Don’t be thrown by the record label here. Yes, it’s Acid Jazz and that probably does bring the likes of Galliano and Gilles Peterson springing to mind initially, but it’s a member of another stalwart Acid Jazz combo, the James Taylor Quartet, who’s the connection here.
The geezer I’m referring to is of course one Allan Crockford: formerly bassist with not only the JTQ, but also the much-respected Prisoners, The Solarflares and Billy Childish’s Thee Headcoats. As Medway garage-rock pedigrees go, it takes some beating, but with his larvely new combo THE STABILISERS he’s got mixed up with yet another bunch of cheeky, but talented chappies who clearly know a thing or thirteen about knocking out the most searing garage sounds around.
Crockford’s moved over to guitar and vocals with The Stabilisers, as the four-string growling duties are handled by vocalist Jon Bott, while extra guitar (and wonderfully naff sci-fi keyboards) is Simon Corbey’s territory and the frantic drumming is handled by Francis Braithwaite. Together, they make a rapturous, old-skool noise, mostly re-erecting the 1976 – 1980 framework, but also stealing a few tasty items from ‘Nuggets’ and early Dead Kennedys along the way. Thrown together, it’s a pretty heady mix for anyone who likes their hooks lobbed at them like a roll of barbed wire between the eyes. And, as a rule, I certainly do.
And, in the main (the surely rhetorically-titled) ‘Wanna Do The Wild Plastic Brane Love Thing?’ is a spiky, runaway snowball of glorious, gonzoid fun. Frantic opening song ‘Wanna’ (“rags to riches and back on the dole/ I’m burning my bridges, I’m losing control”) is all-too-easy to relate to, while tunes such as ‘Plastic Love’, the immortal ‘Do The Brane’ and the cartoon-y, Dee Dee Ramone-style ramalama of ‘Mental Illness is Good For You’ will have you up and pogo-ing within split seconds.
Brilliantly, the rest of the album resolutely refuses to run out of steam either. Indeed, it’s hard to imagine songs like “Where The Wild Things Go” and the irresistibly snotty “My Latest Obsesion” being anything other than instant live favourites, while in ‘Bad Karma’ they have a ‘shit happens’ anthem par excellence and on the alcohol-fuelled anthem ‘Drunk Again’ Bott’s basslines growl like JJ Burnel after a night on the industrial-strength pear cider and the storyline runs like Viz comic’s inebriated anti-hero The Brown Bottle being re-located to the Medway Delta.
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Admittedly, the laydeez don’t always come out of it too well. The, ahem, slower tunes like ‘Belinda’ and ‘Glamourpuss’ (“your company’s no delight/ you’re always bitching and starting a fight”) often find the boys getting something of a burn from the opposite sex, but they’re hardly full-on misogynists for all that, and if you can’t appreciate the humour inherent in tracks like ‘Teenage Talent’ (“well, a face like that wouldn’t launch any ships!”) and the self-explanatory ‘She’s A Goth’ then, well, perhaps you should give your pulse a quick check.
OK, this stuff ain’t gonna re-invent any wheels or produce evidence of alien presence in Area 51 or the like, but it’s hard to imagine anyone who loves the best in vintage garage-rock not capitulating nonetheless. ‘Wanna Do The Wild Plastic Brane Love Thing?’ ain’t so much a question as the clearest invitation to a new cretin hop you’re gonna get all year. Crack open a six-pack, dig the trepanning kit out of the attic and get stuck right in.
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