United Mutation was a strange group from Maryland in the early 1980s that never quite fit in, nor caught on during its existence, constantly overshadowed by the omnipresent harDCore Dischord scene. However, despite the obvious influence of the Bad Brains, United Mutation's songs were primarily psych-damaged weirdness, somewhat akin to Captain Beefheart at hyperspeed. This long lost rarity is one of my favorite songs by the group who only managed to release two seven-inch EPs and a handful of compilation tracks. "Sensations Fix" is a bitter lament on the heroin trend that had rampaged the DC scene at the time, and also relates to the title of the compilation, "Alive & Kicking" (which featured a photo taken by Tomas "Beefeater" Squip of a local scenester shooting up) for which it was recorded. The reverbed sax, wacky guitar riffs and frantic beat sounds like a extremely sped-up outtake from the Stooges "Funhouse." The singer, Mike Brown is credited with inventing the cookie monster vocal delivery, but thankfully he sounds more like HR or Jello Biafra on this track.
The cover art is from United Mutation's "Rainbow Person" EP... Sorry, couldn't locate a scan of the compilation artwork.
WOW... this shit is awesome, BRAH. No, really, wow. Is most of their shit this good? It's like hardcore, but with shrooms.
Posted by: Michael | Wednesday, April 27, 2005 at 08:21 AM
Yes, most of their other songs are this good. Sometimes, the vocals are a bit much, when he gets growly. And, you can tell they were big Zappa fans (not Moon Unit or Dweezil) when it gets skronky. However, there's some genuine insanity sauce on their two seven inches. The records are eally hard to find (I paid $13 for the second EP a couple years back), but Lost & Found in Germany did a reissue several years ago that is also out of print.
Posted by: Panzram | Wednesday, April 27, 2005 at 10:40 AM
Dude.. Dave Clifford posting on this thing. Good times man.
Posted by: shelbot | Wednesday, April 27, 2005 at 10:51 AM
holy fuck, insane stuff. thanks for posting this.
Posted by: guy | Thursday, April 28, 2005 at 12:06 AM
Saw them play once - crazy stuff. They were sort of part of a Maryland axis that included Spastic Rats, Christ on a Crutch but they also had buddies in DC (I'm blanking on the name of the DC band I saw them play with but it wasn't a Dischord group) that got them shows.
Thanks for the link in yr blogroll - will recip when I get a chance.
Posted by: Jim H | Tuesday, May 03, 2005 at 09:47 AM
UM was actually from Northern Virginia, not Maryland.
Posted by: jfox | Monday, November 07, 2005 at 06:18 PM