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Oct 11, 2008 13:10

Ahh, to be 15 again, poring over the pages of Maximumrocknroll, looking for interesting things to special order from the record store. That, of course, is how I came upon Schlong - Punk Side Story, which was billed as a punk version of the West Side Story. At that age, I had never heard or seen the West Side Story, but this was the age before every shitty pop-punk band recorded ironic covers, before crappy record labels put out shit compilations like "Punk Goes Crunk" or whatever, so it seemed like a good idea to me. And let me tell you: I listened to the shit out of that CD. Sloppy, screechy punk songs, telling the tale of the Sharks and the Jets. The forbidden love of Tony and Maria. A retelling of Romeo and Juliet, the play I had pretty much ignored when we were forced to read it in freshman English. I listened to it so much, I knew all the words, which made it very weird when I actually found my mom's original cast recording of the West Side Story LP -- listening to string orchestras playing and singers who could actually carry a tune seemed so wrong. Even more so when I finally saw the movie, senior year of high school: the way this story should be told is by kids with out-of-tune guitars who can't sing in tune at all. The Punk Side Story is beautiful, an underappreciated gem. It was nice to come back to that curious teenager stage.

As always, if you decide to download the record from the link above, I'd love to hear your thoughts on it.
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