Here we have Javier Escovedo's new release, "Kicked out of Eden", courtesy of Saustex Records in San Antonio, Texas, and it's a good one.
We probably all know Javier from his work with The Zeros and The True Believers. He co-founded The Zeros (the so-called “Mexican Ramones”) and was a leading light in the West Coast punk scene. Surprisingly, "Kicked Out of Eden" is only his second solo recording.
I’ve played this CD several times since I received it, and the reason it gets only three bottles is that while it’s really good, it just doesn’t seem to get up and grab me. Maybe that’s me, maybe that’s the production, or the recording on the day. Call me a bastard, feel free, but to me the pace seems just a little too slow, lacking in attack… or something. I can’t quite nail it.
It seems that the imperative a band like this should have has not come out. This happens far too often with recordings (several favourite Adelaide bands who I absolutely loved have released CDs and LPs which seem sheepish rather than roar like a bull buffalo in Kakadu; the worst part is, when a band know the record isn’t up to snuff, they know it and feel bad. The next step should be to determine to do better next time).
Listen up, punks and noiseniks: The Canadian band’s fifth album in 17 years is inarguably their best. It rocks like fuck; It scratches like a rabid kitten. It’s tuneful and noisily offensive at the same time. All of which should tell you something about The Ex-Boyfriends even if you’ve never heard of them.
The Ex-Boyfriends come from Calgary and I’m willing to bet they’re the best-in-breed in that neck of the woods. If Calgary’s music scene is half as fractured as anywhere else, it takes a lot of balls to be a rock and roll band. Big ones if you play noisy punk rock. Shamefully, I’d forgotten they were around until a notice about this heavy-diuty chunk of vinyl landed in the post box.
Well, this is awkward. David Bowie produces a new album. It's actually pretty good. Easily the best album he's produced since "Low". I know, right? A lot of people hate that one too but an album made by a coke snorting lunatic whilst driving around a car park at seventy five miles an hour is by definition going to sort the likes from the dislikes.
After the Seventies glory years of Glam and guitar solos, things took a turn to the weird. The so called Berlin trilogy featured two good albums "Low" and "Heroes" and the rather jumbled "Lodger". His production of Iggy Pop's "The Idiot" quietly changed the way we'd look at popular music. Joy Division and Public Image Limited were obviously paying attention as well as a veritable army of prissy nerds with their sister's make-up kits and Casio keyboards.
Good god, what a fucking racket.
“Johnny Streetlight” is four-and-a-half bottles of joyous, fresh-faced old school rock’n’roll, soaked in piss and substance abuse and if you treat it right you’ll lose part of your hearing (just don’t eat the worm at the bottom). There’s no bad songs on “Johnny Streetlight”, they’re all good for gold. If this band had been around in the mid-‘80s they woulda been huge.
The inner sleeve pic by Leif Alan Creed makes the band look positively criminal (one gentle soul makes up for his lack of pupils by wielding a rather lethal saw).
This re-issue of a 1994 album by Medway’s finest sounds as brattish and vital as anything else around now, the perfect blend of punk rock and beat pop. Fashions come and go but Billy Childish remains a constant.
You think you work hard? By the time Thee Headcoats released this they had eight albums under their belts and fuck knows how many singles. Formed after Thee Mighty Caesars ground to a halt, they were an influence on everyone from Jack White to the Black Lips, Thee Oh-Sees and Jon Spencer.
In a world of shoddy, sub-par live releases and infinite re-issues of studio out-takes, this one lives up to the hype. Capturing the Heartbreakers briefly back on home turf after their first stint in the UK and in all their drug-infested glory, “LAMF Live” is the album your mother warned you about and your old man wanted banned.
Where’s the danger in rock and roll? You hear people asking all the time. It’s around if you dig deep enough but it was never so nakedly on display as back in the late ‘70s when the Heartbreakers were in full swing.
Americans watch their football games in four quarters. The Rest of The World tends to do things in halves. Just because “Heirloom Varieties” is neatly sliced into a couple of equal portions of contrasting music doesn’t make it any less of a trip to the psychedelic and pop backwoods of the US of A.
The first half (the review copy is a 14-track CD but you can score it as an 11-song LP) plays out in Paisley Underground territory, circa California 1986, with a huge nod to the jangly folk-psych of two decades earlier. That’s to say Rain Parade (that band’s Matt Pucci is a member), Green On Red and The Dream Syndicate. Steve Wynn fans will lap it up. The second half switches the mood to something darker and more psychedelic.
Damned if this isn’t one of the best releases of the last few years out of Sydney and its by an all but unknown band. Saying Phringe Dwellers have a low live profile is like labelling Motorhead as a bunch of guys who played moderately loud. Paradoxically, this EP from the blues rock trio sounds like it was forged in the furnaces of a thousand suburban beer barns.
Of course its members are no strangers to live stages. Bassist-vocalist-harmonica player Carl Ekman and guitarist John South were members of The Hunchbacks in the ‘90s and King Felix in the ‘00s with four albums between them. Expat Melbournite and drummer, Simon Li, is a singer-songwriter who used to keep time for World Punk exponents The Balkan Grill.
Artifacts and reviews from days gone by.
PO Box 334
Oatley NSW
2223 Australia
Get in touch: barman@i94bar.com
Mach Pelican
“A Secret Session”
Single Launch
+ Loose Lips + Elvis II
The Last Chance Bar, Melbourne
- Jan 31
Tickets
Peter Black solo tour
FEB
5 - Society City - Wollongong, NSW
Details
7 - Velvet Fog Records - Katoomba, NSW
Details
13 - The Cave Inn, Brisbane, QLD
Tickets
14 - Vinnies Dive Bar, Gold Coast, QLD (Matinee Show)
Tickets
19 - Medusa Bar, Geelong, VIC
Tickets
20 - Town Hall Hotel, Melbourne (two sets)
Details
21 - Shedshaker Brewing Company, Castlemaine, VIC
Details
27 - Hopsters Brewery - Sydney
Details
28 - Flow Bar - Old Bar, NSW
Details
MAR
1 - Hiss and Crackle Records, Newcastle, NSW
Details
Dave Favours & The Roadside Ashes
Service Station Chcken Tour
JAN
30 – Link & Pin, Woy Woy, NSW
+ The Dunhill Blues
31 – The Oak Tighes Hill,Newcastle, NSW
+ Crank Williams and Patsy Decline
FEB
27 – The Main Bar, Ballarat, VIC
28 – Union Hotel, Brunswick, VIC
MAR
1 – Bendigo Hotel, Brunswick, VIC
The Gnomes
Dive! Dive! Dive!
Rock ‘n’ Roll Dive Bar Tour
JAN
30 - Last Chance Rock'n'roll Bar, Melbourne (8pm)
+ Winsky + Riviera
31 - Trash Cult, Bendigo (7pm)
+ Clydesdale
FEB
14 - Shotkickers, Thornbury (8pm)
+ Public House + Special Guests
20 - The Tote Front Bar, Collingwood (6pm)
+ Champ Ruby
21 - Kindred Bandroom, Footscray (8pm)
+ Stimpies + special guests
The Sugar Beats
+ Plastic Section
Golden Barley, Enmore
- Feb 20
TsuShiMaMiRe (JP)
Australian Tour
FEB
19 - Shotkickers, Melbourne, VIC
20 – Trash Cult, Bendigo, VIC
22– Young St Tavern, Frankston, VIC
27 - Shadows, Canberra, ACT
28 – Moshpit, Sydney, NSW
The Jackets (CH)
Australian Tour
FEB
25 – Shotkickers, Thornbury, VIC
+ Plastic Section + Burning Effigy + Special Secret Guest
26 - Vineyard, St Kilda, VIC
(Door sales only)
27 – Mixtape Bar & Brewing, Marrickville,
Sydney, NSW
(moved from Marrickville Bowlo)
+ The Strike-Outs + pocketwatch
28 - The Bendi, Collingwood, VIC
MAR
1 -– Trash Cult, Bendigo, VIC (arvo show)
+ Grinding Eyes, + The Damos
2 – The Last Chance, Melbourne, VIC
Tickets
Cosmic Psychos
"I Really Like Beer Tour"
JAN
30 — Torquay Hotel, Torquay, VIC
31 — Riverview Hotel, Tarwin Lower, VIC
FEB
12 — Royal Oak, Launceston, TAS
13 — Forth Pub, Devonport, TAS
14 — Altar, Hobart, TAS
Bleak Squad
FEB
7 - Blue Mountains Theatre & Community Hub,
Springwood, NSW
8 - East Perth Power Station, WA
12 - .Her Majesty's Theatre, Ballarat, VIC
13 - Theatre Royal, Castlemaine, VIC
14 – Riverboats Festival, Echuca, VIC
19 - Princess Theatre, Brisbane, QLD
20 – Imperial Hotel, Eumundi, QLD
21 - The Regent Cinema, Murwillumbah, NSW
MAR
4 - Canberra Theatre Playhouse, ACT
5 - The Factory Theatre, Sydney, NSW
8 - Golden Plains Festival, Meredith, VIC
Tickets
On The Loose Presents
Guitar Wolf Australian Tour
MAR
14 - Perth, Seasonal Brewing Co.
15 - Fremantle, The Buffalo Club
all WA shows with Aborted Tortoise
18 - Gold Coast, Vinnie's Dive Bar
w/ supports TBC
19 - Nambour, The Ramp
w/ supports TBC
20 - Brisbane, Season Three
w/ Future Shocks & Evil Dick Industries
21 - Sydney, Factory Fusebox
w/ supports TBC
22 - Wollongong, La La La's
w/ Itchy & the Nits
25 - Bendigo, Trash Cult
w/ supports TBC
26 - Castlemaine, Bridge Hotel
w/ The Freedom Wave
27 - Melbourne, The Tote
w/ Alien Nosejob & Cujo
28 - Frankston, Singing Bird
w/ Split System & DJ Centipede & The Worms
29 - Balnarring, Social Club
w/ Cry Cyclops
Tickets
“Surreal Science”
Music of the Scientists &
Kim Salmon
and The Surrealists
APR
10 – The Corner, Melbourne
Tickets
11 – Oxford Art Factory, Sydney
Tickets
18 – Rosemount Hotel, Perth, WA
Tickets