Mr. Mojo Rising

I give music far more credit than it sometimes deserves. I've said it can do everything from cause joy to cure cancer. All hyperbole ... until now. I've just run across a release that has inspired me to write one hell of a terrifying story, and it is all thanks to the music of the Bad Mojos.

Few bands ... no ... no band I know of has ever said that it was inspired by GG Allin and Mahatma Gandhi, but it is a claim made by the Bad Mojos. This Switzerland-based trio who play some lo-fi punk rock may or may not be sincere about it, but they say it and that is all that counts. So how did all this inspire terror?

I was traveling 101 South and listening to the band's I Hope You OD. The song, though it doesn't matter because it was the mood the entire CD was setting that caused this, was "I Wanna Be Dead." It's a pretty standard song title, and the band's sound makes it fit right at home on its label, Voodoo Rhythm Records, but there was something in the air that day. Something that made this release trigger an odd thought in my brain that no other CD has done. I started thinking of a scenario so creepy, so Lovecraftian (this should be a real word by now), so terrifying that it started to freak me out.

I'll be giving the band an appearance in the story, that is for sure. Will the story scare you like the idea did me? I don't know, but I think so. All I know is I could go on and talk about the band's punk sound and so on and so forth, but the fact that it inspired this idea for a story is far more important and interesting to me. If you want to perhaps experience the same thing, try driving down a highway along a bay on a cloudy day and watch the birds in the sky as you listen to "I Wanna Be Dead." Your results, of course, may vary.

... And Justice For None

Metallica's fourth album, ... And Justice For All, was its last great release. I don't think I'm being controversial in stating that. It was the last one that meant anything to me. It was the last one before the band changed. After that release, any moments of pure Metallica were abnormalities and were no longer the standard. The band's game changed, and I did not change with it.

To be fair, I had problems with the release when it came out. I placed it as my least favorite of the band's output until then. Maybe I was nostalgic for the raw power that had come before it. Maybe I was bitter about the band's growing popularity, though I found it to be well-deserved in this case. I did not even hate it enough to not see the band on that tour. (Leigh Valley, PA, in case you care, with the embarrassment that was Queensryche.) It just was not as good as, say, Master of Puppets. Again, no controversy there, I think.

I believe if you had to place blame for the band's change it is because ... the band changed. At some point in the process of writing and recording ... And Justice For All, Metallica started to take itself more seriously. The men wanted to mature as musicians. They wanted to delve deeper into their craft. It's because they were artists, and not mere entertainers who were content with releasing the same thing over and over because that is what their audience wanted. Metallica changed because it wanted to. It needed to. To grow as musicians and artists, it had to.

And there is nothing wrong with that. In fact, it's good.

It just wasn't for me. Not at all. It's not that I wanted the band to stagnate. That is a prison I would never wish on an artist. For me it was that the place Metallica was going was not a place I wanted to meet them at, and I had no desire to be along for the ride. I did not want to listen to a band I used to love experiment with what it wanted to become. Perhaps I wasn't a true fan. Maybe that is true. A true fan would stick by the band no matter what it did. I believe I was a true fan up until that fourth release, though. With that, I sensed the tide was turning. I knew the ride I had so enjoyed was coming to a fast end, and I bailed.

Do I regret it? Not at all. But I do find myself listening to ... And Justice For All more than ever and wondering, "What if ...?"

Shine On, You Crazy Diamond

The fuzzy goodness of "Psychonaut" had just kicked in. It wasn't loud on the car stereo, but it was noticeable. My fifteen-year-old daughter and I were just about home. The wind had kicked up something ferocious outside the car, and we were at a stoplight underneath a big tree. It was the ideal place to hear the song.

"I never heard music made by aliens before," she said.

That is how she described the sounds of ET Explore Me. We were listening to the debut Voodoo Rhythm Records release, Shine, which was released 17 years after the band's first seven inch came out. Also interesting to note is the fact that Shine is the band's first full length album. Far too many bands are around 17 minutes before they do that sort of thing. 17 years, however, is apparently just enough time to release a near perfect album of psychedelic punk, organ distortion music from the Netherlands. The fact that it came out in February of this year makes it a love letter to music fans, too. That's all kinds of treats going on for your ears.

Of the dozen songs on the release, it's the first, "Let Me In," that gives listeners a taste right from the start of what they are in for. It is just the right way to start an album, and at times sounds like it is a soundtrack to a Sixties horror comedy like The Munsters. I am not kidding one bit, either. If you hear that and don't think that, you can write to me and complain. In fact, I insist you do. Eleven songs later ... and all of them sound just a bit different from the others ... and you realize that for 17 years you had no idea this band was out there making this amazing sound. It's the type of thing that makes you wonder what else is lurking about.

Now you know ... and knowing is half the battle.

Metal Devil Cokes

I have owned MDC's Metal Devil Cokes CD for what seems like an eternity. Well, no more. I'm officially putting it up for sale on eBay within a week or so. Parting is such sweet sorrow. But how did I get to this place?

I've always liked Texas-born MDC. Dave Dictor always seemed like a progressive kind of guy with songs that were pro-gay, pro-animal, anti-capitalism. Not every song was a winner, but I felt that the band's heart was in the right place, and I appreciated it. But for all that praise, the only release I ever owned was the aforementioned one. I had a copy of one of the band's other releases (long since eaten by a car stereo's cassette player), and I have some compilations with the band on it, but still ... I only ever bought this one release.

Before parting with it, I decided to give it one last listen. Partly for nostalgia's sake, but also to see if maybe I was making a mistake. Maybe I'd like it even more now and want to pick up everything the band has done. Sadly, after giving it three listens, I was not changing my mind. My reaction was the same upon first hearing it. It's clever, catchy ... and not much else. Perhaps it's a little too juvenile for my tastes. I remember thinking that very thing when I bought it, too.

I'm putting a lot of my music up for sale. Not because I hate it, but because there is so much of it that I don't listen to anymore and have no desire to do so. Oddly enough, my feelings on the bands haven't changed, but some of these things I've heard so many times that I don't think I need to hear them again. They aren't connected to any particular memory. They don't connect as deeply as some other releases. They just don't move me.

But what if I'm wrong? It's a question anyone who is selling off part of their collection faces. What if you are wrong, and the moment you sell it, you'll want it back? Well, I guess the band will get my money a second time ... and there's nothing wrong with that.

Psychedelic Crimes - Advance Word

I was excited to get the new Jackets release, Queen of the Pill, from Voodoo Rhythm Records. I'm a big fan of this Swiss fuzzed-out psychedelica, and with the addition of Jim Diamond (White Stripes) to the group, I figured good would only get better. And then I popped the CD into my car stereo ...

But wait, you say, I didn't know this was out. Well, it's not yet. It's not out until June 14, 2019, but I got an advance copy, and I couldn't wait to hear it. And then I popped the CD into my car stereo ...

Being in the car is not the best place to listen to music for the first time, at least not for me. My concentration is on the road and avoiding getting smashed into by some dumb Humboldt County driver in an oversized pick-up truck with State of Jefferson stickers on it. I put the Jackets on because I was excited. I meant to start listening to it at home that morning, but things got out of hand as I was working on my latest Sinful Cinema book, and I sort of lost track of time, so the car would have to be the initial listen. And then I popped the CD into my car stereo ...

"Dreamer" started it all. "Be Myself" finished it. In between were eight more songs. I was mesmerized. This was all the guitars and females vocals I expected. This was all the Sixties vibe  bustling with rawness that I wanted. It was, in a word, Heaven. To quote The The, heaven sent and hell bent. It was so captivating and dream-like that I actually kind of lost track of the fact that I was driving. That's bad ... but in a really good way.

When you get your hands on this (and you will want to get your hands on this) there will be some standout tracks. For me it was "Steam Queen," "Don't Leave Me Alone," "Queen of the Pill," "Floating Alice" and "Losers Lullaby." Your list may be different, but if my description alone intrigued you, you will have favorites, though it will be hard to pick. Just recognize the greatness, bask in the aural swirls, and enjoy.

June 14th isn't that far away.

Bad Luck Rising

In what world did this come out in 2011? That’s what you’ll ask yourself when you first hear Delaney Davidson’s Bad Luck Man. It’s an honest question because this music at first sounds … old. Then after you settle into the groove of this one-man band, you understand it isn’t really old, it’s timeless.

Davidson is fromdson is a New Zealander New Zealand, but you wouldn’t know it listening to these fourteen tunes of hard luck, depression, and relationships gone belly-up. He sounds fully American, like he was born and bred in the land of the blues, parishes, and voodoo. You can picture him wandering the swamps, playing dive bars, and keeping it honest. It’s no wonder he used to be part of The Dead Brothers.

Voodoo Rhythm Records put this out. It was the label’s second release of his. It was a good choice. Years from now when civilization is fighting over scraps of irradiated food and looking for shelter from the perpetual inferno/polar vortex cycle the planet has been plunged into, this music will still touch souls. Whether it’s the title track, “I’ve Got the Devil Inside” or “Windy City,” this music will be understood by people everywhere at any time. They will recognize and respect its purity just as easily as they know its shame.

As I write the first draft of this, Naked Massacre is playing on my television. It’s a sleazy little movie, inspired by a real crime. It’s a subject Davidson could sing about and make it relatable if he so desired. He has this ability to turn even the most transgressive of men into a tortured being you yearn to understand. He’s not a bad luck man, or even a bad man. He’s just a man with the ability to perform songs that move souls.

And that will never get old.

Midnight Memories

It’s just noise. That’s the common refrain heard by every child about their music from every parent. You heard it. I heard it … especially when I was listening to Diesel Rhino.

Of course, it goes the other way around, too. The younger generation has a hard time coming to grips with the music of its elders. They don’t understand why their parents and grandparents like what they do as much as they do. I remember taking road trips with my grandparents, and the scariest thing I’d hear was, “Let’s listen to Boxcar Willie one more time.” My soul would scream. I could not understand the appeal of Boxcar Willie. I couldn’t relate to him or his songs. Nor could I relate to my dad’s love of Johnny Mathis, or my mother’s need to play Judy Collins.

On the flip side of that, I’m sure my parents cringed whenever they heard Kiss, Iron Maiden, or later on – Skinny Puppy. How could my parents relate to it? It wasn’t their music, and it wasn’t their memories.

That’s where the power lies. Music moves people for different reasons. It creates different memories in different people. How it connects with you as a child may be different than how it connects with you as an adult, but if that connection was strong enough when it originally was created, it will most likely always stick with you no matter how little you listen to it in your later years. I do not listen to Kiss much these days, but if it comes on Sirius, I’ll crank it up and I’ll have some sort of memory attached to it. The last bit of music I bought was Essence! by Death in June. I do not have early memories attached to that band, but I’m interested in making new ones – a new soundtrack for this point of my life. I don’t just stick with the songs and albums I know. My parents did the same thing. I remember my mother buying the newest Blondie release. I remember my dad getting excited when he got a new Anne Murray eight-track.

The music that sticks, though, is what we’ll never understand between generations. We don’t share the memories and that’s okay. We’ll go on not understanding each other’s music choices and it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t diminish either side in either way. We don’t have to understand each other in this sense because it’s so personal that it could never be fully understood anyway. Just remember that the next time you question your grandparent’s love of Boxcar Willie, though I have a hard time coming to grips with that ever being an acceptable music choice.

No One Can Save You

Destination Lonely. If that band name doesn’t scream emo I don’t know what does. Then have a title like No One Can Save Me, and you know what the songs will sound like.

You would be wrong.

Three young men from South France have armed themselves with instruments and have created pure, crisp garage rock with roots firmly in the punk scene and a sound that sometimes evokes the guitar playing of Poison Ivy. Yeah, who would have thought such a thing could exist and sound so raw yet refined?

Not I. Not when I first heard the release three or so years ago. Knowing it was on Voodoo Rhythm Records told me it probably wouldn’t be some emo band, but the label has surprised me before. Not with garbage, mind you, but with something I was something unexpected. The Dead Brothers comes to mind. This was no exception. I was expecting one thing and got something else entirely different, and I was blown the hell away.

A quick read of the lyrics finds plenty of doom and gloom. Suicide, murder, loneliness, and hatred are the common themes. They are not happy ditties that one can sing in the shower. These are songs that play over and over in your head in the dark … after your loved one has walked out the door … or you shot him.

Still, it’s not emo. No, Sir. It’s a grabbing, multi-limbed monster, much like the one that can be found on the cover of issue eight of Marvel Comic’s Fear. It’s reaching through an open window, grabbing you by your shirt sleeve as your wife screams in terror from the stairs. That’s what this is.

The opening number, “Freeze Beat,” is an instrumental piece. If a film of my short story Night Fishing ever happened to be made, I would want this music playing during the opening scene. It sets the mood, but doesn’t really give you a clue as to what is coming, much like my short story’s opening scene. The song lets you know you are in for a ride, but at this point you are not sure if it’s a rollercoaster or a ride through a haunted house. Truth is, it’s a little of both.

Between “Gonna Break” and the title song there are moments of clarity and greatness that aren’t evident at first. In fact, those moments are mostly lyrical, but the music is so appealing that you will overlook the lyrics the first couple of listens. The sound is a sonic whirlwind of broken glass, and it is overwhelming in all the best ways. When you finally decided to take in what Marco Fatal is singing (you may remember him from The Fatals), you will experience this moment of enlightenment where the entire picture becomes clear. It is beautifully terrifying.

No One Can Save Me will probably never be heralded as the must-have, top release of all time, but it doesn’t need to be. It is far too personal for that … and far too fun from a listening level. Yeah, it’s a dark, angry release, but it’s also a work of art. And because of that, far too many people will never quite understand it. For those who do … it’s near perfection.