Trash Panda Social Club

The truth, as management is legally required to state it: Trash Panda Social Club is one raccoon and six trash cans, performing after midnight, behind a grocery store, for an audience of whoever happens to be taking out the garbage.

There is no stage. There is a loading dock. There is no lighting rig. There is a motion sensor that comes on when it feels like it, and the band has learned to play to it.

The cans are not props. The cans are the band. Each one was found, named, and seated by seniority, which the raccoon determines and does not explain.

The raven has heard the album. The raven has counted every note on it. The raven's review is forthcoming, which in raven terms means it is being remembered at you, permanently.

1. Andrew, lead vocals and trash cansFounder
2. Gerald, drumsOne honest dent
3. The Colonel, percussionStands up straight
4. Lidless Larry, rhythm canNo lid, no apologies
5. Soup Ghost, keyboardsSmells faintly of soup
6. The Witness, securitySays nothing
7. Unit 7, bassRefuses interviews

Unit 7 also refuses a name. The raccoon respects it. The rest of the band was named in a single evening and the names are binding, in the Trash and everywhere the Trash is honored, which is the Trash.

Trash Panda Social Club · Totally Not A Label

1. 1. Ask Me Three Times3:33
2. 2. It Was in the Trash (The Whole Time)4:12
3. 3. Legal Tender2:58
4. 4. Soup Ghost3:07
5. 5. Trough Adjacent0:58
6. 6. Night Deposit3:41
7. 7. Finders Keepers2:36
8. 8. Actual Receipts3:19
9. 9. The Goat Is Lying to You (But So Is Everybody)4:04
10. 10. Provenance5:01

Provenance was recorded in a single night, because the raccoon works nights and the studio, a steel dumpster with what three engineers describe as excellent acoustics, was only free between the last delivery and the first truck. All three engineers are raccoons. Their findings have not been disputed by anyone qualified, because no one qualified will go back there.

The bent spoon solo on Legal Tender was recorded in one take. There was one bent spoon. There is still one bent spoon. It is legal tender in the Trash and it is not for sale.

The album debuted at number one in the Trash, where it remains, unchallenged, because no other act is permitted in the Trash. The chart is audited nightly by the raccoon. The results are consistent.

“A landmark recording. The empire finally sounds like itself after dark.”

The Daily Standard, the empire's newspaper

“The most important album ever recorded behind a grocery store.”

Back Alley Review

“Five stars. We would award a sixth, but the raccoon took it. It is in the Trash now.”

The Nightly Racket

“Gerald is the finest one-dent drummer alive. There is no close second. There is barely a first, and it is Gerald.”

The Can Review

The band has framed none of these. Framing is a daytime activity. The clippings are kept in the Trash, which the band points out is also where the empire keeps its history, its evidence, and one undelivered message.

The Provenance Tour: forty consecutive nights behind the same grocery store. No dates have been announced. No dates will be announced. The raccoon knows when you are asleep.

The goat was not invited. The goat attended anyway, all forty nights, standing at the trough, and has written a review of the show at length. The review is not published here. The review is not published anywhere. The trough has a copy.

Capacity is whoever shows up. Admission is a question, asked three times.

A note on authorship: the goat has claimed, in writing, that he wrote every song on this album as well. The band denies this completely. The band's position is that the goat's one submission was a shopping list, that it was not a good shopping list, and that it is being kept in the Trash as evidence.

HORNS OF HATRED, Go Fucking Crazy On It. Four goats covering every song ever written, horribly, at a bar no one goes to. The label's loudest problem and, somehow, its first signing. Visit the goats →

TRASH PANDA SOCIAL CLUB, Provenance. The empire after dark: one raccoon, six cans, one night, one take. The label's most nocturnal act, and the only one that pays its rent in spoons. You are here.

GUY WARNER, Two Ravens on the Standard. The label's flagship human act. Eleven songs, one standard, two ravens, and a memory that refuses to put anything down. Hear the flagship →

All three acts record for the same label, and the full fiction is maintained, in writing, at headquarters: Totally Not A Label →