RECORDS

RECORDS

PEACHES IN CREEM!

GEORGIA SATELLITES (Elektra)

by

Jon Young

Amidst all the jabber about a resurgence in American music, have you noticed how timid a lot of the bands seem? Without mentioning names, it’s obvious our home-grown rising stars often have too strong a sense of history, think too much, and, above all, don’t know how to get down. Therefore, let me direct your attention to the magnificent Georgia Satellites, a hell-raisin’, foot-stompin’, hard rockin’, straight-shootin’, floor-shakin’ bunch of boys. If you’re excited by the prospect of a firebreathing update of the early Faces or Exile On Main Street-era Stones, lay down this magazine and obtain the Satellites’ peerless platter immediately, If, however, you need to be convinced that big fun is a good idea, read on. The rough-andready Georgia Satellites capture the hell-bent, Jack Danielssoaked spirit of their decadent Limey predecessors, but these guys aren’t interested in mimickry. Just as Mick ’n’ Keith freely plundered a wide range of roots sources, this Atlanta-based quartet suck in ’bout anything within reach—and they’re not trying to impress you, they’re just having a raveup. For example, the comic ‘ ‘Keep Your Hands To Yourself” kicks off the LP with a greasy stomp depicting the agony of unrequited lust. While singer Dan Baird alternates between cool struttin’ and desperate country-boy yodeling, eager axeman Rick Richards spits out a barrage of blistering licks in the finest raunch tradition. And once he hits fourth gear, which is right away, influences become irrelevant. This stuff cooks.

In fact, every track creates a fine ruckus in one way or another. After "Railroad Steel” rolls and tumbles with the grace of Lynryd Skynyrd’s ‘‘Call Me The Breeze,” the rumbling “Battleship Chains” unfurls twangy hound-dog harmonies, followed by the snarling “Red Light,” approximating a collision between Chuck Berry and heavy metal. Bam!

The secret? The Georgia Satellites are a real band, not a collection of egos competing for the spotlight. Baird and Richards play off each other with contagious enthusiasm—the singer has his tough dude role down pat, but doesn’t lose his head, while the lead guitarist never strays from the bounds of the song, no matter how zany his solos become. Richards can raise the energy level of a track dramatically with a few wellchosen notes, as he does on “The Myth Of Love,” where his closing display stretches the tune to the breaking point.

Don’t forget the crackerjack rhythm section, either. Both bassist Rick Price and drummer Mauro Magellon once belonged to the artier Brains, though you’d never know it from their ferocious assault. Price is always engaging in some little trick to keep. things jumpin’ and Magellon may be the album’s most valuable player. Aided by producer Jeff Glixman (whose resume included deadbeats like Kansas), the drummer gets a shockingly loud sound from his kit, akin to the noise of a door slamming. The big, fat groove that results comes awful close, to perfection.

So maybe you’re still thinking the Georgia Satellites are ‘ ‘ merely” a superior boogie band, as if classic rock ’n’ roll were limited to a single style. Turn to side two, which begins with “Can’t Stand The Pain,” a howling gut-buster reminiscent of Exile’s “All Down The Line,” and savor the wicked slide work. Then stick around for the atmospheric “Golden Light,” a diamond-hard excursion into folk-rock that makes some of their revivalist colleagues look wimpy. Whatta contrast, eh?

The only thing slightly wrong with this wonderful debut LP is the closing track, a rollicking cover of Rod Stewart’s “Every Picture Tells A Story.” It’s fine, but the Georgia Satellites don’t need to salute their ancestors. They’re as good as those guys ever were—and maybe better.

DEBBIE HARRY

Rockbird (Geffen)

Our Debbie’s back, which in itself is cause for celebration. After all, Harry’s self-indulgent first solo effort, Kookoo, and Blondie’s nauseating swan song, The Hunter, weren’t simply a couple of rotten records; rather, they were conceived in the midst of an impossibly complex set of circumstances—the groups’s incredible rise to the top, while stylistically stretching themselves to the breaking point, inevitable ego problems that resulted from the “Blondie is a group vs. Blondie is Debbie Harry” conflict, Debbie’s movie roles, Christ Stein’s lingering illness, and so on and on and on. Talk about tension. No wonder Debbie came off like a rock zombie on the group’s last tour.

Well, I don’t know, but I suspect that over the last few years, Our Debbie has taken a well-deserved sleep cure (except for a couple of wake-up calls for tracks for the flicks Scarface and Krush Groove). Because on Rockbird, she sounds refreshed and centered; her singing hasn’t had this much edgy allure since Eat To The Beat. While, as always, her lyrics (she co-wrote all but one song) are sometimes so clever that you don’t know what she’s trying to get across, her observations on sex and romance and life in general are clearly based in experience—her point of view is thoughtful, amused, and now rather more realistic than glibly cynical. Produced by Seth Justman (J. Geils band’s keyboardist), Rockbird has a considered playfulness that accentuates Harry’s quirky personality; indeed, one of the albums greatest strengths is that Debbie has overcome the ossified persona of Blondie’s final days.

While not as innately eclectic as the best of Blondie (nor, thankfully, as schizoid as the worst of Blondie), Rockbird does capture, how shall I say, the many moods of Debbie Harry. In the bright, punky “I Want You,” Debbie gets at the intensity beneath such a deceptively simple phrase—-“I’m into you like a hardcore fan.” The nifty first single, “French Kissin,” is a dreamy evocation of the romance of sex. It’s sorta dirty— “Slip into the velvet glove, parted lips so filled with love”—but it has a yearning directness, and Debbie leaves the smirking to another blonde. “In Love With Love,” which she wrote with Chris Stein, is a smooth ticking dance cut, at once innocent and knowing, and all the more appealing for its “Heart Of Glass” references. Perhaps the most lyrically interesting tracks are “Rockbird” (also by Harry and Stein) tough, nervous, and straight out of Blondie and “Beyond The Limit,” a Power Station-like funk tune she wrote with Nile Rodgers. In the former, Debbie sings, “Back to basics a tweedle dee dee” and “Got to get a go-go get me outa this cage,” suggesting her career dilemma, and in the latter, she humorously but truthfully (I live in New York so I know) deals with life as something that you’re not often able to control—“It’s not the way that I want/It’s just the way it is/Beyond the limit.” But as Rockbird proves, not now beyond Our Debbie’s grasp.

Jim Feldman