#194
1980 Housekeeping LISTENING POST DISCOVERY
Nervus Rex
Nervus Rex
Genre: New Wave Power Pop
4 out of 5
Highlights:
There She Goes
Real Life
Start From the Start
That God Sheila
Requisite 80s Cover: “Venus”. Exactly what a middling New Wave version of this song should sound like and I have to wonder if they were trying to get a hit out this the way Bananarama would a few years later. They didn’t. And it drags the record down a bit for me.
Listening to this for the first time I could have sworn it was yet another in a series on unknown New Wave bands from the era fronted by a woman that deserved more attention. And I was wrong…and right. Fronted by Shawn Brighton the rest of the band is all women. Lauren Agnelli, Miriam Linna, Dianna Athey. And Shawn sounds as non-gender specific as anyone I’ve heard. Their songs are all weird and angular, like a pop band took over The Raincoats and made something genuinely great.
This record is produced by super genius Mike Chapman but he couldn’t wring a hit out of them the way he did out of the likes of Blondie and The Knack and Sweet.
Too damn bad.
Every once in a while I feel the need to remind everyone that there were so many amazing female contributors to the world of rock music in the 80s and it wasn’t all Madonna and fishnets and The Go-Go’s and Cyndi Lauper and pop and dance. We started off the year talking about Pam Windo and we got got to The Shivvers and Nikki Corvette and here we are with Nervus Rex. On the horizon are bands like Killer Pussy and Lone Justice and Romeo Void and many years later come Yeah Yeah Yeahs and New Pornographers. And we need to talk more about how great these artists are/were.
The common through line seems to be that the sexism in the record industry gives them a shot but just as quickly abandons them in favor of something more sellable.
There’s no reason that I should have never heard of Nervus Rex. Not a kid listening to college radio in 1980. I would have treasured this thing and made everyone I know listen to it.
They should have opened for Blondie. Maybe they did.
Good little record this one.
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