“To the labels, the artists, the indies, the late night keyboard warriors, the shy bedroom writers that sent out their first tracks….”
music
“Relentlessly clever and smart… But maybe sometimes, just one time, I want my bleak future served… bleak.”
“What comes is a stampede of blues, of dirtbomb dry tracks made of squalor and howl where quiet is a hard thing to find…”
“Every part of pop’s formulas fall into place and there’s barely a hint of intention. Accidents really can happen, and like here it sounds best when they do.”
They live in a haze of accidentally anthemic self-made and self-assured angst, where webs and threads of Bona Drag and Juju clean-jangled guitars (from Morrissey and Banshees respectively) weave like a network of nerves up and through.
“40 years worth of love and half blind adoration has gathered us here to sing to hymns from ‘The Crack’; The Ruts ’79 debut album. Thick with punk’s grit and gristle and dub-reggae tricks it’s a head above pure protest thrash.”
“Dumpunk and primal clubstomp screw-you, wrapped in black and white twilight night static.”
Beauty and compromise run deep through the veins that are stitched into each ebb and flow. Contorted and kept just a shade out of shape, free-flowing down straights and restricted at angles, I find myself pressed and pinched then released by the unnatural designs of the album’s ambitions.
The Bodega’s gone dayglow. Neon rimmed specs at ready. Cameras are snapping at the pre-Henge show build up through prisms for retro effects. They catch alien spikes made of sprayed woven hair and fairy lights stitched into clothing, I look around at the faithful and made-up I and flash back to festival memories…
Here’s the first set of highlights from the state of Colorado… a close to whistle stop tour of Red Rocks Amphitheater, the Million Dollar Highway and Dinosaur Ridge. Queen, natural beauty, sci-fi kicks, claws and warnings all wrapped up in a Rats tour guide wrapping.
