As blusterous as Jon Spencer’s Blues Explosion yet accessible in their slide guitar fixated approach, The Dead Exs were just one of many blues duos to take the stage in the wake of The White Stripes’ popularity. Their debut release ‘Ressurection’ was raw yet focused…possessing power and groove, in short, everything garage blues should be. If The Dead Exs channelled the power and charm of the Blues Explosion’s classic work, then King Pizza signings ¡Vamanos! are almost the ugly Pussy Galore by default – their brand of garage blues making all but the very rawest noisemakers sound like major label puppets.
Tag Archives: lo-fi
FRANCIE MOON – Free To A Good Home
Following a self-released digital EP in 2013 and split cassette with Darkwing in the first half of 2014, ‘Free To a Good Home’ brings more previously unreleased music from New Jersey’s Francie Moon (aka Melissa Lucciola). Released to tie in with a summer tour – and acting as a stopgap before the appearance of ‘Glass House’, a studio recorded four track 7” – its seven recordings are very DIY in origin, but there are still times where they provide an excellent example of the performer’s talents.
VACATION Transmissions EP
For their fourth EP, US lo-fi/anti-folk duo Vacation take on some familiar – and not-so-familiar – tunes by other artists. As Tori Amos proved time and again, you can take the most rocking numbers and reduce them to a minimalist piano ballad with reasonable ease, almost to the point where the once unimaginable becomes predictable. In some ways, Vacation play by a similar rule in that their chosen material gets stripped down and re-imagined in an echoing lo-fi acoustic fashion, but whereas Ms. Amos, Emm Gryner and countless other artists always ensure there was accessibility even within their most bizarre reimaginings, these guys just want to strip things back to their most stark. This results in at least one tune that’s anything but predictable.
DETROIT REBELLION – Detroit Rebellion ’67 EP
In the first quarter of 2013, blues duo Detroit Rebellion (once again, not from Detroit) dropped a release that captured a real sense of energy and grit. Across it’s four songs vocalist/guitarist Jeff Toste and drummer Mikey Lams proved themselves worthy of standing alongside other similar duos. It’s more than fair to say – at least on the lion’s share of the material – with regard to their swiftly delivered follow up ‘Detroit Rebellion of ’67, those who loved ‘Fork In The Road’ will find more to love here, while those unmoved by lo-fi blues sounds remain equally unmoved. You’re either with the Rebels or you’re not – and if two men tackling the lo-fi blues is your bag, man, you’ve come to the right place.
DETROIT REBELLION – Fork In The Road EP
This release from Rhode Island’s Detroit Rebellion offers four tunes of garage blues with a cool, live in the studio sound. While the simplistic approach at the heart of the subgenre usually relies on plenty of slide guitar antics with which to engage the audience, these guys are a little different. Yes, they have slide guitar, but it doesn’t always provide the dominant feature. They may not have the upbeat rock ‘n’ blues grooves of Black Pistol Fire; nor do they ever go for the jugular in the way that first two Dead Exs records do, but in their understated way, these four tunes have their own sense of attitude, something heightened further by the basic recording techniques.