A year later it was included on the seminal Rodney On The Roq compilation album released by Posh Boy Records. That early line up recorded the classic version of 'Bloodstains' in 1979 as a demo produced by Daniel R. The group was formed in1l979 in Placentia, a small town close to Fullerton and Anaheim, by frontman Mike Palm on guitar and lead vocals, Steve Soto on bass and Scott Miller on drums. Adventurous southern California punk trio Agent Orange was the first band to mix surf rock with punk. The theater is on the left.Vinyl LP pressing. * Whereabouts: Take the San Diego (405) Freeway to Harbor Boulevard go north and take the third right, Lake Center Drive. * Where: The Galaxy Concert Theatre, 3503 S. * When: Friday at 8 p.m., with Purple Bosco and Supernovice. CD ratings range from * to ****, with three stars denoting a solid recommendation.) (“Virtually Indestructible” is available at shows or from Agent Orange, P.O. In that sense, the hopeful grown-up of “Virtually Indestructible” has exactly the same motivation as the threatened, insecure teen of “Living in Darkness.” punks, which was to try different things and follow one’s own path. In other words, he’s carrying forward the ethic of the best early O.C. “You Belong to Me” is slow, sensuous and seductive “Broken Dreams” is a poppy anthem with acoustic rhythm guitar flourishes, and “So Close and Yet So Far” gurgles along brightly, recalling the Modern English nugget “I Melt With You.”Įlsewhere, Palm employs touches of Nugent-like metallic squall-guitar that are sure to offend punk purists. On “Virtually Indestructible,” Palm continues to make music that’s his own no bandwagon-jumping here to sound contemporary, just an emphasis on music that, for all its fundamental muscle and dark drive, is fairly diverse. With its surf music influences and strong melodic sense, Agent Orange always stood against hard-core punk’s blaring orthodoxy. Against a climate of pervasive punk-alternative irony and gloom, Palm won’t back away from his conviction that the simple act of rocking is a jolting tonic.
Still, there’s much to be said for Agent Orange’s music of affirmation. It’s time to find a way to fix these broken dreams.
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Actually, some judicious touches of that old bleakness and murky mystery would have lent emotional balance and depth to the upbeat “Virtually Indestructible.” Even when contemplating disappointment, in “Broken Dreams,” Palm sounds full of optimism, verve and can-do spirit: Now in his early 30s, Palm has shed the cloak of teenage fear and paranoia that drove AO’s tremendous first album, “Living in Darkness” (1981).
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The core theme running through “Virtually Indestructible” is Palm’s continued zest for rocking, straightforwardly set forth in the catchy opening tune, “This Is All I Need.” He’s a splendid guitar player, with a sharp sense of how to array multitrack parts for dramatic effect-witness the elemental swarm of “The Electric Storm” (which came out in 1991 as a vinyl single) and the dynamic chordal surge of “Tiki Ti,” an original surf-guitar instrumental that’s strong enough compositionally to rank with the early ‘60s nuggets that were one of Palm’s chief inspirations while growing up in Placentia. Strange for a key inspiration of the Offspring, but Palm remains on his own, without label backing, as he sells the initial pressing of “Virtually Indestructible” only at gigs and via mail-order. It has been a full 10 years since Agent Orange’s last album of new material after that release, the excellent “This Is the Voice,” Palm broke with his old bandmates, James Levesque and Scott Miller wrangled with his now-defunct record label, Enigma went through a few more sets of bassists and drummers scrimped for money to pay for studio time and, finally, has emerged with only the third full-length studio album of a career that dates back to 1978. In terms of music biz clout, founder and creative spark Mike Palm and his latest lineup (bassist Sam Bolle and ace session drummer Charlie Quintana on the record Bolle and new addition Dusty Watson live) have virtually nothing going for them.
Proof that punk rock isn’t just a passing phase lies not with the success of the MTV fave-of-the-minute but with the endurance of a band such as Agent Orange.