Jukebox Zeros
"Rock & Roll Ronin"
By Geordie Pleathur
(SugarBuzz Toronto)
SugarBuzz Magazine
We've heard the cries for more punk rock, but could you be more specific? We don't even know what you mean, anymore. Are you requesting more coverage of heavily tattooed, energy-drink sponsored, corporate child whores, who dress like Nikki Sixx, but sound like Green Day, who perform ironic Guns N Roses covers, at expensive outdoor festivals, and extreme sporting events? Are you referring to grizzled, old, upper midddle-class, yuppie fifty-somethings, who live in gentrified rooms overlooking the Casino, with exposed brick, big bay windows, and shiny, wall-sized appliances, framed posters of the Clash, and Ikea shelving-units, over-flowing, with hundred dollar coffee table books about Patti Smith, and the Damned, who still wear white creepers, to their office jobs, and release new discs annually, on tiny vanity labels to their devoted audience of twelve, who all love their sideburned/hot rod/hillbilly pastiche with the stand-up bassplayer, and the accordion?
OR do you mean the crusty punk kids in the anarcho, paddy-punk bands, who get spied on, constantly, by multiple government agencies, for attending protests, linking to non-neo-con-approved websites, and/or distributing
fanzines in sympathy with the peoples of brutally occupied nations? We hear ya, when you say you're tired of the tedious and hokey, spandex revivalists.
Joe Strummer and Pig Champion are sadly still, dead and gone. When we think of punk rock, we think pure rock'n'roll. The most rock'n'roll thing we've come across, lately, is this boss E.P. by the Jukebox Zeros, "Rock & Roll Ronin". It opens with a crazy blast of Humpers/Joneses/Vice Principals style bad attitude rock, celebrating the dearly departed, Ramones. "Can't Catch Me" packs a cocky sneer that continues to build on the fine Drake Brother's filthy, sneering, badass tradition. "A little bit o' cash and a whole lot of speed!" "Lawsuit Guitars" has a more power-poppish sound, in league with maybe...oh, the Favors, or like, the Devil Dogs. Good stuff. Ten years ago, I woulda been on the floor, in front of my boom-box, making compilation cassettes of this, for my old band mates, while drunk on cheap forty ounces, and cutting and pasting fliers for basement shows, with the next door neighbors, pounding at the door. If you like Electric Frankenstein, the Humpers, Deadboys, Heartbreakers-that brand of punk, we can highly recommend Jukebox Zeros on the Rank Outsider record label, that always gets it right. "Science Of Rock'n'Roll" reminds me of the Dictators, and Cherry 13. "Surfin' Armageddon" is a perfectly executed, trashy rockabilly run-through, ala Link Wray, the Cramps, the Gargoyles, Fuzztones, or Stray Cats.
This isn't groundbreaking stuff, but the mash-up techno hybrid Myspace
rock is quickly, becoming as stale, obvious, cliche' and redundant to me, as eighties stuffed crotch hair-metal. Real rock'n'roll always puts a tiger in our tank. The Jukebox Zeros get two thumbs up and a great big, "AAAAYYYYYY!", like the Fonz.
It's fun, snotty, high-quality rock'n'roll. It'll make you wanna comb your hair in the mirror, and pour your drinks four times too stiff. It's music to black-out to. If you're gonna listen to Jukebox Zeros, you better give the motorcycle keys to the neighbor, beforehand. That's punk-as-fuck, in our book. Go see 'em, live!
(-Geordie Pleathur)