NC if only for the fact that Billy Zoom is the ultimate rockabilly guitar player. And where would we be without him?

Also: The Cramps

Frankly, the sped up blues riff, the 1/4/5, the wiggly pinky, chuck berry, all that is just basic rock and roll. Can't hate on that.

The "culture" of tatoos, rat rods, tight jeans, etc. I can take it or leave it. I immediately suspect some sort of mental disability in people who feel the need to dress up like a caricature all the time. I feel the same way about punx with studs and mohawks. Might as well be a rodeo clown.

Rockabilly actually started when white kids started playing jump jive/jump blues with guitars and drums instead of big orchestras with horns and stuff. It's weird to me that this chapter is largely written out of rock and roll history, because without Wynonie Harris, Arthur Crudup, Big Joe Turner, and Louis Jordan, you get no Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Elvis Presley. It's fun music. I like fun, unlike most of you weirdos.

That said, a lot of retro rockabilly cats and kittens are former skinheads and fuck those people forever. Clearly, they're not big on historical context, just by the very nature of being a racist asshole, so most of them don't get that rockabilly is black music played by hillbillies.

Because I love Los Lobos, JD McPherson, Rev. Horton Heat, and all of that jump blues stuff, I vote NC. Because "Blackboard Jungle" nearly set the world on fire in 1955 and was one of the first interracial Hollywood blockbusters, the soundtrack of which contained plenty of Bill Haley and other great early rock and roll stuff, I vote NC.

Because it's less embarrassing as a middle-aged dude to wear 501s with a white t-shirt and to slick what's left of your hair back than it would be to try to squeeze into skinny jeans or continue to rock the liberty spikes, also NC.

WF for toxic racist weirdos, the sound of those Stray Cats records being surprisingly unpleasant, and the non-portability of some of the affectations, though I do know some sweet friends in larger cities who still rock the polka dots and wallet chains with surprising grace, and their kids have amazing names like Tallulah and Lucille.

I wish I could find that Onion article that was something like "Child of Rockabilly Parents Wonders What the Fuck is Going On."

The Cramps, The Gun Club, and Uncle Les from Dead Alive aren't crap, but hold the leopard, sailor tats, and flamed bowling shirts.

Krev wrote: Mon Nov 29, 2021 11:15 am The Cramps, The Gun Club...

Now there's a Thunderdome idea. I wonder who'd win.

This 'rockabilly' is more in line with current country music than the Cramps or Gun Club.

Disagree on the whiteness of this subculture, which is (was?) at least as big in Japan as in the US.

Yeah the first thing I think of when I think rockabilly is the Japanese rockabilly subculture. I used to see loads of those guys dancing in Yoyogi Park every weekend.

Man it's fine I guess but I'm mostly just sick of it. Like around my way, this is what all the punk guys who got older and better at playing guitar got into instead of weirder, more interesting stuff.

handsbloodyhands wrote: Mon Nov 29, 2021 12:06 pm This 'rockabilly' is more in line with current country music than the Cramps or Gun Club.

This reminds me of Ybor Pizza in the '90s. All of the musicians in Tampa worked at Ybor Pizza for a minute or two, and the Tuesday night local music show was always played in the kitchen. That way you could find out if your friends' bands or even your band got played that week.


On the college radio station, right after the local music show there was a reggae and ska show, called like Crucial Vibrations or something. Half the kitchen staff loved reggae (weed) and the other half HATED reggae (powder drugs). An uneasy détente was established: The reggae show could play until the first time the singer of one of the reggae bands actually sang the word "reggae," and then the radio got turned off.

Every week, the local music show would go off, some semi-coherent undergrad would mutter the intro to the reggae show, the music would start, bass pumping, guitar chanking, keyboards plonking, and the singer would sing "rrrrrrrRRRRRRRRRRRREEEEEEEGGAE MUUUUUSSSSSSIIIII...." [click]

enframed wrote: Mon Nov 29, 2021 11:51 am

Krev wrote: Mon Nov 29, 2021 11:15 am The Cramps, The Gun Club...

Now there's a Thunderdome idea. I wonder who'd win.

The Cramps, without a doubt.

Sometimes the music is ok. I like Fender amps with the reverb cranked and a bunch of vibrato. Cramps is different to me than regular rock-a-billy culture stuff, like MOAM is different than a surf rock band. I will say on the few occasions where I have been at a party or something with someone that is deep in Rock-a-billy culture, like the type of dude that drives a '54 Ford Coupe with dice in the window and has a girlfriend that dresses like Rosie the Riveter all the time, they almost inevitably end up talking about some pretty racist shit or hard neo-con nonsense before the night is over. If nostalgia is your most precious interest, you're pretty much a boring person to me.

Crap. WF for cool amps.