The Last
Painting Smiles on a Dead Man

"...and at that point, we realized we HAD to do something before we were completely forgotten. Because we would have been, we were sure of it. All we had done in three years was an EP, nothing more. Providentially, this French label came along (called Lolita, which was under Eva Records) willing to release some of our material. Only there was no new material. There were, however, some remnants in the drawer, old stuff we weren't sincerely proud of, but it was all we had. And so we said: well, let's put it all together. And that project of giving new shine to recordings that were now dead and moldy seemed something paradoxical, it was like trying to... paint a smile on a corpse. And hence came the title".

Joe Nolte's words say it all, and they couldn't have said it better: in '83 the Last were a band in total decline, spending their last days of life in the indifference of nearly all the industry insiders. The days of the first 45, that historic "She Don’t Know Why I’m Here"/"Bombing of London" were long gone, when they were talked about as the great-grandchildren of the Standells and folks like Chocolate Watchband, in that fertile ground for garage and sixties pop that was the area between Los Angeles and San Diego. Far away was the "grace" year (so to speak) 1979, the year of "L.A. Explosion" and how can we forget it even today - although back then it was quickly forgotten: in fact, a power-pop meteor crushed under tons of punk and new wave, a mix (albeit brilliant) of beat, Byrds and surf that seemed the perfect thing at the wrong time. It took a few more years for new sounds to emerge from the Paisley scene and that retrieval of the sixties in all its forms which was the best California had to offer in the Eighties: from the abrasive and drugged sound of the Dream Syndicate to the McGuinnian idolatry (the Byrds, them again) of pop geniuses like the Long Ryders, passing through the majestic psychedelia of the Rain Parade, Arizona transplanted to L.A. of the Green On Red, the Mojave of Thin White Rope and other things...not trivial, let’s say. But when the Last stepped out into the open the times weren't yet ripe, and nothing could avoid them a dignified place among the greatly underrated in the history of Rock.

Uniqueness, indeed. Because the Last were unique. And wonderful. And moody, contradictory, perpetually dissatisfied with themselves, perfectionists to the point of madness. Self-destructive, too. Because if it hadn’t been for Lolita, God only knows what fate these tapes would have met - in fact "Painting Smiles" is not an anthology, it is much more. It is the encyclopedia of pop songs according to Joe Nolte and Vitus Mataré: a pop among the examples of Pop that has come closest to the ideal of perfection - if one exists at all. A pop that had the edginess of punk and the Genius of those who know how to compose harmonic sequences of disarming beauty. The sound of the Last is something to fully enjoy, a fresco that leaves you speechless, to which you surrender again and again. With wonder, I must acknowledge that these pieces grip me today even more than many years ago: today I put the record in the player, and from the first notes of "Wrong Turn" my foot refuses to stay still.

Frequent chord changes in succession, vocal harmonies, rock'n'roll wrapped in a layer of melancholy and bitterness, sometimes even lugubrious, even "gothic" in due proportions: those who know the treatment given here to "Louie Louie" understand I am not delirious; an obligatory passage for every respectable garage band, this cover. Yet it sounds different from any other "Louie Louie" ever heard (think of the Davies brothers' one: day and night...): they play it in a minor key with guitar-killer outbursts and an impact that to say brutal is to say nothing (Joe's scream at the end is something terrifying) and above all this spectral organ, a direct progenitor of Chris Cacavas’s organ in its most acutely pessimistic moments. And what about "It Had To Be You", Vitus’s flute at the opening (which you don’t expect) and that unparalleled melody...? - one that the Boss of "Darkness On The Edge Of Town" and Tom Petty of "Damn The Torpedoes" would not have disdained but would never have reached even living ten lives. And again: the turmoil of "Lightning Strikes" and that hammering refrain as it should be, and the revisited and updated Byrds of "Isn't Anybody There" ("it wasn't bad, but we could have done better" - said Joe Nolte on the matter, and I wonder if better can ever be done...); "Everybody Had It With You" and those ideal keyboards on an arrangement that required no further addition, to such an extent everything is in its place... For each piece, I would have words of unconditional praise, but it would be of no use other than to lengthen this review and give you a still pale idea of what the Last were capable of. For that: listen, listen and more listens... until you're intoxicated.

After the breakup, episodic reunions for other studio material: but the recommended starting point remains this one.

Conversely, for nostalgics like me: these are records that have no price and no numerical value in terms of judgment.

Except, indeed, the maximum that can be given: and it is a vote of gratitude, above all.

THE LAST WILL ALWAYS LAST.