I felt a serious sense of loss when I’d heard that Biscuit had died. This feeling wasn’t fueled so much by my being an unabashed Big Boys fan—although no doubt there was much of that mixed in there as well—as it was by knowing that one of punk rock’s true originals was no longer around to stir some shit. To me, Biscuit, and the Big Boys, embodied all that was good about punk—the freedom to let your freak flag fly, the unabashed creativity, the desire to push the boundaries and not do the same old thing over and over, and, of course, the unleashing of some of the greatest music ever put to tape, the latter of which is in full evidence here. Collected for your listening pleasure are an unreleased Big Boys track (a live version of “Identity Crisis”), an track from Biscuit’s post-Big Boys band, Cargo Cult (a previously unreleased demo cut, “Computer Date Killer”), and two cuts by his last band, Texas Biscuit Bombs (live versions of Big Boys standards “Frat Cars” and “Baby Let’s Play God”). Although it seems a bit sparse as a retrospective for an individual so revered in the underground, it does serve as a nice reminder of and introduction to his life and music, and the fact that it’s a benefit single only makes it that much more indispensable.
–jimmy (www.ratpatrolrecs.com)