The Backside of America

It’s Really Big, Sometimes Beautiful and Always Worth a Second Look

Wednesday, August 7, 2024

The Backside is Coming! The Backside is Coming - to Revere! (Part IV)

From Dave Brigham:

Thanks to my impatience in the middle of heavy traffic, I found myself one day driving west on Revere Street and I stumbled across some fantastic sites that weren't on my radar. This is my way of bringing you into the fourth part of my series of short-and-sweet posts about Revere, Mass. (see bottom of this post for links to the previous three).

I've stumbled across a few recording studios over the past 14 years of exploring for this blog (see this post, and this one and also this post). But I've never seen one with a sign like Fleetwood Recording Studio.

I practically got rear-ended slowing down so I could turn around to make photos of that place.

The studio is important to music geeks because it's where The Shaggs recorded their sole album, Philosophy of the World. What's that you say? You're not a record-store clerk, fan of "High Fidelity" or someone who wears a "I Listen to Bands That Don't Even Exist Yet" t-shirt? Then let Wikipedia offer a primer on The Shaggs.

"The Shaggs formed at the insistence of their father, Austin Wiggin, who believed that his mother had predicted their rise to fame. Philosophy of the World was recorded in 1969 in Revere, Massachusetts, and released in limited quantities by a local record label. It received no attention and the Shaggs disbanded in 1975 after Austin's death. The Shaggs had no interest in becoming musicians and never became proficient in songwriting or performing. Philosophy of the World features bizarre songs with badly tuned guitars, erratically shifting time signatures, disconnected drum parts, wandering melodies and rudimentary lyrics about pets and families. It has been described as both among the worst records of all time and a work of 'accidental genius'."

Let's listen together to my personal favorite of theirs:

In addition to The Shaggs, Fleetwood recorded local rock bands, school marching bands, glee clubs and other music.

Fleetwood appears to be closed, which is a shame. Directly across Revere Street from the studio there is a private residence with some cool monuments lining its perimeter.

(Leaning Tower of Pisa.)

(Mount Rushmore.)

At the corner of Revere Street and American Legion Highway, I spied the back of an extremely narrow building.

I also made a photo from the front.

But the best way to see how oddly shaped and sized this building is, is via Google Maps.

I've only found a few details. Known as Picardy Corner, it was built in 1936. Sometime between 2013 and 2016, this little slice of architecture was converted to two condos. The last commercial tenant was a psychic.

I'm not the only one curious for about the history of this place. At this web site, somebody posed the question, "[H]ow is there room for anything inside?" this building. One commenter indicated that his uncle, who grew up in Revere, "told me that when they built the highway the state took part of the building by eminent domain. They tore down most of the building then built the exterior wall you see today that faces the highway."

If anybody knows anything else about this place, I'd love to hear it.

Cater-cornered from Picardy Corner is an outlet of Blanchards Liquors, which features a great sign.