DC Larson's JUKEBOX JURY: February 2025

Wednesday, February 26, 2025

Ali and the Hilljack Stompers

"Tags" single

(Self-issued)

So seductive is the groove, and so futile would be efforts at resistance, that surrender is the most logical and pleasurable option. Ali's tones unfurl in burnished adamance, spreading across styling a far piece from Sam's progeniture. (That rank being the combo's more typical domain.) Acoustic movements make common cause with stutter-stepping skins and wall-socketed cohorts, to weave something measured and captivatingly dense.

(An advance audio clip was sent to this reviewer. The track is scheduled for March 4 release.)

No video available

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Gary Hiland Trio

"Running Around" "Rock'n'Roll Blues" singles

(Goofin)

No dramatic departures from standard Rockabilly methodology will be located here. That is a positive appraisal. Because, while innovation is welcome, on occasion, there are moments when the familiar is most apt. In simplicity revs efficaciousness. Dancers don't care to pause and ponder crisp wrinkles; they're on the scene to have a blast. The men gathered here seem intent on just-plain rocking, and they excel at that pursuit. (And the Linda Hopkins gesture augments their validity.)

Videos: "Running Around"

Toini & the Tomcats

We Wanna Boogie 3-song release

(Musikkpartner)

A trio of cuts issued in afterburn left by 2023's Best of full-length disc (also on Musikkpartner). The Norwegians let go with raving of vintage formulation that kicks over the traces, only to wax a bit subdued and reflective in their parting. Nothing more is asked of listeners than that they dig thoroughly. Done.

Recommended: "We Wanna Boogie," "As Long As I'm Moving," "I've Got a Feeling"

Video: "We Wanna Boogie" "As Long As I'm Moving" "I've Got a Feeling"

Back In the Day, 1997

Buster Poindexter

Buster's Spanish Rocketship

(Uni / Polygram Pop / Jazz)

At this scrawling, stricken Big City icon David Johansen lies in a hospital bed, far from the Max's Kansas City stage across which he once gamboled. (Of course, he subsequently discarded technicolor flamboyant frippery, and replaced it with GQ lounge-singer attire and a towerblock pompadour.)

The mind boggles as to why this sterling issuance never reaped rightful regard. Buster's Spanish Rocketship ranks as the most august of David's Poindexter discs (though each proffers especial merits).

Through one's ears pass multifarious Latin pulsations that make elated homes in the feet. Tempos frolic and horns swell quite beyond hindrance. Everywhere is movement, bright colors.

And delightful though those be, they are made still more entrancing by David/Buster's voice; always of distinct salubrity, it had by that moment risen to more technically sublime stature. (A now-aged item once noted David had been espied at a NYC Frank Sinatra performance; the student clearly prospered.)

In these often celebratory tracks reverbates an earthy rapture. The executive production resounds in sensuous grandeur. Such effervescent airs as these fill the confetti-strewn avenuess of New Orleans and Rio with unashamed revelers.

Recommended: "Ondine," "Nueva Broadway (They Don't Smoke)," "Inez (Is Just a Big Rage Queen)," "My First Sin," "Iris Chacon," "Mean-Spirited Sal," "

Video: "Ondine"

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Sweet Relief (Medical fundraiser)

Saturday, February 22, 2025

Fancy Dan

"True Blue" "Rock'n'Roll Will Stand" singles

(Pama Records)

Pama culled two ripping cuts from Fancy Dan's 2019 full-length This Is Rock'n'Roll. And sterling selections, they are. Each track's bold nature erupts with pounded ivories and Chuck-styled guitar, free-of-leash. Exuberant vocals exhort all to dive headfirst into the blowout. That the combo salutes the Blasters signals their stomping ground; it's ours, too.

Videos: "True Blue" "Rock'n'Roll Will Stand"

The onstage scene during recording.

Soul Splitter

"Still" single

(SSP Production)

Metalcore is at once truculent and of oppressive tonnage. Soul Splitter heaves abusive passion with the might of an eye-tattooed grappler whose skull throbs with an undiagnosed fever. This may kill.

Video

Urban Zotel & the Thundertones

"Heatwave" b/w "Emergenct Exit"

(Martin's Garage)

It's perilous kicks, maintaining board-balance atop a crest while pressing a General Electric transister radio to one ear. (Add in waist-up Frugging.) But the cumulative product of twanging strings, gentle sax, and appropriately understated tempos conjures mesmeric force majeure as actual as sand-grains betwixt toes.

Videos: "Heatwave" "Emergency Exit"

Back In the Day, 1959

Wilma Lee & Stoney Cooper

The Big Wheel

(Hickory)

They sported no costly finery, the folks who hailed Wilma as "The First Lady of Bluegrass," just farmland work-duds and faded housedresses. (Though they got slickered-up for Sunday preaching and barndances.) Her humble 1930's West Virginia origin - she sang Gospel with her family - led first to radio, next to a decade with Wheeling's WWVA-AM, and eventually to that desired destination of all musically-turned clod-kickers: the Opry boards. Along that road, she turned her hand to several common-folks music machines. And at her side was git-up fiddler Dale T. "Stoney" Cooper, whom she had espoused in 1941. The two-made-one produced homespun Gospel profound, invigorating, and of timeless reward. Calloused steppers enthused.

Recommended: "There's a Big Wheel," "Canadian Reel," "Walking My Lord Up Calvary Hill," "Big Midnight Special," "Each Season Changes You," "Home Sweet Home," "He Taught Them How"

Video: "There's a Big Wheel" "Big Midnight Special" "He Taught Them How"

Discogs

Amazon

Wednesday, February 19, 2025

Wayne Hancock

Slingin' Rhythm, plus essay

(Bloodshot)

A scan of this blog's history revealed that 2016's Slingin' Rhythm had no ink, here. While not storied western-swing troubadour Wayne's freshest release, it numbers among his more sterling. The man's reputation for assembling only first-chair accompanists well-versed in the ways of bouncing melodies was reinforced; jaunty airs offered running-gear motivations abloom with rustic pleasures. And, as always, the man's own hoi polloi drawlings cultivated welcoming climate.

(Among links below appears one for a Go Fund Me page. Its ambition is to secure monies enabling Wayne to maintain his town-to-town roving.)

Recommended: "Slingin' Rhythm," "Dirty House Blues," "Two-String Boogie," "Over Easy," "Small Bouquet of Roses," "Divorce Me C.O.D.," "Love You Always"

Video: "Slingin' Rhythm" (live)

Facebook (Fan page)

Bloodshot

Bandcamp

Discogs

Go Fund Me (Help Wayne stay on the road.)

The below essay is excerpted from this writer's 2017 Flesh Made Music:

Wayne Hancock

The upstart who overturned Nashville

Much was made of Wayne's significance when he first broke into national consciousness with 1995's Thunderstorms and Neon Signs.

'Wayne the Train,' as he quickly was hailed, was a vital personification of buoyant juke joint swing. His battered and furiously downstroked acoustic, rough hewn, everyman throat, and the mischievous sideways grin he flashed as slap bass walked the line, electric lead-picking stung, and steel caromed off jump-bop rhythms earned broad renown.

Great things, then, were expected of the dirt-road raconteur in whose twangy voice lurked the limber-limbed ghosts of every time-lost honky tonk under the risen troubled moon.

Texas rockabilly scramble has always figured in Wayne's music. Rip-rollicking big band jollity draws deep breaths, too.

When Wayne slips into swaybacked, mid-tempo country blues he evokes Hank Williams, Sr - a genuine touchstone for all who would tread this unadorned path. And he even relaxes still further now and again, delivering sonorous, back-porch plaints of universal melancholia.

Too seldom do any of us shake hands with justice. So when it does come through the door, we all should savor the moment. It visits singular bounty on Wayne every time a crowded dance floor erupts with full-throated regular folks cheering his roots music melange.

"Man, I'm like a stab wound in the country music of Nashville," the paradoxically rebellious traditionalist once laughed. "See that bloodstain slowly spreading? That's me!"

Levi Dexter & the Gretsch Brothers

"You've Got What I Like" b/w "Crazy With Love"

(To be determined)

These cuts sprang from last September's full-length Japanese CD Jumps, Gigs, and Shouts (the Catman reference apparent to the more discerning present). Fleet-footed legend Mr. Dexter cooly maintains rank among neo-roots music's uppermost personages (Robert Gordon, Dibbs Preston, and Danny Dean, by my estimation). In the live-wire brothers Gretsch, he has topflight confederates his capacities merit. Hinted affable moderation rides confidently astride barrelling muscularity. Levi advises these songs are to be issued as a 45, later in the year.

(Some years back, Arizona Rockabilly singer Colin Winski revealed to me that when onstage, Levi wisely sports hospital shoes - the better to pop the peds to the boards.)

Video: "You've Got What I Like"

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"Jumps, Gigs, and Shouts" CD:

Johnny Kool

Rockuten

Yahoo! Japan

Stage Frite

Sentence of Death

(Western Star)

Now besetting us is a cyclonic juggernaut that devastates. Terse voicings establish Psycho balefulness no less than does hard-lashed instrumentation. A stark study in appalling realities.

Recommended: "Hell-Sent Tsunami," "Monster Man," "Contract Killer," "Broken Angel," "Spilled Blood," "House of Execution," "Sentence of Death"

Videos: "Monster Man" "Broken Angel" Part 1 of documentary

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Western Star

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King Drapes

Teddy Boy Stomp 3-track disc

(Musakonttori)

Per this reviewer's evaluation, "BSA" is the standout. So it's a bit odd that it closes things. (On the other hand, going out strongly does brace.) While each selection offers particular qualities, all evoke images of suds-waving Teds storming the hardwood and chanting uproariously. 1,2,3,4 - you know the rest.

Recommended: "Teddy Boy Stomp" "Rockin' Teddy Boy," "BSA"

Videos: "Teddy Boy Stomp" "Rockin' Teddy Boy" "BSA"

Friday, February 14, 2025

V/A

Punk Rock Valentines

(Cleopatra)

As passions so urgent they demand vehement ejaculations be splattered succinctly across starkly arresting canvases number rapture among their bristling troops, curators assembling this compendium of ripped-and-stitched paeans to affaires d amour had copious examples from which to select. Their endorsements provoke. Available as 2-CD set or red-marble vinyl.

(At this writing, David Johansen is recuperating after a serious fall. Sentiments for quick and full recovery are extended.)

Recommended: "Baby Baby" (Vibrators), "Love Song" (Damned - demo), "Kiss of Death" (Mourning Noise), "I Wanna Be Loved" (Heartbreakers) *, "For Your Love" (UK Subs / Dead Boys), "She's My Little GoGo Dancer" (Anti-Flag), "Keep Your Hands Off My Baby" (Flamin' Groovies), "You Shook Me All Night Long" (Queers), "Perfect Girl" (D.I.), "Sea of Love" (Iggy), "You Can't Put Your Arms Around a Memory" (Johnny Thunders), "Looking For a Kiss" (New York Dolls), "Motivator" (UK Subs)

* For the purposes of this blog, this band-name only identifies the Thunders cell; that's only proper.

Videos: "Baby Baby" "I Wanna Be Loved" "You Can't Put Your Arms Around a Memory" "Looking For a Kiss"

Alan Power and the Aftershocks

Morning Blues digital album

(Self-issued)

Yellowed news clippings and photographs whose corners are curled have value as profiles of olden eras. But for vivid flavor, my wagers favor musics, especially those representative of folks outside polite society. In this crackling example, Blues and vintage Rockabilly fashions storm forth as if impelled by youthful freshness; beloved traditional gospel works like "This Train" and "When the Saints" resound off walls, their assembled fellows belted lustily. (One is put in mind of Elvis and the Blue Moon Boys.) Such are the skills with which unlacquered sublimity is wrought that yesterday's evergreen relevance is underscored.

(This digital release is also marketed as a CD at gigs.)

Recommended: "Morning Blues," "This Train," "When the Saints," "Miles From Me," "What Goes Around," "Song With No Name," "You Don't Know (What I Like)"

Videos: "Morning Blues" (Bopflix Sessions) "This Train" (Bopflix Sessions)

P.U.M.

"Společnĕ" single

(Self-issued)

It matters not that the present reviewer is ignorant of the Czech (or Slavic) language. In blood-fast Punk -- as in all genres --it's the music that unifies. Here, as burly chords are spewed in demolition furiousness, a pub singalong in which all mug-hefting participants bellow in back-slapping high-spiritedness packs past capacity.

Video

Linus Zander

"I Love You But I Got a Show To Do" single

(Zander Music)

Among life's rare guarantees is that so long as Linus arches over the ivories, quintessential Rock'n'Roll will send creepers flying. (And that ace accomplices fell in at his elbow further gilds this waxed affair.) Every mileau becomes an electric nightspot. When raucous fun romps under muted overheads and across scuffed hardwood, nights are obviously the coolest place to be.

Video

The Wolston Butchers

"Live Dead Die Fast" single

(Self-issued)

Orthodox Punk, Hardcore, and Skate Punk throw in together, with metal punching in, sporadically. The ripsaw product is at once perilous and grab-hold invigorating. It rages, it hurtles, it hones atmosphere to a spark-flinging instrument of scarification. Something feral possessed these men.

Wednesday, February 12, 2025

Doctor Velvet

New Breed vinyl LP

(Wap Shoo Wap Records)

Apparent from the sounding is that these Netherlands finger-popping perpetrators enjoyed well-spent youth carousing in an old-school R&B 'hood where righteous rhythms, stank guitar articulations, bold brass, and keyboard paradings - crowned by been-through-travails vocals that still find reason to exult - swing down the late-night boulevard. (And "Put the Hurt On Me" discloses J. Geils lyrical shadow - see "Homework.")

Recommended: "City Jungle," "Messed Up," "Blue Moon Caravan," "Bad Luck Baby," "Fool's Desire," "Anytime, Anyplace, Anywhere," "Put the Hurt On Me," "I'm Crying"

Video: "Messed Up" "Bad Luck Baby" "Put the Hurt On Me" (live)

The Biscats

...Best 2019 - 2024

(Rocka Beat Tokyo)

Lest the girl-next-door delicacy mislead, revved Rockabilly with open pipes swerves curbside. In that captivating confederacy specialness germinates. Clever song-architecture with predilection for Pop ingratiation reminds in moments of Eddie.

Recommended: "Haatonoeesu," "take away," "Koiwaaserazu," "Teddy Boy," "Sweet Jukebox," "Summertime," "Last Summer Day," "Sunday," "Anatae," "Junai Crazy," "Goody Girl," "Casino Royale

Videos: "take away" "Sweet Jukebox" "Goody Goody Girl"

Lion's Law

Evermore

(Pirates Press Records)

Oi erupts from the gut, spewing technicolor gushings of eardrum-rending defiance across sidewalks. Such is the bombast that no quarter could be fantasized, let alone extended. In closing, Lion's Law brutalize the Flock of Seagulls poofters. That alone warrants ticket price.

Recommended: "Paris," "Brother," "Back In Time," "Sewer Rats," "Extinction," "The World Is On Fire," "Before Your Eyes," "Evermore," "The City That Never Dies," "I Ran (So FarAway)"

Video: "Sewer Rats" "I Ran (So Far Away)" (live)

Fast Johnny and the Slow Burners

s/t EP

(Self-issued)

If one can't listen to a single track (and doing so would defy capacity), that's because each abbreviated blast courses seamlessly into its fleeting successor. That alacritousness - and the skeletal nature of Punk wrought properly - leaves smoke curling from the cortex.

Recommended: "Ain't Slowin' Down," "Dog Eat Dog," "Self-Depreciation," "Walk Of Shame," "Almost Fell In Love," "Someone Like You"

Videos: "Ain't Slowin' Down" "Someone Like You"

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Vinnie's Records

Saturday, February 8, 2025

Ali and the Hilljack Stompers

"Itsy Bitsy" single

(Tunecore)

Absorbing song and video together poses strange danger; it is to surrender oneself to a shifting reality in which spiders (in sundry incarnations) unfold, elongate, and scurry whilst marvelous musical madness pounds incessantly. Full release Made In Exile is poised for March pounce.

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V/A

Meteor Rockabilly and Hillbilly Recordings

(Ace)

As these simple craftings sprang from plain folks in a plain era, rudimentary technology their vehicle, a compellimg argument could be mounted that the tunes' essential humanity shone without clouds. And because they bespeak hearts, given genre designations disclose but part of the story; Blues and Jazz have peculiar voicings and broaden musical character. Ears detect strains that imprinted others' ensuant works.

Recommended: "Daydreamin'" (Bud Deckleman and the Daydreamers), "Ring Out Those Bells" (Red Handley's Wranglers), "Yakety Yak" (Mac & Jake & the Esquire Trio), "A Gal Named Joe" (Mac & Jake & the Esquire Trio), "All Messed Up" (Jess Hooper), "Can We Live It Down?" (The Hayriders), "Women" (The Jesters), "Don't Worry 'Bout Nothin'" (Mason Dixon with the Redskins), "Mama's Little Baby" (Junior Thompson), "Raw Deal" (Junior Thompson), "Get With It" (Charlie Feathers), "Tongue-Tied Jill" (Charlie Feathers), "Have Myself a Ball" (Bill Bowen & the Rockets), "Charcoal Suit" (Brad Suggs & the Swingsters), "Bop Baby Bop" (Brad Suggs & theSwingsters), "Lonesome Rhythm Blues" (Wayne McGinnis with the Swingteens), "Chilly Willy" (Mary Edwards), "Tell Her True" (Jimmy Haggett with the Daydreamers), "Gonna Shut You Off, Baby" (Jimmy Haggett with the Daydreamers), "Real Gone Baby" (Velvatones/Memphis Rhythm Boys), "Latch On To Your Baby" (Jimmy Lamberth with the Saxons)

Videos: "Ring Out Those Bells" "Charcoal Suit" "Chilly Willy"