Above: Emily (L) and Bree of Tacocat dressed in the full regalia of their other combo Who Is She? just moments before heading out to play halftime at a Seattle Kraken hockey game, at which they were banned from the arena for telling bald truths about a certain local billionaire; but that's a diff story.
The new album by The Crabs, Years at the Unknown [KLP300] is out now and available from the K Bandcamp site. Founded in Eugene, Oregon in the early ‘90s by Jonn Lunsford and Lisa Jackson, The Crabs released four albums on K. Over the years The Crabs had assorted pals and accomplices join in, always with Jonn and Lisa as the creative core. Following the release of Sand and Sea [KLP095] in 1999, Jonn and Lisa became less active with The Crabs, choosing to concentrate on raising their family in Anacortes, Washington. Eventually their children Vince and Zinnia joined The Crabs, along with several neighborhood pals. Years at the Unknown [KLP300] is the result, a compilation of all their recordings from the last 12 years.
The Crabs have toured throughout the United States but mostly played shows around the Northwest, where their influence is heavily felt. Seattle combo Tacocat are Crabs devotees who covered The Crabs' song "Alien Girl" on their album NMV (Hardly ART). Recently queried about their love of The Crabs, Emily and Bree Tacocat gushed forth testimonially, as follows - - -
The Crabs are cool. In the early days of Tacocat, our first influences came from being obsessed with DIY / indie / punk music from Olympia, Portland, Eugene, etc. I owe my knowledge of The Crabs to my bandmate Eric (our guitarist) who showed me a lot of great music in that vein. “Alien Girl” was so fun to sing and harmonize to, I liked the lyrics and how it was kinda wistful and kinda upbeat at the same time. We listened to the Jackpot [KLP042] album quite a bit during that time, definitely have memories of long tour drives with Crabs as the soundtrack on our way to weird basements and warehouses in the desert. I just put it on again and The Crabs still hit! —Emily Tacocat
The Crabs were always so mysterious to me, even though we’d been playing a cover of “Alien Girl” for years. One time in Philly, people even showed up dressed as alien girls because of it. When a request came in to use that song for the film Banana Split, I tried looking them up online but could only find some blurbs about the band but not where everyone is now. Then someone at a show said, “I think our friend Kenneth might know the guy.” I called Kenneth, who said they’d gardened with Jonn Lunsford’s sister, or something like that? So I cold called Jon and he was super nice. We cleared it all through a blur of word-of-mouth and phone calls, no emails. —Bree Tacocat
The Crabs, Years at the Unknown [KLP300] is available from the K Bandcamp site.
Above: cover art for the new album by The Crabs, Years at the Unknown [KLP300]; illustration by Lisa Jackson.