Trouser Press was a rock and roll magazine started in New York in 1974 as a mimeographed fanzine by editor/publisher Ira Robbins, fellow Who fan Dave Schulps, and Karen Rose. Its original scope was British bands and artists (early issues featured the slogan “America’s Only British Rock Magazine”). Initial issues contained occasional interviews with major artists like Brian Eno and Robert Fripp and extensive record reviews. It gradually transformed into a professional magazine with color covers and advertising. (More from Wikipedia)
At the beginning of the “Bio” section of his website is a quote from Trouser Press that says of Phil Gammage’s music: “. . . underwrought darkside Americana echoing Nick Cave’s fascinations minus the melodrama. Which might well make Gammage this generation’s Hank Williams.”
In 1982, Certain General signed with the New York independent record label Labor Records and issued their first release, an EP called Holiday of Love. The mini-album was produced by Peter Holsapple of the dB’s and mixed by Michael Gira of the experimental rock band Swans – “an interesting pairing if there ever was one”, said Nick West in a review for Bucketfull of Brains. (I don’t know much about Swans, except for their startling 1988 cover of the Joy Division masterpiece, “Love Will Tear Us Apart”). According to Wikipedia: “Holiday [of Love] garnered rave reviews, among them a Trouser Press piece that cited the disc as being created ‘for all the teenage devils of the world’.”
(March 2015)
