LOVE, NOT REASON – The Paybacks (Savage Jams/Shock)
Quite honestly, I’ve been fearing the worst for The Paybacks since we last heard of them staring down a hurricane at Little Steven’s Underground Garage Festival in New York back in 2004, the last two years bringing little news from their camp other than a series of line-up changes that would give even Pete Frame a headache. Unmissable one week, missing the next, their big city dreams seemed forever marooned on skid row despite two world-beaters in their catalog on the Get Hip label.
Sometimes I worry too much.
The world isn’t always a pretty place in whip-thin Wendy Case’s world, “Love, Not Reason” distilling the monumental head-fuck of love into two and three-minute pop thunderbolts and tortured, crazy, self-loathing garage lunacy which swaps fear of inner ear rupture for voyeuristic listening pleasure. Songs are sung through clenched teeth, lyrics are verbal knucklebusters, and melodies are still as bright and hard as diamonds. It just wouldn’t be a Paybacks album otherwise.
Recorded in a single weekend, the results are predictably fast and furious, ragged and glorious, the band taking the rawest of materials – howling poetry, shards of chopped guitar chords, and gatling-gun snare fills – and cook up something rather grand: a wiry bundle of sonics and mind-grabbing hooks around which they fashion a noble but doomed-from-the-start attempt to contextualize “some naked truths about love.” Genius or folly? It’s still impossible to decide. At least it rocks like crazy.
And therein lies The Paybacks’ enduring appeal. “Love Letter” takes the Stones’ loose-hipped swagger and twists it up so tight you can hear every vertebrae crack, Case’s rolled-up-sleeve vocals wringing every last drop out of a hook large enough to hang her reputation on, Danny Methric’s car crash riffs and nimble but barely coherent solo tagging all the nerve cells. The dirty sweet platform prance of “Stranger In The House” welds a Slade-like descending intro to guitars that chug like the afternoon shift at Dodge Main and – am I hearing things? – a snippet of harmony.
Bassist John Szymanski, who went on furlough after sophomore effort “Harder and Harder,” is back working the engine room with drummer Bill Hafer, their needle-in-the-red rumble delighting and disgusting with equal measure, hitting hard enough to be heard over Methric and Case.
Without mentioning numbers, Case continues to hoodwink Father Time on chainsaw clamor like “Call When You’re Ready,” “Shotgunn,” and “Like A Man,” her voice a thesaurus-taxing wonder despite every turn at the mic remaining a game of Russian roulette – do or die – but never mediocre; perish the thought. One of these days her larynx is going to bail out and scurry away on tiny legs like the face-hugger in Ridley Scott’s “Alien.” Until then, she’s living proof age need not wither inspiration.
Surprisingly, there are a few moments of respite here where Case cools her pipes – albeit briefly – like the jazzy opening bars of “Painkiller” and the deceptively sleepy “Something Simple,” the latter the perfect soundtrack for an opium dream. Texture? On a Paybacks album? What will they think of next?
So now the band find themselves at a big-fish-little-pond crossroads, full stop in a sweaty heap and sucking air, with absolutely nothing left to prove within the 313, 248, 734, and 810 area codes (that’s metropolitan Detroit and Ann Arbor for the uninitiated). Planet alignment and mundane factors like promotion, distribution, demographics, and sales will ultimately dictate whether they land with feet planted firmly in tough luck or charmed life territory. Regardless, “Love, Not Reason’s” treatises on boy-girl relationships tingle the spine on a regular basis, something you just can’t crunch with numbers. - Clark
Paull
1/2
HARDER
AND HARDER - The Paybacks (Get Hip)
Well,
another summer has rolled around here in the Murder City which can only mean
one thing: time to load the kids in the van for a three-hour trek straight
up I-75 to the wilds of northern Michigan, musical accompaniment
courtesy of the "Shrek 2" soundtrack (Pete Yorn covering the Buzzcocks'
"Ever Fallen In Love"? I think I feel sick.) and my wife's Norah
Jones and Dave Matthews Band CD's (ditto).
As if that wasn't enough to send a mere mortal to be fitted for a straight
white vest, there is also the news that New York Dolls bassist Arthur "Killer"
Kane, recently revitalized and sounding better than ever during a series of reunion shows, has died from
leukemia, the revelation that Roger Daltrey is embracing the corporate dollar
by appearing on an infomercial pushing Time-Life's latest 70's classic rock
collection, and the happenstance discovery of Alice Cooper's mug on a can
of Miller Genuine Draft at a gas station convenience store.
I'm not sure what upsets me more; the fact that Miller and "Rolling Stone"
are using the 50th anniversary of rock and roll to push their respective products
or the irony of Cooper being a dedicated Budweiser man back in the '70s, drinking
a case of the suds every day.
When I got home, I found the new Paybacks album had landed in my mailbox.
There really is a God...
Here's where I usually get in trouble. Wendy Case has whatever the female
equivalent of testicular fortitude is, the former Detroit News entertainment
scribe packing it all in for a chance to grab the brass ring or at the very
least, a cathartic opportunity to plug in, turn up, breathe stale cigarette
smoke, stew in her own sweat, and sleep in her clothes.
2002's "Knock Loud" was nothing short of a cocksure roar of satisfaction,
seething with ire and vitriol and smelling faintly of the barmaid's apron,
Case attempting to splatter her larynx against all four studio walls and drummer
Mike Latulippe, bassist John Szymanski, and guitarist Marco Delicato firing
on all fours. It's one helluva beautiful wreck and in "Just You Wait,"
"Hollywood," "If I Fell," and "Don't Lay It On Me,"
contains four songs which easily stand up to anything to come out of D-town
(or Hamtramck for that matter) since The Mutants, The Torpedos, Elvis Hitler,
and See Dick Run roamed the earth.
Although
two years on this dismal rock have come and gone since the release of "Knock
Loud," the band hasn't lost a step despite the amicable exit of Delicato.
Danny Methric (ex-Muggs and Kingsnakes) has stepped in seamlessly on lead
and as a result, "Harder And Harder" is hotter than a Death Valley
barbecue, an avalanche of great songs delivered with blunt simplicity and
tattooed with the breathless, God-given rasp of Case.
Unfortunately for Case, dogged comparisons to Chrissie Hynde seem to be her
cross to bear and while both seem to share an affinity for Telecasters, it's
probably safe to say Hynde never purged her soul as Case does on "Today
And Everyday," Methric's chicken-peck intro setting up a confession booth-worthy
outpouring ("I just want the same things that you do/Somebody to hold
me, someone I can hold on to") that had this hack reaching for both an
air guitar to flail and a beer to cry into. That's the sound of my youth disappearing.
Although over much too soon at 1:45, this is where the planets magically align
for The Paybacks.
Latulippe and Szymanski grab the stop-and-start "Me" by the scruff
of the neck and make it swing, Case with THAT VOICE , grunting like she's
clearing an obstructed bowel before Methric, waiting patiently, chimes in
on the breaks with malicious intent, a loose cannon loaded with equal parts
Steve Jones, Ace Frehley, and Johnny Thunders. With all apologies to Strummer
and Jones, he's my guitar hero.
"When I'm Gone," "Bright Side,"and "Scotch Love"
are all red meat and arteries bursting wide open and grey matter boiling in
flame, Case in the driver's seat and makin' love with the lights on along
the way, perplexed about the stupefying powers of alcohol but never trying
to answer the questions of the universe. "Lazy Things" cribs the
stomping, chest-baring
riff from The Cult's "Wildflower" (via Angus and Malcolm Young),
turns it upside down and gives it a good swift kick in the cajones and when
Case tells you you're going skinny dipping in the creek, you'd better get
ready to drop trou.
Although "Harder And Harder's" production (by the band with help
from John Smerek) is bone, gristle, and popping veins held together with sinew,
and hits harder than a Jack White sucker punch, it's Case's willingness to
wear her heart on her sleeve, as well as various parts of her anatomy, and
the band's single-minded devotion to beating their instruments to a bloody
pulp
that make it shake and shimmy. And let's face it, ending on an up note - a
ragged, boisterous cover of Marc Bolan's "Celebrate Summer," featuring
a gloriously punchdrunk solo from Methric - doesn't hurt either.
Despite critical plaudits (some would argue hype) flying the way of Detroit's
much ballyhooed "garage rock scene" (quotes are mine) over the past
few years, it's taken The Paybacks to finally give it some street cred, firmly
planting their flag up its arse and in turn delivering the first great album
to come out of this ham-and-egg, shot-and-a-beer burg this millennium.
Let this be the soundtrack to your summer before some major beer company snaps
'em up for an ad campaign. - Clark
Paull
KNOCK
LOUD - The Paybacks (Get Hip)
My
days in the trenches are over. At the tender age of 45, with 50 coming up
fast in the rearview mirror and thumbing its nose at me, going to clubs, bars
and hockey barns just doesn't turn my crank the way it did 20 or 30 (gulp!)
years ago. I began a self-imposed exile from the Detroit/Ann Arbor rawk jungle
back in the early 90's, convinced I'd seen it all, from The Michigan Palace
to Cobo Hall to Bookie's to Clutch Cargo's to The Second Chance to Traxx to
St. Andrew's Hall to Lili's to Nunzio's to The Vanity Ballroom to The Red
Carpet to (fill in the blank). I'm not trying to brag, but chances are if
an amp's been plugged into a wall somewhere within a 50-mile radius of this
lunchpail burg, I've collected dust and/or cobwebs there.
For some strange reason, standing around with a death grip on an overpriced
bottle of stale beer and my eyes glazing over just wasn't fun anymore, or
at least not as fun as watching a car rust. I've managed to stick to my guns
pretty well, with no second guessing or looking back, until hearing "Knock
Loud" by The Paybacks. Now my right hand is starting to curl into the familiar
shape of a long-neck Stroh's and my car's on auto-pilot headed for eastbound
I-94.
Without getting hung up on ceremony or overstating the obvious, it's easy
for lazy asses like me to play "spot the influences" when it comes to a group
of guys in a band staring at the back of a woman handling the lead vocal chores.
It's easier still to throw out references to Joan Jett, The Muffs, and The
Pretenders to describe Wendy Case's hooker-with-a-heart-of-gold caterwauling,
which hits somewhere in the vicinity south of your belt and north of your
knees, but it's probably safe to say that Chrissie Hynde has to be crying
over her tofu burger somewhere out there.
"Knock Loud" is a brash set which alternates between sloppy and melodic, with
big power pop hooks lurking in the ether, and although we've heard these same
three chords a million times over, they never get old when delivered with
such enthusiasm, bravado and swagger. In a perfect world, songs like "Black
Girl," "If I Fell," and "Don't Lay It On Me," all of which tread a fine line
between perfect pop sensibility and an all-out assault on your inner ear,
would be all over the radio, although it's unlikely staid programmers could
handle the afterburn. Marco Delicato, guitar set on "stun," leads the fray
behind Case and bassist John Szymanski and drummer Mike Latulippe lay down
a thunder akin to that car wreck two lanes over on I-75 last Labor Day weekend.
While it's probably true that we Detroiters have been spoiled over the years
and definitely affected a snotty elitism when it comes to local talent, it's
hard not to gloat when something this infectious rears its ugly head above
the grime and rust right in our own backyard. Sure the White Stripes are cute,
but let's be thankful the "garage rock" revival is puttering out so we can
forget about Murder City becoming the next Seattle. Let's just dance! - Clark Paull
3/4
