This blog has a pretty strict instrumental focus, so I'm bending the rules a bit to review the new Untamed Youth, as it only has four instrumentals. But they're such a legendary group that is essential to the story of surf revival, and it would be a shame to leave it off.
OK that's not really why. I want to focus on these instrumentals, as they're pretty excellent.
Alright, that's not really it either. I mostly just want to write about one song.
When the Untamed Youth started Deke Dickerson was seventeen years old. By the time they released their last album in 1998, the Youth part was a little less truthful. Along the way between then and now, Deke has become an established figure in rock & roll history -- his Instagram is full of visits with underappreciated musicians of yesteryear, I've watched him back up countless legends of the genre at Ponderosa Stomp's in the past. If you consider yourself a student of rock & roll at 45rpm and you don't know his name... are you?
So with all that dignity that I've attributed to him, I love that he's still rolling out songs like "Beer", one of the most puerile, moronic recordings I've heard in years, possibly ever. It has only one word, the title, at first built up with a frat-rock-like chant, and from then on in a frat-characature-like cavernous burp voice. It's such a dumbass genius move that I'm amazed I've never heard done before, but it's held up by a joyful trilling guitar line that sounds like pure party. I think if this were released in the 60's, the radio wouldn't play it, but it would be a must-have for every DJ's box of 45s decades later. If the radio did play it, what a terrible society we'd have. If it's not clear: I love this song.
That said, it's not particularly surprising. Deke has always made sure to keep his behavior well below his stature, with some other stupid recording ideas (for instance his album writing lyrics for popular instrumental songs), and with live antics that are frequently full of gags or that are notorious for mess. "Beer" is one of many songs about, well, beer in their repertoire (and on this album!), and I've personally felt a little Pabst Blue Ribbon rain sprayed onto the audience from one of their many "reunion" shows. All this is to say that the untamed youthfulness never really left the band, and so naturally it's all here on this record.
But first, let's talk instros. There are four: "Reverb Bum", "Carbonation", "The Lone Surfer", and I'm counting "Beer". "Reverb Bum" is food for surf nerds as the title would imply: razor sharp guitar tone with heroic licks, Chantays-esque keys, and a few reverb kicks tossed in. "Carbonation", its name likely riffing on The "Penetration", emulates the hypnotic mystery of the track but is still very much its own song. Then "The Lone Surfer" is, I believe, a Johnny Fortune cover, and a surprisingly moody closer for an album that's anything but. All of these are ideal sorta stuff for traditional surf music in a modern sound, and actually kind of remind me a bit of The Volcanics. The Untamed Youth may be only a quasi-surf band, but they rarely disappoint when they are.
But really, they're a garage band, and the notable thing with these songs is that they're still the Untamed Youth. Plenty of energy, great guitar playing, never all that serious. You have cameos from Chris Montez and Trashman Tony Andreason, but I think that's just more people in the party than it is changing the formula around a guest. There's a cover of The Buzzcocks' "What Do I Get?", which may surprise some as that song is so solidly labelled punk, but as they demonstrate it's a pretty straight rock & roll song at heart. I was going to say something about a more updated, modern recording sound but... kinda? I mean it sounds great, and there's maybe few more studio tricks going on here, but dipping back into some older Untamed Youth, they actually weren't quite as lo-fi as I tend to expect from their 90's garage ilk. So yeah, it sounds great (especially those instrumentals), but a bold new sound this is not -- and they didn't need one!
So yeah, while it's questionable that The Untamed Youth ever fully left us (at least in a live sense), they are very much back in recorded form. Fans of the band should jump on this, and buy it on vinyl because that fun album art deserves to be seen nice and big. Available from Hi-Tide's store on vinyl and CD.
