YANK CRIME

Growing up in Northeast Pennsylvania was a trip for someone into punk but completely at odds with the local Zeitgeist. On the job at the local chain record store, witnessing kids come in was a pageant on parade: the hometown goths, three months later transformed en masse into whitepower skinheads, then everyone worshipping at the spiritual altar of Ray Cappo for a bit—and eventually, yeah, Deadheads. It was all puzzling to wonder where one fit in the aesthetic and categoric realm of just listening to damn music, frustrated that the local take on it involved such lemminglike migration to group mentality in a genre that encouraged individualism.

Relief emerged in the form of a pal with wheels who could whisk us to NYC or Philly (or anywhere, for that matter), where we’d sponge up every kind of musical thought we could go experience in the late ’80s/early ’90s. Shopping at Philly or Princeton Record Exchange always resulted in a bounty of outward-thinking music we could share, play on college radio, and learn from. In the onslaught of indie 7-inch singles we hoovered up, I brought home a mysterious one from Peer Platters in Hoboken in ’92, Drive Like Jehu’s “Bullet Train to Vegas” 7-inch out of San Diego: a panicked onslaught of screamo/ sandpaper-coarse vox and incredible post-hardcore assault, complete with rubbery zigzag guitar lines rampaging over everything. Their self-titled debut LP smoked too. Order and tension were there, but all out the door in a mass of confusion underlined by simplicity. It was like someone let all the elastic out of Lugazi’s underwear.

Finally schlepping out to see Jehu at CBGB confirmed it all: normal, unassuming guys on stage taking punk to otherworldly places. Guitarists John Reis and Rick Lroberg migrated over from the band Pitchfork (Reis was also revving up Rocket Prom the Crypt), and rhythm section Mike Kennedy and Mark Trombino locked in with infallible structure amidst the hurricane of spindly, dizzying dissonance. DLJ’s all-encompassing approach to avoiding cosmetic and stylistic preconceived notions marked their individualism. These guys were probably going through the same thing in San Diego, feeling like outsiders every time they played to the jocks in L.A.

Rick’s brief time in the anarchic percussive-based Crash Worship, and his affinity for simplistic self invention on guitar chording (struck by the cupid arrow of Sonic Youth’s “Death Valley ’69”)—coupled with Reis’ punk purism as a riff aficionado—birthed a huge bounty of places guitar could go in a post-HC world. In 1994, their next LP Yank Crime levitated the band to Interscope and sealed the deal for me: Out of all the post-Nevermind market-buying major label panic, here was the shining jewel of the era. This record is an artful, emotional trip to wherever it wants to go, tempering beauty and fury into a sprawling event.

“Here Come the Rome Plows” busts right out the gate with chaos, Proberg’s yawp slightly buried in the blast that reeks of mathiness—yet in Jehu’s world, that of course meant 2 + 2 = 5. “Human Interest” sports Neul-like guitars that hover like bees before showcasing a series of prog sections and shifts, varied time signatures, and Prankenstein-like passages stitched together in their trademark blur. The nine-minute “Luau” especially unfolds into a pastiche of duck-and-cover guitar dive-bombs, a near-sea-chanty sing-along about indigenous indignities: “Kill off the tourists and we’ll all sleep sound/Cash in their fillings and blow it in town/We’ll blow it on rifles, we’ll blow it on drinks/Head for the corner, head for the sink,” around a chorus of “Aloha! Aloha! Suit up! Luau! Luau! Luau! Luau!” Such politics had yet to be illuminated by peers in such a manner. Their template was now in full force, though sadly they called it quits as Reis developed Rocket From the Crypt. The Froberg/Reis team fired up Hot Snakes from 1999 to 2015 (and again in 2018), another glorious band worth all your attention for its even more precise condensation of power hooks and riffs, and Rick also helped drive the excellent NYC-based Obits in conjunction with his continuing work in graphic art, sleeve design, and flyers.

Froberg’s sudden, unexpected natural passing this past June was horrific news to all who knew him, and he was a man who thrived on his huge network of friends everywhere. We became acquainted during his Brooklyn years; he was an endlessly cheerful fanatic of music, culture, art, and humor whom you could spend easy bar-side time with totally oblivious to his legend, which he never leaned on one bit, just being excited about the now.

Jehu reunited for a bit in 2015. I witnessed them playing to a rapturous response in Barcelona to thousands at Primavera. We were there to broadcast, and Rick was on the ball making sure we had a great mix for radio before going to the massive stage, where they commanded the environs with even more power than at CB’s, playing lots of Yank Crime. A neverending toast to this album, his work, and a guy who subsisted on the moment. We are blessed with his art and influence hereon.