eMusic Review 0
Reverse Shark Attack, a 2009 vinyl-only release getting resuscitated by In the Red this year, is the product of Ty Segall and Mikal Cronin, who have been partners in rabble-rousin’ for about as long as either have been making music. In their respective (prolific) discographies, they have captured, perfected and riffed on what it means to be a garage rocker in the aughts, and this sorta-early gem catches them in fine, pre-notoriety form.
“I Wear Black” is a cough-syrup reimagining of “Wild Thing,” or Nuggets rung through Captain Beefheart’s soul patch, depending on your persuasion. Ragers like “Ramona” and “Doctor Doctor” are delightfully overdriven punk rock taken to wall-punching extremes. The pair dresses Pink Floyd’s “Take Up Thy Stethoscope and Walk” in a snot-covered leather jacket. “Bikini Babes” actually swings, which is probably the point, if they were thinking about the titular gals it was written about while singing lines like, “I don’t wanna go to school/ I just wanna have fun.” Clearly, they were, and are.
The whole scuffle ends with the ambitious title track, which begins as a harmless goofabout, rollicking with la-la-la’s, before morphing during its 10-minute runtime through acoustic laments, electric arguments, and bonkers noise, like some… read more »
