''Dance with Me'' is the first full-length album by the American

hardcore punk Hardcore punk (also known as simply hardcore) is a punk rock music genre and subculture that originated in the late 1970s. It is generally faster, harder, and more aggressive than other forms of punk rock. Its roots can be traced to earlier punk ...

band

T.S.O.L. T.S.O.L. (True Sounds of Liberty) is an American punk rock band formed in 1978 in Long Beach, California. Although most commonly associated with hardcore punk, T.S.O.L.'s music has varied on each release, including such styles as deathrock, a ...

(True Sounds of Liberty), released in 1981 though

Frontier Records Frontier Records is an independent record label, started in 1980 in Sun Valley, Los Angeles by Lisa Fancher, a former employee of Bomp! Records and writer of the liner notes for the first album by The Runaways. History Frontier Records first ...

. While the band's eponymously titled debut EP, released earlier that year, had been filled with radical

leftist Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...

lyrics, ''Dance with Me'' moved away from politics in favor of

horror film Horror is a film genre that seeks to elicit fear or disgust in its audience for entertainment purposes. Horror films often explore dark subject matter and may deal with transgressive topics or themes. Broad elements include monsters, apoca ...

- and

gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

-inspired subject matter. The album includes T.S.O.L.'s most well-known song, the

necrophilia Necrophilia, also known as necrophilism, necrolagnia, necrocoitus, necrochlesis, and thanatophilia, is sexual attraction towards or a sexual act involving Cadaver, corpses. It is classified as a paraphilia by the World Health Organization (WHO) ...

-themed "Code Blue". Following the punk rock revival of the 1990s, ''Dance with Me'' was re-released by

Epitaph Records Epitaph Records is an American independent record label owned by Bad Religion guitarist Brett Gurewitz. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, most acts signed to the label were punk and pop punk acts, while there are many post-hardcore and emo bands ...

in 1996 and by

Nitro Records Nitro Records was an American independent record label, founded in 1994 and operated by The Offspring's Dexter Holland and Greg K. Nitro is famous for being an incubator for punk rock artists who have subsequently become successful, most notabl ...

in 2007.

Recording and release

Following the release of the ''

'' EP through

Posh Boy Records Posh Boy Records is a Hollywood, California-based record label owned by the American-born, British-educated Robbie "Posh Boy" Fields, a sometime high school substitute teacher and former copy boy at the ''Los Angeles Times'' who took an interes ...

in spring 1981, T.S.O.L. moved to

to record a full-length album. This led to a dispute with Posh Boy owner Robbie Fields, who claimed the band had not honored their commitment to record a second EP for his label. The issue was settled several years later, with the band received back payments of

royalties A royalty payment is a payment made by one party to another that owns a particular asset, for the right to ongoing use of that asset. Royalties are typically agreed upon as a percentage of gross or net revenues derived from the use of an asset o ...

from Posh Boy while the label was able to purchase the

master recording Mastering, a form of audio post production, is the process of preparing and transferring recorded audio from a source containing the final mix to a data storage device (the master), the source from which all copies will be produced (via met ...

s and publishing rights to T.S.O.L.'s 1982 EP ''

Weathered Statues ''Weathered Statues'' is an EP by the American hardcore punk band T.S.O.L. (True Sounds of Liberty), released in 1982 through Alternative Tentacles. In comparison to the band's previous material, its experimental nature and melodic leanings conf ...

''. ''Dance with Me'' was recorded at Redondo Pacific Studios in

Redondo Beach, California Redondo Beach (Spanish for ''round'') is a coastal city in Los Angeles County, California, United States, located in the South Bay region of the Greater Los Angeles area. It is one of three adjacent beach cities along the southern portion of Sa ...

with

record producer A record producer is a recording project's creative and technical leader, commanding studio time and coaching artists, and in popular genres typically creates the song's very sound and structure.Virgil Moorefield"Introduction" ''The Producer as ...

Thom Wilson Thom Wilson (died February 8, 2015) was an American punk rock record producer and engineer. Career Wilson began his musical career in the mid-1970s, engineering recordings by soft rock artists Burton Cummings and Seals & Crofts. He began working ...

, who was initially hesitant to work with T.S.O.L. because of their violent reputation: "I was very apprehensive about it," he recalled in 1998, "People said to me, 'Are you sure you want to do this? They beat people up. However, he found that the band members took the recording process seriously and worked hard, the lone quirk being singer

Jack Grisham Jack Grisham (born July 22, 1961) is an American rock vocalist, musician, raconteur and political activist from Southern California. He is the vocalist for the punk rock band T.S.O.L. (True Sounds of Liberty), which emerged from the late 1970s L ...

's insistence on sitting while he recorded his vocal tracks. Wilson

engineered Engineering is the use of scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad range of more specializ ...

and mixed the recordings, and they were

mastered Mastering, a form of audio post production, is the process of preparing and transferring recorded audio from a source containing the final mix to a data storage device (the master), the source from which all copies will be produced (via meth ...

at K Disc. Paintings by artist Mark Wassman were used for the front and back cover, while photos for the back cover and insert were taken by photographers

Glen E. Friedman Glen Ellis Friedman (born March 3, 1962) is an American photographer and artist. He became known for his activities within rebellious skateboarding and music cultures. Photographing artists Fugazi, Black Flag, Dead Kennedys, Circle Jerks, Minor ...

and

Edward Colver Edward Curtiss Colver (born 1949), also known as Ed Colver, is an American photographer, best known for his early punk photographs.

. The album was released through Frontier in 1981 as catalog number FLP004. Grisham credited himself as Alex Morgon on the sleeve, following a tradition of using a different

pseudonym A pseudonym (; ) or alias () is a fictitious name that a person or group assumes for a particular purpose, which differs from their original or true name (orthonym). This also differs from a new name that entirely or legally replaces an individua ...

on each release both to confuse audiences and to hide his true identity from the police.Blush, p. 94. As part of his Alex Morgon persona, Grisham wore stage makeup resembling that of

Adam Ant Stuart Leslie Goddard, better known as Adam Ant (born 3 November 1954), is an English singer, musician, and actor. He gained popularity as the lead singer of new wave group Adam and the Ants and later as a solo artist, scoring 10 UK top ten ...

, though this was not entirely new: "I was wearing makeup when I was a skinhead three years ago, just to bum people out", he later recalled.

Music and lyrics

Lyrically, ''Dance with Me'' diverged from the radical

political themes of the band's debut EP in favor of

- and

-inspired topics.

Steven Blush Steven Blush is an American author, journalist, record collector and film maker who is best known for his book ''American Hardcore'' and the movie of the same name. Blush has written five books, is the founder of ''Seconds'' magazine and has w ...

, author of '' American Hardcore: A Tribal History'', writes that "T.S.O.L. were always a step ahead of the audience. Their self-titled EP with 'Abolish Government' was lauded for its political conviction. By 1981, [singer

] was smearing makeup on his face to affront the surf punks, and people called it 'goth subculture, goth'." According to Grisham, the band had been moving in a horror-inspired direction prior to the ''T.S.O.L.'' EP, and already had some of the ''Dance with Me'' material in their repertoire before recording the EP but withheld it for later use:

People talk about how T.S.O.L. changed so much from the first EP to ''Dance with Me'', from political punk to gothic punk. But we had all those songs before we did the first EP. If you look on the first EP cover, my hair's sticking straight up, I'm wearing some Frankenstein suit, and I've got black makeup all over my eyes. We knew Posh Boy was gonna burn us, but we wanted to put out a record. So it was like, 'Let's give him these, and we'll save the good stuff for later.' During ''Dance with Me'', we were labeled gothic/horror...whatever. Yeah, we dug up some graves but we dug up graves even before the first record. All that crap, like breaking into mortuaries, we'd done that before. Look at the first T.S.O.L. record, it thanks the church PA: we'd been busting into churches and desecrating the altars. We'd steal the PA and spraypaint the altars.

Photographer Edward Colver, who contributed photos for the album's insert, remarked "Back then, we called it

death rock Death rock (or deathrock) is a rock music subgenre incorporating horror elements and gothic theatrics. It emerged from punk rock on the West Coast of the United States in the early 1980s and overlaps with the gothic rock and horror punk genre ...

. It wasn't called goth yet. T.S.O.L.,

Christian Death Christian Death is an American rock band formed in Los Angeles County, California, in 1979 by Rozz Williams. With major line-up changes over the years, Christian Death has retained "a relentlessly confrontational stand against organized reli ...

45 Grave 45 Grave is an American rock band from Los Angeles formed in 1979. The original group broke up in 1985, but vocalist Dinah Cancer subsequently revived the band. History The band was founded during the punk rock movement by Paul B. Cutler in ...

, and even

Social Distortion Social Distortion is an American punk rock band formed in 1978 in Fullerton, California. The band currently consists of Mike Ness (lead vocals, lead guitar), Jonny Wickersham (rhythm guitar, backing vocals), Brent Harding (bass, backing voca ...

started that whole mess. They all wore lots of pancake makeup and pissed off a lot of the punk rockers in the process."Blush, pp. 93–94.

Reception and legacy

According to Blush, "''Dance with Me'''s impact confirms

SoCal Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and cultural region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. It includes the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the second most populous urban ag ...
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