JJ and the Real Jerks on Rank Outsider Records

I don't know what California as a place has to do with the pop rock punk sound of San Diego's Rocket From The Crypt. Was it a west coast punk surf interpretation of the Dolls or The Heartbreakers? Maybe not even a direct reference but that same set of circumstances in a different place? Whatever mysteries are at work out there JJ and The Real Jerks out of Redondo Beach are currently tapped into a lot of those same sounds. These guys are reaching the same conclusions between catching waves and rays.
Yea right.
These guys play with a chopped up matte black hot rod sort of feel sweating in denim jackets and rolled up jeans.

On "High Anxiety Society" a bass line drops in with structure over power chords with JJ sounding like blue collar rock country. Throw a little distortion on that vocal for a verse and a half. Frantic guitars with a real snarl, this solo has some bite as well. Loose with a great chorus takes me back to that Social Distortion's Somewhere between Heaven and Hell. Separated guitars from both sides of the channels open "Short Term Memory Lane" with harmonica wailing. It's a story track that has a lot of electric hard living rock blues to it. A rock cramps style if they played it straight. JJ gets on sax for the solo breakdown that goes everclear honkeytonk, blowing doors off bars. There's even some of that Replacements sound, their honest rock if you cranked up the tempo with a greaser feel to this being a little unkempt and not housebroken.

B-Side's "Punch Out At The Record Shop" had me being about a record store, as if those still exist. It's raunchy and rocking stuttery bursts of riffage. JJ doesn't sound like himself so much on this side with thicker doubled up vocals, losing the blues feel? More power pop. "I want what's in your hand!" I love that there could be a fight about records turned into a track with an almost 60's sound at it's heart. The sax especially, its not over, that bass is keeping this thing alive. Someone does get punched, believe me, I get it and this ends with that title of the track back and forth in a call and response vocal really hammering this home. I bet they would appreciate it if this actually happened with this single...or its based on a true story? Ride this last refrain faster and faster to the end. SHOOOOPPPP!!!!!! Physical violence at the record store? It happens every year. It's called record store day.

On clear vinyl from the bands blog or Rank Outsider.

JJ & The Real Jerks on Rankoutsider Records

Joe from JJ & the Real Jerks sent in a couple of his singles a little while back (I'm getting seriously behind these days, at one a day I'm seriously about a month behind already...and I have to start another year end list?) and I grabbed this one with the crazy Hot Rod, pin-up, tiki man style sleeve by Shawn Dickinson of what happens in the first track, thanks to a ladyfriend of course. She's got her hand on the handle and is cranking away in this slick, big roadhouse country punk A-Side track, "The Wringer". This California based trio is making a hell of a huge crisp racket starting with Hoss on drums pounding out a real booming kick/snare beat out of the silence. JJ of course is windmilling in serious tremolo distortion, in a real heavy country style, with a great howl of a vocal that's alternating between various levels of slight distortion, leading up to the big chorus begging her not to put him through the wringer. It's got a hint of something like the Black Keys, the raw straight ahead beefy guitar (almost cock rock?) with the cool, sunglasses at night saxaphone and little richard piano pounding. Stripped down without sounding unfriendly. This is the final attempt, he seriously can't take it anymore, but I bet this isn't the first time either.
B-Side's "Shootin' from the Hip" has JJ taking this right into a bluesy distortion bend from the very beginning, a booming, huge sounding, gleaming garage pop. Pretty epic in scale, and style, ,aking sure to include lots of these impassioned starts and stops, where the whole thing hangs up for a second and blasts right back way down into the gritty garage again. More driving rhythms and a wavery crackling solo that sounds to me more like the southern center of the country, the bbq's and the cattle than what you think of happening in California, what the hell do they have the powerful blues about?

Get this from Rankoutsider Records.