Review
Jon Spencer
Spencer Sings The Hits!

In The Red (2018) Kevin Fitzpatrick

Jon Spencer – Spencer Sings The Hits! cover artwork
Jon Spencer – Spencer Sings The Hits! — In The Red, 2018

Garage rock is a term that no longer gets a lot of usage - dissipating into the ether after the resurgence and seeming demise of the genre around the mid-00s. The thing is, it never died. We just forgot where to look. And when it comes to unabashed, unapologetic garage rock, you need look no further than Jon Spencer. He of the Blues Explosion and Pussy Galore. He who started the fuzzy, fizzy guitar sound that contemporaries like Jack White seem to get all the credit for. But make no mistake - Spencer did it first, and Spencer does it better.

Listening to tracks like “Ghost” and “Overload”, it becomes evident that Spencer has no real interest in changing his formula but that’s all part of its charm. The garage is still his laboratory and Spencer Sings The Hits! has the formula to put a smile on your face, a swagger in your walk and a sway in your hips. What music does that anymore? Music that elicits that kind of response all but died with The Ramones. But bless Jon Spencer’s greasy ol’ truck-stop heart leading the charge for the next generation. 

Jon Spencer – Spencer Sings The Hits! cover artwork
Jon Spencer – Spencer Sings The Hits! — In The Red, 2018

Related news

Jon Spencer & the HITmakers with two tours

Posted in Tours on September 17, 2022

Jon Spencer & The Hitmakers (& a Quasi connection)

Posted in Records on February 19, 2022

Recently-posted album reviews

Carnivorous Flower

Carnivorous Flower
Dead Broke Rekerds (2025)

There's a time to be cerebral and there's a time to tell it like it is. Carnivorous Flower lives by the latter. Their debut has 10 songs: 18 minutes in total. Each of the songs is catchy as heck and you can pretty much singalong on your first listen. It's "simple" punk with peppy energy and a lot of heart. … Read more

SUB/SHOP

Democatessen
Independent (2025)

Richmond, VA has always had a way of bending punk into something sharper and stranger, and Sub/Shop feels like a direct product of that tradition. Their EP democatessen isn’t a debut in the wide-eyed sense but a statement from musicians who’ve already spent years inside heavy, confrontational music and are now choosing precision over spectacle. Across six tracks, Sub/Shop delivers … Read more

Guerilla Teens

I Cyclops / Pride of the Savanna-7"
Heavy Medication Records (2024)

One-eyed wind-up dancing eyeballs boppin' and weavin' with Scott "Deluxe" Drake and Jeff Fieldhouse from the one and only and never replicated the almighty "The Humpers". I was lucky to see them back in the 90's in Toronto at a hot, sweaty club in the dead of summer, back when there was a blue hue of cigarette smoke, a faint … Read more