The Traditional Fools, Reverse Shark Attack

Before helping put San Francisco on the map as the garage-rock hub, Ty Segall was keeping Laguna Beach weirder with his crony Mikal Cronin in a band called Epsilons. From there the two went on to record a couple albums together: one bearing their names and another as The Traditional Fools. And as if Segall isn’t prolific enough these days (he released three fantastic records in 2012), In The Red is coughing up reissues of his (semi) lost gems. And, not surprisingly, they’re both good. The Traditional Fools’ 2008 self-titled debut plays it a little straighter—with one noisy, good-time rock ’n’ roll jam after another. The fidelity is on the lo end, but it’s still plenty punchy. “Snot Rag” and “Party at My House” sorta say it all. Reverse Shark Attack came out a year later and found the two getting a little weirder and more spazzy, heaping on the guitar and vocal effects. Opener “I Wear Black” sounds like an outtake from Segall’s Melted LP, and does exactly what an opener should do by getting the heart pumping some blood. Reverse Shark Attack is only slightly less memorable than The Traditional Fools, but both are a bloody good time