Game Theory leader Scott Miller has never made much of a secret of his fondness for Big Star, but while Real Nighttime favored the sound of #1 Record and The Big Shot Chronicles suggested the harder-edged tone of Radio City, Lolita Nation sounded like Game Theory's variation on the themes of Big Star's masterfully damaged swan song, Third/Sister Lovers. Certainly Game Theory's most ambitious album, Lolita Nation was a two-LP set that combined some of Miller's most user-friendly power pop with dark, moody ruminations on betrayal, failed love, and mortality, bursts of avant-garde noise, and fragments of unclassifiable studio doodling, all thrown into a sonic Cuisinart through Miller's aggressive use of aural montage. Lolita Nation is more than a bit disorienting on first listen, though it finds the band playing at the top of their form on challenging material (new guitarist Donnete Thayer makes an impressive debut), and there are more than a few flat-out brilliant tracks (such as "Chardonnay," "The Waist and the Knees," and "The Real Shelia") alongside such head-scratchers as "Turn Me on Dead Man," "Watch Who You're Calling Space Garbage Meteor Mouth," and the 22nd track (which stubbornly defies titling). Taken as a whole and given time to fully absorb, Lolita Nation is probably Game Theory's finest and most impressive album, though it's also the worst place for a beginner to start examining their work.
Today I find myself looking back fondly on the paisley underground of the 80's, and one of the movement's very earliest exemplars, Sacramento's own--Game Theory.I love the tranquil calm a thickly distorted electric guitar can create if you let it, and the kernel of bitter rage you can find within that calm if you look. This song is the perfect illustration. Notice also the two intertwined voc...
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Just picked up a vinyl copy of LOLITA NATION by Game Theory off of ebay, and it's killer. Good 80's power pop. Any Game Theory fans out there? I know, it's an obscure one even for mog.com, I have a feeling. Buzz me if you have something to say about Game Theory.
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I tried ebay for the first time last night and discovered the meaning of "snipping." In the last 30 minutes before the bidding ended I got distracted with something else and when I looked up, I had lost the bid for this record. I am desperate for this record. I've got pretty much everything else Scott Miller has done with his two primary groups. This is worse than my "Smile" and "Black Album" ...
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Today I find myself looking back fondly on the paisley underground of the 80's, and one of the movement's very earliest exemplars, Sacramento's own--Game Theory.I love the tranquil calm a thickly distorted electric guitar can create if you let it, and the kernel of bitter rage you can find within that calm if you look. This song is the perfect illustration. Notice also the two intertwined voc...
More >
Dale has a post up about the compilation album "Nineteen Eighty Seven" in which he asks which song you would have liked to see covered on the album.My choice:Game Theory's "The Real Sheila" from their Lolita Nation album.
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I tried ebay for the first time last night and discovered the meaning of "snipping." In the last 30 minutes before the bidding ended I got distracted with something else and when I looked up, I had lost the bid for this record. I am desperate for this record. I've got pretty much everything else Scott Miller has done with his two primary groups. This is worse than my "Smile" and "Black Album" ...
More >
Just picked up a vinyl copy of LOLITA NATION by Game Theory off of ebay, and it's killer. Good 80's power pop. Any Game Theory fans out there? I know, it's an obscure one even for mog.com, I have a feeling. Buzz me if you have something to say about Game Theory.
More >
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 "Lolita Nation")
