The Swamp Gospel, the Psyatics, the Holy Smokes at the Double Down Saturday Jan 18, 2020
For the first Swamp Gospel revival of the new decade, we brought in our pals (and my second band) the Psyatics along with the terrific Holy Smokes to our local dive bar/clubhouse, the Double Down for a night of garagey/noisy/bluesy/punky/what-the-heck-ever rock'n'roll.
As usual, the Gospel opened the night to a reasonably full club of sinners'n'saints who joined in the festivities - laying of hands, strychnine sippin', dancin'n'debauchin'! It was a good time all around, with brand new songs joining the old standards and Rev. Sister Divine and Brother Lenny drivin' the backbeat and everyone joinin' in for a raucous start to the evening.
With a change of clothes, I then joined the Psyatics for our set of dual guitar garage-noize. Mark powered the beat from behind the drums while Rob - even with some bass-amp technical difficulties - provided the snakey low-end lines and crooned'n'snarled as Jack and I laid some feedback-laden guitars over the top of it all. Jack continued to get into the faces and onto the tables of everyone within reach while my new wireless let me prowl the club. Plenty of new tunes from our just-recorded album mixed in with classics from the other albums and covers from the likes of the Scientists and the Banana Splits!
(Above SG & Psyatics pix by Nikki Ruffling)
The Holy Smokes made a rare appearance of their blistering garage/blues led by harp-maestro Jeffrey and bass-groover Luke - both on vocals - with original Telecaster terror Joel joined by "newcomer" Turbo on the stormin' drums. With swingin' bluesy originals, covers ranging from Billy Boy Arnold ("I Wish You Would") to the NY Dolls via Bo Diddley ("Pills") to the Stones ("Miss You"), they got the late night crowd on the feet and on the dance floor! I love these cats and hope that they will do more in 2020 and hopefully we will be joining them again soon!
posted by rich @ 4:20 PM
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