• Combustion (wave or aiff)
• Unsweetner
• Runaway Dog
• Snarl
• Bass/lb.
• Rift (wave or aiff)
• Jazz Monster
• Gorkon
• Slag/Lipstick Traces (wave or aiff)
• Miscegenation (wave)
• The Invisible Hand (wave)
• Tape Will Tell (wave or aiff)
• Clear Conscience
• Dunza Dub
• Attack Nerve Epicenter (wave or aiff)
• Narrentanz (stereo) (wave or aiff)
• Separation's Fine (wave or aiff)

"Kill Yr Boss" was the first full length DragKing CD. Recorded at Mama Stel's studio from February '93 through June '94. It was released on Portland's Imp Records in cooperation with Chicago's DogPatch Records. The CD is full of material from the first few years of DragKing's existance. There's all sorts of stuff in here. From the pure noise of LipStick Traces, to the dub feel of Dunza Dub, to the straight ahead punk rock Attack Nerve Epicenter, to the punk lo-fi jazz feel of Jazz Monster and Runaway Dog.

To check out the Roadcone pages for more info on Portland, Oregon's IMP Records, click here.

To check out a comic that our pal Bundy contributed to the liner notes of Kill Yr Boss, click here.

Reviews

Cyndi Elliott just reviewed "Kill Yr Boss" in a recent issue (#35) of the national music magazine Puncture

DragKing are an ambitious, ultraoriginal, and rockin' band who succeed on many counts. Their blend of jazz, dub, and avant-punk-rock comes across as neither amateurish nor stilted; the way they weave satire on consumerism into their music (while bringing to mind Albert Ayler crossed with Negativland) doesn't kill its joy, or clash with their message. Form matches function in a blend of guitar, bass, keyboards, samples, saxophones, autoharp, etc.

Live, it's obvious that DragKing are about collaborating, pushing each other, their music, and their ideas, while guitarist/vocalist Benjahmyn Ewens plugs his guitar into an oscilloscope and trips the electronic display fantastic. Samples decorate "Snarl" (a voice bends and recites: "the new society of America does not want educated workers, what we want is somebody who can look at the little pictures on the cash register"), a song which turns to display a fuzzy guitar-as-horn line and crashes in cacophony. It's this well thought out, yet inspired, nightmare-vs.-reality squonkishness about the way DragKing rock (as on the standout "Miscegenation") that makes them so appealing. Whether droning lyrics over finger-picked guitars or executing beautiful free jazz replete with innovative drumming and saxophone, they defy--with samples, noise, well-placed disasters, and lush home-stereo arrangements--any stretch that could leave listeners passive or bored.

It's a record you could listen to a lot, especially "Dunza Dub" (originally done by King Tubby), which has a hilarious '50s-era shellfish promotion running over the groove. Kill Yer Boss wonders what it means to be in a "subculture" at a time when such a thing doesn't exist except in ad execs' heads--and when no one seems to resist mainstream culture anymore. DragKing do, and their relentless resisting makes this great modern punk rock. DragKing are a voice for our generation--or else I just co-opted them.

Cyndi Elliot
Puncture
puncture@teleport.com

The Squealer recently reviewed Kill Yer Boss along side articles about Veruca Salt and The Smashing Pumkins?!

Whoa, Nellie! DragKing is one mighty big hunk 'o music hailing from that lovely burg of Chicago. A hot dish of styles with ingredients pulled from nearly every genre. You name it, they incorporate it into every song, with the result bing a tasty, mouth-watering morsel of tunage. It's like Coltrane students meet Captain Beefheart on the road to Austin, Texas where they have a dose party set up with the Butthole Surfers. Chew on that!

Paul Bernstein
The Squealer
Issue #9 - November 1995

The fine weekly music 'zine Aiding and Abetting reviewed "Kill Yr Boss" in a recent issue (#71)

Truly momentous noise, DragKing sounds much like Iceburn crossed with Mama Tick. If these references are too esoteric, then try this: the Jesus Lizard trying its hand at jazz. I like my first attempt better, but the second works all right.

Samples are a driving force, and the music pretty much caterwauls behind that impetus. Is there a rhyme or reason? Somewhere, I guess, but I don't feel like finding it at the moment. I prefer bathing in the chaos.

Music at its most uncommercial. DragKing does everything wrong in terms of mass acceptance. While that does not always guarantee the converse (acceptance by me), it sure helps. And despite this veneer of guys wailing away at instruments with no concept of reality, I can hear something behind the noise. Sure, it's a mess, but DragKing has that intangible, a sense of art.

"Kill Yr Boss" is mean, perverted, loud, distorted, backstabbing and just plain weird. And yes, I love it.

Jon Worley
Aiding and Abetting
jworley@tpa.cent.com

This review comes all the way from the Portland weekly Tonic

Dragking [sic] is a very strange Chicago combo, composed of the usual guitar, bass and drums along with sax, a sampler [!] and blessed with too many ideas and a shizo personality. Some of the tunes fall in a Soft Machine, avant-jazz-rock vein, while other mine a post-punk, aggro- rock thing, yet all of the songs seem very different from one another. OK, let's call this punk-jazz, say in the territory once explored by Saccharine Trust, though not dealing in pretentious wordplay. Instead Dragking substitutes powerful music. _Kill Yr Boss_ is so full of sound bites, ideas, different jams and wild stuff that it takes some time to fully digest, but it's pleasing to hear _alternative_ music that really does sound like it is coming from somewhere else.

Lawrence Crane
Tonic Vol. 2, #1

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