Crash Kelly

Penny Pills (Liquor and Poker)
By Craig Regala

Tapping into the hooky (and playin’ hooky) ’70s of pre-bullshit power pop (Rick Springfield, Big Star), FM rock and roll (Sammy Hagar’s early ass-shakers, Kiss, Quarterflash, that amazingly great Crabby Appleton tune “Go Back”), later ’70s “new/nerd wave” ID’d stuff (Jack Green, The Bangles, Donnie Iris, Tommy Tutone, Patti Smythe) is a good idea. Knowing enough to stand with cool bands from the late ’80s/early ’90s like The Affected, Joan Jett, Redd Kross, and The Fireballs whilst ripping gummy guitar parts from the effervescent parts of Thin Lizzy bespeaks some kinda luck/brains. A couple good tunes, some great guitar parts, and the ability to rock harder live (one hopes) should lead to wherever. Being Canadians, do they have the balls to come out and do a set of tunes from B.T.O., The Forgotten Rebels, and Slow? I hope to fuck, right? Not that the Rainbow and Cheap Trick tunes they did weren’t good picks.
(www.liquorandpokermusic.com)