Angry Johnny and the Killbillies

Hankenstein (Tar Hut Records, PO Box 441940, Somerville, MA 02144)
by Dick Dent

Welcome to the Grand Guignol Opry. These guys don’t need too much descriptive amplification, since the cover kinda sez it all: A cartoon rendering of the title character, a stitched-together, green-skinned version of the turberculotic one, Mr. Williams, Sr., himself. Your cheatin’ heart will get splattered all over the interstate before I’m through… Fire BAD! and so forth. And gol-danged if they don’t pret’ much live up to the promise inherent in the cover art, playing bent-roots-rockabilly-club-you-over-the-head whiskey-and-hemoglobin drinking music with a scary number of references to chainsaws and pickle jars. The music’s mostly trad pre-rock stuff, which helps bring across the Hasil Adkins/ EC comics scenarios of “Life, Love, Death, and the Meter Man,” “Poor Little Raccoon,” and the epic closer “Drag Racing the Devil.” The less modern it sounds, the better it is (meaning those moments that don’t sound like they came off a Joe Strummer solo record), but even its lesser moments would bring a lonesome tear to the eye of Charlie Starkweather as he sent another innocent bystander screaming into the flaming maw of Hell. And that there’s a good thing, ya’ll.