The Hands
The Hands
Basement Empire
By Jose Fritz
There was a pop sensibility in the '80s that wasn’t so much shit in its own right but was so often presented couched and smeared in shit that we could not see it for what it was. It was blatant cock-rock pandering and I see it here mixed with a 45 minute long impression of Mick Jagger. Normally this is where I’d start mocking the band more openly, but the Stones are so old, so stiff and taxidermied that there is now a void.
The Stones were a bad-boy alternative to the Beatles. They had the same manager and the same cross-the-pond success strategy, but they were allowed to wear the leather pants. The Beatles still had to wear matching outfits when the Stones were making Their Satanic Majesties Request. But the Stones had grown sloppy already, merely two years after “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction.”
It’s been a long hard road down into hell watching four decades of Keith Richards milk what’s left of the Chuck Barry catalog. The Stones only started to break out of the British Invasion mold when they began doing covers of Willie Dixon and Bobby Womack. While there is still a world of underrated black artists to exploit, The Hands have instead digested the art form. They became students instead of another epigone.
That’s where The Hands enter the arena. Clayton Doley makes a perfect frontman to replace the withering Richards. He croons, he howls, and as an added bonus he pounds on the Hammond keyboard like he’s avenging the death of Jerry Lee Lewis. Jerry Lee of course was a foot-washing Baptist and would have been offended by this bastard mixture of gospel and garage rock. But it’s equally true he’d cross himself, close the screen door and let out the dogs if the Hellacopters or the Animals showed up in his yard.
This is a record for men who drink Pabst and give the finger to the cops driving circles around the block with the house party. It’s a record for the last table of drunk assholes at the bar forcing you to work late. It’s also a record for the three guys fighting outside and their pissed off girlfriends waiting in the car.
Is this a satire of rock n’ roll? Could it be that simple? Is that the way they hang in Olympia these days? I say no. I say this is the pure unadulterated love of an ancient rock n’ roll aesthetic. It’s like the Electric Prunes on Agnus Dei. No listener can claim to fully grasp what’s going on around them but it makes the effort all the more powerful. Every song is about women, sex, drugs and/or the devil. That’s the first requirement. The second is that they need to kill Brian Jones -- only after that can they claim the mantle.
|
