(Alternative, Post-Punk, New Wave) Neo Boys - Sooner or Later [2CD] - 2013, MP3, 320 kbps

01. Kids
02. No Venue
03. Put A Penny In
04. Never Comes Down
05. I'm Free
06. I Don't Belong
07. Caution
08. Abnormal Chick
09. Empty My Head
10. Give Me The Message
11. Rich Man's Dreams
12. Never Comes Down
13. There Is A Place
14. Movie
15. WWII
16. Time May Tell
17. Little Man
18. Image of Guilt
19. Broken Mirror
20. Let Go
21. Running In The Shadows

01. Poor Man's Jungle
02. City Unlimited
03. In Disguise
04. Split
05. Days In Heaven
06. Between Borders
07. Under Control
08. Dirty white Lies
09. Obscure Emotion
10. No Form
11. Look
12. Time Keeps Time
13. Cheap Labor
14. Hands Down
15. Nothing To Fear
16. Someday Maybe
17. Ancient Youth
18. On Common Ground
19. In This Circle of Time
20. Under Control
21. Nothing To Fear
22. Falling
23. Living For A Change
24. KBOO FM Retrospective Tribute

Fall, 1979. There they were again: the two girls, disappearing into the fog by the park blocks in downtown Portland. One blonde, one redhead, bright berets floating over long wool coats.
The bus came once an hour and I’d missed it. Sometimes I missed it on purpose. But it was too cold to hang around much longer. I dug a book out of my backpack and sat down to wait.
Who were those girls? They weren’t like anyone I knew in the suburbs, or at the big-box high school I was stuck at for two more years. They looked like they might be interesting. Maybe I could talk to them. But what if they were bitches? It didn’t matter. The times I saw them, they were always at least a block away. Ghosts I could never catch.
I went back to my book. Then my bus came. Forty-five minutes later, it dropped me off in the middle of nowhere: the place I spent most of my time.
At home I had more books–mostly poetry–and records from Park Avenue and Renaissance. On Sundays I taped Joe Carducci‘s show from KBOO. I wanted to be in a band, but I wasn’t old enough or cool enough. Worst of all, I wanted to play an instrument. Nobody wanted a girl in their band unless she was the singer. I knew that was stupid, but how could I argue? Obviously, there were rules not even punk could stop.
The eighties started. That summer, I went to an all-ages show at The Long Goodbye. The band came on. Four girls. Wow, two of them were THE girls. The redhead went to the microphone, the blonde picked up a bass. They even had a girl drummer.
How did they do that, start a band with other women, three of them not the singer? Maybe they thought the rules were stupid too. No, that hope was too big. I pushed it down. I watched them tune up, waited for them to be terrible or act campy.
But they weren’t, and they didn’t. The Neo Boys had a strong pop energy, but Kim‘s hard-edged voice was never too sweet. KT wove her basslines around Pat‘s solid beat, while Jennifer played a twangy, clean guitar.
The lyrics were real poetry. None of their songs were about boys. THEY weren’t about boys. They were a band. Four equals, up there on stage in their regular clothes, being their regular selves. And kicking ass.
Their regular selves kicked ass.
By the end of that year, I was in my own band with four other women. I got to know KT, Kim, and Pat. They were real. They were nice. I should have talked to them sooner. I should have thanked them sooner. Thirty-two years is a long time to wait. But here goes.
Over the decades here in the Northwest I’ve seen countless other all-female bands, good ones, up there on stage being their regular selves and kicking ass. KT, Kim, Pat, Jennifer, Meg, you knew the rules were stupid. Your music made them irrelevant. This work has aged well, but I’m not surprised. It’s just proof.

In Portland, OR, in 1978, a radical form of artistic expression some refer to as “punk” or “new wave” was beginning to take shape, and at the heart of this legendary movement was the powerful all-girl punk group the Neo Boys. Though they were an active band for just five years (1978-83), teenage sisters Kt (bass) and Kim Kincaid (vocals), Pat Baum (drums) and guitarists Jennifer Labianco and Meg Hentges forged a place for women in the growing punk rock scene, and redefined gender roles in the 80’s movement of rock and roll. They regularly shared bills with The Wipers, opened for Nico, and played their first show with Television. Calvin Johnson has been working with the band members to track down the missing tapes of their recordings through a rabbit hole of Northwest basements and closets, and after twenty years of effort, the result is Sooner or Later [KLP242]. A comprehensive double LP collection of Neo Boys recordings from 1977-1982, including the long out-of-print 1980 7” EP (released on Greg Sage's Trap Records), and 1982 self-released EP Crumbling Myths. Sooner or Later also contains recordings, early demos and live sessions that have never before been available to the public.