FISHBONE

(Columbia)

I’ve been waiting for years for some hep young blacks to take up that leering torch passed by our greatest rock ’n’ roller ever—Mr. Chuck Berry, of course, who’d you think I meant?—and the hour may have come to this Fishbone disc. Not that these L.A.-fried teens sound that much like Berry, nope, the resemblance is more in their existential-jollies attitude. Aurally, these guys suggest the Bus Boys, Wall Of Voodoo, Run-D.M.C., the Good Rats, Madness all mixed together into something even newer than Lionel Richie’s latest Mercedes. Fishbone themselves call their sound “a brand of ethnic rock ’n’ roll” and we couldn’t need that more right about now. This may be the LIVELIEST record I’ve heard all year because these guys are so young they’ll still bust their butts for PASSION alone. R.R.

ROBYN HITCHCOCK & THE EGYPTIANS Fegmania

(Midnight U.K. import)