Big Dipper: Ron Klaus Wrecked His House

Saturday is Lost Classics day, and today’s selection is one of the greatest indie-rock anthems of the 1980s. Boston’s Big Dipper were my favorite college-circuit band of the late ’80s. Their initial EP and first two albums are still some of my favorite recordings of all time. Their songs are incredibly catchy, riff-driven indie-rock that exemplified a specific sound that quickly disappeared after the grunge of SubPop and noisier music of The Pixies and Pavement changed the world of college radio. They were also an incredible live band, and I can say from first hand experience that they were really nice guys. Personally speaking, “Ron Klaus Wrecked His House” was the first song I ever performed live in front of people (about 10 people in my apartment for a friend’s birthday party – I sang and played terrible bass). The song was track 2 on the band’s 1988 album Craps, and you should read this fantastic interview with the band about the history of the song. The short version is that Ron Klaus (a member of early ’80s Kansas indie band The Embarrassment) was being evicted from his rental house because it was going to be demolished, so he threw a party and had everyone come in to destroy the house for free. Unfortunately, the landlord didn’t agree with Klaus’ understanding of the situation. While the music of Big Dipper is slowly forgotten with each passing year, this song remains their one addition to the canon of ’80s American indie-rock.

To learn more about Big Dipper, check out their Wikipedia page.

To listen to all of the songs of the day, check out the Radio Faux Show Song of the Day playlist.

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