On this very night, ten years ago, along this same stretch of road in dense fog just like this. I heard the best concert I’ve ever heard. There was this sound, like a garbage truck dropped off the Empire State Building, or maybe it sounded more like a Girth Quake, Live, in a basement, in Albany, New York. And when they finally pulled the bodies from the pit, it sounded something like this…
Sorry, maybe I got some wires crossed there.
“What Got You Stoked In The First Place?” Is Girth Control’s debut album, recorded live in a basement in Albany in 2015, as the intro paragraph alluded to, and now, 10 years later, for the first time, is being re-released as studio recordings for the first time, and the new recordings are definitely worth picking up. The CD version features both versions of the songs as a side A (new recordings) and a side B (originals)… except all on one side, because it’s a CD and not a cassette or vinyl.
The songs are mostly high-energy punk or ska, mostly about drinking beer, getting older, and having fun. The New York three-piece band seems to run on the philosophy that life is short and you need to have fun with it. The songs embrace going over the top, bad puns, and high-energy fun. I’d argue the most fun song on the album is “Beer Me”, a fast-paced, mostly punk song, and then the drum fill starts going with the chant “Give me a B, give me an E, give me an E, give me an R” which speeds up and repeats, you can’t help cheering the band on.
My favorite song on the album is probably “Girthquake”. In pure punk form, the song lasts a solid 90 seconds (not dissimilar to any of the rest of the songs). Girthquake features a tsunami of surf punk vibes, sirens, and my favorite drums on the album. It’s not that the song’s lyrics say anything special; it’s just nonstop fun energy.
“Neverending 40” is one of the most ska-influenced tracks about having a magical 40 that never empties, that remains cold forever, and the heartbreak of nearly losing it and the misadventures of searching for the misplaced beverage.
While most of the album is just absurd nonsense and fun, the title track is actually lyrically more serious. The song deals with getting older and trying to rekindle the fires that ignited our passions when we were younger- as we fight off the monotony and mundanity and rediscover passion with our friends. What got you stoked in the first place? Was it the music? Was it the friends? It’s never too late to go back and rediscover new things to fall in love with.
The re-release cuts out a couple of minutes of crowd engagement and tuning from the original, which actually makes it much easier to listen to, but both versions end with an amazing, slightly altered, cover of Loverboy’s “Working for the Weekend”, although in this version, Everybody’s “girthing for the weekend”. It’s a terrific punk cover that feels perfectly placed with the rest of the album.
If you’ve never heard of Girth Control, this is the perfect album to pick up and see what you’ve been missing out on- and if you decide to buy a copy of the album, be sure to tell them Large Marge sent ya.
Written by Gimp Leg
