The sarcastic and highly negative (fake) review of the Citizen Dick album, the band of Cliff Poncier with Jeff Ament, Stone Gossard, and drummer Eddie Vedder.
Do you remember in the movie Singles when Citizen Dick read the beginning of the review of their album?
Citizen Dick is a fictional band created by Cameron Crowe for his film Singles, consisting of Cliff Poncier (played by Matt Dillon in the movie), Stone Gossard, Jeff Ament, and “drummer” Eddie Vedder.
In 1992, Cameron Crowe, inspired by various harsh album reviews he had read in Creem magazine during his youth, also wrote a fake review of their (fake) album Smarter Than You, released by the fictional label Real Clever Records.
Below is a selection of the highlights from the fake review of the album. To read the full version, please visit the Cameron Crowe’s official website, theuncool.com.
CITIZEN DICK
SMARTER THAN YOU (LP)
Real Clever Records – 1992
TRACKLIST:
- Mist Of Pain
- Doghouse Blues
- Can’t Go 3 Days (w/o Drinking)
- Touch Me, I’m Dick
- Stomach Of Chaos
- Rebound
- Louder Than Larry (Steiner)
- Bust Of The Boz
Once again, when the Cliff Poncier begins swinging… you know what you’re in for. More pompous, dick-swinging swill from a man who has haunted the local scene for much too long. You wish that Cliff would move to another town, like Minneapolis or Los Angeles or New York. A town where he could disappear into the masses and not stand out like the relentlessly mediocre talent that he is.
Mediocre? Well, that’s probably a rather kind term for the kind of music that Poncier’s new band purports to play. This is Seattle grunge rock at its predictable and painful best/worst. Slashing guitars mesh with sonically ‘treated’ vocals to create a kind of desperate preening, prodding and chugging mess. Mark Arm probably dreams about music like this, and then wakes up grateful. In fact, Citizen Dick makes groups like Gruntruck and Sadhappy sound like geniuses.
The very cover of this album makes me want to piss blood. There is Poncier, his arms spread like a scabarous messiah, begging to be appreciated. I remember when Poncier met my sister at the Central one night. He called her answering machine for a month straight, leaving yearning and dull-minded, semi-pornographic messages of love. And my sister is not good-looking. It makes you wonder about Poincier, and it makes me wonder about me. Why my life has come to this. Reviewing the music of a puss-faced immature pussy hound with a fake wig for hair.
And that’s me being kind.
(…) Then there’s the music on this penile piece of poop. The LP begins with Mist of Pain, a song that reminds me of the sheen covering me right now. Check out these lyrics.
Feel the rain
Dig my pain
Grieve
Grieve
Grieve for me
Mist of pain
(….) But you wouldn’t know it from Doghouse Blues, the show-closer in the band’s disgusting-but-mercifully short live performances. I saw Poncier dining in the Doghouse once. He was eating a grilled cheese, and I haven’t been able to have one since.
Louder Than Larry (Steiner) is his next, and as a friend of Steiner I know they ripped off his best equipment and haven’t given it back since the night of Eric Johnson’s benefit. Poncier is also spreading the rumor that Steiner takes a lot of acid, which is untrue about Steiner but true about Cliff… or at least his mother to have produced such a damaged offspring.
This review is actually getting enjoyable.
Touch Me I’m Dick is local Seattle humor which isn’t really funny.
(…) Cliff Poncier will never amount to anything more than a dying ember in a scene that didn’t spawn him and will never give him a home. He sings about women and himself and himself with women and I don’t want to hear about it anymore. That’s it.
This is the last time we will ever write about him again. He is so mightily, so colossally ridiculously impudently awful that I may never say his name or write his name again. Let this be the last time you ever deal with this music or these words… Cliff Poncier.
Other than that, there was able backing from Stone and Jeff and drummer Eddie Vedder.
– Mike Vinson
CITIZEN DICK RISES AGAIN
On April 22, 2015, to celebrate Record Store Day, Touch Me I’m Dick by Citizen Dick was officially released for the first time as a 7″ vinyl. The song, made famous by Cameron Crowe’s 1992 movie Singles, is performed by the fictional band Citizen Dick, with Matt Dillon playing the role of lead singer Cliff Poncier. However, behind the instruments are the real members of Pearl Jam: Eddie Vedder, Stone Gossard, Jeff Ament, Mike McCready and Dave Krusen.
The track is a tongue-in-cheek parody of Mudhoney’s classic Touch Me I’m Sick, featuring deliberately naive and self-ironic lyrics. The Record Store Day release includes a special etching on the B-side with a message from Cliff Poncier. Issued in a limited edition, the vinyl quickly became a sought-after collectible for both Pearl Jam and Singles fans.
This release not only celebrates Singles, a defining film of the grunge era, but also highlights the strong connection between Crowe’s movie and Pearl Jam, who were just beginning their extraordinary career in 1992.
Born in Reggio Emilia in 1980. He created pearljamonline.it in 2001 and wrote the first edition of “Pearl Jam Evolution” in 2009 along with his wife Daria. Since 2022, he is behind 2 podcasts: “Pearl Jam dalla A alla Z” and “Fuori Orario Not Another Podcast”. He has collaborated with Barracuda Style, HvsR, Rolling Stone, Rockol and Il Fatto Quotidiano. He continues relentlessly to try to find “beautiful melodies that say terrible things”.
Favorite song: Present Tense
Favorite album: No Code
Favorite bands/artists other than PJ: Tom Waits, Soundgarden, Ramones, Bruce Springsteen, IDLES, Fontaines D.C., The Murder Capital, Dead Kennedys, Mark Lanegan, Cat Power, R.E.M.