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Morning 40 Federation S/T M80 Records __________________________________________________ |
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-Sleazegrinder |
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Morning 40 Federation S/T M80 Records __________________________________________________ |
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-Sleazegrinder |
You know that voodoo funeral band that marched
through the streets in that one James Bond movie, with the blood and the
fire and the skulls and shit? Well, if Johnny Thunders had picked
THAT
band to back him up when he got to New Orleans, this is what they would
have sounded like. Mixing sloppy, half-drunk stripper jazz with sleazy
dive bar rock is such a good idea it nearly gives me a hard-on just
thinking about it, but it took ‘til now for there to be 6 (7? 13? Plenty,
at any rate) dudes savvy- and cocked- enough to pull it off. 
So, dig. The songs are all about booze, that’s
easy, but SOUNDING like booze is something else entirely, and take it from
a cat that drank a river in my time, this is the booziest record I have
ever fuckin’ heard in my life. The sax player has just gotta be on the
floor already when he’s blowing on that thing, ‘cuz every note sounds
CROOKED. And the guitar player wanders in, half-blind, tosses in a few
syrupy glam-punk riffs, then splits to puke somewhere. There’s trombones
and tubas, there’s chicken scratch drums, there’s a carnival barker going,
“He got a girlfriend and she’s only 13/That ain’t professional…” It’s
phenomenal, man, and that’s to say nothing of the Big Chief style
pimp-funk of “Chile Cheese Fries” or the Mexican firing squad waltz of
“Stinky” or the gospel punk blowout of “Gotta Nickel”. This is
some record, Jack, and I am actually happy these fuckers live in N’Awlins,
because I guarantee that if they lived in this town, they’d be the end of
me. I mean, this is one circus I’d seriously think about joining, you
know? If you’re looking for shimmy-shaking rock n’ roll record that’ll
you, Betty Page, Snagglepuss, and Anton Levay could all get real,
real gone to, this is it. The boys in the band like to call this mess “Sleazy
Burlesque”, and I’m not arguing. Outta sight.