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East Bay Ray And The Killer Smiles - S/T
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East Bay Ray And The Killer Smiles - S/T
Released by: MVD Audio
Released on: 9/13/2011
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East Bay Ray has kept reasonably busy since the Dead Kennedys broke up ages ago and has had a few projects get off the ground, from forming Kage to playing with The Dresden Dolls' Amanda Palmer (on her first solo album) to remastering those Dead Kennedys reissues that came out a few years ago. He's kept pretty busy and so it shouldn't surprise anyone who has kept tabs on his career that he's once again playing in a band. This time around it's The Killer Smiles, made up of Ray on guitar with vocals from Skip McSkipster, drums courtesy of Steve Wilson and bass chores and backing vocals handled by Greg Reeves.
The twelve tracks that make up the record are:
Raising The Stakes / Lipstick Cherry Red / You're Such A Fake / Area 51 / The Heart Is Something / It's Broken / I'm A User / The Runner / The Last Time You Failed / Safe And Sound / The Hardest Part / 16 Tons
Produced by none other than Paul Leary, he of The Butthole Surfers fame, their self titled debut album, it will probably seem obnoxious to see Ray playing with the vocalist who replaced original DK frontman Jello Biafra on the 'reunion tours' that happened a couple of years ago, but at least they're now doing their own thing under their own name, no longer content to cash in on past glories but instead trying to do something different. And this is different, at least compared to the Dead Kennedys' records - but in the grand scheme of things? It's fairly generic. Not bad, certainly not horrible, and at times pretty catchy but Ray's trademark Morricone-esque guitar twang is pretty subdued here and while McSkipster has a decent enough voice and the rhythm section keeps time perfectly fine, the twelve tracks here just don't stand out all that much.
The production is good. Everyone sounds great here, the levels are well balanced and Leary has managed to get a really clean, slick sound out of the band. The album is eclectic enough to run the gamut from the eighties style hardcore you'd expect to more traditional style pop punk to a little bit of old school surf rock but never really finds that one sort of key sound that it seems to be looking for. The guitar playing is great, completely professional sounding and almost flawless even, but the song writing here, while periodically clever, isn't breaking any new ground. A cover of Merle Travis' biggest hit, 16 Tons, is a fun way to close off the record and a couple of tracks will get your foot tapping between that closer and the up tempo opening salvo of Raising The Stakes.
Perfectly listenable from start to finish, I found myself wanting to get more into this than I did. Again, the musicianship is great, the guitar sounds killer, everything is really well done here but the erratic style of jumping from roots rock to hardcore to surf to, well, Merle Travis, just made it tricky to latch on to. This periodically sounds more like The Foo Fighters than the punk bands most fans are going to expect it to sound like, and while that's not a bad thing in some people's minds, again, it just gives things less flavor and results in a more watered down album than what these guys are perfectly capable of putting out - here's hoping this debut does well enough that they can live up to their potential, because sadly they don't on this inaugural release.
Check out the video for Rasing The Stakes here:
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