„Tell young teenagers the news, we got good hard rock”

Mick Cancer, Sal Mineo’s Only Son (aka Ben Vaughn), Barb Dwyer and Palmyra Delran are together

PINK SLIP DADDY

was a psychobilly punk band in Philadelphia from the late 80s up to 1995. Next year 12 Golden Country Greats was released by Ween with Ben Vaughn as producer.

The band was reformed in 2012, and in 2016 they have „returned to rock action with a vengeance, having recently played a string of calamitous live shows and a new 7” EP, a rollicking, raucous heartfelt celebration of the music of teen pop idol Fabian Forte, and the golden age of Philadelphia rock ‘n’ roll.”

Fabian’s music career lasted exactly so far while Elvis Presley as a sergeant of US 3rd Armoured Division served in Western Germany between 1959-60. A short film about Fabian, the manufactured idol.

But more important that here is a 7″ vinyl with 3 new songs on French label Kizmiaz Records. The first ones after 22 years

so PINK SLIP DADDY  is a psychobilly punk band in Philadelphia again. And you can find some old songs on their soundcloud free to download

In my mind there are some cases when a band suddenly changed radically its style. For example when hc/punk Beastie Boys changed to hip-hop in 1983. When new wave synth pop Ministry became an industrial metal act around 87. When Metallica lost himself in 90. When one of the most thrilling thrash metal bands Voivod made a psychedelic rock album Angel Rat in same year. When industrial band Laibach became a successful cover band first, and then became a synth-pop band during the years gradually. And now here is the long awaited new Lantern album Black Highways and Green Garden Roads. And as if it were made by an other band.

After their sensational wild rock’n’roll album they have released an easy, almost distortion free, sometimes dark psychedelic folk rock album, „taking ideas from the work of Hieronymus Bosch, Carl Sagan, and Mikhail Bulgakov”. „It’s an exploration of the natural world and the cosmos, and a celebration of the wonderful, the serious, and the absurd.” They also said that it’s a result of many oversteeped pots of black tea.

It was recorded at The Bottle Garden, a home studio in Montreal filled with vintage gear and an array of instruments during 22 non-sequential days over a year and a half in 2013/14. More so than previous recordings, it is a collaborative effort born of studio improvising and collective exploration. They used new, unfamiliar instruments, such as organ and kalimba, and they experimented with tape loops and group harmonies.

Really fine songs – except for the cover version of Solomon Burke’s Cry To Me from 1962. It’s a mistake, just like the Rolling Stones’ version. (Listen to the original one.) The songs come Roy Orbison, 60s Rolling Stones, psychedelic era Voivod, and Illés (Hungarian beat legend) to my mind. And there is the bass theme of Dead Kennedys’ Holiday in Cambodia in the song We Are Here:

But the album is too long. And unfortunately badly edited, so it is hard to listen from first to last. It would have been better if there an LP with 10 songs and an EP with 4 (He Is A Pinball; Wait, Wait; Cry To Me; We Are Here Again) had been released.

Cassette by Fixture Records (Can) & LP by Sophomore Lounge (US)

Listen to it here

There is a fuckin good rock’n’roll band in Philadelphia. So ultra fuckin good that Goodbye Boozy also released them three years before. And at long last here is the new, the second LANTERN album! Black Highways and Green Garden Roads.

This has written about it by their labels: „Taking ideas from the work of Hieronymus Bosch, Carl Sagan, and Mikhail Bulgakov, the new album is an exploration of the natural world and the cosmos, and a celebration of the wonderful, the serious, and the absurd. More so than previous recordings, it is a collaborative effort born of studio improvisation and collective experimentation. The resulting collection is a diverse and sophisticated 14-song program that balances concise pop and lush psychedelic rock with weirder, headier jams.”  And it „is an ambitious and distinctly ’60s-inspired rock ‘n’ roll record, rich with surf, soul, and hard rock textures.”

cassette and digital by Fixture, vinyl by Sophomore Lounge Records

And here is the brilliant first album Rock’n’Roll Rorschach

„Home Recordings 1993-1999” on vinyl and cassette by HHBTM Records (US). Professional amateur high standard lo-fi bedroom country rock blues punk like Velvet Underground, Daniel Johnston or Pink Reason by Joe Jack Talcum founder of The Dead Milkmen. In 1979 it has started as an imaginary band, which released his home recordings. The real band formed in 1983. There was a minor hit Punk Rock Girl in 1988. After break-up (1995) and suicide by drug-overdose (bassist, 2004) they have reunited in 2008. Since then here is their second album Pretty Music For Pretty People

The new songs of Purling Hiss come to Dinosaur Jr to my mind, but this Philadelphian trio is better. I can’t endure J. Masics’ mewing.

„Weirdon” album on Drag City (US)

*

Thank God, less experiment and more music by Dan Melchior and Walker Russel (Pheromoans).  „Kraut-influenced space rock.” Maybe, I don’t know.

7″ by Kill Shaman Records (US)

Dan Melchior on RNR666