Slovenly calls this JAPANPUNK. My preliminary google search of this portmanteau didn’t come up with much but I already know Angel Face features Fink from noisey ’90s Japanese garage rockers Teengenerate. I also learned that some people consider them a supergroup as members also previously played in other bands like Fadeaways, Raydios, Ruler, Triple Junk Firestarter, none of whom I’m familiar with so I had my work cut out for me here. I decided to start by watching Wild Zero, the 1999 Japanese B-movie cult flick starring the premiere jet rock’n’roll band Guitar Wolf. I remember wanting to see it in the early oughts but never got the chance so this seemed like a good excuse to rectify the situation. My first impression was that it hadn’t aged well and I probably would have liked it more back when it came out but by the end it had won me over in a pretty unexpected way. Within the crazy rock’n’roll alien invasion zombie apocalypse narrative is a seemingly ahead-of-it’s-time love story between the straight male lead Ace and his trans female love interest Tobio. Sure, Wild Zero was released several years after the much more famous Crying Game, but its message- delivered by Guitar Wolf to Ace- is a much more positive one: Love has no boundaries, nationalities or genders.
Out In The Streets opens with a reasonable facsimile of the guitar feedback intro from Jimi Hendrix’s “Foxey Lady”, then rips through 10 searing powerpop rock’n’roll bangers. I read that Angel Face started without a singer but this dude Hercules kept showing up to their shows and dancing his ass off so they invited him to join the band! I don’t know if this is true but as they say never let the truth get in the way of a good origin story. His snotty growl sounds like an animal telling a leg hold trap where to stick it, while Fink’s guitar blasts from the speakers like raw meat through a meat grinder. The melodies in songs like "Searching For The Truth” and “Out In The Night” are stuck in my head, more rock’n’roll than Stupid Plots but more powerpop than Guitar Wolf, and like both the production is rough around the edges, just sloppy enough to make it never get boring.
Would we remember MC5 as fondly if they had slicker production? We’ll never know but I would bet the Slovenly dudes would say no way. I have yet to see the Hollywood remake of Toxic Avenger, my all-time favourite B-movie, but I can’t imagine that it could be as good as the original in all it’s goofy, low budget glory. I think the idea here is to try to capture the live energy and this sounds like some of the bubblegum garage punk that was coming out of the Bay Area before Green Day and pop punk became household names. Ben Weasel should get back to making music as good as this and stop being such an asshead. I actually feel like this review doesn’t live up to how much I like this record but I did figure out what JAPANPUNK is at least, I guess my algorithm is better than google AI! Turns out it’s a song by Slovely labelmates Glitter Fast, they sing in Japanese so I don’t know what the lyrics are but it’s fast and loud and I dig it. As they say in Wild Zero, all it takes is courage and rock’n’roll.
