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The Death of Speedy Ortiz & Cop Kicker .​.​.​Forever

by Speedy Ortiz

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  • Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

    Double LP on limited edition ruby & coke bottle clear vinyl, featuring a liner notes essay and unearthed photos and journal scans from 2011.

    Includes unlimited streaming of The Death of Speedy Ortiz & Cop Kicker ...Forever via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 5 days
    edition of 1000  19 remaining
    Purchasable with gift card

      $31.99 USD or more 

     

  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      $14.99 USD  or more

     

  • Speedy's Mystery Caravan tea

    From Craft Tea: "Ten years ago, Speedy Ortiz was D.O.A. We’re going to try resurrecting them with a high-octane blend that has burgundy and oak characteristics to celebrate the anniversary. Fans of Sad13’s Haunted Breakfast can expect another exceptional tea heavy on aroma and mystique.
    The concept of the blend is Russian Caravan but with Speedy’s tour bus as the vehicle. Keemun and lapsang souchong produce a smoky and wine-like flavor profile that is rounded out nicely by the spicy and smooth Shangri La Oolong, an oolong from Nepal with tasty notes of campfire and caramel malt. Last but not least, lavender adds a hint of sweetness, therefore makes a good companion for the van!" Artwork by Sarah Cowell @sc0wll

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  • Frankenweenie T-shirt
    T-Shirt/Apparel

    Designed by Stephanie O'Byrne (www.stephanieobyrne.com). Bella+Canvas 3001 Unisex Jersey Short Sleeve Tee. Not available to ship to Australia or New Zealand.

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  • Death of Speedy hot sauce

    Each year Dragon's Blood Elixir in Willimantic Connecticut makes a batch of sauce called Stone Soup containing a little bit of everything they made sauce with in the summer and featuring the hot peppers that customers grew as part of the Stone Soup Pepper Project. It's a yearly "reissue", if you will. This year's batch has a multi-layer flavor profile–savory, yielding to fruity, leading into an herby/spicy finish. And the Scorpion Peppers in the blend are a bit more apparent. It's spicy, but it's still on the "everyday sauce" side of the heat scale, so we decided we should kick it up a few notches for this collab. The heat does not disappoint. Made by Dragon's Blood Elixir (www.dragonsbloodelixir.com).

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1.
Hexxy Sadie 02:48
Never was the one to keep our plants alive in the sun, feeding all the slugs and ticks that dragged around in the mud. Not me, not me. As if it was torture porn, this rat piles me up to my neck in centipedes and scorpions. My dear, don’t you know it’s a trick? I believe it’s a breeze. So if it’s my birthday, were you born just like me? With my very heart and teeth? Lost my little brother, am I just a killer? Was he just a bug I squished? Who were you to call me out on walking on two legs, not six? And six times I got swatted down in the mesh. I was gnawing on all your debris. (Creepy creepy crawlers crawling inside me. In the grave, I will still be a slave to the crown that molted beside me.) So if it’s my birthday, were you born just like me? With my very heart and teeth? Ate the other children hatching from my mother. C’mon, sweet thing, let me feed. Let me eat, let me eat, let me eat, let me eat. Let me!
2.
Cutco 04:04
Calm yourself, fighters, calm down. Do you rip up dollar bills when no one’s around? Swore the semi-century would suffer no hunger of sound. Fill the spots, use and abuse. Sand down your throat just to choke on your food. Can’t you find the balance between chewing me out and getting chewed? If all my friends wanna cut me into bits, they should throw me on the skillet, make a dinner out of what they get. When they’re done, they can flush me with the shit. It’ll be the same as always, I can’t see any difference. Summer of infection, pus and sweat in my eyes. Everyone avoids me and it’s no real surprise. Catch ‘em during mealtime hunting lessers that scurry right by. And who am I to skewer in song? Teeth and claws like predators, meat in their gums.Wanna eat a balanced diet, wanna hear they’ve done no wrong. Get out the knife, butcher me to bits. Oil me up, I’m ready for the fire pit. When it’s done, wash me down with tears and sweat. Your friendless friend digested, then it’s over with. It’s over with.
3.
Phish Phood 02:10
Drove an hour to your house in the middle of the evening, and all your lights were out. Parked to the side of your lawn. Hopped the fence into the front path, broke your window with a rock. Turned the bathtub on. Let the water flood the downstairs, then I stole your father’s watch (which was his father’s). Crawled in your fresh-pressed sheets. Took all your mother’s sleeping pills, and then I fell asleep ‘til you came home and said to me, “It’s okay to love and hate. I love you something in between. You’re no ghost, you’re just some kid. So why are all your songs so mean?” Oh, I think I get what you mean.
4.
Kinda Blew 03:34
Chomping at the bit for another shot of self-analysis, she says, “It's fire water, try and sip slow.” Bought the realistic. On a frozen lake, ballistics went off around the ice. Now we're swimming below. Not impressed with her flotation vest. Got her hair all wet, broke her shiny white pearls. She gave me mental freeze. She gave me ballerinas. Gave me crystal black cave scratch. She's down for anything. Chris Lord-Alge is a knight on the board, makes a mix that cuts through tinsel and deflects off a sword. Soundtracked backseat seppuku, gutting more than the core. Beat the teen center heat licking lips on all fours. Not amused by her maintenance bruise, on an outer space mission stealing chapstick at the mall. Put on "Blue in Green," it gives me psycho dreams. It makes me wanna screw the entire team, makes me do anything. Behind the movie screen, would you hear that scream? She's gonna stab at the heart of the fling. Such a pretty thing when her hair's not clean, when she's twisting the blade in deep.
5.
Ken-Ohki 01:31
Did I betray you? Told me you wanted a shoulder for your head with a bounty upon it. Not like I shaved you, or drained you and sold all your organs o'erseas. Still, I refund your trust in me. I act shitty. I'm no Judas to fuck with. I just break things, like the village drunk on a rampage 'cuz he scratched his truck.
6.
Speedy Ortiz 02:40
One, two, tell me your big secret. I got two more reasons not to keep it. Flies on the ceiling. Speedy making magic on the speedway. Choose your own adventure or your own way to waste. Flies on the ceiling. It's a ghost from a story and his boo's getting boring. It's a ghost you swear you've seen but he doesn't haunt anything. Fingerprinting cops put out a query. At a punk show back in Hoppers someone asks what it means to see flies on the ceiling, mating and molting. If I cast a spell it's cuz I loved you, and if you're dead I'll still wind up above you. Lay back, leave it to me. Check out the ceiling. It's a ghost from a story, closing doors draining heat. Gangs cry, witches divine. Milk the sheet and put it to sleep. Silhouetto serpentine. Take out your belly ring. Eyes, an eggy cataract cream, eye the flies on the ceiling.
7.
Ever the teen in a virgin's first dream, what a life! Hidden by pigskin and chasing down tunnels at night. Lanterns light the way. Come on out and play. I know there's a no-face waiting for me. Bolt on the skyscape, go follow it into the creek. Trains don't stop running from magnets, stop running from me. Get soaking wet in the moonlight, terrified. He's just a monster with money and a big appetite. Lanterns float around. Does he make a sound? I know there's a no-face waiting for me. I know there's a no-face waiting.
8.
Thank You 02:54
Thanks for never being there. Thanks for holding back my hair while I coughed up rotten meals (thanks for those). Thanks for showing me what I'm not. Thanks for cutting me while I bled out. Thanks for dying in my dreams. Really, thanks for nothing. You were such a lonely kid, cursing the teacher and doling out hits to your friends out waiting by the tire swing. Thanks for bruising my arm. Look, I'm tough; look, I can fight. Thanks for stealing my car that night and leaving me afraid by the dark roadside. King of loathing, ghost or something. Oh my buddy, thanks for nothing. Thanks for nothing.
9.
You're a killer, but I don't blame you. I guess you have to kill a few when you're as cutthroat as you are. Said you loved me, and I don't doubt that. I doubt the shaking of your hands as you pushed the needle down into my neck. First, you moved away. You left me starving in the August heat, chowing down on the dirt you walked on, but I don't blame you. I guess you have to starve a few when you're as bloated as you are. It was fine in better times when you pulled thorns out of my feet, and fought off bears that threatened me, and let me ride in your front seat. Oh, you put me so down, so low these lumps of body melted with the ground. Imaginary friend, that's all I can be, just floating inside your bad dreams - but I don't blame you. You choke me, you play cruel, but I don't blame you. I grinned through it all. I was your good dog.
10.
Blondie 03:03
Dogs wanna bark and the wind wants to blow. I wanna be with you, don't tell me no. Ask Harold Camping if this earth will quake. I'm all excited about it, I’m shaking. Insomnia, my one true love. You fit with me like some blood on a glove. Drunk on a plane 'cuz I got a new man. The engine's caught fire, the wind understands. Pick me up, blown away. You turn in an open grave. Trees falling on power lines, this home a dark cave. Howl in the basement, they're scared to go out. Oh, all of you dogs, get the fuck out my house. This'll get ya blown away.
11.
Ka-Prow! 02:33
Arsenal of tans. A mistress with matches held out from either hand. Arsenal of tans. Tick tick tick tick tick...another automatic stick. Blow off, you blew away. You wanna see me every day. You wanna swallow my flames 'til another sucker lights me up. Scorched skyline for days. The neo-sororital sequence burned and frayed. Arsenal of tans. Tick tick tick tick tick….another automatic stick. Blow off you, blow away. You wanna see me every day. You wanna swallow my flames 'til you burst from the gut. C'mon, light me up. Blow up and into space. Burn your tongue and get a taste. Heat the skin that strokes the flames. All consumed, dynamite. I'll see you every night.
12.
Necronomicon 02:40
Hot core of the woods mapped out in the trees. Branches snapped around me. Take my hand and I’ll lead. Read me from the book, draw me something sweet. Oh, you're changing, I see. These woods won't let us leave. Somebody hand me the knife. Aztecs and poison and sleaze made a girl outta me. These woods won't let me leave!
13.
Teething 02:33
A word should come from my head before it grows in size, but what breaks through me instead are all the spiders inside. I left a home down the creek for an Acadian wife. You're pretty, pretty please provide. Saddling a Trojan horse, there is no need to hide. But I still could kill you off. What a waste of my time. Hang tight, but don't look up twice. It's a snake, not a snake vine, and if he gives you a bite you're stuck with voodoo for life. Get angry, boys, all your teeth are hitting lingerie shame. You wanna sleep where I came. Saddling a Trojan horse, there is no need to hide. Here we are, a man and a car. You turn to me, we collide. Do you think I can survive? Do you think I can survive? Do you think that I can't, sir?
14.
Doomsday 03:30
Mouth made of dried meat. Some mouths come over to me to lick up what I leave. Legs kicking the stream, parting the white waters out. It's the parting of everything. Maybe it's sex, maybe it's sexlessness, maybe it's doom. Maybe it's death, maybe it was your death, maybe it's doom. Right, this one feels right. One who was lost in the snow buried up from below. Right, wasn't I right? Humming some shit songs I wrote about the parting of everything. Away on an ash, your timeline could not be matched. This one, it's doom. Drowned in the lake with every stroke you take. Baby, it's doom. Called me the hex. I never said I was less. Maybe I’m doomed. Wasn't I right? Humming some shit songs I wrote about the parting of everything.
15.
All Red 03:17
A seal upon the sea, a king who fathered me. Am I no one? Am I ocean, finally? Just a baby, just a silky baby. Hello, hunter. Shot me and my progeny. All red upon the sea. Half a man, half-man dead of husbandry. Hello, hunter. You’ll be sorry. All red upon the sea.
16.
All the same keys, drum the same beats. We walk the same way and on the same streets. Share the same house, the same dog at our feet. You wanna be me and I wanna be me and I wanna be you. I wanna be you. We got this doppelgangbangin’ routine. Give me a promise. Give me your hard-earned drunk liberty. Let’s sew ourselves back up tight and shut in a cocoon, or let’s freeze in a cave. If bears eat our frost-bit bodies, there are worse fates. Let’s kiss off a cliff. Take a nap in a grave. Let’s get evicted and torture our enemies. You wanna be you, you wanna be me. I wanna be you, I wanna be you. I wanna be you, I wanna be you, I wanna be you, I wanna be you.
17.
Open Sesame 01:56
Open sesame. Open it up for me. All of the treasury, trash-talking tyranny. Lord, you best run for your life. No more kings. Open season, not talking no treason. If your soul is sensitive, my soul is sensitive too. Boo hoo hoo. Open container. He said, “Smell ya later.” Slapped on the handcuffs and led me back into my cell. Gosh, he’s swell. Out on the open road, last night stuck in my throat, whistling just one note. Whistling back just one note.
18.
Bill Sauce 00:44
I am not a seminal doctor. Quarantine didactic disorders. Wasted and stoned, calls me up on the phone. Gloves are for the kids. I don’t need gloves. The only way to shoot me’s a real gun--time to get shot. Paul works the door, I think I met him before. You play too cool.
19.
Summon It 01:57
(Séance.) Control crimson red, got arrowed by this arrowhead. (Show off.) Humming whistling songs, just a hum to show the whistle’s wrong. (Plaza.) I’m so psycho and sweet, aren’t you sorry not to be with me? (Mafiosa.) Kill ‘em boys where they lay. Peopled pictionary, back off baby. (Be gone.) From the grossness of dreams, gold teeth decaying in your sleep. (Step off.) Smoke you out with my sage so I can be alone to end my days. (So long.) Spitting my dorsal drawl. I live in my head, if you recall. (Mafiosa.) Self-obsession to boot. Slay the rudiments, hand off your use. (Transubstantiation!) Morph out, mess up, good Christian fun. (Show your blood!) I showed mine ‘cuz you’re out of love. (Love me not, love me not.) That radiation was a shock. (Saw my ribs and my spine.) Patted me down and said, “Safe flight.” Am I out of control? (All by myself, babbled softly though you didn’t haunt me. Demon tried to tell you, “I wished I was dead.”)
20.
Deady 03:21
Hey, ho, the nanny goats groan. They fall in line. They lock and they fold. No kids at their teet so their milk turns cold. Hey, ho, I fall in line too. An enchanted bitch full of vice and rue. Silk and spin, stitch and twine, and a mandrake root. Does the spell release or do I fade too? I wished I was dead when you called me up and said, “You let snakes in your bed.” I wish my god’s law let me do that thing I want. This depression’s not my fault. Hey, look out, the tower’s on fire! It’s the virgin priestesses feeding that pyre. Wield an axe so sharp, shoot the blade in the dark. Blood weddings only for my terrible heart. I’ll tell you something I never should have said. More than myself, I wish that snake dead. Sell my soul to the devil if he brings me her head. I wish I was dead. Pump my chest full of lead. Would you call on me again? I wish my god’s law let me do that thing I want. This depression’s not my fault. Am I so invincible? Cast the agate in the cauldron, melt my heart wound, curse my foes. These dark arts tear the living apart. Mouth shut, mumbled up. I’m never gonna say the things I only wanna say. The things I’m never gonna say: “I wish I was dead with a bullet through my head.”
21.
There’s a critter sleeping under my knees. He can sleep through the sun and the breeze. But I never could sleep very well with a beast in my bed, claws out, playing show and tell. Traced my name in the fur of my mate. Took my new name, started going to church on Sunday. Sneaky, can’t you smell it on me? Here, now, is your monster, my baby. I am indifferent if I am here or there. Will you eat me when I die? Silent predator, red eyes and tail. But for all of your scratching, I tell you, I cannot care. Knew a hunter, loved him a lot. He was my best friend and he was such a perfect shot, and though he shot me quick, it’s true he never missed. Wound’s healing slow. Critter, c’mere. Lick the blood out my bullet hole. (White meat, white meat, white meat, white meat.)
22.
Son Of 01:39
How would you spell my name if I said that our names were the same? Coddled and cultless, piss on the goddess who granted us these fleshy frames and named us such similar names. I’m not the name I chose. I’ve got a scar that runs deeper than those who forgive the forgeries two names afford to me. Under the bus, eighteen wheels slash across me as penance for all my killings. And you’re under the bus similarly, bleeding out and listening to me. You just sit and listen to me.

about

It’s been ten years since Sadie Dupuis recorded the first Speedy Ortiz songs, a solo experiment that quickly became her full-time band. Since then, Speedy has produced an expansive and critically revered discography, toured worldwide, and inspired next generations of bands with inventive songwriting and advocacy to better the music industry. But in 2011, the younger Dupuis was struggling through concurrent traumas: heartbreak from first love, leaving her hometown of New York for Massachusetts, and the grief of losing several young friends. Speedy’s first songs glowed within the contrast of noisiness and intimacy, raw sonic elements that came with closely processing vulnerabilities and Dupuis’ insistence on performing and recording each instrument alone. As the new project fielded show offers from favorite show spaces like Death By Audio and Shea Stadium, these early tracks became the springboard for the playfully melodic and cleverly distorted style for which Speedy Ortiz as a full band is celebrated. Now, ten years later, Speedy’s first self-released collections will be widely available for the first time and reissued as a double LP The Death of Speedy Ortiz & Cop Kicker…Forever, alongside previously unreleased tracks, reflective liner notes penned by Dupuis, and unearthed photos and journal scans from that era.

The tracks on The Death of Speedy Ortiz & Cop Kicker…Forever were written after student-created prompts while Dupuis was teaching a songwriting class at the same summer camp where she’d first learned guitar. "Hexxy Sadie” was written in an hour, like the rest of the songs, and on Dupuis’ twenty-third birthday; using explosive riffs and distorted harmonies, she explores her uncertain yearning as a twinless twin. "Frankenweenie" came from the prompt “dog,” and over brooding piano, spry tambourine, and eruptive snare, Dupuis sings from the perspective of a dead childhood pet about forgiveness. “Cutco,” which navigates tricky chord changes with deft guitar passages and ironic deadpan, grins at the bitterness of friendships gone awry. These early songs highlighted Dupuis’ remarkable talent at dissecting specific emotions and moments, analyzing the many ways the pieces fit together, and scrutinizing the places where they don’t.

During the recording process, Dupuis was inspired by the impulsive DIY methods of artists like Elliott Smith and Sparklehorse; a mixing note from September 2011 read, “It's important for the 'concept' of this 'album' that I don't redo anything.” The Death of Speedy Ortiz & Cop Kicker…Forever still holds onto the magic immediacy of lo-fi recordings, but this reissue is helped by the technical know-how gained through Dupuis’ solo production work as Sad13 (Lizzo, Backxwash). Remixing in 2021, Dupuis cleaned up edits on her triple-tracked drums, made space for instrumental flourishes performed on eclectic instruments like cello, banjo and timpani, and rewired digital sounds to warm up the layers of intersecting guitars. Co-mixer Justin Pizzoferrato (Dinosaur Jr., Sebadoh), who worked with Speedy on Sports EP, Major Arcana, and Real Hair, further clarified the mix with analog compressors, and mastering engineer Emily Lazar (Liz Phair, HAIM) added a glossy sheen to the stratified bombast.

As Dupuis’ cult-beloved early material finally re-enters the world in a substantive way, The Death of Speedy Ortiz & Cop Kicker…Forever is a seamless fit to the Speedy Ortiz discography that succeeded it, and evidence that Speedy’s biting lyrics, intricate compositions, and daring performances have been inherent to the project since its outset.

credits

released November 12, 2021

Originally recorded, performed and mixed in 2011 by Sadie Dupuis at Buck’s Rock, New Milford, CT and at then-home in Northampton, MA. All songs July Was Hot (BMI) 2011.

Sadie played: electric and acoustic guitar, electric bass, drums, piano, banjo, timpani, cello, violin, upright bass, ambient sounds, shaker, cabasa, tambourine, handclaps, vocals, “clicks,” drum machine, and the bathroom sink.

Cop Kicker was first released October 11, 2011. The Death of Speedy Ortiz followed on November 29, 2011. A couple ...Forever bonus songs showed up on compilations but were otherwise unreleased.

2021 production, programming and co-mix by Sadie Dupuis at home in Philadelphia, PA. Mixed by Justin Pizzoferrato at Sonelab, Easthampton, MA. Mastered by Emily Lazar & Chris Allgood at The Lodge, New York, NY.

Artwork by Sadie. Digital layout by Rob Carmichael. Speedy Ortiz and The Death of Speedy names from Jaime Hernandez.

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Speedy Ortiz Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Speedy Ortiz is: Sadie Dupuis | Andy Molholt | Audrey Zee Whitesides | Joey Doubek

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