Cat Power-Undercover 7" (1996)
Title:Undercover
Label: Undercover, Inc.
Format: 7'
Cat #: uncv 003
Year of Release: 1996
Country and Year of Edition Issue: US 1996 Red vinyl
Listed Condition: VG+/VG+
Sell Price: $15.99
Discogs Last Sold: 6/15/21 $15.00 NM/VG+
Low: $9.00
Median: $15.00
Average: $16.07
High:$25.98 VG+/VG+
Current low price: $16.95
Current Number on Sale at Discogs:6
Have/Want: 237/195
Where Sold: Brooklyn, NY
Time it took to sell: 6 years
Where and When Bought: Other Music $4.49 sticker still on it
Gwiz-gau Letter Grade: C+
Sad To See It Go: No
"Are you following me?"
And so began the 3rd and final time I had a lengthy conversation with Chan Marshall. I know the date was 7/27/96, which happens to be the year this single was released. Why do I remember the date?
Well I was walking down Ave B this summer evening, minding my own business and maybe I noticed Chan and said hello. But I think the question was if I was following her without out me saying anything, just walking down Ave. B. A head tilter, but I can only remember the catch phrase and the feeling of surprise. We had met twice before and had long conversations before. This a normal NYC thing to bump into someone every two or three years and pick up where you left off like 2 or 3 or 15 years never happened..
The first time was at Max Fish and she was talking about her boss at a waitressing job but was playing with some people that were far along in their careers. My friend Mark Maloof told me that Chan is playing with Tim Foljhan and Steve Shelley, and she was talking about it enthusiastically, so I didn't interrupt her, but at some point I got bored with the non name dropping so I told her I knew she was playing with TIm Foljhan and Steve Shelley. "You are a serpent!" she railed, and I can't remember the rest of the conversation. I do remember feeling sad I had blown the conversation, but I got another half hour to chat and get shot down on a phone number request. Catchphrases stick!
The second time was a couple years later. I was record shopping at Adult Crash on Ave. A and she told me to by her record, so I got the Dear Sir 10" and like it and saw her play at Brownies. There were no catch phrases from this day, but I did like the 10".
So this brings us to that date I can point so accurately and soon you will find out why I remember it. I guess she remembered me, but maybe she hadn't, yet she invited me to drink with her at Mona's, a dive on 13 & B that still is there. So I joined her at a table with some other guy I think from the bar but who knows. I looked up and news was flashing about the Atlanta Olympic Bombings. And so, I can forever identify this date. Had he never become famous, I would have remembered these same events in my head.
What I also can't remember was this single of 3 covers-the title track from Thurston Moore's Psychic Hearts, "We Dance" from Pavement's Wowee Zowee and Johnny's Got A Gun by Dead Moon. Good selection in lo-fi, but it took me a quarter century to focus on the record. This was not the case with the aforementioned Dear Sir or What Will The Community Think or Moon Pix. I'll pretty much check out anything Chan does, but I don't even remember the act of spinning this one time in 1996.
The last time I saw her close enough to say hello she was doing a soundtrack for a screening of The Passion of Joan of Arc in the late 90's. I got the blank eyed unfamiliar walk past as I waved hello.
So I resumed being anonymous and went home into my serpent's lair.
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