I was the Mix-Tape Master of Deltona High School. Deltona, Florida, USA. Somehow, after all these years, I've even kept tapes from way back in the day.
You reading this, Kim? I still have that tape you made for me, all covered in bubblegum wrappers and Band-Aid brand bandages and your sweet profanity. Tapes packed so tight and deep with angst and desperation that songs get chopped off at their bitter ends, are left to rot in some chocolate brown Memorex hell. All Siouxsie Sioux and Jesus and Mary Chain and Jane's Addiction.
And Liz Phair.
Liz Phair's shockingly great debut,
Exile in Guyville, was released during our junior year. I was 16. I remember standing against the side of someone's parked car, engine hot, windows rolled all the way down, cassette tape spinning, radio pumping "Fuck and Run," feeling scared and excited and
shocked by this woman. I must've received that song on dozens of mix-tapes that year. What were people trying to tell me?
The album was said to be some sort of song by song response to the Rolling Stones'
Exile on Main Street, but what did we know about that then? All we knew was that Liz Phair used words like no one else, strummed her guitar like no one else. In her broken highs and husky lows, she offered secrets to be repeated between classes in study halls, offered secrets that made guys feel sensitive, that made girls feel strong. But it was tracks like "Divorce Song" and "Flower" and "Johnny Sunshine" that really killed, that made me want to rescue her. I will love you forever, Liz. Forever and ever. Don't you worry.
ATO Records celebrates the 15th anniversary of
Exile in Guyville with a special edition vinyl package, complete with bonus 7" and four tracks taken from the original recording sessions. Acoustic Sounds told me so.
