Author: Dr. Flucke (Page 4 of 7)

“Rökning Dödar.” It’s on every Finnish pack of cigarettes, covering half the front panel. Big and bold. Finns know it to mean “Smoking kills,” but to us less literate English speaking music fans, man, doesn’t that sound like a bichen Deep Purple Deep Cut? One with Jon Lord going crazy-wack-psycho on the church-rockin’, pimped-out Hammond B-3 organ? With lots of smoke and dry ice and distortion…and wattage that would knock skulls on the next continent?

Yes!

That, obviously was the thinking behind insouciant bar punkers The Sharp Chuckies, an upstate New York band who named their latest record—you guessed it—”Rökning Dödar.” The music isn’t that great (although we’ve heard much worse), the homophobic lyrics are a little hard to take, and the band might be taken a bit more seriously if they polished up their act some.

But they do sport an awesome album cover, complete with a Finnish pack o’smokes:

Boston’s best-kept musical secret probably will remain such forever. But you, now, are privy to this instrumental band that sounds kinda like Chet Atkins on acid. Or Les Paul on some sort of otherworldly speedball. Or some lounge band that’s played together in so many freaking velvet-lined, cigar-fogged rooms that they can’t help but be tight and perfectly well-practiced. “Rock/Surf/Lounge” is how the Weisstronauts bill themselves, but that’s just a way to pigeonhole them conveniently for the rock press. No, anyone who’s driven down the kitschy, cheezy world of U.S. Route 1–from the gargantuan gas tanks to the Prince Leaning Tower of Pizza to a Chinese restaurant bigger than two city blocks–knows that the Weisstronauts (who quote Route 1 in their album art) come from another place.

That damn monkey always shows up on their album covers
in front of some Route 1 establishment of questionable repute.

In that place there’s fuzzy distortion, weird sound effects, and damn fine pickin’ on the electric guitar. Their sound is sparse and melodic, catchy, and crankable to earth-shattering volumes on your hi-fi rig because it’s clean and beautifully produced. I love these guys and I wish they’d crank out some more music already, because nearly two years without a new record is two years too many. At least they live large on MySpace, where new fans can listen to sample cuts and track down their obscure records on an obscure local label. Long live the Weisstronauts!

While MySpace hosts plenty of original artists doing original music, there’s room for a lot more than that. Yeah, we’re talking about cover bands. Or “tribute bands,” as these tireless warriors of dollar beer weeknight gigs at every damned dive across America fancy themselves.

And who’s to argue with these groups? Their work ethos, their dedication, their initiative to set up MySpaces, for gosh sakes, is not to be denigrated. Not here. Really, if you’re that into Depeche Mode so much that you’d devote your leisure time to covering their music, we’re not going to dump on that.

It’s really pretty easy to find cover bands on MySpace that you can make fun of yourself. Or, if you’re into the oeuvre, seek out a nearby show because you wanna be rocked. Here’s the process, using AC/DC as an example: First Google “MySpace AC/DC cover band.” If that gets you nowhere, just hit a fan MySpace. Then look at their friends. The cover bands will be there. In the case of AC/DC, you get groups like New Jersey’s Dog Eat Dog, or Kansas City’s finest–KC/DC, naturally.

Happy hunting. Really, get into this. Listening to the music is a fascinating study in musical anthropology, addictive stuff. Once you get your fill, jump over to YouTube and not just hear the stuff, but watch things like dueling Journey cover bands interspersed with actual Journey videos and the latest incarnation of Journey with the original members and the myriad lead singers they’ve found to replace Steve Perry, some of them found on–you guessed it–YouTube, as Schon confessed here. As Perry once put it, it goes on and on and on and on-n-n.