ROCK•A•RAMA

ROCK•A•RAMA

DEPARTMENTS

This month’s Rock-A-Ramas were written by Michael Davis, Chuck Eddy, Thomas Anderson, Richard Riegel and Dave Segal.

QUICKSILVER Peace By Piece (Capitol)

No, it’s not a full reunion; it’s basically a project co-led by original Quicksilver guitaristvocalist Gary Duncan and ex-Hot Tuna drummer Sammy Piazza, which means (1.) you don’t get to enjoy John Cipollina’s slinky leads, but (2.) you don’t have to put up with Dino Valenti either. Duncan’s guitar playing is still basically outta East-West-period Bloomfield but the material is as snoozey as it is bluesy with a couple of exceptions. "Pool Hall Chili” is a Diddleyesque romp that would have been welcome on any Quicksilver album while "Peace By Piece” is one of the strangest raps from this or any other year. I mean, check out, “I got six fingers on my left hand/l’m gonna be the President’s right hand man/Every blind man needs a seein’ eye/I know he’s gonna call me I can read his mind.” Right, Gary, now is that before or after you walk those 47 miles of barbed wire? M.D.

AC/DC

Who Made Who (Atlantic)

This isn’t quite the perfect AC/DC retrospective—there’s not enough Bon Scottera stuff (no “Highway To Hell,” even), one of the new cuts is an instrumental, and so on. But so what? Nobody’s ever accused these heavy-boogie dynamos of being perfectionists, far as I can remember. And if you’ve only got room for one AC/DC album, this better be it: Nowhere else will you find swingin’ gutpunches like "You Shook Me All Night Long,” "Sink The Pink,” "Shake Your Foundations,” and “For Those About To Rock (We Salute You)” all in one place. Count as a bonus "Ride On,” the only Bon number here, and an honest-to-Lucifer drained-bottle blooze ballad (wherein he asserts, “I’m just another empty head”). And figure the hit title track, which starts with a synth-hook borrowed from “Billie Jean” (I) and raises epistemological questions concerning taxes, one-night stands, sub-par video game play, and the creation of the universe, as the greatest thing these Aussies have ever done (not to mention the only decent song I’ve heard on the radio all year). If this isn’t the smartest popular rock band of our time, I’d sure like to know what is. C.E

THE SLUGGERS Over The Fence (Arista)

Guitarist-vocalist Tim Krekel did a solo album, Crazy Me. for the late Capricorn label, while bassist Tom Comet and drummer Willis Bailey used to be in Marshall Chapman’s band. Now all three are united in the Sluggers, a rootabilly outfit with fast guitars and a hard plug beat. Yeah, that’s the vogue this electronicallyfarmaided year, what with the success of Mellencamp, Setzer, and all the rest, but on the other hand the Sluggers are pretty tuff on their own terms. Sometimes they chug almost like the Stones, but without their generic "decadence,” of course. And catch Lonnie Mack’s guest performance on the Sluggers’ “City Lights,” a song which has the brashness to name Cincinnati as a location of just such urban illumination.R.R.

UT

Conviction (Out import)

With careening, jittery, beyond-metal guitar, squawkingly lovely nails-onGod’s-chalkboard vocals, chaotic drums that sound played from the inside out, and, as they say in “Phoenix,” "basslines probing subhavens like a stethoscope,” three expatriate New York women comb a frightening postindustrial-and-once-again-prehistoric landscape littered with lipsticks, mittens, coke machines, pulp magazines, birdcages—the flotsam and jetsam of our frivolous doom. “What was once/lt’s gone stained,” they remind us. Mining everything from Black Sabbath to The White Album to Ornette to Stonehenge for ideas, swapping instruments and singing chores song-by-song like they just don’t care, they produce a horrifying music that comforts as it cautions and cleanses as it defiles. You can have your Bangles; for me, this turbulent din is what rock ’n’ roll is all about. C.E.

KIDS IN THE KITCHEN (Sire)

This band represents (almost) exactly the style of Australian Invasion I’ve been anxiously awaiting ever since the amazing Sports inexplicably failed to collect millions of U.S. fans back in 1979-80. Kids’ vocalist Scott Carne sings with some of the same Oz-R&B-flavored syllable-bending as the Sports’ Stephen Cummings, though, as befits kidz allowed to play in the pop-music kitchen of the yuppoxed ’80s, everything is much more subtle and understated. In fact, the Kids In The Kitchen are just as likely as not to cut their native R&B impulses with big scoops of more “modern” synthpop vanilla. But it’s a start. Next time, Kids? Use fewer different producers, and do more songs like "Not The Way.” R.R.

DESCENDENTS

Enjoy!

(New Alliance)

Doggone refreshing to hear an L.A. hardcore band that has neither stuck to loud ’n’ fast antiReagan whining nor succumbed to tough-guy arena-rock tedium. These non-punks (whose favorite lyric subject used to be food) would rather pick up girls with new wave haircuts, fart in each others’ faces, try to figure out “the difference between a whore and a concubine,” take on Husker Due and Motley Cru, change all their song titles from the album jacket to the record label to confuse critics, and write incredibly melodic (and sincere!) powerschlock love songs. Add their eight-minute arena-rock anthem and their 43-second loud ’n’ fast blitz, and you’ve got every base covered, seems to me. (P.O. Box 1224, Lomitq, CA 90717) C.E.

ERIC DOLPHY Iron Man Conversations (Celluloid)

Out To Lunch (Blue Note)

By some fortuitous corporate coincidence, these three long-unavailable highlights of Eric Dolphy’s career have snuck back on the shelves within months of each other. If they sound strangely contemporary, it’s because Dolphy set standards of excellence on alto sax, flute and bass clarinet that have yet to be consistently matched and because several of his sidemen here—Tony Williams, Freddie Hubbard, Woody Shaw, Bobby Hutcherson—went on to become influential jazzmen after his death in 1964. Since he left us before he had recorded much as a leader, these records are that much more valuable; along with The Great Eric Dolphy Concert box on Prestige, they contain some of the finest work he ever did.M.D.

WE’VE GOTTA FUZZBOX AND WE’RE GONNA USE IT Fuzzbox EP (Vindaloo import)

The spunkiest girlpop to hit these ears since the Slits split, the Fuzzies exude a carefree brashness as they tear .through their songs about sexual harassment and stuff while tarted up to the fnax (contradictions are fun dammit). The music’s a visceral Stooge/Pistols blizzard of fuzztones. The playful, enticing vocals lift this immediately satisfying artifact into the sublime trash category. It sounds as though the songs were written over tea one afternoon, but so what? This is energetic pop for now, not posterity. Fuzzbox: frivolous fun by four femmes in florescent finery. Fab! D.S.

JERRY DALE McFADDEN Stand And Cast A Shadow (Reptile)

Jerry Dale McFadden is a kid from the Southwest who played rock ’n’ roll in bars for years, moved to Nashville, and now has his own album out. From the string-ties and Stetsons of the cover photos, and from song titles like “Sunset Died When The Whores Went Away,” it would seem he’s trying to hitch a ride on the Jason & The Scorchers/Lone Justice bandwagon. If so it’s a shame, since he’s better than most of that lot. McFadden writes pop songs with surprisingly sophisticated chord progressions and memorable lyrics (e.g. “Country Beats The Hell Outa Me”). He also obviously knows his way around a piano, and his playing is every bit as memorable as that of special guests Warner Hodges and Duane Eddy. But best of all, this record isn’t more Farm Aid-fodder—no designer Americana, and no vocal cameos by his grandmother. More reminiscent of David Bowie’s Hunky Dory than of Hank Williams, Stand And Cast A Shadow is an album as surprising as it is good. (Reptile Records, P.O. Box 121213, Nashville, TN, 37212.) T.A.

THE NIGHTINGALES In The Good Old Country Way (Vindaloo import) Unknown to several million people, England’s Nightingales released the utterly brilliant Pigs On Purpose in 1982. It was a generous banquet of Velvet-Beefheart guitar sandwiches, laced with sardonic lyrics about the ill health of Britain and themselves. Singer-writer Rob Lloyd is the only original ‘gale on this, their third LP. With the new people comes a new sound. The title’s ironic ’cause this music is anything but good old country. Oh, they’ve added violin, mouth organ and viola, but like the loyal Van Vliet disciples they are, the ’gales use these trad instruments in unconventional ways. The ’gales deftly mix skewed countryish stompers with meandering (yet mesmerizing) Easternized rock (very ambitious!), featuring a Cale-like, dissonant viola. The ’gales may be long-winded but they’re never boring. All this, plus social awareness, biting wit and intelligence. A walloping good record, as is anything they do.D.8.