If the Carter Family were an inept garage band with its own songs, it would have been the Shaggs. I think.

Either way, the mythical Shaggs, comprised of a trio of sisters from New Hampshire. The story goes, their father was always interested in music, thought it would bring his family together and sprung for music lessons. Whether or not those lessons were of value is still up for debate today.

Released in 1969, Philosophy of the World is the Shaggs figuring out life – and their collective instruments. If you’ve heard Jandek before, this is the sixties pop version, perhaps. Well, actually, comparisons can’t amply describe what’s going on here. I mean, how difficult would it be to describe the groove found on “Sweet Thing.” It’s only really there for about thirty seconds even as the section that swing emerges from began before and ended after. It’s a confusion. But out of that, a unique world view, an insular one concocted by this family emerges.

In its scope, the Shaggs aren’t too distant from the Ramones or any early punk group pummeling some simple progression. With three girls crooning, though, the music takes on a weird flavor. It’s not good. So, why’s it made it through countless reissues? No idea.

But the collector geek, historian and rubber necker in all of us wants to understand what was going on. The girls weren’t retarded, just dilettantes. At the same time, though, the fact that the band was able to sound so detached from then current rock tropes is just short of staggering.

Again, that might be chalked up to the general ineptitude displayed by all involved, but even in its lyrical content, there’s something completely different going on when contrasting this clutch of tracks with SF bands, the avant sounds lopping out of New Yawk and everything else. Devo was formed not too long after this band recorded Philosophy. That’s a drastic comparison, but the Shaggs needed to craft its own outlook on the world, because it had no peers. How cloistered were Wiggins family up there in New Hampshire?

Whatever the answer to that is, the results easily count as a shambolic and dreamy look at growing up as a young women in a place out of time – that doesn’t mean the Shaggs were ahead or behind the times, just left to their own devices and startlingly creative. Not for everyone, but worth a run through.