Browse Tag

raucous records - Page 2

Sure Shots (the)

Published on
///
The Sureshots - Four to the Bar
The Sureshots – Four to the Bar

Sure Shots (the) – Four to the Bar

ID Records – NOSE 16 [1987] / Reissue Raucous Records RAUCD 212 [2007]
Four To The Bar – I’m On Fire – Right Behind You Baby – Am I Blue? – I’m Uneasy – No Show Dole Cheque Blues – What I Got For You – China Town – Little Pig – Broken Heart – Wanna Know – True Love

Four to the Bar is one of those album that changes the face of Rockabilly back in the mid 80’s. The Sure Shots were at the time of this recording Gary Allen on vocals, Joe Guillan on guitar, Colin Mee on drums and Pete Hardy on double bass. They recorded this album in 1987. Produced by Pete Gage who also worked with Restless, Fractured, Frenzy and later Rusti Steel, and the Rattlers, it became an instant classic.

It opens witht Four to the Bar, the title track, penned by Allen, a highly melodic tune with a strong jazz feel, courtesy of Guillan’s amazing guitar solo.
I’m On Fire, not the Springsteen tune but another original by drummer Colin Mee, is a hot blues bopper in the same vein than Sure Like the Look in your Eyes by Red Hot’n’Blue.
Their cover of Right Behing You Baby, made popular by Ray Smith is pure Rockabilly gold. It also shows Guillan’s versatility, this time you can hear him in fiull Cliff Gallup mode.
Their version of Am I Blue is modeled around Cochran’s version though slighlty (too much?) faster. They calm down with the jazzy ballad I’m Uneasy co-written by Allen and Guillan. Allen is equally at ease with cool stuff than he is with mean number or hot boppin’ rockabilly like What I got for you. Truly a great singer.
Chinatown, the old jazz standard is another guitar tour de force. After a short intro and one verse that sounds as a launch pad, Guillan jumps into three amazing and inventive solos. The production serves the song well with a solid work on the rhythm section and the acoustic guitar.
Back to solid Rockabilly with Little Pig (Dale hawkins and later Buzz and the Flyers and the Polecats) and the Moonlighters’ Broken Heart. After all these years and to my ears, the Sure Shots still hold the title of best cover of this song, despite many attemps by other bands. Mee’s Wanna Know brings a bit of Diddley beat and Perkins’ Your True Love concludes the album in beauty.
The cd reissue by Raucous records features No Show Dole Cheque Blues as a bonus, a Rockabilly / blues number recorded for the compilation album the James Dean of the Dole Queue.

The Sure Shots - the early years
The Sure Shots – the early years

Sure Shots (the) – The Early Years Vol. 1

Skip Records – SKCD-06

Jump Baby Jump – SOS – Baby Got No Time For Me – You Don’t Care – Broken Heart – Somebody’s Been Rockin’ My Boat – Fire Engine Baby – Don’t Make Me Wait Too Long – Worried Bout You Baby – You’re My Baby – I’m On Fire – Little Pig

Released by Colin Mee who played drums for the Sure Shots between 1984 and 1993, on his own Skip label, the early years digs deep into the archive of the band.
The first four tracks come from a 1984 demo with Ian Rhodes on guitar. The sound is raw and a bit young at places but all the elements that will make constitute the Sure Shots are already here. Two songs are originals and the other two are covers of Harry Carter and Narvel Felts.
Next are two songs by the same line-up recorded three months later for a compilation album. It includes an early verson of Broken Heart that will later be re-recorded for their debut album and Norman Witcher’s Somebody’been Rockin My Boat.
Both Fire Engine Baby and Don’t Make Wait Too Long were recorded for a French ep they shared with the Jokers. I still remember the first time I held it in my hands and it’s still in good place in my record collection. By the time these songs were put on wax, Joe Guillan had replaced Rhodes on lead guitar bringing a touch of Jazz to their brand of Rockabilly.
Four live tracks complete the set. The first two, featuring the first line-up, are pretty.
If you dig the Sure Shots, you’ll sure want to listen to this early recordings. The cover reads Volume 1, but to my knowledge no Volume has been released yet.

Buy it here.

Taggy Tones

Published on
//
Taggy Tones - Unplugged, Unreleased, Unexploited

Taggy Tones - Unplugged, Unreleased, Unexploited
Taggy Tones – Unplugged, Unreleased, Unexploited

Taggy Tones – Unplugged, Unreleased, Unexploited

Raucous Records RAUCD165
Saint & A Sinner – Rockabilly Girl These Boots Are Made For Walking Rockabilly Rebel – Rebel Yell – This Little Girl – His Latest Flame Folsom Prison Blues – Insane – Big Fat Stella – If Only You Knew – Memories Keep On Haunting Me – Pink & Black – Crazy Kid – C’mon Johnny 501 – Crazy Love – Blue Suede Shoes Tutti Frutti – Nutbush City Limits Run Rudolf Run – Don’t EverTrust A Girl
Very good compilation of totally new material from this Danish neo-rockabilly combo. Tracks 1 to 6 are taken from a radio show and are recorded unplugged. These six songs worth the price of this album alone. Do you remember Restless’ unplugged songs on their “Rarities” cd, these ones are as good. Acoustic guitar, slap bass and brushed snare. Great version of Matchbox “Rockabilly Rebel” and even better is Billy Idol’s “Rebel Yell”. Idol seems to be a favourite of rockabillies and psychobillies as he was heavily covered troughout the years. Lost Souls did “Dancing With Myself”, The Ricochets did “King Rocker” and recently Union Avenue played a fine version of “White Wedding”. “Saints & Sinners” is not The Long Tall Texans one but a Taggy Tones original. The second part are unreleased and alternate takes from the “Rockin’” album. They kept the same tempo for “Memories Keep On Haunting Me” but this version has no whistling and the voice is different. Hard to choose between the two versions, I’m afraid you’ll have to buy both. Tracks 13 to 17 are demos of songs from “Viking Attack” album and are produced by Kim Nekroman. It’s no wonder to hear on “Crazy Kid” a typical Nekromantix backing vocal. A few live songs complete the set, with various guest on saxophone, trumpet (great rendition of Tutti frutti à la Sonny Burgess) and various guest singer. The last song on this cd is a beautiful piece of rockabilly with just the voice, a light guitar and a strong slap bass. And, according to the liner notes, it’s only a rehearsal. A very well crafted record with various moods, sounds and stuff that will delight every Taggy Tones fans and gain them lot of new supporter.
Fred “Virgil” Turgis

Niteshift Trio (the)

Published on
///
The Niteshift Trio - You Aint Seen Nothing Yet

The origin of the Niteshift trio can be traced when Gary Venn started to learn double bass in the early 1980s. His teacher was Boz Boorer from the legendary Polecats (and now Morrissey’s main man). He soon teamed up with a school friend called Steve Lovett on guitar and they started to practice in his mum and dads garage. It all seemed to fall into place and they quickly found their own sound. Their drummer at that time was a guy called Carl.
Things went well and the trio played lots of gigs at various rockin’ clubs around the country.They gained a good reputation and one evening after a gig they met Dell Richardson from Fury records who asked them to do some recordings for him on a couple of compilation albums (Gipsy Girl, I Love My Car, She’s Just Rockin’, Taken By Force).

Then Carl left to emigrate to California. By chance they knew Keith Bailey a fan of the band who also played drums. He was proposed the place. This line-up recorded their unique album “You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet” still for Fury. Using the lp as a card the Niteshift Trio gained more gigs abroad, including Germany which they toured twice with the Guana Bats, Demented Are Go the Deltas and various other top name and is remembered as a fantastic experience.

Unfortunately Steve decided to quit the band to become a solo country and western singer, which he still does now. Gary went on to form a new band called Loveless, a wild rock n roll band doing various rock n roll with a trashy sound, for which he switched from double bass to guitar and vocals enjoying playing and writing songs. Loveless toured Germany and went down a storm and it remains like a great experience for Gary.

The Niteshift Trio - You Aint Seen Nothing Yet
The Niteshift Trio – You Aint Seen Nothing Yet

The Niteshift Trio – You ain’t seen nothing yet

Fury / Raucous RAUC 237
You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet – One More Day – Leave ‘Em Cold – Venus – See My Body – Super Jet Rumble – Rockin’ In The Graveyard – Cadillac Ranch – Train Don’t Stop Here – Don’t Let It Fade Away – Slide – Taken By Force / Life Could Be Easy – Don’t Need Nobody – Taken By Force – What D’Ya See Now.

After numerous apparitions on compilation albums (one of their track even gave its name to “Taken By Force”), the Niteshift Trio finally made it on long distance.
“You AIn’t Seen Nothing Yet” is a typical 80’s neo-rockabilly album. The ingredients are all here (light guitar and snare, slap bass to the fore) and the result is rather pleasant. They have good originals and like many rockabilly bands of this era they also cover rather unusual material like Venus (made famous by Bananarama) and Bruce Springsteen’s Cadillac Ranch. This cover is the only weak point of this platter, using and abusing of a repetitive riff, but to their discharge this boring riff was also present on the Boss’ version.
The original album is rounded by bonus material coming from the aforementionned compilations
This is a must have album for any true neo-rockabilly fans and a good reissue from Raucous.

© Fred “Virgil” Turgis

V/A – Psycho Tendencies

Published on
///

Psycho Tendencies - Raucous
Psycho Tendencies – Raucous
Raucous
The Griswalds – Nighthawk / Spellbound – Last Breath / Full Moon Freaks – Surfboard Song / Frantic Flintstones – Hot Head Baby / Termites – Let Me In / Grovelhog – Times Gotta Change / Long Tall Texans – 900 Miles / Full Moon Freaks – Swamp Rockin’ Baby / Go-Katz – Real Gone Demented Hillbilly Kat / Sugarpuff Demons – Weedin’ / Griswalds – Psycho Tendencies / Termites – I Can’t Wait / Shakin’ Bones – Deviltown USA / Frantic Flintstones – Alley Cat King / Go-Katz – Nightmare / Griswalds – Robbie Robot / Sgt Fury – Cold Cold Sunday / Radium Cats – Haunted By Your Love / Cosmic Voodoo – Old Man In The Woods / Frantic Flintstones – Let’s Go Somewhere

This compilation is a good snapshot of the Psychobilly scene in the second half of the 80’s. The original vinyl was the first long player released on Raucous, a label that has made a long way since. It covers a variety of styles and proves if needed that this music isn’t that easy to pigeonhole. It ranges from the up-tempo skiffle/rockabilly of the Long Tall Texans to the punkish sound of the Grovelhogs. In between you find excellent bands like the Frantic Flintstones, the Go-Katz (with an excellent psycho-hillbilly number), the Griswalds (Robbie Robot sounds like a psychobilly version of Devo!) and Spellbound. Less essential are Full Moon Freaks, Shakin’ Bones and Cosmic Voodoo.

Fred “Virgil” Turgis

Crawdads (the)

Published on

The Crawdads - On a platter - Raucous
The Crawdads – On a platter – Raucous

The Crawdads – On a platter

Raucous Records – RAUC017 [1995]
Bad Motor Running – Thinkin’ Of You – Three Hearts Later – Two Left Feet – Jolene – Running From Home – Stop Playing WIth My Love – Long Black Shiny Car – Lend Me Your Comb – Sweet Smell Of Evil – Moonlight Kisses – Evil Thinkin’ Woman – Honey Could You Lend Me Some Dough – How Can You Be Mean To Me

The Crawdads formed around 1984 with Paul Murphy on guitar and Dean Kennedy on vocals. They were associated with the Northwood label and had songs on the James Dean Of the Dole Queue sampler. A decade or so later they resurfaced with “On A Platter” their firt long play, under the guidance of Chris Cummings of the Riverside Trio fame (also on Northwood). It’s a perfect balance between rural hillbilly bop/rockabilly with, among others, influences from Carl Perkins recorded in a trio format and tunes with a harder sound that see the trio augmented with a drummer. Cummings also lays steel on one tune. Superb playing and production and good choice of covers. Too bad it’s only been released on vinyl..

Fred “Virgil” Turgis

The Crawdads - Released
The Crawdads – Released

The Crawdads – Released

Raucous Records RAUCD199[2005]
Little Lil ~ Lucky In Love ~ Narcotic ~ One Long Road ~ One and Only ~ Gypsy Woman ~ Strange Boulevard ~ I Can’t Lose ~ Midnight Rendezvous ~ The Answer Is Yes ~ Feed The Flame ~ Beating In My Heart ~ Run For My Money ~ Pocket Full Of Rainbows

Ten years later, the second album from this British rockabilly quartet.
crawdads-1984-3

White Lightning

Published on

White Lightnin' promo photo - One of a batch of publicity photos taken by photographer and actor Martin Oldfield, somewhere in a warehouse in Ancoats sometime in 1981 - All rights reserved
White Lightnin’ promo photo – One of a batch of publicity photos taken by photographer and actor Martin Oldfield, somewhere in a warehouse in Ancoats sometime in 1981 – All rights reserved

A British rockabilly quartet formed by Stuart Warburton (vocals, rhythm guitar, tenor saxophone, harmonica), Paul Murphy (lead guitar/steel guitar), Phil Morris (double bass) aznd Gary Leach (drums) in the early 80’s. They had two tracks (House Of The Rising Sun and You’re Not Going Out Dressed Like That) scheduled for release by Hot Rock Records but were dropped at last minute though some test pressings exist.
They changed their name for the Rhythmaires when Big Dave Machin joined the band in late 1982 then split before reforming in late 1983/early 84 with a more jump/jive sound.
Paul Murphy later joined the Crawdads.
The album The Rhythmaires – Tenth Anniversary Album (Raucous RAUCD006) features 10 demo tracks by White Lightnin’.

1 2 3