Broms – Review

Broms

by Scott Hefflon

Vocalist/bassist/organist Rev. Ed Broms goes full circle. After 20 years performing with Cecil Taylor, John Zorn, Mat Maneri, Eddie Kirkland, Bulgarian dance bands, not to mention something called a two year spirit quest, the good Rev. comes back to where he started: Rock. Recorded at New Alliance Studios, produced by Mudrock, featuring Jordan Cohen (Powerman 5000) on drums, Crick Diefendorf (New Orleans-style jazz band Made in the Shade), guest guitarist Paul Mascott (composer of the musical Drop), and live drummer Captain Rock (aka Todd Perlmutter – Blue Man Group, Jocobono, Orangutang), Broms is a veritable who’s fuckin’ who. Funny thing is, this nine-song, 45-minute debut sounds a lot like grunge rock. That said, if you can get past the foul taste of over-commercialized Gap commercials the genre became, perhaps you’ll remember when the music moved your soul. Some of it, at least. There was passion and integrity ground into the sounds created by some of those unwashed musicians.

It wasn’t about chicks and money and cars (well, maybe, but not first and foremost), it was about singing stoner poetry/lyrics that were either insightful or oblique nonsense, and jammin’ like the ’70s never gave way to under-sexed, hairspray-abusing posterfags in neon long johns. It was ’cause playing shows got ya free dope, and if the big money started rolling in, you were gonna pay all the people back that’d been payin’ your rent all this time, and, man, get the biggest bag anyone had ever seen. So yeah, Broms is talented as hell, yet aren’t so fuckin’ wanky that they feel the need to show you. They groove, they rock, they stumble, they croon, they emote, they make your buzzin’ head sway from side to side.