aka The Vinyl Villain incorporating Sexy Loser
#029– Flophouse – ‘Right Now’ (Harp Records ’91)
Dear friends,
I mean, come on: if you are honest to yourselves, you knew all along that this was absolutely inevitable, didn’t you?
The thing is, as already explained in the last post, living in a village in the middle of nowhere in the 80’s, no internet, TV with three channels only, all under public law, my sole resource for new music was John Peel on the radio. And those of you a) located on this side of the ocean and b) of a certain age and c) with a liking for things not too mainstream (which, let’s face facts, will 100% apply to everyone reading this nonsense. Apart from Johnny and Brian.) will surely have heard a BBC or BFBS program presented by John Peel back in those golden days of the Cold War. And if you did, you will surely know that very often records were played which only appealed to those, let’s say, with an appetite for the bizarre.
Now, nothing wrong with this, of course: there’s no accounting for taste after all, but my approval for quite a lot of “those” records constitute the dilemma I am in now with this series. Why? Well, the more unheard-of these bands were some 40 years ago, the harder it is to ascertain any reliable information on the internet today. In addition to this, very often the specific record I heard on Peel remained the specific band’s only output. And this, in combination, is the reason why on occasion there isn’t pretty much I can tell you about my specific single of choice …. which explains the sentence introducing all of this stammering!
So, to cut a(nother) long story short, here’s the only thing I found on the net about today’s band, alas it’s Trouserpress quite slagging them off really: Flophouse.
“Produced by Peter Case, this mild-mannered San Francisco quartet’s uneventful debut proffers nicely played folk-rock (genus Californius), alternately sung by bassist Kim Osterwalder and guitarist J.C. Hopkins. Cello, violin, piano, mandolin, harmonica and trombone help color the tunes, but Hopkins’ material (and voice; hers is much better) lacks character, and the band doesn’t do anything special that would make up for it.”
Well, I can’t argue with Trouserpress, because I never heard Flophouse’s first album from 1990. But somehow I doubt that the review can be taken entirely seriously, bearing the strength of this single in mind, which came out just one year later:
mp3: Flophouse – Right Now
To be fair, if it weren’t for the wonderful Kim Osterwalder, I might think differently about this record. But because of her, it remains a real treat and therefore deserves to be included in this series.
Enjoy!
THE NEW VINYL VILLAIN 
I can’t say I’m bothered about ‘the facts’ of a record from long ago. Sometimes the mystery add to the enjoyment of the music. I know that I still sing some lyrics as I think I heard rather than what the lyrics actually are. The internet had been a mine of information but… sometimes… personal experience is best.
I’ve never heard of this band. The song doesn’t really grab me but the outro does. The melody, in places, reminds me of the Vaselines Dying For It.
Unknown to me. A little heavy on the distortion for what’s not much of a lead. But I looked up Kim Osterwalder and her paintings are nice!
I used to see J.C. Hopkins and Flophouse occasionally in San Francisco. While J.C. was obviously talented, the problem seemed that he couldn’t decide if he was gonna be Bob Dylan or more noisey indie rock. Later on he went all Hogey Carmichael, moving to New York, joining up with Nora Jones and Madeleine Peyroux.