him pronouncing the band's name at the start as “Oh See Ess”, so now we all know it's not “Oh Sees.” Oh, and there's a bit during 'The Chopping Block' where someone says something I can't quite make out but it makes Dwyer crack up and makes me realize how much this song sounds like David Bowie's 'Space Oddity.'


Otherwise, there isn't much to say about this release that I didn't already say about Memory Of A Cut Off Head, so I'll cover the final three throwback tracks for curious parties. Once the string players leave the stage, we get a nice Thee Hounds Of Foggy Notion throwback with 'Dreadful Heart' and 'Iceberg.' The former is prefaced by a dedication to a friend of Dwyer, and is really close to the Hounds version. 'Iceberg' gets a weirdly self-deprecating “This is another old that we played for nobody a long time ago...” comment from him and a dedication to someone named Garth. There's a bit more to 'Iceberg' in this performance, including some gorgeous Rhodes organ, presumably from Tomas Dolas. And then there's 'Block Of Ice', and hoo boy!


To date, this is the longest track on any Oh Sees release. It starts out like the version on The Master's Bedroom Is Worth Spending A Night In, with a fatter bottom end thanks to organ/keyboards from Tomas Dolas. They extend the hell out of the song and Dwyer absolutely cuts loose on his electric guitar just like the epic, live album closing 'Contraption' on Oh Sees' Live In an Fransisco. Send 'em home with their minds blown! I can only imagine listening to this on acid. Around the eight minute mark you can really tell why Dwyer brought on Dolas full-time. He's a decent improviser in his own right and tries to keep up with the guitar madness going on. They return to the main riff and lyrics around 14 minutes in, and if you aren't paying attention to the runtime you might think they're about to wrap it up. Nope. You still have like ten minutes left, dig in! Around 15:35 it mutates into 'Ghost In The Trees'—why the tracklisting doesn't reflect this, I have no idea—before going off into more jamming and wrapping up with another runthrough of the 'Ghost In The Trees' riff/lyrics. Over the course of this performance, Dwyer does everything from silky delay trails/loops to grimy noise blurts and groans to bluesy riffs. It never quite flows logically but that doesn't really matter. It's all about the pure spectacle, like that live Frank Zappa album where they play 'Louie Louie' using the giant Victorian organ at the Royal Albert Hall. After the calmer/hushed tone of the rest of the Live In San Francisco album, it's a jarring change, though not strictly in a bad way.


In all honesty, if you own Live In San Francisco, you don't really need Memory Of A Cut Off Head. This may be a bit controversial, since some people always prefer to have studio versions of music. For me, though, Live is superior in every way. It's like having the original album plus three interesting, unique throwbacks as a meaty bonus, kinda like ordering a 12 oz. steak and getting three sliders as the side. Well, I guess one of the sliders should be a double bacon cheeseburger. Alright, let's stop torturing the metaphor. For fans of Memory, this is an excellent companion piece. For people who aren't especially big on the album, however, the three bonus songs are worth the price of admission alone. I've sure spent $7 on worse things.

Oh Sees Retrospective #25: Memory Of A Cut Off Head

As I near the end of this retrospective series, it seems fitting that I'd eventually get back around to talking about OCS. Now, you might argue that since I'm not covering Damaged Bug and other John Dwyer side projects, I shouldn't technically be writing about Memory Of A Cut Off Head. Yes, part of the reason he revived the OCS name is that he now considers Oh Sees and OCS to be distinct entities, though this is a bit of a sleight of hand. Early releases under the OCS name are certainly distinct in style and tone from, say, Help or Smote Reverser, but in the early-era of the band the subtle name changes slowly blurred OCS into The Ohsees and then into Thee Oh Sees and finally into Oh Sees. The lineup from the early OCS days also slowly morphed into the mid-era foursome, so even if I am cheating a bit on this one, I still think it's a relatively fair cheat. And anyway, Memory Of A Cut Off Head features contributions from Nick Murray and Tim Hellman, who were/are from the modern-era Oh Sees lineup, as well as future Oh Sees member Tomas Dolas, so there!


Like many surprise Oh Sees releases, the revival of the OCS name and announcement of an album seemed to come out of nowhere. Memory Of A Cut Off Head was released on November 17^th, 2017, mere months after Orc. Technically speaking, this record is billed as a collaboration between Dwyer and Brigid Dawson. This is interesting because she was never nearly as a big presence on old OCS records. They were dominated by Dwyer...which makes sense, since I think we all forget Dawson didn't join OCS until album five, The Cool Death Of Island Raiders, which was released as The Ohsees, not OCS. So I guess she was never really a member of OCS until 2017? Eh, maybe this is needlessly splitting hairs. Memory Of A Cut Off Head (hereafter referred to as simply Memory) is a fun throwback in terms of the OCS style. To have Patrick Mullins back is pretty huge, as is the reappearance of former Oh Sees drummer Nick Murray (who we last heard on Mutilator Defeated At Last, or the Fortress single if you want to be a stickler for details). Tim Hellman is an interesting addition to the OCS sound, since if I remember right they never really had a bassist before. John Dwyer must love him as much as I do! Tomas Dolas contributes unspecified keyboards to the album, marking this his first appearance on an Oh Sees/OCS album, though he's billed as Thomas Dolas because...I don't know. It's either laziness or whitewashing, and I'm much inclined to believe the former. Luckily this would be rectified on Smote Reverser.


Going into this retrospective series, I was most curious to tackle the early OCS output and in particular to revisit this one. I had only given a couple cursory listens to Memory before coming back to it for this series, and it's been an eye opening experience. I had almost forgotten how nice Dwyer and Dawson's vocals sound together in a more psych folk/orchestral folk setting, especially when he's singing more hushed and melodically. It's also much easier to pick out the lyrics, which are quite dark and suffused with death and sadness. For example, 'The Remote Viewer' offers the chucklefest of a chestnut: “we are junkies of despair.” Anyway, if Memory is a return to any era of the band, it's a return to the old OCS sound circa 2. However this time it's much more “professional” and full sounding, with the welcome addition of string arrangements. In fact they're essential to this record and its style. There's a very good reason the OCS Live In San Francisco has string players on it. Some of the Beatles-esque/early Pink Floyd whimsical psychedelia and orchestral folk elements I've detected on the 'solo' Oh Sees records like Castlemania and Drop are in full bloom here. There's other intriguing instrumental flourishes, such as the harpsichord on 'The Remote View' and another welcome trotting out of Dwyer's flute skills for 'On And On Corridor.'


On a side note, the overall buoyant feel and especially the Rhodes-style organ in the beginning of album closer 'Lift A Finger By The Garden Path' always makes me imagine a slower, more folky 'You're My Best Friend' by Queen. Am I the only one who hears it? Probably.


Perhaps the greatest change to the OCS sound comes in letting Brigid Dawson step forward as a true collaborator. As far as I remember, Memory is the first time she sang on an OCS/Oh Sees songs alone, and presumably she helped write at least some of the lyrics. Overall, hearing her voice alone reminds me a lot of another female singer but I can't put my finger on who for the life of me. 'Time Tuner' definitely starts off sounding like Nico. I know I also made this comparison for one of the last songs on Castlemania but 'Time Tuner' could have gone on The Marble Index and nobody would have done a double take. Anyway, this record makes me curious to hear more full-blown collaborations between Dwyer and other people. I know at some point he was rumored to be working with Ty Segall but that either didn't happen or it ended up just being Segall co-producing Orc. I'm a big fan of Segall's two collaborations with White Fence, in particular Hair, so I'm still holding out hope. But I digress. With all the changes and updates to the sound, and the addition of Oh Sees members, it's easy for me to forget the way Memory actually is a throwback in a few crucial ways. Obviously there's the mellow/downer atmosphere, as well as the prominent use of acoustic guitars and occasional singing saw contributions from Patrick Mullins. In addition, I love that the ending of 'The Baron Sleeps And Dreams' is a drone throwback to similar moments/tracks on OCS releases. One last throwback that isn't really an OCS throwback: the album cover was done by Jonny Negron, the same artist as Drop, which makes total sense because the color palette is almost exactly the same. I find his style more limited and less appealing than Ryan Beatty; as ever, your mileage will vary.

I've struggled with a way to conclude this retrospective because I have very complicated feelings about Memory. Let me start by saying it's absolutely tops as far as OCS-billed releases. It's as if it presents an alternate history wherein John Dwyer kept The Coachwhips going and so didn't steer his OCS project into going in more of a rock rather than a folk direction, becoming the Oh Sees we know in our timeline. Memory, therefore, is like if he kept putting out OCS records between Coachwhips projects, so that in this alternate timeline OCS developed/matured into this particular nuanced, orchestrated sound, while also allowing Dawson to step forward more often. Now, all of this said, though I may not have any issues and problems with Memory, I don't adore it. It works for me but it isn't something I foresee wanting to listen to consistently over the coming years. It's quite similar to how I feel about the Damaged Bug records. They get released, I listen to them and admire them and appreciate them for what they are, and I don't have many, if any, relevant complaints...yet they don't fully bewitch me. Well, that's subjective taste for ya. Next time we'll find out if OCS in a live setting makes any difference.