Thee Headcoats "The Kids Are All Square - This Is Hip!" 1990**** / Thee Headcoatees ‎"Girlsville" 1991****

Billy Childish is a true original - he emerged from the lo-fi punk/garage/blues Medway scene of the late 70's as an impossibly prolific singer/guitarist (about a 100 albums, released by a dozen different groups) as well as painter, poet and overall cult artistic personality. He's played punk, psychobilly and blues among other styles, but Thee Headcoats, probably the best-known of all his groups, were more or less straight garage rock. Obviously there isn't anything new and revolutionary about the music; it's all just rock'n'roll, played right. At times you get the nagging sensation the tunes are a bit too familiar: The opening "Gatekeeper" sounds like The Downliner Sect's "One Ugly Child", "Davey Crockett" like The Premiers' "Farmer John" etc. But what does matter when you're having so much fun? Childish's lyrics are true to the rock'n'roll tradition - with the addition of the best dry English humour. "Davey Crocket" (one of the many Western-themed songs here) features The Headcoatees on vocals, lots of handclaps and the Ramones Gabba-Gabba-Hey war cry. The party atmosphere and male/female vocals also reminds of the B52's. "Monkeys Paw"'s jungle sounds and guitar riffs are closer to The Cramps, while "All My Feelings Denied" is a mix of Sonics and early Kinks. "Ballad Of The Fogbound Pinhead" adds a cheesy keyboard part to the mix. "Cowboys Are Square" is another Louie Louie/Farmer John garage ditty remarkable for its funny anti-cowboy lyric and ululating Indians in the background. "Poccahontas Was Her Name" continues the Wild West saga, with its tribal rhythms and recounting of the popular myth. "Nanook of The North" is inspired by a 1922 pseudodocumentary about Eskimos - who else than Billy Childish could have made an R&B song out of this story? "Squaresville" is the slow psychedelic one, and "Krasal" mixes the classic Bo Diddley beat with some carnival music. Generally a great record with no weak songs. One sees why Jack White and Kurt Cobain were such big Billy Childish fans...

***** for Davey Crockett

**** for Monkey's Paw, Ballad Of The Fogbound Pinhead, All My Feelings Denied, Cowboys Are Square,  I Can Destroy All Your Love, Poccahontas Was Her Name, Nanook Of The North, A Town Named Squaresville

*** for I'm A Gamekeeper, Karasal

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Generally coupling two albums by different groups in one CD doesn't sound like such a great practice. In this case, though, there can be some debate on whether Thee Headcoats and Headcoatees are indeed different bands. Ostensibly the latter were an all-female band and their pose on the record cover is meant to give that impression. But in truth I doubt they played the instruments heard on this record: Tradition with Childish bands was to feature a few numbers with female guest vocalists, usually their girlfriends. These were often presented as the work of a girl band. As The Milkshakes gave way to Thee Mighty Ceasars and then to Thee Headcoats, so their female analogues Milkboilers were succeeded by The Delmonas and they in turn by Thee Headcoatees. The latter band contained Holly Golightly (then dating Headcoats drummer Bruce Brand), who was destined to have a long and successful solo career. She sings lead on a cover of the Kinks' "First Plane Home", "Boysville" and Childish-penned "When The Night Comes" - all reminiscent of 60's British Invasion R&B. Contrary to Thee Headcoats who just incorporated (or stole if you prefer) classic rock'n'roll tunes in their own compositions, the 'Coatees usually just cover the oldies. The humour here comes from the gender reversal: While the original "Wild Man" was sung from the perspective of a boy whom the parents of his beloved try to keep away from their daughter, in this version it's about a young girl lusting for the boy-next-door's father. Likewise, instead of the sexy Gloria of Van Morrison's garage classic, the singer gets nightly visits (and orgasms) by the tall and mysterious "Melvin". On the Beatles' "Run For Your Life" and "Money" Ludella Black sounds much more dangerous and greedy than the clean-cut Fab Four ever did. She also takes the lead on the Bo Diddley-ish "Meet Jacqueline" -a paean to a famous UK 60's go-go-girl- as well as the punky "Give It To Me" and vindictive garage rocker "Stolen Love". Kyra La Rubia handles the saucier numbers "Wild Man" and (The Sonics') "Dirty Old Man", while Bongo Debbie offers a tough R&B cover of Petula Clarke's "Round Every Corner" and lead vocals and lustful moans on "Melvin". "Girlsville" turned out to be so successful that what started as a side project ended up more popular than the main band, The Headcoatees went on to release many more records, as well as solo albums for each girl. As for this particular compilation, pairing two great albums in one CD makes for an unresistable combination - unless, of course, you're strictly a vinyl person. Billy Childish makes his feelings clear on the stamp on the album cover where the CD is described as a silver digital beermat!

***** for Melvin

**** for Wild Man, When The Night Comes, Stolen Love, Run For Your Life, Dirty Old Man, The First Plane Home, Meet Jacqueline

*** for Round Every Corner, Give It To Me, Boysville, Money

The Delmonas "Do The Uncle Willy" 1989(comp)*****

I was visiting my best friend (from highschool and beyond) Anastasia and we got talking about all the cassette tapes we used to exchange between us and with other friends. Through them we discovered some artists that became later favourites and broadened each other's musical horizons - I'd record garage rock for her and she'd do the same for me with obscure indie bands. It was the only way to share music from our collections, since back then there were no MP3's and internet file sharing. Even then though, record companies were worried about piracy and added stickers to their LP's saying that "home taping is killing music" - when in truth it was the opposite: the more tapes I wrote, the more my friends would discover new groups and eventually buy their records. Stupid record companies! My own cassette collection perished for lack of space - a sad prelude to the tragic saga of the Great Vinyl Purge of 2004. But Anastasia kept hers and these are some of them - including tapes from the radio show she used to co-host on Rodon FM (Mystiries Istories) and also some of my compilations. If I had my Delmonas CD back in the 90's, some tracks would probably have found their way into the one I named Kostas and the Happy Hipsters Live! At The Christmas Ball 1963 (maybe the song "Heard About Him") or Attack Of The Flying Saucer (probably "Lie Detector"). Now we still sometimes write and exchange CD compilations but somehow they feel less personal, less handmade than those old cassettes or maybe the music just doesn't hit as hard as before - we're so saturated with it there's little room for life-changing new discoveries. OK, back to the Delmonas, the brainchild of a certain Mr. Billy Childish. According to his wikipedia page, Billy Childish "is an English painter, author, poet, photographer, film maker, singer and guitarist". I could add that he personifies the whole English garage scene and may possibly be the most prolific rock musician ever, as he's personally responsible for something like a 100 albums, released by a dozen different groups. One of the first was the rockabilly-influenced Milkshakes. A few of their EP's were released as the Milkboilers, who were actually the Milkshakes acting as a backing band for their respective girlfriends on vocals. For their first LP, they were renamed to The Delmonas - allegedly "taking their name from the word for a decorative handbag favored by women in the Klaipeda region of Lithuania". Probably a hoax - any Klaipedean visitors of the blog are kindly requested to verify the above allegation. Anyway, the Delmonas continued to make records, backed by the Milkshakes or by Childish's new group Thee Mighty Caesars. As TMC's were replaced by Thee Headcoats, the Delmonas morphed into the Headcoatees with the addition of new girlfriend Holly Golightly. We'll get back to them on another post. Now, all these don't sound very promising: They sound like the proverbial director casting his sexy yet talentless lover as the leading lady of his latest vanity project. Well, guess again: Liberated from the boys' need to act tough, they became a much more enjoyable proposition - tough Bo Diddley beat and Cramps riffs softened by Nancy Sinatra sass and Beatles-like harmonies. "Do the Uncle Willy" is a U.S. compilation of material either unreleased or previously only available in the U.K. It opens with the rave-up of "I Feel Alright" (almost a rewrite of "The Train Kept-A-Rolling"), followed by the breezy garage-pop of "Heard About Him" - imagine the Shangri-La's backed by The Yardbirds. "Carn't Sit Down" and Don and Dewey's '59 evergreen "Farmer John" are hi-energy Rock n' Roll, with lots of screaming a la Sonics. "I Feel Like Giving In" and "I Did Him Wrong" are near-perfect garage pop with groovy Zombies-like organ. Had they been released in the mid-60's they could have been hits like today's golden oldies. Basically every song on the record sounds like it came from the mid-60's Nuggets compilation. "Uncle Willy" and "I’ve Got Everything I Need" have that Chuck Berry/Rolling Stones feel while "Dangerous Charms" is more Bo Diddley. "Black Ludella" and "Jealousy" are driving garage rockers and "Lie Detector" is R&B instead of the punk of the familiar Headcoats version. On "That Boy Of Mine" they sound like a female version of the early Beatles, while the slow "Delmona, The Temptress Of Love" closes the CD with an oriental exotica flavour. If these were guys singing, they'd get 4*, but I'm always more generous around girls, so I'm giving them 5 - a perfect score! Enjoy their music, and if you're ever in Klaipeda get a Delmona handbag and mail me a photo of it...

***** for Heard About Him, Black Ludella, I Did Him Wrong

**** for I Feel Alright, Farmer John, Carn’t Sit Down, I Feel Like Giving In, Jealousy, Lie Detector

*** for Uncle Willy, Dangerous Charms, I’ve Got Everything I Need, That Boy Of Mine, Delmona  The Temptress Of Love