Very well said, Mike. Now get the new LP. Most people don't take my advice seriously. For example, most of my alleged friends have yet to take in a viewing of Homeboy, or Last Night at the Alamo, or Death to Smoochy...the family of the Great Maligned. The Kills thing seems to be taking shape everywhere though.
But back to Ryan's little testimonial, it is true that the Kills are unafraid of sincerity, as if that is something in itself to be admired. "I'm SINCERE! I really MEAN it MAAAAN." Big deal. Shut up. Go away. After all, everyone THINKS they mean it, even if "it" just happens to be the PRIDE IN TOTAL FILTH AND ARROGANCE, hideous fashion, "ROCK ROCK ROCK, GONNA ROCK YOUR LITTLE PUSSY, GONNA ROCK YOUR LITTLE ASS, ROCK ROCK ROCK"....yup, that's basically IT, myopic and stubbornly stupid, all wrapped up in a greasy 73 leather jacket and tossed into the River Rouge. Rock and roll is the only art form that I hate to love, because 99% of it makes me feel like a cranky old man.
But to be as deliberately anti-social and suicidally long-term optimistic as the KILLS, to just fire away with those countless gestures of unrestrained effrontery for which they are coming to be both reviled and adored, IS something of great importance, and I do mean historically. This goes beyond music. It's the reason why people like me don't t give up on rock and roll, full total. The problem with all these infantile scene whore bands is that they are too immersed in music. Music need not only be based on and informed by other music. What you get then, as with inbreeding, is drooling idiots. The Kills encompass film and literature in their songs, it's incredibly visual music, evocative as a chunk of Celine or William Burroughs or Harry Crews. They're far smarter, sexier, and authentic than anyone else the snotty punks are stumbling around dumbly nodding their heads to. The Kills, like their 03 touring mates Primal Scream, are mixing and matching the best and darkest of subcultural elements to create a mythological framework, wherein a fireworks show for unleashed feelings of contempt and desolation can take place...new music for the new age. Pure sex and guts, with rusty shotguns, cheap bathtub crank, awkward screwing behind filling stations...a total collision of primal lust and uncontrollable panic. (They recorded the new record in a remote Michigan ghost town, and the effect makes this effort even more "Nebraska" flavored than their first.) A band like this comes along but once in a decade if you're lucky. In the 80s, there was a few, like PiL, Pixies, Stone Roses, MB Valentine, Dream Syndicate etc. The 90s had Primal Scream, Come, Handsome Family, Geraldine Fibbers,. Maybe I'm missing a few.
justin gene gregorits
detroit 2005 "i happened in the back of the shell"
You're fantastic and an inspiration. I spend way too much time on youtube watching your live performances. Tour again soon; it would be a service to the world.
I just got Keep on Your Mean Side that I had to order in at my record store down town. It fucking rules my world right now. Its the first Kills I have bought and man it just is like... fuck I don't know. But the urge to lick my speakers is a good thing yes?
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