Independent record label based in LA. Home to The Black Keys, Two Gallants, Buffalo Killers, Radio Moscow, Lee Bains III & The Glory Fires, Hacienda, John The Conqueror, Brian Olive, Black Diamond Heavies, Left Lane Cruiser, T-Model Ford, Thomas Function, Waves Of Fury, etc. More at www.alivenergy.com
Celebration is the perfect name for this debut full-length from Thomas Function. Basically, it is forty minutes of nothing but pure rock & roll fun. The Huntsville, Alabama group write fast-paced songs that feature catchy vocal hooks and shouted choruses that will have your head bopping in no time. There's a good reason that just about every review you'll find will contain the word 'infectious', the melodies seem to have no end, the production is crisp and clean, and many tracks build into a stomping climax that is hard to resist."Many of the songs here fit rather neatly into genres, like the C&W "2012 Blues," the bluegrass hoedown of "Relentless Machines," the psych styling of "Filthy Flowers" and "Can't Say No," the driving R&B of "A Long Walk" or the "Earthworms"'s blues. However, even these numbers aren't quite as straight-forward as they initially seem, for each is tinged with a touch of other sounds and styles. "Snake in the Grass," for example, is a musical homage to The Buzzcocks, but swishes psychedelic organ into the mix.Check out a couple of tracks below, and head to Alive Records to make it your own.
"Conspiracy of Praise" is reminiscent of the Violent Femmes or even The White Stripes, but also boasts a psychedelic organ break, a western flavor, and a guitar solo beholden to the Rolling Stones. By the time listeners get to "Swimming through a Sea of Broken Glass," most will have given up even trying to identify all the elements within -- in "Sea"'s case, punky C&W, mixed with bluegrass, as alternately played by Simple Minds and the Velvet Underground. And its here that TF reach their greatest heights, punching through a pile of musical envelopes and into a dizzying sound all their own."
The Black Diamond Heavies played at a venue called The Junction last night in the Ancient Cathedral City of York. They are an American two-piece, comprised of a drummer, and a lead vocalist who plays over-amped, heavily distorted Fender Rhodes electric piano. They basically make a sound which is like all the best bits from any good Detroit garage / RnB / southern soul band with an organ, with all the shit non-organ bits taken out and replaced by nothing but organ & drum breaks for an hour, and the organ is cranked up 100 times louder and uglier than any sound you've ever heard, and the drums are thunderously loud and funky, and you wonder after about 5 minutes of watching them why anybody would ever bother having any other instruments in a band, especially an electrified guitar, which the screaming Fender Rhodes does a fair impression of at times anyway, only better. The lead vocalist / keys player sings in the Louie Armstrong / Howlin Wolf / Beefheart gravelpit style, and plays simple bass lines on the lower end of his piano like The Doors used to do, thus erasing the need for bass players. When they hammer away at max. tempo, they sound like The Stooges, with the Ashton brothers replaced by a really really loud Fender Rhodes piano. When they slow it down and groove, they sound like a broken down Booker T & The MGs / the theme from 'Taxi' being run-over by a taxi. They are, in parts, genuinely funky, and as jazz as a rock concert gets these days. They swing. I preferred them when they were on this low-slung groovin' tip, but whether they were careering wildly through a crazed punk-blues or lazily loping through a Al Greenish soul number, they were pretty much better than anything else I've heard this year. If Black Diamond Heavies play anywhere near you, go see 'em, unless you've got something else on, in which case they'll understand and the gig will probably go ahead anyway. I mean, you can't get to everything right, people lead busy lives and there's the credit crunch to contend with, shit, I almost couldn't be bothered to go to this gig myself just 'cos it had got to 9.15 in the PM or whatever and I was watching 'Men In Black' on video (Tommy Lee Jones' character 'K' is a White Album fan, and there's a good Elvis gag too, what, like I'm menna be watching 'The Trip' or 'Apocolypse Now' or 'The Last Waltz' or some shit just 'cos I'm a Hip Rock Journalist?) but 'cos I'd promised the local support band (98 Pages: early 70s Sabbath / Hawkwind proto-metal, v, good) I'd go see 'em I dragged my sorry ass out the house for a couple of hours. All in all, Black Diamond Heavies are the best band in the entire history of last night in York, they've got a myspace or you can probably Google them or whatever. - Electric Roulette
Celebration é o “debut” dos Thomas Function, banda de Alabama (US), que depois de excitantes singles e Ep´s contendo um contagiante rock'n'roll, levaram-me a pensar o que poderiam fazer num longa duração, imaginando que podia este conter um profundo e até dramático nível de qualidade, não me enganei, "Celebration" é irresistível, cheios de ritmos galopantes, fantásticas elevações vocais, que atropelam um oscilante e bem colocado órgão, destacando-se esse hino que é "Relentless Machines", que nos corta a respiração. Obrigatório, sem dúvida.
