This one-off merger from Jon Spencer and the North Mississippi All-Stars' Luther and Cody Dickinson was recorded in 2001, but it only saw a Japanese release. Fortunately Chapel Hill, N.C., indie Yep Roc stepped in to issue this 2006 domestic version, with remastering and bonus tracks to boot. (A muddy boot, definitely.) The platform here is blues and bash, china-off-the-mantel noise. The seven unreleased tracks up the white-noise factor considerably, and if you figured Spencer's Blues Explosion to be elitist roots revisionists, you need to hear his forays into cock-rock on this, because it's a genre that doesn't require genuine emotional investment to be utterly convincing. Check out "That's a Drag," "Watcha Gonna Do," and "Sat Morn Cartoons" — all short, punchy anthems with a deeply felt "huunhh" grunt every few bars — and you'll really believe Ten Years After records have a viable shelf life. The Dickinsons, for their part, aren't too shabby, either — there's a barely-hinged quality to this whole thing, which probably suggests the look of the studio door after these three were finished throwing down.
Serene Dominic writes about music for Metro Times. Send comments to [email protected].
