DC Larson's JUKEBOX JURY

Sunday, March 15, 2026

Marley Bone

"Neesey Smile" single

(Marleybone Records)

There's a time for stridence and pugnacity, but life also offers tender moments. Couple spells, during which lidded eyes lock, caresses inspire, and the clock's hands lose meaning. For, just as the sun's rays banish dismal cloudiness, so dimples dash away despondence. Would that all combos were similarly adept at contriving hushed romanticism. Brushes imprint snare, strummed chords hint at beatitude, and basslines articulate empathetic structure. Blissful stirrings are brought to a head by womanly radiance.

Video "Neesey Smile"

Murry Robe

Move it Over

(Untamed Records)

A phrase-turning laureate, who sports finger-snapping finery and manhandles longnecked gut-boxes like they stole something. Great White North slickster Murry, on leave from the Shook Boys, sequestered himself at home so as to cobble this spartan demo bundle. It cruises with aplomb, occasionally hinting at hijinx. And despite couch-and-coffee-table surroundings, he hiccups like he's at a little nightspot on the outskirts of town. That's the way to be.

Recommended: "Hate Our Youth," "Dance with Me," "Wild Ones," "Move it Over," "Rockin' the Lake"

Video: "Wild Ones"

Haunted Rhythm

Scare Dance four-track EP

(Tessy Records)

Having produced two CDs by Essen bop 'n' swing commandos Haunted Rhythm, Tessy now markets the group's first vinyl endeavor. Hold onto something (preferably someone curvaceous). Because per urban legend, spinning "Scare Dance" repeatedly before a mirror will summon jitterin' yesteryear spooks in leather and lace; their acrobatic gyrations - urged on by Haunted Rhythm's chain-swinging fever-jump - may well be matched by your own.

Recommended: "Scare Dance," "Serpents and Spiders," "Dance, Dance, Dance," "Fade Away"

Videos: "Scare Dance" "Serpents and Spiders" "Dance, Dance, Dance"

Screamin' Meemies

The Trap

(Self-issued)

Shrewd production by chief Brain Rene De La Muerte allows every plugged-in deviser to be heard unto the extreme. And for his part, Marcel Bontempi fashioned startling cover art that, were it a movie house poster, would ensure swarming streams of bloodshot-eyed ticket-seizers.

Chord-swiped spectacles arisen are so dark, their poetry so lurid, one imagines Maila Nurmi getting up on the wrong side of the slab and seizing a quill. "Don't Tell Me No Lies," "All That She Wants," and "Motherfucker" stampede crazily into that bad night, busting clean through any impediments at ultra-volumes and without regard for anyone or anything.

Instrumental "Haunted Mountain" veers from bubbling electronics to gleeful brutality, six-string savagery and beats of locked-in purposefulness ushering listeners through what undead surely sounds like.

A Bandcamp advisory notes that conclusive slice "Something is Wrong" "officially closes this chapter and opens the door to what comes next." The song portends ebony desolation to which monsters will surely ransack labs' Strickfaden apparatuses and tear up moonshadowed countrysides.

The lid now closes. But know that it will again crack.

Recommended: "The Trap," "Drivin' Me Crazy," "Don't Tell Me No Lies," "Haunted Mountain," "All That She Wants," "Motherfucker," "Something is Wrong"

Videos: "All That She Wants" "Motherfucker" "Something is Wrong"

The Stripp

A vital truth that bears bellowing.

Video: "Ain't No Crime to Rock'n'Roll"

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The Darts

Mascaraed powerhouses set cities on fire with Rock'n'Roll.

Video: "Apocalypse"

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Wednesday, March 11, 2026

Jinx Jones

Under the Neon Moonlight

(Vibrosound)

Bow low, when entering the palace chamber. Jinx pulls up a pillowed seat at the same roundtable as Barry Ryan, Chris Spedding, George Benson, and Danny B. Harvey. (From yon wall, gilded portraits of lamented heros like Joe Pass, Barney Kessel, Matt Murphy, Jimmy Bryant, Danny Cedrone, Charlie Christian, Danny Gatton, and Franny Beecher peer down on proceedings.) The guitar case Jinx hefts is festooned with stickers proclaiming genres from which he samples, an idiosyncratic admixture the end product. Jazz accentings daub passages as only they can. Rockabilly assertions jump up. Blues pensiveness murmurs. Even Bakersfield Country contributes. Beribboned cavalier Jinx renders them as coalesced body, and they celebrate spectacularly.

Recommended: "Prelude Noir," "Rumble Street," "Get Out of This Place Alive," "Hittin' the Hard Stuff," "Duane's Train," "Cadillac Love Machine," "Neon Moonlight," "Million Dollar Fool," "Western Orange," "Lookin' for My Next Mistake," "Flippin' My Lid," "Love Letter from North Beach"

Videos: "Duane's Train" "Cadillac Love Machine" "Neon Moonlight" "Million Dollar Fool" "Western Orange"