Paul Westerberg - Dirty Diesel

Dirty Diesel MP3

It may seem unorthodox to begin a punk mp3 blog with a song by Paul Westerberg or that the mp3 linked takes you to a Vagrant Records website.

First let me just say that Vagrant Records have gone through quite a change. 5 years ago they had the ultimate emo/pop punk roster featuring such all-stars as Get Up Kids, Hey Mercedes, Saves the Day, and A New Found Glory. But now there is some definite quality control going on over there.

While Rocket From The Crypt were there from the beginning, the signing of Paul Westerberg seemed like a strange addition. Westerberg, whose career with The Replacements was never high profile, managed to secure a cult following. His relation to the punk or emo community was never strong; there was no correlation for Vagrant putting out Paul Westerberg records other than the fact that he is a great songwriter and he was still making good records. Also a recently reformed Lemonheads have put out a record on Vagrant and the Hold Steady are part of the Vagrant family.

There’s a quote Bono liked to throw around about U2 starting off being a punk band but realizing they had something more to say. I think the opposite was true for the Replacements. They may have started off being a punk band but they had less to say. They had no message. They weren’t part of a scene, they weren’t very political or revolutionary, maybe just a little confrontational and self destructive.

Paul Westerberg post-Replacements is marked by his inclusion on the soundtrack to Cameron Crowe’s Singles. The song Dyslexic Heart is a pretty great song, but maybe too clever and not grungy enough to make him the slacker icon he probably deserved to be. That’s why these Vagrant records are so important.

What’s punk rock about Paul Westerberg is his approach to songwriting and recording. His albums on Vagrant so far, Mono, Stereo, Folker, and Come Feel Me Tremble are all late night recording sessions. These songs go straight to tape. Sometimes there are bum notes, or fumbled lyrics; they may all be one-offs, and if they are, they are the best one-offs you’ve ever heard.

I listened to Come Feel Me Tremble riding the train to Philadelphia one morning. They sounded like Rolling Stones demos post Exile on Main Street. Or what I wish the Rolling Stones would have sounded like after Exile on Main Street.

There’s an economy to Westerberg’s songwriting. He can be clever at times, but it’s not cringe-inducing. What he’s good at is coming up Satisfaction style riffs that aren’t as distracting as the riff from Satisfaction.

A lot of the style of these Vagrant records may actually be affect, but I don’t care if they are. The way the beginning of the song Dirty Diesel is cut off, whether it’s because it’s the beginning of the tape or it’s meant to just sound like that; I don’t care I like it.