Outta Place
We're Outta Place

So, there are these five New Yorkers who decide to form a band just for fun: no long-term plans, other than to create a decent mess while it lasts.

They are Chandler on vocals, Jordan on guitar, Shari on organ, Orin on bass, and Andrea on drums, and they christen themselves Outta Place.

It's 1984, they are still kids, but they play garage music with such a raw and primitive spirit that they become known to everyone as "New York's Own Cave Teens".

«We're Outta Place» is their debut: it contains six songs (all covers), lasts barely ten minutes, is recorded in mono for Midnight Records and will have no follow-up.

Is that enough to enter the History of garage-revival? Absolutely! In reality, Outta Place needs much less, about ten seconds to define a genre and mark their territory.

To fully understand the History, you need to start from the B side (vinyl, of course).

Jordan crunches a violent riff, Chandler lets out an inhuman scream: it’s the signal that triggers Shari, Orin, and Andrea into the most D-E-V-A-S-T-A-T-I-N-G version of «Louie Louie» ever heard. There are no Stooges or Black Flag capable of competing: «Louie Louie» is garage stuff, and Outta Place bring it back with weight. They mark their territory, in fact: because you might be called Iggy Pop like Dez Cadena or even Henry Rollins, but Outta Place are teenagers not even twenty years old, come to claim that «Louie Louie» is their thing, so everyone else, hands off, unless they are possessed by the wildest and most stinging garage demon.

And for those who didn’t get the hint, «Dirty Old Man» and «We’re Pretty Quick», occasioned titled «We’re Outta Place», follow in quick succession, under the pleased gaze of Sonics, Gonn, and yes, even Monks.

Now, whoever wants can switch to the A side to endure the lashes of «Things Are Different Now», «Outta Sight, Outta Mind», and «Don't Crowd Me». Sonics, Gonn, and Monks are still there enjoying the show, as from the bad seeds planted in the Sixties, worthy sprouts have finally emerged.

Useful for spreading contagious energy and passion, crazy and uninhibited fun, raw and primitive instinct: all of this is compressed within the ten minutes of «We're Outta Place», the first and last, the only album by Outta Place.

Because then maturity comes and brings other stories: Chandler leaves for the Raunch Hands, Andrea and Shari for the Maneaters, Orin with the Optic Nerve, Jordan nowhere; in short, nothing comparable to that monolithic cornerstone of neo-garage that is «We're Outta Place».