Less Than Jake: Losing Streak [HIP-O RECORDS]

Why you'll love it

This vinyl edition brings Losing Streak back to shelves for its 30th anniversary year. It was the band's first album for Capitol, and the brass-and-buzzsaw sound of "Automatic" and "Johnny Quest Thinks We're Sellouts" set the template for late 90s ska punk.

This edition

• Back on vinyl for the album's 30th anniversary
• 33 RPM

About the album

Few bands have ever been as openly devoted to Pez candy as Less Than Jake, and that sense of fun runs right through their second album. Formed in Gainesville, Florida in 1992, the band signed to Capitol after the independent Pezcore and went straight back to work with producer Michael Rosen, cutting drums and bass at Criteria Studios in Miami and everything else at Mirror Image in Gainesville.

Chris DeMakes and Roger Lima trade vocals over Vinnie Fiorello's drumming, while Buddy Schaub's trombone and the saxophones of Jessica Mills and Derron Nuhfer give every chorus a brass punch. "Happyman," "Sugar in Your Gas Tank," "Never Going Back to New Jersey" and "Lockdown" fly past, and the band re-recorded two Pezcore favourites, "Jen Doesn't Like Me Anymore" and "Johnny Quest Thinks We're Sellouts," with a bigger budget behind them.

The video for "Automatic" was built from fan footage shot at shows in Gainesville and Chicago, and it landed on MTV's 120 Minutes. Sixteen songs in about 35 minutes is a brisk pace by anyone's standards, and frankly it's the most efficient use of a Saturday afternoon we can recommend.

Also at Kops: more Less Than Jake on vinyl · browse Punk

Tracklist

Listen

On Capitol, a reissue of the 1996 album.