Reatards

Playing no-frills, lo-fi rock & roll that was raw, wild, and unapologetically manic, the Reatards were the first project of note from <a href="spotify:artist:3cAGUcRbwsFHwKbJv8FT4T">Jay Reatard</a>, who would go on to become one of the most celebrated figures on the garage punk scene before his unexpected death in early 2010. The Reatards literally began as a bedroom project, with 15-year-old <a href="spotify:artist:3cAGUcRbwsFHwKbJv8FT4T">Reatard</a> making primitive four-track cassette recordings at his home in Memphis, Tennessee, on which he played guitar, sang, and provided percussion in the form of "bangin' on a bucket." These early recordings were crude but showed genuine promise, and in 1997, Memphis' <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Goner+Records%22">Goner Records</a> (run by Eric Friedl, whose group <a href="spotify:artist:14UQmxJzeKtmgYzJ1sEJdi">the Oblivians</a> were a major influence on <a href="spotify:artist:3cAGUcRbwsFHwKbJv8FT4T">Jay</a>) released the first Reatards record, a 7" EP drawn from <a href="spotify:artist:3cAGUcRbwsFHwKbJv8FT4T">Reatard</a>'s bedroom sessions called Get Real Stupid. Another former <a href="spotify:artist:14UQmxJzeKtmgYzJ1sEJdi">Oblivian</a> and Memphis tastemaker, <a href="spotify:artist:4SshVhFgHYFHasFzZCTc6w">Greg Cartwright</a>, liked <a href="spotify:artist:3cAGUcRbwsFHwKbJv8FT4T">Reatard</a>'s early material enough to play drums with him, and appeared on a cassette-only release called Fuck Elvis, Here's the Reatards. By the time the Reatards cut their first full-length album for <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Goner%22">Goner</a>, 1998's Teenage Hate, they had evolved into a proper band, with <a href="spotify:artist:3cAGUcRbwsFHwKbJv8FT4T">Reatard</a> joined by second guitarist Steve Albundy Reatard and drummer Ryan Elvis Wong Reatard. After the Reatards recorded a handful of 7"s , <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Empty+Records%22">Empty Records</a> issued the group's second LP in 1999, Grown Up Fucked Up, but by this time, the Reatards were competing for <a href="spotify:artist:3cAGUcRbwsFHwKbJv8FT4T">Jay</a>'s attention with a number of other projects, most notably his synth-punk band <a href="spotify:artist:19MNF0TUercueIIxCeQyHa">the Lost Sounds</a>, as well as <a href="spotify:artist:7LdpJCqqLmVsM6XWfIEMHu">the Bad Times</a> (a collaboration with Eric Friedl), <a href="spotify:artist:7DfvgFQryp4BxC3Jbfpyh9">the Final Solutions</a> (featuring <a href="spotify:artist:3cAGUcRbwsFHwKbJv8FT4T">Reatard</a> and members of the Jackmonkeys), and Angry Angels. In 2004, <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Empty+Records%22">Empty Records</a> issued Bedroom Disasters, a collection of unreleased Reatards recordings and non-LP singles, while <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Goner%22">Goner</a> issued a live Reatards LP the same year. Around the same time, <a href="spotify:artist:19MNF0TUercueIIxCeQyHa">the Lost Sounds</a> split, and <a href="spotify:artist:3cAGUcRbwsFHwKbJv8FT4T">Jay</a> re-formed the Reatards, playing live shows and releasing a new album, Not Fucked Enough, on <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Empty%22">Empty</a> in 2005. It proved to be the Reatards' last hurrah; in 2006, <a href="spotify:artist:3cAGUcRbwsFHwKbJv8FT4T">Jay Reatard</a> stepped out as a solo artist, and nearly all his subsequent recordings would be issued under his own name. In August 2015, the out of print Grown Up Fucked Up was reissued by <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Goner+Records%22">Goner Records</a>. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi