I recently bought Last Drive's "Blood Nirvana" for the 2nd time. Now, when you have a large collection, that's bound to happen by mistake sometimes - but this time it was purely intentional. See, I had the US version of their album (above) that contained 1 bonus track: An alternate mix of "Time Has Come Today" from their 1989 Time EP. I figured I'd get the EP in time, but no such luck. It is possible to get secondhand - if you're willing to part with a few dozen euros. Then I stumbled into the German version of the Blood Nirvana CD (below), which contains the entire Time EP and thought what the hell, let's buy it once more for the bonus tracks. Now, if you're from Greece and listen to rock music, you know who Last Drive are: They're synonymous with the Greek Alternative scene of the 80's. They started out as a garage/surf/psychobilly band (in 1983) and gradually drifted towards a more hard rock/guitar dominated sound. I've seen them more than a dozen times: solo, supporting visiting groups or in political events in support of the underground movement. They had always been great live but, around the time of this album, their concerts had begun getting noisier with layers of distorted guitars. It was the Drive's "Judas" moment, when some older garage-psych fans began booing them and calling them metalheads. At the time I was one of the garage purists, too. I would have loved it if they had produced another Heatwave. Despite the noticeably harder guitar sound though, Blood Nirvana (produced by Dream Syndicate's Paul Cutler) still retains many garage/surf elements, while their next albums would flirt with the emerging grunge/stoner scene. "Bite" opens with a slow menacing bass that is soon drowned by a tidal wave of distorted guitars while "Overloaded" is an incredibly catchy number that's reminiscent of Radio Birdman who, along with Wipers, Screaming Trees and Dream Syndicate, seem to be the band's new heroes. Old heroes get a nod, too: The Cramps on "The Bad Roads'' and Stooges on "Cool Spine", while "Slave To The Wave" is, as the title suggests, a throwback to their surf origins - with added metallic guitar heroics. "Desert Rose" and "Sweet Thing" are the fast punky ones and "Chain Train" and "Holy War" the guitar-dominated metallic ones. Their concerts around that time ended usually with an elongated version of "Holy War", wreaking havoc with loud distortion and feedback. It'd leave you with your eardrums buzzing and ensure that demand for encores were less persistent. "Flesh Diver" is a heavy slow number that used to close the original LP. As previously mentioned, the German edition adds all 3 songs from the 1989 Time EP: "Time Has Come Today" is a garage/hard rock take on the Chambers Brothers psychedelic soul classic, "Black Limo" a typical Last Drive garage rocker and "Have Mercy" their poppiest song ever with its "fun fun fun" chorus and perfect indie/surf mix, like Pixies and Jesus & Mary Chain meeting The Beach Boys. It was the only reason I bought this CD again, as I had "Time..." in the US version and "Black Limo" in The munster dance hall favorites 3 comp. Well, as it turns out, I was just a tad too hasty. The "time" EP is set for a (possibly very limited) vinyl re-release later this year - with extra unreleased tracks. As for Last Drive, their new direction cost them some fans and they disbanded in 1995 to form other projects. A reunion gig 12 years later was such a triumphant success that it led to a full-blown reunion - a story we'll get back to...
***** for Overloaded, Have Mercy
**** for Bite, The Bad Roads, Cool Spine, Slave To The Wave, Black Limo
*** for Chain Train, Holy War, Sweet Thing, Time Has Come Today
** for Desert Rose, Flesh Diver
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