The Afghan Whigs & friends

[BlueCalx]

Anyone going to see these guys on the 2012 now-or-never reunion tour extravaganza? Have we any fans here of the Afghan Whigs, the Twilight Singers, or anything else Greg Dulli gets up to? Will we ever see the release of Greg's "Filthy/Delicious" electropop side project? Can anyone fucking believe all the weight Greg's lost?

Compare and contrast:

2012:



2009:

[dlb]

Lanegan introduced me to the Twilight Singers and then of course to the Gutter Twins. While I knew about Dulli and the Afghan Wigs before I never really gave them a proper listen, so while I dig deeper into the Twilight Singers discography I'll dive into the Afghan Wigs afterwards. Any recommendations? Otherwise I'll just listen my way through their work chronologically. Once I got the hook of his voice I started to really love this guy. Next time he's near my neck of the woods with either projects he's got going I'll definately be there!

[BlueCalx]

You're in for a long, wild ride. There's a load of Dulli/Whigs/Twilights material out there, and most of it's awesome. Some stuff is more awesome than others, of course, but generally if you like some of his music you'll end up liking all of it. Here's a super brief album by album breakdown of the Twilight Singers' and the Afghan Whigs material.

The Twilight Singers:

Twilight as Played by the Twilight Singers (2000): The Twilight Singers' debut, recorded around the time that the Afghan Whigs' last album, 1965 was recorded. This album is a bit of an anomaly in the discography - there is less rock on here than any other Dulli album, it's all drum machine beats, piano and electronics. It's very much like the R&B that was being made at the time. Dulli says that it's his stab at the canon of classic makeout albums. It's gotten me laid a few times. "The Twilite Kid" is still a staple in Twilight's live sets, and has one of the best melodies Dulli's ever written.

Blackberry Belle (2003): Critical consensus says that this is the best, most consistent Twilight Singers album, and I agree. The nocturnal R&B of Twilight as Played by... is still here, but it's here alongside a lot more rock 'n' roll muscle and tighter songs. It's a loose concept album about a close friend's suicide, and features some of the most honest, autobiographical lyrics Dulli's published since the Afghan Whigs days. "Teenage Wristband" is a perfect pop song.

She Loves You (2004): An album of covers recorded after the current incarnation of the Twilight Singers began to gel as a band. The band shows off how hard it can rock, Dulli shows off his stellar taste in music. Most of the tracks here have a raw, off-the-cuff feeling that should appeal to a Gutter Twins or early Whigs fan. The Marvin Gaye cover here, "Please Stay", is the standout, but they're all good.

Powder Burns (2006): A monster of an album, recorded in New Orleans by gas-powered generator in the aftermath of Katrina. The first record Dulli made after getting clean of class 'A' narcotics (heroin, cocaine). "I'm Ready" kicks ass like the Whigs did, "Underneath the Waves" evokes the Who. If you've watched Rescue Me, chances are you've already heard big chunks of this album.

Dynamite Steps (2011): The first Twilight Singers album in five years, recorded and released after the successful conclusion of the Gutter Twins tour. The songwriting is strong as ever, and the band gets to really flex its muscles on these songs, but Dulli is in very poor voice. He struggles to stay in tune, when he gets really hoarse the mixing drowns him out in walls of guitar. When I first heard this album, I was seriously worried that something bad was happening with Greg, but by the time I saw him on tour for Powder Burns his voice had recovered fully.

The Afghan Whigs:

Big Top Halloween (1988): The first proper Afghan Whigs album, recorded when the group was basically a Replacements cover band. Greg Dulli considers this record so embarrassing that he has gone on record as saying that if he sees copies of it turn up on eBay, he buys them and destroys them. Still, some people like "Priscilla's Wedding".

Up In It (1990): There's some good stuff here, but the quintessentially early '90s rock production has meant that this record has aged BADLY. In light of all the great stuff to come later, this is inessential, but you should at least know "Retarded".

Congregation (1992): The big breakthrough. Here's where the tropes that Dulli still rides hard - "bad boy" lyrics, Catholic guilt, whiteboy soul, unexpected covers (Andrew Lloyd Webber!!!) show up for the first time. The album cover is a stone classic. So are pretty much all the songs. Dulli will occasionally drop these songs into his sets to this day - one gets the sense that he's particularly fond of Congregation.

Gentlemen (1993): The best-known, most-heard Dulli record, and the one that casual listeners still associate with him and the Whigs. It's a great album - the first concept album they did, and stronger and more arresting for it. The songs are instantly memorable. A lot of people associate "Gentlemen" with tough times in their own lives, so the album's biggest fans often talk about Gentlemen as if they wrote it. To a long-term fan, though, Gentlemen is actually an anomaly in the larger body of work. It's the most confessional Dulli has ever been on record, before or since, and the most autobiographical. Dulli, more often than not, writes in character. On Gentlemen, it's pretty much just Greg, with some poetic license.

Black Love (1996): Dulli's "misunderstood baby", the soundtrack to a shelved crime novel he had started writing after the conclusion of the Gentlemen tour. It was during the Black Love sessions that the band were deepest into drugs, this comes through in the long, rambling tracks and scarily aggressive rockers. "Blame, Etc." is masterfully malignant, "Faded" is one of the best power ballads ever, everything else is very, very fun, if a bit over the top.

1965 (1998): The Whigs' swan song, done in New Orleans with a battery of famous New Orleans session musicians. The party record, initially titled "Get Up To Get Down". This one is a thrill a minute, and a great palate cleanser after the rage and regret of Black Love. These songs will make you move your ass and stick with you for days.

Enjoy, and happy hunting.

[aggroculture]

The Afghan Whigs' Gentlemen and Black Love are imo the best things Dulli's ever done.

[dlb]

Thanks for the huge write-up BlueCalx!

So far I've been listening to teh TS's powder burns the a stitch in time EP and that live in NY record. All of them were amazing and I can't wait to check out the rest of them. Then off to the Afghan Wigs!

While a bit late Dulli really won a fan with me.

[allegro]

aw, God, I swear I listened to "Powder Burns" on repeat in my car for, seriously, six months, at least, and I wouldn't listen to anything else. That is one of the most brilliant albums I've ever heard in my life. I have to go get that out, again.

[Deadpool]

aw, God, I swear I listened to "Powder Burns" on repeat in my car for, seriously, six months, at least, and I wouldn't listen to anything else. That is one of the most brilliant albums I've ever heard in my life. I have to go get that out, again.

That's the album that introduced me to Dulli. I love it, too.


Afghan Whigs have a new song! "See and Don't See" originally recorded by Marie "Queenie" Lyons in 1970. Get a free download at their site:

http://www.theafghanwhigs.com/

This is what they'll be performing on Jimmy Fallon next Tuesday night. I wish I could go to their Bowery Ballroom show - I've been dying to see ANY Dulli project live since hearing a great Twilight Singers bootleg from 2006. I almost saw The Gutter Twins at The Stone Pony in Asbury Park but they fucking cancelled. Anyway, Greg's banter is hilarious, and his cover of "Wolf Like Me" crushes any other attempt I've heard.

[Amaro]

All this time I thought it was The Afhgan "Wings."

[BlueCalx]

Yeah, I'm gonna beg, borrow and steal to see that Fallon performance on Tuesday. This'll be the first glimpse that any of us get of the reunited Whigs - isn't the Bowery Ballroom show the day after? And of course I'm waiting with baited breath for the band to announce their US tour dates after their Terminal 5 shows. If they don't play Seattle, I'll totally fly to Cincinnati to see them.

[aggroculture]

Would have jumped at that Bowery show but Meshuggah are playing the same night. But $50+ at Terminal 5? I hesitate, it's a real shitty venue, and I'm not sure a reformed Whigs would have much of a chance in there.

[BlueCalx]

I've heard Terminal 5 is famously awful. What is it about it that sucks so much? All I know is that it sucks, but I don't know any specifics. If I were on the east coast (or planning to be there for fall) I'd be ducking those shows and trying to get admission to the Whigs-curated All Tomorrow's Parties in New Jersey.

[ManOfAtom]

I bought Gentlemen today 'cos I'm seeing them at the UK ATP next week. I've been digging the Gutter Twins so I'm looking forward to this, I'm guessing there's a degree of musical relation between the two?

[aggroculture]

I've heard Terminal 5 is famously awful. What is it about it that sucks so much? All I know is that it sucks, but I don't know any specifics.

Someone recently explained to me why, and apparently it's something to do with it previously being a club with lots of separate rooms. Basically unless you are dead center in front of the stage the sound is terrible. And if you are on any of the upper levels unless you are right at the front of the balconies you can't see shit. When it's packed and you don't want to be squashed in the crowd there's nowhere to see or hear the band: you go to the side and you can't see or hear anything, and there is no back of the venue because there's a bar there. You end up drifting to one of the various pointless "lounges" upstairs and watch the band on the screens. It's a horrible place to see a live band unless you have a VIP pass in which case you get to sit right over the stage in a massive and spacious balcony.

[BlueCalx]

It sucks that they're stuck playing there. I went and looked up Terminal 5 and found this brief article from The Awl which explains that money is the reason why bands end up gigging there despite its dreadfulness, but one would think that that wouldn't be an issue for the Whigs. Greg's got money on his own, and this whole world tour thing has the potential to be lucrative enough to pay for both Curley and McCollum's entire retirements.

[Deadpool]

The boys just classed it up on Jimmy Fallon. Weird to see Greg Dulli performing without a guitar, but he was looking and sounding great in a dapper turtleneck + blazer get-up. The new single is good, but the live version is a lot more satisfying. Should be online very soon - curious what the "bonus performance" is that they did.

[BlueCalx]

That performance was shit hot. The lucky motherfuckers at the Bowery Ballroom are going to have their heads readjusted tomorrow. The bonus performance, which is linked on http://theafghanwhigs.com, is "I'm Her Slave".

[Aladdinsanity]

Has anyone been able to catch these guys live? Their performances have been nothing short of amazing (from what I can find on YouTube). Greg has been closing "When We Two Parted" with a cover of Drake's "Over My Dead Body", as if to get the point across that your dad has literally no excuse to be listening to the same classic rock bullshit since high school.

[Hazekiah]

So The Afghan Whigs fucking KILLED IT at Lollapalooza.

Had to miss it in person but caught most of it streaming on the official Lollapalooza YT channel.

Been a HUGE fan of these guys since I first caught "Debonair" and "Gentleman" on MTV's "120 Minutes" back in my high school days. Backtracked and kept up from there but still haven't really seen 'em live. Caught The Twilight Singers for two shows back-to-back in Chicago back in '06, I think. Pretty cool but I'd still KILL to see The Afghan Whigs instead.

Anyway, I bootlegged those Twilight Singers shows pretty well and gave the masters to gladcarrot to transfer properly. I'm sure he's busy and backlogged with a million other things but I'm totally psyched to see such enthusiasm for 'em here so I'll make sure we get 'em posted here someday.

Something else that helped make me an immediate fan that I haven't seen mentioned here, btw. I'm mean, it's always awesome to see someone put some balls back into The Beatles again for a change, but THESE MOTHERFUCKERS and ALL TOGETHER and ALL IN THEIR PRIME?!?

HOLY FUCKING FUCK:

[hobochic]

Awesome. I'm seeing them at Way Out West this coming week

[Kodiak33]

I've never heard them before the webcast yesterday. I thought they were awesome. Where should I get started with them?

[aggroculture]

Read Bluecalx's post in this thread. Then get yourself a copy of Gentlemen, followed by Black Love.

[Hazekiah]

[Jinsai]

well, I'm going to the second night in LA. It's going to be fucking awesome. I love the Afghan Whigs.

[Kid Charlemagne]

After watching their set from Lollapalooza, not only was I not going to miss their ACL set, but I got tickets to see their aftershow. I've read that the shows so far have been what reunion shows should be, so no fucking way in hell was I going to miss this.

[BLOND-É]

went to Prague to see them , with my best friend from twenty years ago, the same friend who was by my side when we bought that Bulgarian bootleg AW two-album cassette on a school trip to a bigger town in 1993. 'twas perfect back then. it aged well and is even more perfect now.

[Kid Charlemagne]

So I saw them twice last weekend and I was amazed at how good the shows are. The show at ACL was awesome and probably the best at the entire festival. Greg remarked after "Crazy", "that's why we have three guitars." They absolutely schooled every band during that weekend and he can still scream and howl. The next night at Antones in Austin was even better. One of the best shows I've seen and the setlist was absolutely perfect. I really can't stress enough how vital it should be to attend one of these shows. Even the merchandise was awesome with the tour shirt reading "North American Tour '77", and another one with the Earth, Wind, and Fire logo with Whigs replacing Wind. This has probably been the best reunion to take place in quite some time.

[aggroculture]

http://pitchfork.com/news/53721-the-...-to-the-beast/

Finally.

[allegro]

http://pitchfork.com/news/53721-the-...-to-the-beast/

Finally.

Ah yes this is great news indeed!

[fortheloveofgod]

Haha. Cool. Saw the in Camden in London 16 years ago.

[allegro]

I'm really liking this new album.

Thoughts?

Edit: streaming here