Mentally Ill - Gacy’s Place 7″
December 21st, 2007 at 9:39 am
This is a re-post from April the 3rd 2006. Added more scans, new rips, Paddedd Cell and Tumor Boy.
There’s no doubt that these punk rockers are mentally ill. How well they capture it in this fuzzy buzzy manic sing along punk rock anthem. Where are the psychos in punk nowadays? Recommendations? No not The Spits I don’t like them.
Country: USA
Year: 1979
Label: Autistic
Format: 7″
Songs:
Gacys Place.mp3
Paddedd Cell.mp3
Tumor Boy.mp3
April 3rd, 2006 at 11:36 am
Haha, I take it you read my Spits post? Have you heard the recent Alt-Tent reissue of this?? It’s supposed to have a bunch of extra/unreleased stuff…
April 3rd, 2006 at 11:43 am
Ha ha ha you’re right. But I’ve heard other comparing The Spits and Mentally Ill and I think The Spits is higly overrated though they have a cool attitude. People had been talking about Spits and I’ve got one of their first 7″’s for free and I was just like “uhhh?? what the fuck this sucks.”
No I haven’t heard the reissue.
April 7th, 2006 at 12:21 pm
this 7in is hamms.here’s the A.T. one for free even better then the 7in.
http://www.alternativetentacles.com/octopodes/852/NHJueyHajPQqsNm9smD/The_Mentally_Ill-Not_Quite_Dead_Y.mp3
April 7th, 2006 at 12:41 pm
Holy crap! That song i actually better then Gacy’s. Is that from their second release?
May 28th, 2006 at 10:42 pm
try the Homicides from perth Australia, they are a bunch of psychos! and they play sleazy punk rock n roll which fuckin rocks
there are a few songs and pics on http://www.myspace.com/thehomicides
May 29th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Hi Claire! Thanks for the tip but The Homicides was way too generic for my taste.
May 29th, 2006 at 12:13 pm
There’s a handful of songs that they redid the vocals for…other than that it’s pretty solid. I’m not sure what song you’re talking about…but i guessing it’s “Cum Twat”…shit rules!
I remember reading (about a year and a half ago) about AT’s plan of releasing the Eat disography? Anybody know what’s going on with that???
May 29th, 2006 at 12:16 pm
oops…i guess it was “not quite dead yet”
May 30th, 2006 at 5:45 am
Spits 2nd album has their best track imho: “Black and blue”
December 19th, 2007 at 11:28 pm
ONE OF MY ALL TIME FAVORITE PUNK BANDS. FUZZY, BLOWN-OUT GUITAR, KILLER VOCALS, COOL LYRICS, AND THE DRUMMER SOUNDS LIKE HE’S PLAYING ON CARDBOARD BOXES!!
OH, AND THE SPITS FUCKING RULE! THEY MADE PUNK FUN AGAIN, AND HELPED GET RID OF(FOR THE MOST PART) THAT GODAWFUL “STREETPUNK”/TOUGH GUY GARBAGE AND WANNA BE HEARTBREAKERS BANDS FROM THE LATE 90′S/EARLY 2000′S THAT LABELS LIKE TKO SEEMED TO LOVE(SAVE FOR THE BODIES FROM SONOMA, CA. - THEY RULED TOO).
December 21st, 2007 at 11:12 pm
I don’t think I’ve ever heard Mentally Ill’s 2nd 7″ - Sex Cells. Why was it not reissued on the AT CD? There’s a session on the CD from the 1990s when Mentally Ill briefly got back together but not the 2nd record??? That makes no sense to me at all. Can anyone shed some light on this or direct me somewhere I can get a rip/copy?
December 22nd, 2007 at 8:38 pm
uhh….The Spits whoop ass…
December 24th, 2007 at 3:43 pm
I seem to remember an advertisement that the Mentally Ill placed in Trouser Press many years back…it was something along the lines of $5 for the single, $1005 to have the single personally delivered by a band member.
December 24th, 2007 at 10:58 pm
December 24th, 2007 at 11:10 pm
amazing! Sort of like a like
low-grade “Nervous Breakdown” EP. I love it. I wonder why the label like Subterranean, Posh Boy, and SST did not help out this band. I guess Posh Boy was too busy trying to cash-in on new wave with Los Microwaves. Subterranean probably would have not supported a band outside of California.
It’s amazing this came out of Deerfield, IL.
December 25th, 2007 at 10:44 am
Do you have the second Mentally Ill 45? It wasn’t included in the AT comp. I have only heard on side of that.
December 27th, 2007 at 9:57 am
These guys actually played their one and only gig in Chicago recently and did a respectable job of it. They were (and are) a bunch of rich dudes from the northern Chicago burbs who were just fucking around, trying to be offensive back in the day. I got all the original studio tracks from this session from a guy who was in a band with the original drummer along with an unreleased album recorded in the late 1990’s by Steve Albini that is OK. Never even heard the AT release but those 1979 “Starbeat Sessions” kick ass. They went on to form another band called The Men which is worth checking out, as well, and actually tried making a go of it in the music biz with their Autistic / Snat5 record label in the early 80’s, attempting to push their weird brand of “industrial” “dance” music but the shit was just too weird for the times and they faded into oblivion (their lyrical content actually got weirder with time!). They even had an office in the South Loop which ain’t cheap.
January 2nd, 2008 at 9:45 pm
mrpoopy, thanks, very informative, i bought the alt-tent cd a few years ago, and they remain to be one of my all time favorite bands. unfortunately, i could never dig up any info on them. Any more info/anecdotes about the band would be much appreciated.
January 10th, 2008 at 12:53 pm
I went to college in a suburb near the Mentally Ill’s home base of Deerfield, Illinois. Um, Deerfield is not a total richy rich suburb- I have a few friends who currently live in “normal” areas of that ‘burb. But there definitely are some richer areas to it. About 12 years ago, I saw a picture of the other pressing of the Gacy’s Place EP- it printed an address on Wacker Drive in downtown Chicago on the back of the sleeve, and I went on a mission because I worked not too far from there at the time. Um, I couldn’t get past the security guard at the front desk of the small brick office building so my pipe dreams of uncovering copies of the EP were unrealized. Since the Mentally Ill were kids when the EP was released, perhaps the Wacker Drive address they listed was not their office space but maybe the business office of one of their Dads (?). The office had a nice location overlooking the Chicago River and not too far from the Chicago Opera building and all that. The “Gacy’s Place” EP is otherwordly and blows my mind every time I listen to it- the guitar sound and vibe on it is simply amazing. “Gacy’s Place” is my favorite track of course and “Tumor Boy” is my 2nd fave– the guitar solo on it is a jaw dropper. “Padded Cell” is good but just OK. To my ears, their 2nd 7″ (”American Dream/Soldier 19″) and the cassette in a can from the early 80’s blow compared to the 1st EP. A friend of mine in San Diego was supposed to release the unreleased 1979 “Starbeat Sessions” as a 10″EP on his label back in like 2000 but it never happened and came out on Alt. Tentacles instead in ‘04. I have a few copies of the “Spank The Bottom Red” CD from ‘99 with the funny 3D sleeve and it’s OK musically but has a pretty demented vibe to it. There is a local live music/dance cable show for kids here in Chicago called “Chic-A-Go-Go” (helmed by Jake Austen from the always-cool Roctober ‘zine), and the Mentally Ill played on the show in the late 90’s. I didn’t see the episode but I have seen photos from it and it’s pretty odd to see little kids dancing in front of the demented-looking band. Funny stuff.
One more thing- here is a link to an early 80’s review by Jeff Bale of their 2nd 7″:
http://www.operationphoenixrecords.com/mrrissue02_19MusicReviewsandTheEnd.pdf
February 17th, 2008 at 12:32 pm
I was glad to find Gacys’ place on e-bay. I lived in Deerfield when it first came out. It was at
Lauries’ discount Records where the 45′ was being
sold, and if i remember correctly, one of the band members worked there. Gacy was on one side,
and Tumor Boy and Padded Cell on the other. I was
really glad to find this cd. My record player broke in 2000, and i figured it was too much to get it fixed, so i went to cds’. So it has been long since i heard it……