Agent Orange: Living in Darkness

Agent Orange: Living in Darkness

1981

Posh Boy Records

Format I Own it on: Vinyl

Track Listing: 1. Too Young to Die  2. Everything Turns Grey  3. Miserlou  4. The Last Goodbye  5. No Such Thing  6. A Cry for Help in a World Gone Mad  7. Bloodstains  8. Living in Darkness



I  picked this up about 6 months ago when I was going through a brief period where I was buying any Posh Boy vinyl I could dig up...During my teenage years, I was very familiar with the 90's expanded CD version of this, but hadn't heard it since then...

 I remember the CD had a few songs I liked, but it didn't knock me flat ass backwards or anything...

I think a lot of 90's kids had a similar love/hate relationship with the Agent Orange...Sorta like the 90's Dickies, I was introduced to the group by the bandmember's constant entitled griping that new punk band's were simply "ripping them off"...Of course, once you hear the recriminations, you buy the old band's albums to see if the accusations are valid (oh, and they never are)...

So after you get over the petty, desperate, litigious, cash-grabbing nature of the folks responsible for the art, you start to realize what great songs "Bloodstains" and "Everything Turns Grey" actually are...So I guess their gamble kinda paid off...A new generation of kids were picking up their album as a result, however they may have sacrificed a bit of their reputation for these additional sales...However, reputation can carry a lot of weight in the punk rock community...

The band's approach was really novel for the time, adding Dick Dale/Ventures surf-rock to angsty California punk, and they has a great ear for moody little melodies...I also find the relatively laid back vocals, set against the tightly-coiled punk appealing...They really avoid the whole standard punk "bludgeoning you over the head with jackhammer riffs" thing, although "Bloodstains" does show they can work themselves up into a convincing frenzy when the mood is right...And their cover of "Miserlou" leaves no doubt  that these guys could really play...

I do think the original vinyl version helped me to appreciate this album a bit more...It was kinda swallowed up in the deluxe reissue, but here the compact nature of the 20-minute original really shines...There's really no time for fatigue to set in here...

So I'm glad I gave this another listen after all these years...I'll concede that I originally underestimated it...It offered something a little different and for that reason I'll argue that it's earned its place in the pantheon of early 80's punk classics.. Plus the cover is real  blue and orange ...I like blue and orange...

 Here's "Living in Darkness" by Agent Orange...Enjoy...