Brief looks at recordings on independent or smaller labels:
”Bombs Away,” Evan Johns and His H-Bombs, Rykodisc (CD) and Speedo Records (LP and cassette), Pickering Wharf, Bldg. C-3G, Salem, Mass. 01970-If you`re looking for some genuine red-white-and-blue, all-American music, you can`t do much better than this. A Virginia native who has spent a good part of his life in Texas, guitarist-vocalist Johns and his three bandmates play an earthy brand of rock `n` roll laced with R&B, country, Cajun and blues influences. And they play it with an exuberant, honest joy. There is never any sense here that a deliberate attempt has been made to concoct a ”rootsy”
record. Instead, the music seems to flow naturally and effortlessly from a guy who has hopped a few freights in his time, hitchhiked across the country more than once, played in all manner of clubs and bars and soaked up those American musical styles along the way. Produced by the E Street Band`s Garry Tallent-and featuring guest appearances by E Streeters Roy Bittan and Danny Federici-”Bombs Away” is filled with music that frequently bounces off the walls with vitality. Add Johns` untamed-swamp-child, steeped-in-R&B singing, and you get a gritty, good-times celebration most definitely made in the U.S.A. (STAR)(STAR)(STAR) 1/2
”Now It Can Be Told,” Devo, Enigma Records, 11264 Playa Ct., Culver City, Calif. 90231-3628-You could call this the sound of Devo evolving. Last year, the band released an album titled ”Total Devo,” its first recording in a few years, that offered pretty much the same synth-oriented sound that Devo had purveyed during the early-`80s techno-pop era. But the market for synth-oriented pop had changed greatly since the early `80s, the music growing a lot more complex and sophisticated, and Devo`s LP was called ”outdated” by more than one critic. When it came time to release 12-inch singles from the LP, Ivan Ivan was brought in to remix the recordings. Now, with this live recording of a late-1988 show in Los Angeles, Devo appears to have stepped back, considered its options and made a course correction. ”Now It Can Be Told,” which includes several Devo oldies, is much more guitar and bass oriented than the band`s techno-days outings, and ”real” drums come into play as frequently as the electronic variety. One measure of the adjustment is the inclusion of a country-pop version of the Devo classic ”Jocko Homo.” The shift in approach has yielded results, breathing a new immediacy and life into old Devo numbers. The synth sounds are still there but are now only one element in a more varied, warmer mix (at one point synth is used to replicate the sound of soul-band organ stylings). Best of all, the band seems to have been energized anew by the stylistic adjustment, playing with real conviction and fire. (STAR)(STAR)(STAR)
”Groupa Kroovy,” Kino, Gold Castle Records, 3575 Cahuenga Blvd., Los Angeles, Calif. 90068-The proliferation of recordings in this country by Russian pop artists is nearing the point where we fully expect to see a rap outing soon by D.J. Jazzy Boris and the Fresh Comrade. If you`re ready for one more record born in the USSR, though, this one by the Soviet rock band Kino isn`t bad. Its chief drawback is one shared with other Soviet-pop ventures:
The lyrics are sung entirely in Russian. English translations are provided in the liner notes, but the translations often have a stilted quality and the imagery from another culture can seem odd (although the song ”It`s Our Time, Our Turn” has a classic, cross-cultural, cry-of-youth quality). A guitar-bass-drums outfit, Kino offers a relatively restrained, mildly moody, mainstream sound that at various times taps into New Wave, reggae and Dire Straits-like stylings. The album title, according to Gold Castle, translates to ”Blood Type,” and the title song deals with the fighting in Afghanistan. (STAR)(STAR) 1/2
”General Pain & Major Disease,” the Neon Judgement, Play It Again Sam Records U.S.A., distributed by Wax Trax Records, 1659 N. Damen Ave., Chicago, Ill. 60647-This retrospective of 1980s recordings by the Neon Judgement, a two-man guitar-synth unit from Belgium, offers some tracks available for the first time in the U.S., including ”Chinese Black,” which appeared on the marvelously titled European EP ”A Man Ain`t a Man When a Man Ain`t Got No Horse, Man.” Situated somewhere between early techno-pop and current-day industrial material, this dark-atmosphered electro-dance music will whisk many a listener back to club days of yore with its swirling, Goth-Romantic synth lines. In common with a lot of dance material that emanates from the Continent, the vocals often take on a portentous, hi-kids-it`s-Apocalypse-time tone. Nostalgic and nifty. (STAR)(STAR) 1/2
”The Hardest Way,” the Original Sins, Psonik Records, P.O. Box 2727, Lehigh Valley, Pa. 18001-2727-As long as garages and rock `n` roll continue to exist, there probably will be guitar-happy youths twanging away on patches of oil-soaked concrete across this land. But not many car-barn artists are going to bring to their playing the ferocity and passion displayed by the Original Sins, a Pennsylvania foursome that melds garage-rock tradition and wall-of-noise sensibilities into an intense, powerful hybrid. Employing fuzz-toned guitar, bass, brute-force drumming and an organ sound that inevitably will be labeled ”cheesey” by many, the Original Sins crank out loud, rough-textured and at times stunningly crazed music that resonates with echoes of the Standells, the Ramones, the Seeds, the Kinks, various British blues-rock bands and Husker Du. The key ingredient, though, is passion, both in the playing and in the raw-throated vocals of lead singer John Terlesky. Those vocals-marked by the garage-ese accent that turns ”floor” into ”flow-uh”-can boast all the polish of a pair of gym shoes, but like this entire LP they really are remarkable in their earnestness and fervor. (STAR)(STAR)(STAR)
”Billboard Top R&B Hits” (Five Volumes), Various Artists, Rhino Records, 2225 Colorado Ave., Santa Monica, Calif. 90404-A companion series to Rhino`s ”Billboard Top Rock `n` Roll Hits” anthology, these records offer a varied array of R&B oldies from the early `60s. Each of the five LPs contains 10 songs from one of the years from 1960 through 1964, the songs selected by Joel Whitburn, author of a number of Billboard-chart-related reference books. Among the selections included in this midline-price series (each LP carries a $6.98 suggested retail price) are the classic ”There`s Something on Your Mind, Pt. 2,” by Bobby Marchan, onetime member of Huey Smith`s Clowns;
”Fannie Mae,” by Buster Brown; ”Shop Around,” by the Miracles; ”I Like It Like That, Pt. 1,” by Chris Kenner; ”Let Me In,” by the Sensations;
”Heat Wave,” by Martha & the Vandellas; and ”Baby Love,” by the Supremes. (STAR)(STAR)
”Justice in Freedom,” Thee Hypnotics, Situation Two Records (British import)-You say you keep telling people that there hasn`t been any good rock
`n` roll since 1970? But everybody keeps telling you to put a zipper on it?
Well, these guys might lend a sympathetic ear. A British quartet, Thee Hypnotics seem to be a throwback to the days of Hendrix and the MC5. They turn in an 8-minute-long title number on this three-song 12-inch that is ultimately rooted in the blues but is also awash in the droning, freaky, psychedelic guitar style of the late 1960s. The two other songs incorporate elements of psychedelia but also draw on an aggressive, garage-punk brand of guitar assault. (STAR)(STAR)
Indie bin
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Our motto: ”If tin whistles are made of tin/ What do they make foghorns out of?” (Lonnie Donegan, ”Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavour (on the Bedpost Overnight)?” 1961)
