Abby Jeanne “Somebody to Love” and “Stop and Listen” 2020. 7″ single, limited edition green splatter vinyl. This past weekend we got to see Abby Jeanne perform in her hometown neighborhood (and ours, too!) of Bay View, Milwaukee, at WMSE’s Backyard BBQ music fest.

It was her first performance and visit back to MKE since she moved to NYC just before the pandemic. The night and her concert were perfection. It’s not often that you find yourself in a magic moment and realize it while it is happening but Saturday night at Humboldt Park was one of those special times. The photo below doesn’t do any justice whatsoever but the sun had just set, the heat of the day had broken – just a lovely warm breeze (and no mosquitos biting!), we were in the company of friends and neighbors with Abby’s clear, bluesy voice soaring through the atmosphere.

She performed songs from her 2019 full-length album (Music Box Dancer), debuted brand-new songs, and sang these two covers. “Somebody to Love,” originally by Jefferson Airplane (1967) is a faithful, summer of love psychedelia rendition, though Abby somehow manages to both recreate Grace Slick’s crystal-sharp voice and infuse her own warm, bluesy range into the vocals. “Stop and Listen” (also from ‘67) is a cover by Milwaukee’s own, The Shag. It’s garagey pop, delightful and danceable.

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Slow Walker’s latest release Ah Yes is fantastic (and packaged with only a slightly higher budget than their full-length Slow Walker from 2014: red ballpoint pen and pre-fabbed stamping on the record label vs a black sharpie scribble saying “fuck off”). They played several of the tracks at the record release show (plus some of their “old” tracks from the 2017 EP Command Z including the most excellent “Basement”). My favorites on Ah Yes are the shorter, punkier tracks with the groovy rhythms like “Weed Out the Squares,” “Sacrificial Lamb,” “Can U Wup?” (guest guitarist Graham Hunt of the Midnight Reruns joined Slow Walker onstage and on vinyl for that track) and the hypnotically funky “Ride.” But there are a couple of longer, trippy songs like the instrumental “Drum and Drummer” and “No Drinks.” “No Drinks” is really really heavy, Black Sabbath on mushrooms level of heft, that later morphs into a full-on garagey dance party. I believe it was during that song that Sam’s dad, Al Reitman, came on stage to shred along with the band.

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From their liner notes: “The term spoil + destroy is taken from a witch-hunting manual that, to paraphrase, states that even good witches who do not ‘spoil and destroy, but save and deliver’ should be killed. That resonated with us – the idea that, as a woman, your achievements are irrelevant because of your gender.” The tracks on the album back up this sentiment, with grit and without apology, a giant middle finger fuck you to the age of Trumpism. “(What You’re) Good For” leads off the record, bouncing with infectious rage. “Clever Girl” has an ominous groove and seethes with glorious feminist fury (this is probably my favorite track on the record but there are several runners-up). “Hiawatha” is beautifully haunting, deliciously dark. “Boogie Man” and “Girl Hater” are even darker, violently so as the beat revs up to head banging punk. The hashtag of 2016 appears on “Nasty Woman” as does the sane person’s response to climate deniers on “I Believe in Science.” While not my favorite song on the LP, Fox Face’s cover of Britney Spears’ “Toxic” is intriguing, reimagining the princess hit as a witchy antidote to pop poison.

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Static Eyes are a hometown Milwaukee trashy, thrashy garage punk band. They formed in 2011 “after The Gut Reactions called it quits. Knocking out loud, trashy rock-n-roll” (quote from bassist Lindsay), they are also – in classic Milwaukee-band-overlap style – 3/4′s of Foxface. The women, Lindsay on bass and Lydia on drums, are the powerful ass-kicking rhythm section, providing the foundation for Lee’s howling, Murder City Devil-esque vocals and Chris’ dirty guitar riffs.

Their first release, “Trouble” b/w “Waves” is blistering garage infused punk swagger, reminiscent (to me, anyway) of the early aught’s Milwaukee band The Mistreaters: snarly yet really danceable.

Static Eyes’ 2013 release is a split with another Milwaukee band, Drugs Dragon, and is more Cramps-like psychedelic garage (The Cramps are one of Static Eyes’ influences, as are Hasil Adkins, Dead Moon and The Gories), from the cover art (by Luke Chappelle) to the slower psychobilly beat to the A side at 33-1/3 rpm and the B side at 45 rpm (I think!!). The B-side is Drugs Dragon playing “Fester/Breed/Scatter” and “Waiting Around to Die” (which, notably, was recorded and mixed by Space Raft’s and RX Drugs’ Jordan Davis; RX Drugs also played at Burnhearts on Saturday), both of which are complete fuzzed-out insanity.

Their latest release, “The Thaw” is the most polished of the three, albeit at an awesome scuzzy lo-fi frantic level. “Blank Tapes” is my favorite, with a minor chord hook that is slinky, dark, menacing and yet totally ass-shaking.

My favorite song from Static Eyes’ Burnhearts’ performance was “Dhamer Faced Dog,” which has a disturbingly hilarious title and showcases Static Eyes’ rhythmic power and hookable riffs in a bite-sized garage punk nugget.

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The 101ers, fronted by Joe Strummer, only released one pub rock single (”Keys to Your Heart”), the rest of this 2 record release is a compilation of demo sessions, BBC recordings and live performance featuring many cover tracks (”Gloria,” “Maybelline,” “Don’t Let Go”) as well as originals (”Letsagetabitarockin,” “Steamgauge 99″). Classic Strummer delivery backed by a 50′s/60′s rhythm and blues beat.

This album was the only exclusive Record Store Day purchase this year, though we did drop a nice chunk of change at our neighborhood indie record stores, Acme Records and Rush Mor Records after battling the vinyl hordes that descended upon Bay View this past weekend.

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The Record Store Day 2015 scene at Acme Records (cannot even get to the record bins) and Rush Mor Records, Milwaukee WI.

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Classified as punk rock, it’s really more punk goes modern-experimental with a biting humorous edge . Their songs often give many nods to the Milwaukee area (i.e. the track “Hwy 100″ and ”Picasso’s Mailman” – shout out to Kenosha!) and to Midwestern culture (”Mobile Home” – their hit single, so to speak, though not on this LP).

Here is a photo of Jay (and his wife Renee) from 2003 at a wedding of our mutual friends, Greg and Natalie. I cannot remember exactly what happened, but he had the whole table in tears of laughter about the soup.

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