Nymphs- The Nymphs Review

There are a million crazy stories about the Nymphs out there on the internet, how the lead singer revenge-pissed on the desk of the record company exec who screwed her band over, the onstage oral sex, the Courtney love rivalry, but something that isn’t too often mentioned is the feat that the Nymphs pretty much created their own version of grunge as far back as 1985 in the vacuum that is New Jersey. This band only released one full-length album, but it’s definitely worth getting. At the very least, the album art is extremely cool and it perfectly illustrates the psychotic, dark, and deep sound that the Nymphs put out. At the most, the Nymphs could’ve been one of the first grunge bands out there and maybe would’ve been huge if they hadn’t been jerked around by their label.

Nymphs is an interesting CD sonically. There are songs on here that could have been on a Nirvana album, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see “The Highway” on an Alice in Chains disc at all. But then there are some songs on here that show the glam rock influence that permeated their performances (like the awful bridge that almost ruins “Sad and Damned”), so I would have to echo those reviewers who say that this is a very good bridge between glam and grunge, but it’s much more grunge than glam. There aren’t any songs on here celebrating inane male fantasies, or anything even remotely “happy.” The songs are about insanity, religious disillusionment, yearning, sycophants, social dissatisfaction, and just about every other topic that could please a punk or grunge listener. What sets this album apart (besides the fact that it was very early) is the lyrics, which are full of powerful imagery. The song “Imitating Angels” contains the lines “Those venomous fumes like ghosts imitating angels/ came and brushed death through her hair with a loving stroke/ telling her pretty lies and flowery stories/ about a place where nothing hurts and no one knows” that’s heavy, beautiful stuff that makes you think, and music that makes you think is really lacking these days, just as it was at the time the Nymphs were first starting out. But hey, if you don’t feel like thinking, just sit back and get lost in the drugged, hazy, heavy sound, buzzing guitars and banging drums.

After this album was released, the Nymphs quickly broke up. The band had been ready to release the thing since about 1989, which gave them plenty of time to piss around and get hooked on heroin, lose lovers to overdoses and create rivalries with psychotic fans. All this gave way to Inger (the lead singer) having a nervous breakdown and going back to New Jersey, spending a few years in mental institutions, and recording a pretty awesome solo CD. The band has actually “reformed” and you can find Inger, who is the only original member of the New Nymphs, at MySpace (www.myspace.com/ingerlorre). This album is supposed to be reissued, along with their even rarer EP A Practical Guide to Astral Projection, which you will hear about as soon as I can get my hands on it, and their new CD.

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Track Listing:

1. Just One Happy Day (3 stars)

2. Cold (4 stars)

3. 2 Cats (3 stars)

4. Imitating Angels (5 stars)

5. Wasting My Days (3 stars)

6. Heaven (3 stars)

7. Supersonic (3 star)

8. Sad And Damned (4 stars)

9. Death Of A Scenester (5 stars)

10. The River (2 stars)

11. Revolt (5 stars)

12. The Highway (5 stars)

This CD has been out of print since 1991 and is very rare. It can be bought on eBay and Amazon.com, but it is supposed to be reissued sometime on Sympathy for the Record Industry, so buying it from them will benefit the artists most.

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~ by infinitously on March 7, 2008.