10 Mistakes - Gruppo Sportivo
My wife and I have been married for more than twenty years and you'd think that we would have covered all the musical ground already. When you first meet somebody, you talk about the music you like and dislike and that's how you figure out who this person is. Isn't that how it goes? I've been reading Rob Sheffield's first and - just recently published - second books and that's kind of what they are about. How music defines you, how you define yourself in relationship to the music you embrace. You adopt all sorts of personas, try things out or on and then put them aside without making a huge leap or committment. Just by dancing to a tune, singing at a karaoke bar, or buying a record.
And if he/she doesn't listen to music, well, you've learned something, too. And if he/she does, but its hideous, or simply not what you listen to, well, if there is something else there at least you have things to talk about.
But most of that happened to us more than twenty years ago.
By now, I don't think I have any musical surprises from my past to share with her, but, it turns out, she still has a few surprises for me!
Like Gruppo Sportivo.
Who?
Gruppo Sportivo is a Dutch New Wave band - Rob Sheffield, did you listen to them in the 80s? - that formed around 1977 and still apparently tours with a slightly updated crew.
Back in the day, they played at my wife's high school, I think, but in any event they were a local(Dutch) band. And she saw them perform live and they were great!
She recently brought some more of her old records back from the closet on the second floor of her mom's house and one of the records was Gruppo Sportivo's '10 Mistakes.' I have seen this record in the house but never listened to it.
Until two nights ago. What a riot!
Our friend Krista was visiting and she is into music and we had just blasted Supertramp's 'Crime of the Century' and suddenly the Gruppo Sportivo album appeared.
Petra took great care of her records and a quick brushing away of a little dust later - the record has not been played for more twenty years - and voila!
Described on their website as 'retro kitsch for the intellectual elite' with tongue firmly planted in cheek, Gruppo Sportivo's music veers wildly from new wave to 50s and 60s quotations and back and around and around.
They are still around and more folks should be listening. It's alot of fun.
My favorite cut on '10 Mistakes,' their 1977 full length debut, is 'Superman' which they describe as "a six-minute, four-color comic book love triangle complete with romance, deceit, intrigue, murder, jail time, and the keyboard riff from Del Shannon's "Runaway."
Hard to describe in words, yes, but an unforgettable listening experience.
For more:
http://seedyroad.com/grupposportivo/
different sound from the local band that played at our high school (Donnie Iris and the Heartbreakers)...
Gruppo Sportivo is a cool name. I can imagine Petra took very good care of her records! but what I'd like to know is how you get them back overseas. ...
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