The Tar Babies: A Sampler

The guitarist from the Tar Babies, Bucky Pope,  has a new album out with a band called Negative Example. Ben Ratliff tells me so in the NY Times. He calls Pope “one of the great non virtuosic guitarists of the era.”

Here’s a Tar Babies song,  Rockhead.

Here’s another tune.

Well, actually, it’s hard to tell who are Tar Babies and who are other bands called Tar Babies. But this is their first release, a 12″ put together from sessions produced by Butch Vig and Bob Mould. It’s a much heavier headbanging sound than the funk-inflected tunes above.

Tar Babies were from Madison Wisconsin in the 1980s. They reformed in the 90s for an elpee, and then played some more in the Aughts as the Bar Tabbies.

The only Negative Example album I could find on YouTube was this cover of the Beach Boys Disney Girls.

 

5 thoughts on “The Tar Babies: A Sampler

  1. Like if Beck and Red Hot Chili Peppers had a (tar) baby.

    Not my thing, but I’d exchange current popular (shit) music for this in a heartbeat.

  2. In 1992 I was happy to learn the tar babies were popular with the snowboarding krowd in Squaw Valley. We were listening to ‘no contest’ and their first album ‘fried milk’ that was an older favorite
    which I worked to love. Bringing the saxophone in to their hard rock sound made it great for me.

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