MUDLOW - Lower Than Mud

The Bosses of the Brighton branch of blues recently returned seaside from their mighty new-friend-making jaunt around the countryside with Irish pals The Bonnevilles, following the release of their, ahem, "greatest hits" set, Waiting For The Tide To Rise. I gotta wonder aloud, how the hell could they narrow their best songs down to 12 tracks, let alone the 17 tracks on the digital releases, but perhaps I digress. 

Wanting to bring along some fresh music for the tour the lads released a very cool Mudlow four-song EP (I heart EPs! Give me 4-5 solid songs over 8 good ones and 4 meh, but again...I digress) consisting of a new song called Lower Than Mud from the tooth-marked, bourbon shellacked and jazz and grime-besotted carpenter's pencil of the enigmatic Tobias Mudlow. Lower Than Mud is classic Mudlow- nimble, menacing, and subtly rocking hard in a sleek sort of country blues jazzed combo that is only bettered by Tobias' lyrics, and story-telling.

Next up is Crocodile Man, a rare cover and a song by the late folk singer Dave Carter and Mudlow has put their stamp on it. It's a desperate, cimmerian song that Mudlow wraps their coats around and rolls into a shaded cut down by a dark, tempestuous river.

To pound the spile into the metaphorical whiskey barrel we get two live tracks, the impossibly funky So Long Lee from their first album Welcome to Mudlow Country (2004) and Caz from 2017's Crackling EP.

So Long Lee has long been a favorite of mine, and not just because (full disclosure/humblebrag) they let me play maracas on it once, and Caz will send a shiver down your spine. The often angular, sparking and jazzed guitar style of Tobias, his strong, raw Waitsian vocals and the characters it portrays, in combo with Paul Pascoe's solid, thoughtful bass playing and drummer Matt Latcham's understated batterie provide a solid yet mutable stage for Tobias's words and guitar to dance over and with, authoring a style unlike that of any other band in the alt-whatever you want to call it scene. They do their thing and refine it, then drag it thru the dirt. Again. Definitely one of the most interesting and original bands around in any genre, and one that rewards with repeated listenings.

I'm told that this EP will have a short life. Physical copies are limited to fifty and those are close to gone. Once that happens, this set of songs will disappear. You've been warned.

THE BONNEViLLES - Arrow Pierce My Heart

// Fb // Alive Records // Web // Youtube // iTunes // Motor Sounds Records // Spotify 

The Bonnevilles new hit record, Arrow Pierce My Heart, starts with a haunting, lo-fi, acapella prayer called The Bells of Hell Go Ting-A-Ling-A-Ling, a WWI British airmen's song, and it segues into a mono fade to stereo bomb drop guitar tone that rocks like the sound of Howlin' Wolf's 1969 amplifier rolling off the top of his station wagon. No Law In Lurgan, is a monster garage super rock boogie that sets the tone for the album. The Bonnevilles have sent notice: They ain't fuckin' around.

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My Dark Heart is track two. A blues shouter you'll be blasting on a late afternoon flat-black motorcycle ride straight into the sun.

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Track three, The Whiskey Lingers tells it like it is, if you like your liquor amber. A deeply grooving blues, it shows they've absorbed some Tupelo rock, a little North Mississippi trance action, and throttled it all thru a Nirvana/Stooges filter...wholly unavoidable, like The Beatles filter, it's in the air and in the water. Hold on! Singer/songwriter/guitarist Andrew McGibbon shines incredibly bright on this slab of blues rock implosion. Plucking, swinging, rolling. tumbling, sliding, grinding, McGibbon sails here...the performance...like the rainbow in a great glass of Rye whiskey, is stellar.

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I don't know if The Electric Company is a metaphor for something or not. Maybe the dude in the song worked for The Electric Company ...and while on the job liked to "Get drunk! Get high! Get Some!" and more. Whatever. I don't know about all you, but I say hail! Flip the switch, and rock it, y'all. #ItsTooLateToDieYoung

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Title song Arrow Pierce My Heart (#5) has Andy McGibbon playing an insistent, garagey tribal country spaghetti western surf guitar creep that transmogrifies into a feedback-breathing UFO-driven beast, hackles up. You'll be looking in the rearview mirror to see if McGibbon's guitar solo is catching up to you. Skinsman Chris McMullan gets a solid high-five for his hard slapping, one-driving-shoe-on-the-gas, one-boot-on-the-brake-drumming. #Wicked #OnPoint #Work

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Song six is Eggs And Bread, a short, beautifully picked gallows song that speaks to the eternalness of love and the blues. That is all.

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Lucky seven is I Dreamt of The Dead. It rocks. Hard. I'm thinking McGibbon (who produced the album) has some serious power-pop off-shoots from his blues roots. You'll hear some Dan Auerbachness in McGibbon's vocals, or maybe it's just his Northern Irish soul shining, either way, if you had the opportunity you'd buy this song as a 45, and keep flipping it over to play:

#8 - We've all felt it. You've weathered all manner of storms for a taste of love, and you fail it. Sing along: I've Come Too Far For Love To Die.

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Erotica Laguna Lurgana is an instrumental intermission that takes you through the steamy, sultry sub-tropical rainforests, and wild west deserts of Lurgan, Northern Ireland. It will set you to whistling, again.

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The Man With An X Shaped Scar On His Cheek tells the tale of just that. Not all the details, just the essentials. A roots-rock banjo-slugged chugger with a terrific, dark melody and driving rhythm...it runs just shy of a three-minute short story and teaches in its essence:
#Bewareofdarkhairedgirls
#Ringsofgoldcanlosetheirrubystone
#Beware

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Song #11 is Those Little Lies :

lie
lī/
noun
noun: lie; plural noun: lies
1. an intentionally false statement.
"Mungo felt a pang of shame at telling Alice a lie"

intransitive verb
1a : to be or to stay at rest in a horizontal position : be prostrate : b : to assume a horizontal position —often used with down C : archaic : to reside temporarily : stay for the night : lodge d : to have sexual intercourse —used with with e : to remain inactive (as in concealment)
2: to be in a helpless or defenseless state
3: Rotten fruits on harvest day

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Number twelve!
Learning To Cope is a wailer, a wall of gnarly Stooges soul garage punk blast... imagine The Undertones squad up with The Clash to produce The Cramps, and The Afghan Whigs cover it. Drummer Chris McMullan is a monster robot, destroying everything in his path...and doing it locked in. Another Bonnevilles song that'd make a great 45.
#compactknottedhardkicker
#Peoplesaddenedbythedeathofthejimjonesrevue
#Fuckyeahhandclaps

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Song Thirteen, baby.

The closer.
Who Do I Have To Kill To Get Out of Here?
The Bonnevilles start the album with a prayer, and close it with a post-grunge howl, a thumping anthem for something we can't imagine, that we all fear is coming because of what we've done...and all that's missing is a bottle of George Dickel, a horn section...and a longer fade out.

If you're one of those who, for some reason, felt
disenfranchised after the first two Black Keys albums, or maybe the first one even, and that's not meant to slag on The Bk's...some folks feel that way. Whatever. But you'll never deny the influence, bad and world-wide...or maybe you're still bemoaning the loss of The White Stripes, then you must rock out The Bonnevilles' new album, Arrow Pierce My Heart.

The Bonnevilles, like The BK's, are flavourful muthrs. They know their rock and blues deeply, but they've absorbed it, made it their own, and mutated it, rather than wearing it like a dress-up badge or a special hat.

The Bonnevilles are their own thing. Post-grunge blues-infected rock and post-Fat Possum-infected-punkass blues dressed up in new suits and fightin' boots, like city folks, but dusty with Irish country soul. They're stadium rockers at the corner pub, they're the band you wish someone would play for you when you think no one knows how to rock anymore. They're probably what you've been waiting for.

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THE BONNEViLLES Are Recording A Live Album!

The Bonnevilles are recording a live 
album in Belfasts Limelight 2 on the 4th September 2013, the venue for their extremely successful album launch last November. 

Album working title::

TAPE * SATURATION * OVERDRIVE

The album will be recorded and mixed by Walter DʼGoon who also recorded the bands previous long player “Folk Art & The Death Of Electric Jesus” on Twenty Stone Blatt Records and will be released in a limited edition, vinyl only format. The Bonnevilles have earned a reputation as one of Irelands most explosive live acts and now want to commit that energy to vinyl. The record will be live, raw and real with no studio overdubs or trickery, a true representation of what the band can do with just one drum kit and one guitar on one night in Belfast.

Here's a taste of what to expect::

10'000 - A Short Film About THE BONNEViLLES

@ Web // Motor Sounds Records // Facebook

Our Northern Ireland friends The Bonnevilles are heading out on their first major tour this spring in support of their new album Folk Art & The Death Of Electric Jesus. They've assembled this sort of audio/visual love letter of introduction that does a fine job of showing just how humbly badass they really are. The video for 10'000 was shot by Sean Duncan , who made the video for Good suits & Fightin Boots. The Bonnevilles throw down sweaty, poetic blues that soulfully rocks out like it's going out of style. Go see 'em and give them your money!

Psssst! Top Secret and in the works: 
A 10" 4 song vinyl affair for Twenty Stone Blatt Records coming in late spring!



1st March UK And Ireland Tour - OʼConnells Dundalk, Ireland
2nd March UK And Ireland Tour - Sweeneys Dublin, Ireland
3rd March UK And Ireland Tour - Ireland
8th March UK And Ireland Tour - The Zephr, Lemington Spa, England
9th March UK And Ireland Tour - The Prince Albert, Brighton, England
10th March UK And Ireland Tour - The Blues Bar, Harrogate , Leeds, England
14th March UK And Ireland Tour - Radar at QUB, Belfast, Northern Ireland
15th March UK And Ireland Tour - The Parlour Edinburgh Scotland
16th March UK And Ireland Tour - Scotland
17th March UK And Ireland Tour - Scotland



Who else digs these dudes brand new slab?
The Irish Times 
"...grief lurks over their second album like a leaden spectre. McGibbon’s whiskey-soaked voice is a powerful tool, driving home the likes of on of Reverbio with a steely fortitude and scaling it back for the tender shimmer of Separate Ways. Occasionally recalling the shady stalk of contemporary artists such as Dan Sartain..." 4/5

Mojo Magazine 
"... stunning of the wall twisted punk blues - makes the Black Keys seem like a bunch of pussys..." 4/5

Alternative Ulster Magazine 
"...it’s dense, it’s thrashy, and oh-so-dark. We always had an inkling The Bonnevilles weren’t the tea sippin’ kind, but Folk Art & The Death of Electric Jesus presents us with a solid slab of woe sure to convince any non-believers." 8/10

Incognito Magazine
Top 5 Songs of the year. “10,000″ by The Bonnevilles (Folk Art and the Death of Electric Jesus). If ZZ Top collaborated with a raw garage-rock duo, this song would be the result.
More Than Music

"Imagine a two-headed fuzz delta garage punk fusion that comes on like an incestuous relationship between The Black Keys and The Jon Spencer Blues channeled via Rory Gallagher, Howlin' Wolf and Willie Dixon." 

Dan Hegarty RTE 2FM Album of the week and #6 in Top100 Irish Albums of 2012
Vive Le Rock 8/10
Choice Meteor Music Prize Long List

Fuck Yeah THE BONNEViLLES! Live @ The Yard Sessions!

THE BONNEViLLES - Good Suits & Fightin' Boots - New Video + Free MP3s!

Watch the vid then go HERE and grab free mp3s of the songs Good Suits & Fightin' Boots + God Might Love Me ( But he don't know me like the Devil does ). While yr at it, if you've got any sense you'll just thrown down for the whole album and thank me later. New low prices + cheap international shipping. Or download it from iTunes. Good Suits & Fightin' Boots is one of the best albums of the last couple years. The Motor Sounds compilation Blood On The Scratchplate '65 is a killer too. Might as well download their free ep while yr there, too! Go!

THE BONNEViLLES ~ THE DRAG

One of my favourite bands on the planet is Lurgan, Ireland's The Bonnevilles. You can get their totally wicked sexy album Good Suits And Fightin' Boots (one of my fave albums of the year btw)  HERE!



A song, A motto:
God Might Love Me But He Don't Know Me Like The Devil Does:


HELL!

THE BONNEViLLES kill and kill again. In a kebab shop.

Via Bandwidth Films:

IN STORES NOW#32: THE BONNEVILLES from Bandwidth on Vimeo.

THE BONNEViLLES - GOOD SUiTS AND FIGHTiN' BOOTS!

One of my favorite albums of the year! Available HERE!

THE BONNEViLLES - GOOD SUiTS and FiGHTiN' BOOTS!

The Bonnevilles are a grimy punk-infected rocknsoulblues duo out of Lurgan. Bonnevilles guitarist/singer Andy McGibbon day job is boss of Lurgan's Motor Sound Records which represents a stable of underground (if there is such a thing anymore) outsider blues and garage outfits from around the globe (check out my review of Motor Sounds wicked compilation Blood On The Scratch Plate '65). With their new release Good Suits and Fightin' Boots, The Bonnevilles announce their arrival as a band to reckoned with, feared, and loved.

McGibbon's voice is a gritty, sexy, early Danny Auerbach-ian soul machine. His guitar sound swings thick, heavy, and as tasteful as a saws-all with a new blade, at once vicious and keen-edged. McGibbon keeps the vibe hangin' low, feedback full, and on-point exact. Drummer Chris McMullan's work is burly...soulful like ironwood and it tears at the seams of McGibbon's vintage pinstriped pocket, primally adding what's sonically required and vital. As a team they give each other the needful room the music requires to breath, grind, wail, and shake.

Shall we get on to the album? Let's shall.
Hey! Bonnevilles! Who the fck starts out their first album with an instrumental? You do, ya bastards. That takes some cojones. But while Good Suits stands tall as a powerful eleven track filler-less collection of singles it also flows album-wise, weaving from the aforementioned instro One More Nail Outta Rock n' Rolls Coffin to the souped up garage stormer Army of One to the boogieass menace of title tracker Good Suits and Fightin' Boots. No Government, No Country, No King is a slow, tense politiblues burner which is followed by The Drag which sports a similar hot slow burning, if not sexier vibe and ends with the snip of a JFK speech. The centerpiece of this work, God Might Love Me (But He Doesn't Know Me Like The Devil Does) stands as one of the tracks I found myself playing repeatedly. McMullan's simple slow tribal toms match McGibbon's on-point grungy slide work to set a resigned yet menacing tone. Acoustic roots rocker I don't Like Whiskey is a blues redeemer. Super single C'Mon is a delicious hook filled head knocker and bottle buster with it's singalong chorus raisin' hell and fuss. The Belgians Are Coming is two minutes of Dick Dale-esque red tide dirty surf perfection. The set ends with the wicked live anthem Hardtale Lurgan Blues that smokes deep and hard from fit to fin. Like my man Dj Hillfunk says "it's a slow grower" but once I locked into the turbo charged souled-out grinding alt-blues sound of The Bonnevilles I was blown up and dusted. The Bonnevilles Good Suits and Fightin' Boots easily ranks high on my short list of best albums of the year.

You Will buy The Bonnevilles- Good Suits and Fightin' Boots HERE

The Bonnevilles- The Drag MP3
The Bonnevilles- C'Mon MP3
The Bonnevilles- God Might Love Me (But He Doesn't Know Me Like The Devil Does) MP3
The Bonneville- Hard Tail Lurgan Blues MP3