Double Nickels on the Dime (1984)

Double Nickels on the Dime is the third studio album by American punk trio Minutemen, released on the SST Records in July 1984. A double album containing 45 songs, Double Nickels on the Dime combines elements of punk rock, funk, country, spoken word and jazz, and references a variety of themes, from the Vietnam War and racism in America, to working-class experience and linguistics.

After recording new material, each band member selected songs for different sides of the double album, with the fourth side named "Chaff". Lyrics for several songs on Double Nickels on the Dime were written by friends such as Henry Rollins of Black Flag, Jack Brewer of Saccharine Trust, and SST co-owner Joe Carducci.

Double Nickels on the Dime is seen not only as Minutemen's crowning achievement, but, according to critic Mark Deming, "one of the very best American rock albums of the 1980s". The album now appears on many professional lists of the all-time best rock albums, including Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. Slant Magazine listed the album at No. 77 on its list of "Best Albums of the 1980s". Despite this, the full version of the album is only available on vinyl.

Background

Minutemen were formed by guitarist D. Boon and bassist Mike Watt, both from San Pedro, Los Angeles, in 1980. After their previous band, the Reactionaries, disbanded in 1979, the pair continued to write new material and formed the band with drummer Frank Tonche a year later. Minutemen signed to the Californian independent record label SST Records following their second gig. George Hurley, the former drummer of the Reactionaries, replaced Tonche as drummer soon afterwards. The Minutemen were noted in the California punk scene for a philosophy of "jamming econo"; a sense of thriftiness reflected in their touring and presentation. They soon released numerous recordings through SST and their own label, New Alliance Records, while touring with hardcore punk bands like Black Flag and Hüsker Dü.

In January 1983, Minutemen were asked by ex-Blue Cheer keyboardist and local producer Ethan James to contribute a song to Radio Tokyo Tapes, a compilation named after the Californian studio where James worked. The band agreed and contributed three songs to the compilation, with James recording them all for free. These three songs, and another five recorded in May 1983 for a total of $50, were included in their 1983 EP Buzz or Howl Under the Influence of Heat. The band had recorded solely with SST engineer Spot before the recordings. However, they were so impressed by the sessions that they enlisted James to record their next full-length album; Watt later commented: "Ethan, although not knowing us much, tapped right in." After their European tour in mid-1983 with Black Flag, Minutemen entered Radio Tokyo Studios in November to record their next studio album.

Recording and production

Minutemen originally recorded an "album's worth of material" with James in November 1983 in Radio Tokyo Studios. However, after hearing labelmates Hüsker Dü's double album Zen Arcade (1984), which had been recorded a month earlier, Minutemen decided to write more material. Watt later commented: "It wasn't really a competition even. When I wrote 'Take that Hüskers!" in [the album's liner notes] it was acknowledging that they gave us the idea to make a double album." Unlike Hüsker Dü's Zen Arcade, Minutemen did not have a unifying concept when they started the album, but soon decided that the record's concept would be their cars.

The band wrote almost two dozen more songs for a second recording session with James in April 1984. Double Nickels on the Dime was then mixed on a single eight-track in one night by James and cost $1,100 to record. Several songs on the album were recorded elsewhere; a studio-recorded cover of Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Don't Look Now" was replaced with a live version of the song, and according to Watt, "Love Dance" was written at Ian MacKaye's Dischord House.

For sequencing, the band decided that each band member would be allocated a side of the record, an arrangement inspired by Pink Floyd's 1969 double album Ummagumma. The band drew straws to select songs; Hurley won the draw and decided to pick his solo track "You Need the Glory", followed by Boon and Watt. The fourth side of the record was named "Side Chaff", an admission that the songs present were the leftover songs.

Music and lyrics

Watt refers to the album as being the band's art record in the documentary We Jam Econo: The Story of the Minutemen. The songwriting styles of Boon and Watt on Double Nickels on the Dime contrasted. Boon tended to write the band's anthems, and often explored wider political issues. "This Ain't No Picnic" was an example of his approach. Exploring racism and the strife of the working class with both gravity and humor, he composed the song after his supervisor would not let him listen to jazz and soul music on the radio at his day job, calling it "nigger shit".