It pretty much goes without saying that any band who think to call themselves Death are going to sound pretty ferocious. It also must be mentioned that a far more famous band marauding as Death are regarded as one of the forefathers of (you guessed it) death metal... different strokes for different folks, I suppose. Our Death (the first to call themselves Death, I should stress), consisted of three dope-smokin', two-fisted brothers outta Detroit, Michigan. The Hackney brothers recorded seven tracks of fierce, brittle proto-punk in 1974 and vanished into Detroit's garage rock ether until a few months ago in 2009 when Drag City Records reissued the band's entire seven track catalogue as ...For The Whole World To See. Legend has it that Columbia Records mogul Clive Davis heard something special in Death and persuaded them to change their name. The Hackneys refused. Listening now, the idea of Clive Davis hearing anything remotely commercial in Death seems pretty mystifying: "Keep On Knocking" is Grand Funk Railroad smokin' laced blunts, while "Rock 'n' Roll Victim" manages to make Bad Brains sound like lightweight AM pop. "Let The World Turn" shows a little more finesse than the pummeling garage-punk that the Hackneys played so damn well, and "Politicians In My Eyes" is one of those kooky naïve political rants that died with the stoned 70's. Reissue of the year, and I dare you to try and argue about it.
No comments:
Post a Comment