The latest release in Palmist’s split 12’’ series serves up a distinctly 60s garage flavour, courtesy of LA’s Growlers and Leicester’s Thee Ludds. And it’s easy to understand why the Brighton label has thrown the two bands together: they occupy different sides of the same room, with the lizard-like sleaze rock of The Doors being the entry point.
Growlers start proceedings, offering five tracks of twisted lo-fi psychedelic rock with a sound rooted in LA’s 60s scene. Opener ‘Graveyard’s Full’ is able to deliver starkly dark lyrics over a infectiously quirky soundtrack, with lines like “The graveyard’s full/We’re running out of earth/But we can use the bones to build another church” becoming so much more effective because of it.
The band blows a dusty tune at times, sparking visions of a peyote fuelled road-trip through tumbleweed territories. ‘Something Someone Jr’ and ‘Sea Lion Goth Blues’ both have a bluesy element to them, while ‘Drinkin’ the Juice Blues’ sounds like it’s been ripped from Robert Rodriguez’s turntable.
The LA band’s edgy, unnerving restraint is offset by Thee Ludds’ sonic canon blasts, where everything is loaded up and let loose. ‘Astral Plane’ is unashamedly bombastic, sleazy, fuzzy garage built around a pounding beat and static soaked hook. If Growlers’ set was the peyote fuelled road-trip, Thee Ludds’ six songs are the soundtrack to the acid adventure in the dangerous and dirty bar at the end of the path.
‘Jagged Path’ simply struts with a 60s Rolling Stones style confidence, while ‘Feeding Time’ puts that sound through The Stooges’ grinder and comes up with something refreshingly raucous.
The release is out on October 3 and is limited to 500 12’’ copies worldwide.
