Monday, June 18, 2007

CD Review: White Light Fever’s Heavy Knife Blues

By Todd Maternowski

Every so often, a band flies in the face of flaccid, dumbed-down convention by taking the best elements of the past and putting them to work in the present. Recent successful examples of this are the Black Crowes and the White Stripes --both of whom were hugely influential to Dallas-based rockers White Light Fever, who have recently come out with their debut album (under their current moniker), Heavy Knife Blues. With HKB, WLF has issued a slap in the face of the DFW "rock" scene, particularly the too-cute, too-ironic mucho sucko indie/emo indistinguishable-bands scene that ineffectively replaces musical passion and ability with unintelligible screaming. Combining severely downtuned Black Sabbath-esque guitarwork with whiny bellowing vocals and the stripped-down sound of The Cult's Electric, White Light Fever has created an album that brings back the psychedelic early 70s electric rock sound without sounding like a REO Speedwagon cover band.

White Light Fever, formerly Army of Fools and the unfortunately-named Japanese Auto Clinic in previous incarnations, is comprised of just three souls tirelessly mining the passion of early rock: guitarist/vocalist Danny Billingsley, bassist Mikey Branton and drummer Thomas Pearl. Song after song, the band spews old-school rock nastiness.

I'm sorry, didn't anyone tell you? Pretty-boy screamo sucks!

The album starts with a reverse-bang with "Windmills": slow and grinding, the track pounds with a thunderous heaviness that's punctuated by an even heavier rock refrain --with a swampy tuned-down guitar riff at the end. "Windmills" sets the tone for most of the songs on the rest of the album: for example, the next track "Black Cards and White Hats" is "Windmills" with even more heavy downtuned molasses-rock, and the uneven squawk from lead singer Billingsley --a voice that sounds volumes closer to Ozzy and Fogerty than Justin and Kelly.

The third track, "Home, The Woods" is far peppier, more poppy and less bluesy, before White Light Fever gets right back into it with "Emmet Ray", which combines the heavy downtuned guitarwork with a punk flavor. The album continues its onslaught of rock variety with "Lightning Gonna Strike" and "Echo", two songs whose circling, looping Steppenwolf-esque guitarwork hearkens back to rock's early 70s heyday. It's not all straight-up stripped-down rock, however, as track #7's "Spiders" throws in some genuine folk-flavored blues, complete with harmonica.

Heavy Knife Blues doesn't stray too far from their effective rock formula, however, as later tracks "Paint Your Hands" and "Shackle" bring back those blues-flavored heavy rock riffs, Billingsley's vocals drunkenly swaying across the track, explosively punctuating the ponderously slow songs with that passionate whine. The vocals on HKB might not be everyone's cup of tea, but for a band that is working hard to re-introduce the chaotic, blazing unpredictability of the devil's music, they are absolutely essential. The album is capped off by "Under a Veil", an acoustic guitar ballad in which the singer's watery vocals are even more emphasized.

Heavy Knife Blues is precisely the sort of hot-blooded, impetuous album the screamo/indie-dominated Dallas rock scene has been lacking. White Light Fever has put together an impressive album that takes the soul of early 70s rock and uses it to create something very real and undeniably powerful. WLF doesn't need over-intellectual lyrics to show off their musical chops, nor do they need boredom-inducing, pre-pubescent screaming to get their emotion across. If Heavy Knife Blues is any indication, the DFW rock scene and beyond is about to get a heavy electric wake-up call.

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