The sound of freaks
How I learned to stop worrying and love Bulb Records.

By Mike McGuirk

THE FIRST BULB record I ever remember liking was the Pterodactyls' 1996 album, Reborn. My friend Ron, who owns Bulb's distributor, Surefire, had been giving me stuff from the label forever, but I would always go home and put whatever it was on and think, "What the hell is this shit?"

One album, the Incapacitants' Asset Without Liability, was just the sound of an amplifier turned all the way up for like 50 minutes. The other thing I remember is listening to the Bulb sampler, In Bulb-O-Phonic, and not finding one single song that I would ever want to hear again. "That guy just puts out shit that he knows people will hate" was how I summed it up.

The Pterodactyls record was the first one where I felt there was possibly something good coming out of the Adrian, Mich., label. It was as retarded as any of their records, with intentionally awful metal riffs and a bizarre singer who dressed in this shitty Pterodactyl costume and sang in a grating falsetto. There was a six-minute guitar solo played by Pete Larson, the guy who runs Bulb, that proudly demonstrated his own inability to play the guitar. The jokes weren't even that funny, and the whole thing was barely listenable, but at that point either I got the joke or Bulb had finally achieved something that could reach people outside of its inner circle.

That was like five or six years ago, and today Bulb is my favorite label. I almost always use Bulb and the bands related to it as points of reference for what's going on here in the city or whatever I happen to be talking about, practically. It was the first independent label whose mentality made sense to me when I finally figured out Matador and Sub Pop were just major-label product whores. These records were not just junk – it was clear that they were made with earnestness, purpose, and an enthusiasm that Larson fully expects will infect people. It's the most rule-breaking, distancing yet welcoming aesthetic imaginable.

I don't really care about music made by people who are in a band because it's cool or because they want to sound like their heroes. The thing about Bulb bands is that they are almost all composed of these freaks making freaky music because it's the only thing they can do. Admittedly, sometimes it works, and sometimes it just sounds like freaks. But in the past three years or so, Bulb has started putting out records that are actually really good records in addition to displaying this genuinely anti-everything mind-set.

And it's all about the speed and energy and bipolar manifestations of its creator. It sometimes seems like Larson puts out these records on a dare, but the truth is, he is as much a freak as any of the artists he promotes, and putting out these types of records, against every accepted convention, is as much a form of expression as the music made by his artists. He is dedicated to the furthering of far-out, honest music and is convinced that everyone would understand why the records he gets behind are great if they are given enough exposure. One release after another has been in direct conflict with whatever seems to be accepted as good at the time, systematically destroying all hipness and giving rock and roll back to people who just want to get fucked-up. Even today, when people are catching on to what Larson was putting out five years ago, he releases a 25 Suaves record that is basically '80s hard rock fit for an arena.

What follows is a list of recommended Bulb releases. I don't have enough space to write about all of them, so this is by no means a definitive discography of what you need from Bulb. Basically, you're gonna want it all.

Temple of Bon Matin, Cabin in the Sky (2001) Temple of Bon Matin is a primal free-rock outfit led by drummer-god Ed Wilcox, who lives in a haunted house in rural Pennsylvania, in an area known as Cheery Acres. For eating money, he puts up those posters on the plywood dividers at construction sites. Cabin in the Sky was released in 2001, and the ancient rhythms and astonishing beauty you encounter as you make the journey into its Hawkwind-meets-uh-jazz spirit plane make for the best record to come out in that year or this one. I will fight anybody who disagrees with me.

Mikey Wild and the Magic Lanterns, I Was Punk B4 U Were Punk (1999) This one often gets overlooked for some reason, maybe because the first song is like 10 minutes long and singer Mikey Wild really sounds like he has a head wound. There's wild gurgles and profane lyrics over stolid gutter-punk chord changes, and it's never clear what is meant to be funny and what isn't. The insane thing is that in the end the record comes off as poignant and honest. And I never use the word "poignant."

25 Suaves, 1938 (2002) 1938 is the rock music equivalent of that scene in Rambo: First Blood Part II when Sly materializes out of a wall of mud and cuts the commie bastard's throat. Larson's personal project – one of many – has gone from some kind of retardo-garage crapola to this lean and mean take on pure fucking rock music. Just the endings of the songs are better than most bands' entire catalogs. Larson told me he got the name of the album by multiplying Motörhead's 1916 by two. You figure it out.

Andrew W.K., Girl's Own Juice (2000) Former Pterodactyl's drummer and current Coors Light shill Andrew W.K. is the weirdest MTV phenomenon since the Scatman, but at least his music is great. This, his first EP, is a giant, fist-pumping masterpiece that cannot be played loud enough, and it sounds like a heavy metal Sparks record, and there's already been so much press on Andrew W.K. that it's pointless for me to say anything else.

Quintron, Unmasked Organ Light-Year of Infinity Man (2000) Quintron is just weird. I have to admit that he was one of those Bulb artists I didn't get at first, probably because I've never seen him do his Drum Buddy thing live. Until I heard the Prince-like song on here ("9-4-9") and the Oblivians-type thing before it that really made me happy, I thought he was this weird guy that played eerie, fucked-up party music on an electronic doohickey he created himself and performed puppet shows with his wife. Now I know different.

King Brothers, King Brothers (2000) I remember when I first got Pussy Galore's Right Now! I played it for a friend of mine who shared many musical tastes with me. He said, "Hey, man, I like noise too, but this hurts." This record is for those of us who cannot be hurt enough by the obliterating howl of amplifiers turned up too high, with one crappy microphone too close to everything to record properly. The King Brothers' record is my favorite garage rock record of all time, if only for "King of Boogie," which sounds like a building collapsing on a train track, and then the train comes and crashes into it, and it is loaded with TNT, and then there are these sublanguage kill-crazy hill people coming out of the jungle, and they want your ass dead.

Wolf Eyes, Dread (2002) Wolf Eyes is creating some new kind of evil with the music they're making, and until Dread came out, there was no adequate representation of their sorcery – outside of going to see them live and having them boil your blood for you themselves. I am told their new one, Slicer, is also good, but I haven't heard it yet. There is this 10-minute section on here that swells and surges with some kind of siren going off and humanoid noises and a fizzing electronic club to the head. Finally, there is a Wolf Eyes record that comes close to their live show.

Bulb Records artists Ass Baboons of Venus play with Zmrzlina and the Ghosts, Wed/13, 8:30 p.m., El Rio, 3158 Mission, S.F. $5. (415) 282-3325. Quintron and Miss Pussycat play with Stereo Total Sat/16, 9 p.m., Slim's, 333 11th St., S.F. $12. (415) 522-0333.