Tonight We Ride

You can never say enough about The Scene Is Now - Ira Kaplan, Yo La Tengo. That's an oft-quoted line used by anyone spruiking the wares of the band known as The Scene Is Now, but never have truer words been uttered. The Scene Is Now (TSIN) were formed at the dawn of the 1980's by Philip Dray and Chris Nelson, a band born from the ashes of No Wave Trio, Information (the third partner of that outfit being Rick Brown). Influenced equally by the ragged avant-folk sounds of the holy modal rounders and the fugs, the screech of DNA and Mars, and the traditional Americana of Bob Wills and Hoagy Carmichael, TSIN instantly set themselves apart from the pack. Their music was an indefinable mixture of the old and new, the impenetrable and the accessible and the weird and wonderful. Some folks compared 'em to the Red Krayola or Pere Ubu, some to SST outfits such as the Meat Puppets and Slovenly, and some people even hail them as the world's finest no wave jug band. The point is this, between the years 1984 and 1988 they released three magnificent albums on their own label, Lost (the last two being in co-operation with the Twin/Tone label), which have been out of print for a dog's age and never seen the light of day on compact disk. Until now.