4/5
Don't Let The Bastards (2020) Get You Down.
Never mind the bastards, bollocks, 2020, all that shit. Truth be told we'll never forget it, but that doesn't mean we have to drag it over the coals, or walk it back. It's time to leave it where it lies, as we try to pick up the pieces left by politicians outside of New Zealand that couldn't seem to get their act together as we still fight this deadly disease. COVID-19 and presidential. Leave these bastards standing as on our own two we won't let them grind us down with Sex Pistols, 'God Save The Queen' swagger punks. The one thing we will take with us from last year are the 'Little Bastards'. The late December rarities album from The Kills that we are late to getting round to in review lost in our tape deck shuffle and yearly Spotify streams (we're in Haim's top percentage for the album of the year of 'Women In Music'). The one thing we owe to take into 2021 from the pond to pond, English/American rock duo of the U.S. singer Alison "VV" Mossheart and U.K. guitarist Jamie "Hotel" Hince. The Kills. The most underrated, indie band killers and killing it like Brandon Flowers and them 'Imploding The Mirage' on 'My Own Souls Warning'. But this is The Kills, the original band of the vocalist of Jack White's other supergroup to go with The Raconteurs and of course The White Stripes, The Dead Weather that have been kept on your mean side since 2003 or a 'Midnight Boom'. The last time this dynamite like 'Treat Me Like Your Mother' TNT duo had a record out it was the other worst year of the decade or all-time, when we lost Bowie, Prince and Ali and gained nothing but Brexit and Trump. But out the 'Ash and Ice' of 2016 came a classic like the black and white 'Blood Pressures' and all those 'Satellites' and 'Last Goodbye's'. From 'Doing It To Death' like "double sixing it night after night," to the 'Echo Home', it was another classic after another four years of 'Pressure' and now after almost another half decade to properly begin this new one. Its time to let the 'Bastards' play.
'Superpowerless' like the opening track...yeah that's how we've all felt this year. "Take a drink of my red wine" they sing to begin this Polaroid look of a photo booth of remastered memories. "'Til you're drunk/' Til you're high/'Til you're fake/'Til youre crushed/'Til you're red/' Til you're superpowerless," quarantined at home, locked down with a social distance from everybody and everything except our vices, this decades back track may aswell be the anthem of 2020. But No! It's '21 and over now. And 'Passion Is Accurate' for the anthem of the future that starts slow but moves in "mathematician fashion". Before 'Kiss The Wrong Side' locks the guitar in the right one for some raw riffs of punk power. "Things may turn around "VV" reassures us on the demo of 'Raise Me' with "Hotel's" background, "pledging allegiance." Hince's haunting guitar doesn't wince on a 'Night Train' to where you wish all music sounded like these days as Mossheart like a clash or crush of velvet underground's and pure nirvana, sings for the new sonic youth, "All my lovers take the train/All my lovers, all my love/All my lovers take the train/All my lovers, all my love" to "sleep tight" with "no pain" on this original midnight boom, before the 'Half Of Us' takes us away. All before "London Hates You" like Seven Sisters. Or Paris, New York (Brooklyn too), LA, Detroit, Moscow, Rio, Georgia, Berlin, San Francisco and every city in-between for a track set to be loved the world over. So "muscle on" Hummingbird. 'I Call It Art' Alison sings on the next track that is pure that. We do too. Call it love, or hate all you want.
'Forty Four' keeps us going like we wish 44 did (the only 45 we know is number 23's brief jersey change). "I'm so mad this morning" they declare on this track as blusey as the deadest weather you've seen all decade, until the drumsticks leave it all on the skins. Getting the guns out they hit an XFM session for 'Love Is A Deserter' with "one eye on the sun" and "one eye in the night" and just that static studio sound that's as raw and real as dust on a groove. But it's 'The Search Of Cherry Red' that revs up a "lipstick trebles under boomlights" track worthy of scoring something cinematic, theatrical, or drive-in. Worthy of a 'Magazine' cover, "in Hollywood I got the phone call". We're hit with a beautiful vocal distort under the 'Blue Moon' that you'd love to wake up to under China blue as you "hear the thunder of life driving by" on this road. The runaway in bluegrass 'Jewel Thief' experiments with real rock and roll traditions for this Englishman from Buckinghamshire and Floridian. You could never dream up a diverse duo that's so dynamic together in your wildest, but through the 'Baby's Eyes' you can see and hear it. Even in demo form, it demonstrates greatness worthy of the record, or the cutting room floor cleaning up when it's comes to what you should stream through your weeping speakers right now. This retrospect of life shows the B-side wins again. But it's their rockin' cover of Screamin' Jay Hawkins' 'I Put A Spell On You' that like Creedence Clearwater or her White brothers take on Dolly's 'Jolene' is the real classic revival and one of the reasons this band that should be one of the biggest in the world is famous. 'Run Home' slow like the way the future starts, because this 'Weed Killer' won't kill your high, but maybe the lows of yesteryear. And in 'The Void' of it all, or "flying too close to the sun", this is where musical earthquakes come from. This band is part of the seismic shift that made independent rock music from the United Kingdom to the States as Beatle born real like a Rolling Stone in all its killing strokes, like black Dead Weather leather or a rebel motorcycle club in all its stripes. The atmospheric 'Sugar Baby' will sweeten this deal in closing too. Before whatever comes next this year. Sure it's been a while since we've had a brand new Kill or album and as we dig through these crates of vinyl we're really scratching for one now. But until then here's 20 tracks that feel like their own album in themselves because they really do make one here to tide you over. This rarities album from The Kills is a gem set to make a killing. No joke. TIM DAVID HARVEY.
Playlist Picks: 'Passion Is Accurate', 'London Hates You', 'I Put A Spell On You'.
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