Music

Jugular (Reissue) Year: 1997 | Run Time: 1:06:20

Track List

Weak One Now [3:22]
Songs on the Radio [4:01]
Something To Hold on To [4:12]
As Big as Christ [4:42]
Love Cocoon [3:45]
In the Morning [6:31]
Thorn in Your Flesh [2:13]
Take No Prisoners [4:16]
Watching the Moonlight [3:52]
Flames of Hell [4:28]
America [5:56]
Drunk on the Tears [5:31]
Losin' It [4:43]
Words of Love Spoken [3:59]
Who Knows When the Sunrise Will Be [4:49]

About Jugular (Reissue)

In 1990, Bill Mallonee, a school teacher who didn't learn the guitar or try writing music until he was 30, recorded 13 of his own songs under the name Vigilantes of Love. He'd written and performed songs with local Athens, GA, bands like the Cone Ponies and Bed of Roses in the few years before, but Vigilantes of Love was his own project. He says the band name was inspired by a song from a New Order album, but Jugular doesn't sound anything like Joy Division. These are songs driven by acoustic guitar, accordion, and harmonica, songs about the sad state of radio and the struggle of life, "folk songs on speed" that aim straight for the jugular. Several songs from this album still hold places in the band's roster. Years later in 1998, the guys on the road bought an old accordian and then-bassist Jake Bradley learned to play it just so they could perform "America" from this album. The earnest and empassioned "Drunk on the Tears" finds faults with society but even more with the singer himself, showing an honesty and openness that have become a sort of trademark for Bill. When Fingerprint Records re-issued the album on CD in 1993, they included two extra tracks that were recorded during the Killing Floor sessions.

Did you know?

Bill has said that this album changed his life because he left working with emotionally disturbed children and instead became one. At the end of 1995, VIA records was going to distribute VoL's discs to the "Christian Market," but decided not to let Jugular out into this market because of "Love Cocoon" and three other "bad" songs. VIA claims this was the decision of their distributor, Diamante, which they soon parted ways with.

Quotes from Bill Mallonee

May 9, 1995: I find Jugular hard to listen to. I like the spirit behind it. But it was done so quick. It was supposed to be nothing more than a glorified demo. We weren't going to make a record. We never thought it would get past a cassette format.

May 9, 1995: Like four days, maybe three. I think the fourth day was mixing. I remember I borrowed the guitar on it from a guy named Don Chambers. Don plays in a really cool group now called Vaudeville. They are a real hard edged kind of group. Anyway, I borrowed this really old Takamine from him. It sounded better than Martins or Guilds. I remember that I had one more song I wanted to do. It was "Who Knows When The Sunrise Will Be." I called Mark Hall and said we've got like one hour to get this song on tape, cause Don's coming out to get his guitar. So we laid it down and Mark put that accordion solo on.

Aug 20, 1996: Jugular feels like an album without a low end, because he's [Mark Hall] playing in and around the melody line. That's what's beautiful about that record. It's very intoxicating. I've never heard anybody else play like that. Accordians are great. It's the rock instrument of the future. Who'd a thunk it?

Jul 15, 2000: It was done over the course of 3-4 days in a small utility shed about 12 miles outside town... mostly done "live" around a couple of mics... we had rented a good mic for vocals and instruments and began piecing together our first homespun record... those tunes and about 8 others which were in the set list but never recorded were our prototype for this new, more intimate but still rev-ed up thing that Vigilantes was becoming.

Jul 15, 2000: It still feels pretty organic, first take, and quaintly inspired in several places... perhaps a bit over-sung in places... it was really just a snapshot of what we were doing at the time... I still love to listen to it... almost all the tunes felt like they found a mark... the sparse arrangements and plaintive voice along with Mark's French-Impressionistic accordion parts still sound unique and fresh... there was certainly a chemistry about it... it was urban folk, some blues... and smart-aleck college band bookishness wrapped around spiritual questing...

Jun 17, 2001: I was on a roll... that was the period of the "oh I'm so hip urban folkie with a beat up guitar but I gotta college loan to pay off and this sure beats working" era.

A Review by Jeremiah Lewis / May 3, 2002

It had been at least six years since I'd heard the original release of Jugular, back when I was still in high school. I'd always loved the driving rhythms of many of the songs, but I had never really listened to the slower songs like "Losin' It" and "Who Knows When the Sunrise Will Be". I'm going to go over my favourite songs on this album - the rest you'll have to discover for yourself.

The album begins with a medium-paced song with a guitar opening, an accordion melding in after the first couple of measures. "Weak One Now" is plaintive yet reassuring look at modern life and dealing with all that could be in our lives. Listen to the words to receive the full impact of this song.

"Songs on the Radio" is a funny and pointed criticism of the music available in commercial format today. The desire to hear good music is an ingrained part of our lives, and yet we're fed drivel on the airwaves, given nothing of substance. Amusing too, because this song, of any available, will be the last to hit airwaves.

Listen to Bill's straining voice as he begs "Leave me somethin' SOLID I can hang on to!". For those who wonder at the doubts left in faith, Bill answers it in this song with a clear hope in what he knows to be true.

"America" is another of what I like to call 'tableau' songs revealing some aspect of history or story back in time. This is a respectful yet questioning song of the way America has treated its every day heroes.

"Losin' It", probably my favourite song on this album is so heartbreakingly beautiful, with the cry of a man at the end of his rope, with no hope yet having the faith to say "Hold me tight, I'm losin' it." Depression can take a hold of a person, but there is salvation in the arms that hold you tight.

As I said before I didn't really listen to the slower songs on this album, and when I did, I realized that Bill has a wonderful outlook on life. He's seen some rough times; in fact he's suffered from depression at times. Throughout his songs one can see an interminable hope of salvation even in the worst of times. Jugular (Reissue) is a testament to that hope.

A Review by D. Alan Hurst / Sep 2, 2001

"[they] come back together
for you and me"

For some, "favorite" albums are like stamps in a passport. "I got here via a slow, dark train," or, "I started out because of a parting shot." My first album was the VOL compilation, then Slow Dark Train. In fact, I had every other Vigilantes album before I found a copy of Jugular. And maybe that has something to do with my love of it. The rush of victory. If you've ever tried to get a copy of Jugular, you know the feeling. So, this is to say, my feelings toward Jugular are biased at best.

To say there is a powerfulness and an honesty to these songs is to describe most of Bill's catalog or any songwriter's catalog...even the bad ones. I believe Bill has gone on to say these songs represent his "pompous ass phase" or something like that. And maybe that's true. But, also on the (right) side of truth is the soul-shattering humility found in these songs up to and including the best use of "shit" I have ever heard and likely ever will.

These are the songs no one will ever be ready for. Whereever you are, they'll pull you into the gutter and (if you pay attention) you have a chance of coming out clean(er) on the other side.

"Hold me tight" is a mantra. Hold me tight, hold me tight, say it until your tounge can't get loose. Holdmetightholdmetightholdmetight think until your mind can't get loose. And, if you're lucky, it won't.

And what about when you're so pent up and hellbound you can't say or think? When the walls are looking like they have a penchant for making a sandwich out of you? Hope? Yes. But what does that mean? "In the morning they may be gone," is hope. "In the morning," tomorrow, or the next day, the future, in paradise, "they" all those little and middle and bigger things that get stacked up in the windsheild, "may" maybe, hopefully will, with grace and mercy "will be gone," vanquished.

"And I will help you bear it," I heard Bill sing, "but first you got to share it...America." The dream is about his dad, my dad, our dad fighting it out for whatever reason and to whatever end but it winds up in the same place, "I salute you."

So if you're losin' it, usin' it, abusin' it, or confusin' it...if you're a pompous ass in search of pomposity...if you're drunk or watching or in need of something...find this album. Two thumbs up.

Credits

Bill "Malice" Mallonee: guitar, vocals, drums

Marcus Aurelius Hall: accordion

Jonny "Dog-Mess" Evans: harmonica

Oglethorpe County Tree Frog Chorus: backing vocals

"Slap Happy": (last of a dying breed) drums, percussion

Billy Holmes: mandolin, bass, backing vocals

Liner Notes

places (and more people)
recorded at saturn recording studio, arnoldsville, ga. in january & febuary 1990. produced by the vigilantes. engineered by cam mullally. recorded at maxwell sound, athens ga. in december 1991 & january 1992. produced by peter buck, mark heard and v.o.l. engineered and mixed by mark heard, los angeles, ca. executive producers: dan russell & chuck long. cover design and layout by harv. photography by emmy dudley and melony wilson. digitally remasterd for compact disc by fingerprint.

things
8-track source deck, tascam 48-OB. console, tascam m-50. digital mastering deck, panasonic sv-3500. microphones, neumann u-87, sennheiser 421, shure 839 lavalier. 24-track source deck, mci jh-24. consoles, tac scorpion. trident b-range. preamps, neve 1081. microphones, akg 451. neumann u-47 tube, teletronix la-2a and fairchild 660 tube compressors. other stuff.

thanks
ed larson, kevin weinrich, brenda mallonee, sue evans, dan orme, uc, aron homberg, lee moody, sci lib people, the mercy seat, john keane, mark maxwell, dan russell, chuck long, joel russell, harv, john flynn, and buddy miller.