nomeansno, "rags and bones" (1989)

Posted on April 29th, 2007 by Scraps.
Categories: Music, Songs.

Song Project #16

"Hunker down, y'all! Wooooooo-hah!" "Rags and Bones" is my favorite punk song. Right from the start, the thick low guitar riff grabs the ears and doesn't let go; when you have a riff this strong, you might as well lead off with it and run with it. We hear it twice, then everyone else joins: a drum fill, a squalling guitar, and a grinning, warning yell; by the double-cymbal crash four bars into the song, it's clear that the band knows full well what a massive song they've got.

"Christ was married on the cross; my father was married to my mother," allows the singer. "And I am married to a cigarette butt, lying in the gutter." The second time he sings "cigarette butt" the drummer emphasizes it with hits on two off beats -- this is the message, pay attention. The guitarist jumps up to play a quick three note riff (I think) repeatedly over the four-four beat -- Donald, what's the word for that? -- for two bars, while the drummer continues to stress the off beat, then back to the main riff for two more bars, and the drummer -- one ha two ha three ha -- and the singer ("Oh, that's too bad!) propel us into the chorus, with the two guitars noisily intertwining while the drummer plays a stuttering beat: then back into that massive main riff for four bars, while the drummer plays a different fill each bar. Those four bars will be back twice more.

Back into the verse: "White man, you! you! you! you! you just startin' to get -- the blues!" The guitar jumps up for the secondary verse riff again, then briefly back to the main riff, then slamming back into the chorus with a snarled "Sing it!" I love the way the singer draws out "b-o-o-o-o-ones" with the tiny stops between each "oh". Then the four bars of the main riff with the drum fills again, and the climax of the song, which is actually the coda introduced halfway through: a (mostly) descending, angry guitar riff going one, two, three, four, five, one two three four five!, one two three four five six seven eight nine ten ten ten ten, BANG.

Now the first bridge (yes, there are two). The guitars stutter with the drums, vaguely like a Led Zeppelin song, and space in the song has opened up, pulling back a bit from the intensity that has carried the song through its first minute and a half. The intensity is slowly built back up through a developing call and response, changing every four bars till by the end of the bridge it's shouting in agony. Then those wonderful four bars of the main riff with the drum fills again, and then the third verse, the frustrated nihilism at the heart of the song: "If I could choose to believe or not to believe, you know I would choose not to. But I... can't... choose... not to!" This straining at despair is a microcosm of the song. It's angry, destructive, bleak; but not only is it inspired -- great riffs -- but it's inventive, with an energy put into the assembly of the song that belies its nihilism. The lyrics want not to believe, but the music can't choose not to.

Another chorus, this time with a couple of hup! hup! hup!s and a moaning ohhhhhhhh! from the backing vocalist, then the second bridge cuts in abruptly, the strangest part of the song. The lead vocalist is almost contemplative in his wondering while the backing vocalists sound quizzical (with one of them dit-dit-ditting), and while it's just the drummer and the vocalists it sounds like a lost bridge to XTC's "Melt the Guns". But when the lead singer repeats "Who would've thought?" that killer riff kicks in again (just the low guitar for the first four bars, then it jumps up and is joined by the other guitar), and then everyone gets together for a huge monolithic repetition of the riff, blasting into the climactic coda which (both times it appears) somehow manages to trump everything else in the song.

NoMeansNo have recorded a lot of great songs in their quarter-century career, but this is their towering achievement fusing their punk sensibility and their hard-rock instincts with a tireless inventiveness that sounds like it could go on all day. "Rags and Bones" is five minutes long, but it doesn't feel long, even for a punk song; nothing in it is wasted, nothing stays in one place too long, no part of it flags. It's as awesome to me now as it was when I first heard it nearly twenty years ago. I think it's one of the twenty -- ten -- best rock songs ever made.

15 comments.

Adam

Comment on April 29th, 2007.

I love that song so very much, and you've captured a lot of why. The second bridge is possibly my favorite part, if I had to choose. (But I can't choose...)

Fred

Comment on April 29th, 2007.

>I think it’s one of the twenty — ten — best rock songs ever made.

What are the other nine?

Christina

Comment on April 29th, 2007.

That three notes spread evenly over four beats is called a triple T I believe.

Scraps

Comment on April 29th, 2007.

Adam, I thought you might be the first one here.

Fred, I don't know! It'd take a long time to chop the list down. I'm pretty sure "Rags and Bones" makes the cut, though.

Christina, I misspoke. The three notes are played on the beat, it's just that the sequence is only three notes repeated. If the notes are A, B, C, it looks like this:

A B C A  B C A B  C A B C
1 2 3 4  1 2 3 4  1 2 3 4

etc. I thought it was hemiola, but I looked it up and that's more specific.

Scraps

Comment on April 29th, 2007.

Hm, this theme doesn't seem to like the pre tag.

riffraff

Comment on April 29th, 2007.

It'd be on my top 20. Dunno that it would be on my top 10. Thanks, Scraps, for reminding me. It's seriously, and sadly, been months since it came up in rotation.

The Ogre

Comment on April 29th, 2007.

As you & i have mentioned before, it's also my favorite punk song as well.

LauraJMixon

Comment on April 30th, 2007.

Good stuff. Thanks.

Don Keller

Comment on April 30th, 2007.

I am nearly certain that what you are referring to as "low guitar" (the instrument that brings back the main riff each time) is in fact high bass; Rob Wright is one monster bass player. (If you disagree with me, I'll cite some evidence.) Remember that NoMeansNo is what used to be called a "power trio" (one guitar, bass, drums); the rare instances where it sounds like two guitars (or two basses) seems to be overdubs.

No, it's not hemiola (persistent triple meter against duple meter), because there's no change of meter and no triplet feel. I'm not sure it has a name, but it's an effective trick (by Zeppelin among others).

My shorter comment (I could, and have, written at length about NoMeansNo) is that "Rags and Bones" is one of their greatest songs; but I don't rate it above, oh, say, "Sex Mad" or "Mary (The Last)" or "Dark Ages," and my personal vote in the end would be for "Dark Ages," the first song of theirs I ever heard.

Last question: what makes this song "punk"? As opposed to "hard rock" or "blues rock" or even "metal"? Maybe I just lack "punk sensibility."

richw

Comment on April 30th, 2007.

this isn't my favorite song of their's but i was a big fan for many years. i saw them open up for the circle jerks in san antonio, texas before their first record 'sex mad' was released. i made a nuisance of myself down at the local record store hogwild as a result of my uncomprehending efforts to purchase nonmeansno's first record that hadn't even been recorded yet, let alone released in the states. 'sex mad/the more you have/the more you want'.

Scraps

Comment on April 30th, 2007.

Don, I wondered whether it was bass. The credits aren't specific (naturally).

"Dark Ages" is my second favorite.

It's punk because I said "punk" when I pointed to it. More elaborately, it's punk because NoMeansNo identified as a punk band, were listened to by a punk audience, were on Alternative Tentacles, and because it isn't clearly not punk.

Scraps

Comment on April 30th, 2007.

Rich, you might know this already, but some pre-Sex Mad stuff did get released as a cassette (and later, I think, a cd) called Mama. I didn't find it that interesting, though. (And I think Sex Mad is pretty great.)

Adam

Comment on April 30th, 2007.

Yes, Mama is out on CD.

Sex Mad was my introduction to Nomeansno- I've never been that much of a punkhead, really, but some friends in high school gave me a tape with most of Sex Mad on one side, and Negativland's "Escape From Noise" on the other. That was a combo. But Wrong and 0+2=1 are what really got me into Nomeansno. I was really glad I got the chance to see them play the Starry Plough in Berkeley a few years ago.

Don Keller

Comment on April 30th, 2007.

Yes, Mama was reissued on CD. I have it, and probably also the cassette somewhere. It's drums and bass only, and is far less interesting than the string of albums (Sex Mad through 0+2=1 on Alternative Tentacles featuring Andy Kerr (whose name appears nowhere on the albums) on guitar.

I'll punt on the punk business, then.

Scraps

Comment on April 30th, 2007.

Did Kerr leave after 0+2=1? That would explain why the albums after that aren't that great.

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