The Johnny Ill Band on Dusty Medical Records

It happens to the best of kids. They start off innocent and sincere. Ignorant of hardships they write and play hilarious, laid back jangly tunes in a hexagonal lodge with some cocktails. Soon that cruel unforgiving world they have to fight every day turns them into hard ass men who purchase distortion pedals and play faster and harder with a mean edge. The lodge becoming a distant memory and the pleasant cocktails replaced with shots of whiskey. This is the story of the latest single on Dusty Medical Records from The Johnny Ill Band.

Johnny is back on the scene with A-Side’s "Post Office" coming on psychedelic with this swirly synth opening, the modulation wheel used and broken. Damn this is going heavy and Johnny pulled out distortion on vocals. Anrgy Johnny, I know missing a lot of the lyric about going to the post office but it’s about getting emotional here. There's a theatrical, massive sound to this, the keys are hard and heavy, things are gated, jagged post rock riffs are tossed in, untill they hit that verse to ROCK. Bare bones guitars have been replaced with lots of rock, faster and heavier. You get what he's saying now? This isn't a joke man.
B-Side isn’t getting softer either with "Mark is in the car with my Dad". Rolling those toms hitting them into that surf sound with reverb an almost jamaican dub sound bouncing into the this one. Johnny got that distortion still, that punk and delay on “Did he have a moustache or did he have a beard beard beard?” That fantastic lyric writing is back, this is a reggae dub dream about (I'm guessing), about being high and your friends dad having to drive you home. The way this is so freaking heavy and serious and Johnny says “Can you give this book back to him?” It’s like some kind of trick. Is he still nice? Seriuosly committing to this 1000 mile stare of a track that has a Cramps reverb garage from psychedelic hell. Shakers, all kinds of layeres of keys, building to this massive peak that's going to fall, I don't know how we even ended up here. I just needed a ride home and it went all Fear and Loathing on me. The lizards on the rug are eating my shoes. I'm going to reach over and make us crash. They’re all grown up.

Get this one from Dusty Medical Records.

The Johnny Ill Band on Kaboodle Records + Interview

I've been listening to the Ill Band's full length since I picked it up many weeks ago now at their Moon II show, but these early singles Johnny had at the show are equally as good, with a little bit more of a raw sound, some messing around with vocal effects...the origin story of that crisp, minimal masterpiece that is Ask all the Doctors.

On A-Side's "The Doctor" Johnny is almost poking fun at himself on this one, delivering the vocal in the exact opposite of how I'm used to him sounding on the big record...rocking out, almost screamy metal, some sort of blues style, cutting himself up. The bleating vocals, of this manic, spaz doctor, and when the guitar distortion lines up with these howls of vocal, it's pretty great, still minimal as anything and all I keep hearing is a Devo new wave sound in everything, but I think that's just me. The strumming here even is off at one point, a little slip of the pick in this take...and they left it there! Hell yes, it all gets a little out of line, and says nothing about the musicanship. These are conscious choices, like that intro to "new Years Eve" on the full length.
"Makes Them Feel Good" gets a little country with a bendy, almost slide electric, lyrically, it's JIB perfection:

Don't listen to the people that you live with

because, you need to do whatever makes you feel good... we've all got our own things, some people like to write about 7inches because it makes them feel good. Exactly.
It's everything that's great about the Dead Milkmen why I'm a little guilty of not revisiting Big Lizard in my backyard enough, what am I too cool for that album now? Hell no! They're making clever simple points that aren't too jokey, but are really specific...that's a fine line, and they nail it every time. Bitchin Camaro?
That modern art over there don't hate it, I don't get it either, but the guy that made it really cares about it, and you don't have to try to understand it. It won't make you stupider. But this is as catchy as a line dance, they've got the music part completely covered.
B-Side's "Television personality" is a spazzy track with a see/saw manic rhythm, and again, I can't hear anything but those new wave influences, like the Feelies, not going as pop as Talking Heads or anything, but it's that goofy messed up robot style. Malfunction, malfunction. Messing with the vocal more on this one, he's got a lot of range for being so deceptively straightforward.
The last one up, "Rocketship" is the most rockingest interlocking guitar melody about leaving on a rocket ship, that's it, and that's great.

We had better rocket ships in the '80s.

Just like "It's The Future" track on the full length, this is another lament about technology. I don't think we can really blame scientists...the future with no diseases and free energy and holograms just never seems any closer. It feels like the future is just going to be exactly the same as it is now with different clothes and celebrities, that's basically it. Still The Johnny Ill Band makes it sound pretty fun, like 'hey lets get excited about this again'. Nasa's gone? That's all I used to dream about as a kind...what's going to happen when you take that away? The children should listen to the Ill Band...THIS is what rockets were like.

Very proper, exact timing notes on the sleeve, 4 songs pressed onto black vinyl, with an inner screened red sleeve, machine stamped with numbers from Kaboodle via X! distro.

Have a listen to this interview with Johnny and the Ill Band, the sexagon is revealed, these early singles are discussed, pete talks about his organ sound, and Detroit. 19min.

The Johnny Ill Band on Italy records

When I caught these guys a few weeks back at Moon II, Johnny happened to have both of their previous singles with them, including this one on Italy Records, my crack research team was unable to find a discography but I'm guessing this was an early one from the rough garage fuzz covering this one, three tracks at 33 1/3 becuase you shouldn't rush Johnny, it's not a god damn race.

What we have on the A-Side, "Cars" is a more distorted, raw sounding JIB, almost psych haze layered feel with this big swirly guitar, Johnny is probably straight strumming away under this improv feedback. This chorus really gets sci-fi thanks to Pete and that Moog pitch wheel, with Johnny is deadpanning this vocal about cars.
Which reminds me of that Sidewalks single by Tyvek, in a couple of ways, this is dabbling in that same sound, Tyvek is probably a little more extreme in their scuzz, and the lyrics are way more buried, but not by much. And if you get down to the vocal, it's basically the same kind of delivery and even lyric. Tyvek is wondering about engineering a sidewalk and people walking around and here JIB is taking that same no bullshit approach to cars.
There is a huge conspiracy guys, these cars that everyone have... they're straight up killing people...now it's either that Johnny's talking about literally getting hit by them or just all the auxillary things that cars bring to society...you know the wars, the pollution. I wouldn't think that this has anything to do with their Detroit roots per se but then Italy Records put out those early White Stripes singles, which leads to "The Big Three Killed my Baby", so from the outside, those sorts of ideas might just be added to the water supply.
This chorus vocal is chopped into syllables connecting on the fast snare beat...there's that cool detached style of The Soft Pack, but still feeling like kind of a nerdy younger brother...they aren't going to ditch you somewhere after the show, they manage to keep things informal and just plain fun in spite of the inherent seriousness surrounding music, the kind of thing that comes with the business side of things, worried about the proper B-Side remixes and pitchfork coverage.

The B-Side, "Amphetamines" track is surprisingly slow, even for these guys, and especially for a song about speed...this must be on the downer side of the high. This one kind of erring on the punkier side of things, a little bit sloppy in that way that doesn't sound restrictively rehearsed with a warble of big synth bass tones. But hey...just because a song title is abut speed doesn't mean you have to go and obviously represent it in a song. It's going to be about someone who is on amphetamines. So they get this slower nervous kind of energy going, that paranoia, with deliberate, plucked chords, marionetted together and stiff. A rolling see saw rhythm, a single clink from a triangle ... in the end he always sounds hopeful, in spite of this unemotional delivery...there's no fucked up judgements or politics here, just calling it like he sees it.
"Tv Psychic" then, keeps Johnny's distant distorted vocal going, that shitty speaker coming off as more garage-y than usual.
When will the TV let you be psychic too? This time getting a little more abstract with what exactly he's talking about, almost back on Side A in a more pop psych land, with a nu wave stuttering....damn this could be a demo Devo track even, the back and forth clink of guitar sounds, a deliberate lockstep single note melody.

I really can't recommend that full length on Urinal Cake Records enough, still great weeks later, and you only have to flip it over like once every ten minutes.
Secret message in the gutter on this black vinyl, hand colored cars on the front of the sleeve! From Italy Records....$5 Bucks!

Johnny Ill Band at Moon II • 1-27-12

Got a chance to catch Detroits, The Johnny Ill band at Moon II over on the Hasidic side of south Brooklyn Friday night, and ended up meeting one of the guys outside who helped to build out the raw space not more than 6 months ago. They've got a Silent Barn type space over there with a balcony and your choice of PBR or glasses of champagne....really keeping it classy.

When Johnny goes on tour, they have a lot of people and equipment to think about - the multiple levels of keyboard, two guitars and bass, and thank god for Paul's somewhat minimal drum kit because all of this already can't fit into one van. This has to be laid back bunch just getting off on playing these straightforward psych-pop observations, or they would have imploded miles and miles ago. It's also surprising that the deceptively minimal sound of "In the Wintertime", came out of this big band combination. They're really paying attention to the details, which don't ever overwhelm the songs, especially the two tiers of organ which Pete uses sparingly and keeps this well out of the usual raw garage sound which they otherwise are successfully going for.

I think Johnny's not trying to sell the performance, or this post-garage minimal feel....this isn't a crafted persona...and I mean that in great way. Like Wounded Lion, Johnny Ill Band is that combination of the mundane bits of life while turning it into a good time sounding party. They aren't afraid to possibly sound ridiculous and at the same time make this track about the future something you want to hear more than once. It's not as easy as it sounds to carry a song about living in the garage or hating the wintertime as obvious as these songs are. This is a sort of a reinterpretation of the slacker aesthetic in the '90s and, although this might sound like that on first listen, Johnny really cares about these mundane observations. It's not with a punk attitude when he's talking about posture, you should really try to do something about it.
This storytelling style delivery of Johnny is at it's best on "Used to be Confused" combining a solid bassline, thumping along kick beat, and stabs on the organ. Johnny is straightforward laying the lyric down, not too emotional, when he raises his voice on the end of a verse it's just to fake the enthusiasm. Let's not get carried away.



Their recordings are almost documenting the compulsion to create, and thank god Johnny is talented, and trying to temper some of this smarty pants instrumentation with an barely emotional vocal about his washing machine. When he sings about it being stolen because of where he lives, it's not with any kind of hatred, he isn't railing against injustice when he says he has to hide his things, it's just the way it is.
In winter, you can't play baseball, it's a fact.
It's done with this kind of naive openness, not the way some friends on facebook overshare their daily details, but in the way that he's really got a compelling personality that isn't trying to glamorize anything...it's almost a challenge for The Johnny Ill Band to see if they can pull this off musically. Matt and Cree have to come up with a little extra, the single note solo and the bassline hook is going to be brutal, just as raw as humanly possible. Pete on organ isn't going to ever overplay his hand, almost winding up into a windmill with the time he's got in between chords, a perfect compliment to these concrete personal details.

Johnny was nice enough to have copies of their amazing full length, Ask All the Doctors on Urinal Cake Records which I have been listening to nonstop, plus a couple of singles on Kaboodle Records and Italy Records. They've been flying under the radar for far too long for me and I got a chance to see Matt Larson from the B-Side in person and that was exciting.

They're currently on their way back to Detroit after wrapping up this mini-tour and I hope that the washing machine is fixed or at least not stolen because they've got some major laundry to do.