Name Milo Aukerman
Best known for Going to college, for some reason.
Current city Newark, Delaware.
Really want to be in Colorado, where I can go on hikes and practice with the Descendents (and record at the Blasting Room!).
Excited to Go on tour to Canada in a few weeks. I’ve always secretly wished I was Canadian, and now more so than ever. Hey Canada, I know our government sucks, but don’t take it out on me, please!
My current music collection has a lot of Cars, Kinks, Bob Mould, Bad Brains, Black Flag.
And a little of Little Chair, but that’s only because there’s not a lot of Little Chair. If there was a lot of Little Chair, that would be better.
Preferred format Radio in the car. Vinyl albums around the house, when I get noise ordinance clearance. When it’s “for me only,” I’ll pop in earbuds and do Spotify.
5 Albums I Can’t Live Without:
1
Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo!, DEVO
This served as a manifesto for my teen nerd years. Yeah, maybe it’s new wave, but I loved the aggressive guitar chording that would soon have me searching for harder, faster punk stuff. And most of the songs are hilarious, made even funnier by the band’s attempts to pass it all off as serious.
2
Los Angeles, X
First saw them open for DEVO, and after hearing them on KROQ (Rodney on the ROQ), they became my favorite band. I love the weird harmonies between John Doe and Exene, the in-your-face yet intelligent lyrics, and of course the coolness of Billy Zoom. In those pre-merch days I made myself a T-shirt of the album cover using spray paint and an X-Acto knife (appropriate tool, eh?), thus destroying the sleeve…
3
(GI), Germs
This album is “slick mayhem”—maybe the first hardcore punk album, but Joan Jett gave it a tight, professional sound. Pat Smear’s tasty guitar licks inserted neatly between buzz-saw chords, and Darby Crash’s poetry-as-lyrics were inscrutable, but also evidence of a dark, twisted genius. I only saw them play once, and then Darby killed himself a few days later.
4
Look Again, The Last
These guys lived in Hermosa Beach, near me and Bill, and they gave us a copy of the Look Again test pressing back in 1980. But it only got released for real in the last few years! Bill and I worshipped the Last, and did a deep study of all their stuff, but especially this album. Every single song is classic power pop.
5
Revolver, The Beatles
Growing up, I had the U.S. version that lacked three of John Lennon’s songs, so when I play the U.K. version, it sounds… wrong. Even though those are great Lennon songs! But when you play an album over and over again like I did with this one, it just has to go the way you heard it as a kid. So, yeah, McCartney-heavy, but he wasn’t messing around on this one. Some true masterpieces.