Ep344: Donita Sparks of L7
The Vinyl Guide - Artist Interviews for Record Collectors and Music Nerds
Nate Goyer
4.7 • 579 Ratings
🗓️ 27 June 2022
⏱️ 52 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
L7 are celebrating the 30th anniversary of the LP "Bricks Are Heavy" with as reissue and tour. Today co-founder, guitarist, songwriter Donita Sparks shares the journey across several decades & multiple record labels to celebrate this record and many more.
Topics include:
- The 30th anniversary of "Bricks are Heavy"
- Reissues of albums with band cooperation
- Nearly burning her neighbourhood during the cover of "Bricks Are Heavy" photoshoot
- Different versions of the Bricks reissue
- The state of the L7 master tapes
- The story of Yoko Ono on Wargasm
- The story of the name "L7"
- The various labels of L7
- The live L7 albums on Easy Action
- Memories of "Yummy Yummy" on the SST compilation
- How L7 ended up on Epitaph records
- The varying cover crops of the L7 debut LP
- Does Donita recall the runout groove etchings?
- L7 joining up with SubPop Records – Shove/Packin A Rod single
- Recording Shove, Packin a Rod & Smell the Magic w Jack Endino
- Why was Smell The Magic an EP, not an LP?
- Bootleggers selling L7 recordings
- L7 moving from SubPop to Slash
- Memories from the early days of Subpop
- L7 band members have ephemera collections
- Recording Bricks are Heavy w Butch Vig
- The impact of Nirvana breaking on Butch Vig and L7
- L7 making gold records of "Bricks Are Heavy"
- Who inspired the writing of the song "Shitlist"?
- Vinyl status of "Omaha to Osaka" on Man's Ruin Records
- Comic Book and vandalism stencil inside "Slap Happy"
- When did the band recognize the large fanbase that missed L7
- The L7 documentary "Pretend We're Dead"
- The issues of "Scatter The Rats" on Pledge Music
- Interview wrap up
Extended interview available here: www.Patreon.com/VinylGuide
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If you like records, just starting a collection or are an uber-nerd with a house-full of vinyl, this is the podcast for you. Nate Goyer is The Vinyl Guide and discusses all things music and record-related
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This episode is brought to you by Groove Washer, the best record cleaners and protective sleeves for your vinyl collection. |
| 0:05.6 | Ask for the Groove washer from your local shop or go to groove washer.com. Discount code, |
| 0:10.6 | Vinyl Guide 10. We're also brought to you by audiophile USA.com. The family owned and operated, used at record shop that only sells excellent and near mint vinyl records. Over 42,000 titles in stock. |
| 0:23.5 | Search, dig, and load up your cart with your final vinyl upgrades at audiophile USA.com. |
| 0:29.8 | And now, on with the show. |
| 0:31.8 | Listen up, all you record nerds. |
| 0:33.7 | This is Danita Sparks from L7, and you're listening to The Vinyl Guide. |
| 0:39.9 | Well, hey, everyone, it's Nate. |
| 0:41.8 | Welcome to episode 344 of The Vinyl Guide, the podcast for record collectors and music nerds. |
| 0:48.2 | And wow, I'm back after a short break, brought on inadvertently by a computer crash. |
| 0:56.5 | That was rather unexpected. However, |
| 1:02.4 | I did get my new computer up and going and also took the opportunity to install some fresh new recording equipment, as well as redo my office, which has sprawled over the last seven years |
| 1:08.1 | of doing this podcast. It absolutely needed a refresh, especially |
| 1:11.9 | after COVID. So the good news is I'm now set up and ready to roll for another seven years of |
| 1:18.1 | the Vinyl Guide podcast. So hot damn, I'm looking forward to it. I shared an update, a whole bunch of |
| 1:23.4 | pictures, even a secret episode on the Patreon page, patrion.com slash vinyl guide. So |
| 1:29.4 | supporters of the show got a whole bunch of extra stuff up there. And this week we welcome |
| 1:35.4 | Danita Sparks of L7 to the show. Danita and L7 are celebrating the 30th anniversary of their |
| 1:42.1 | album Bricks Are Heavy, with some special vinyl |
| 1:45.2 | pressings and a tour. You can pre-order vinyl and get show tickets at L7TheBand.com. And of course, |
| 1:53.0 | today, Danita shares all about the making of the Bricks or Heavy album, as well as the other |
| 1:58.2 | records of their catalog, the subpop releases, the epitaph album, |
... |
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