Black Pistol Fire “Big Beat ‘59”
When I first heard Black Pistol Fire do an EP covering the songs of Little Richard I wrote that they could have a very solid sound their own if they combined the music of Little Richard with something more modern, sort of how they added that sort of punk feel to their covers. Well, Black Pistol Fire has not really added that formula to this album, but I like it nonetheless.
The majority of the music on “Big Beat ‘59” reminds me of classic rock bands but it is done so in such a matter that it doesn’t make me want to listen to those bands instead (Why listen to a modern version of Led Zeppelin when I can just put on a Zeppelin record?) , but rather it comes off sounding a lot like something modern or just continuing the long standing tradition known as rock n roll.
The opening track, “Beezlebub”, is really a world until itself. At first I could hear piece of The Black Keys within the music and that made me immediately cringe, as I thought this whole album may come off sounding like the band that impresses many but I tend to find boring. My opinion on that quickly receded, as I began to hear more of the acoustic guitar overtones of a band such as Kansas fused with what can only be described as a song sung a long time ago whilst picking cotton in a field.
After this, the album continues- for the most part- on a trend of rock n roll that’s somewhere between ZZ Top and Led Zeppelin, which if you’ve ever heard either of those two bands I can tell you is not a bad sound to have at all. An odd sort of reference as well that I can pick up in the music (Though only in the second song really) is some vocals that sound a bit like Billy Joel. Why I hear that exactly, I am not entirely sure.
The only exceptions to what I could dub “ZZeppelin” (Get it? I mixed ZZ Top and Led Zeppelin together. Clever, huh?) would be the song “Young Blood”, which is closer to the rock n roll sound of the 1960’s ala Buddy Holly as opposed to the 1970’s. If you need a contemporary reference as well, I can hear bits of Kings of Leon in “Bombs and Bruises”, though if you’re looking for a band to be your next King of Leon you might want to look elsewhere because Black Pistol Fire just rocks too hard. The last song, “Dead Love”, also reminds me of Blind Melon at times, which is about as contemporary as I like my references to get.
Growing up, I listened to grunge, which is no secret. I used to go to church and one time someone there (An adult, as I was an early teen) made an off the cuff remark, downplaying the importance of Nirvana by saying, “I wish I could eat your cancer when you turn black? What does that even mean?” That was the closest I ever came to resistance in the music that I listened to because quite frankly my parents didn’t care what I listened to at the time. My father actually only ever cared when I listened to CIV and he swore as opposed to the style of music being played.
My point is, I didn’t have a big rebellious childhood full of music like many teens must have had in the 1970’s (Which again, my parents probably freaked out their parents, so consequently my parents were less freaked out by my music) Black Pistol Fire is the type of ROCK N ROLL band that quite frankly is what people refer to when they say “If it’s too loud then you’re too old”. Black Pistol Fire are also the type of band that you could listen to in secret- as a teen- because if your parents ever found out you were listening to that rock n roll they would assume you were also smoking the marijuana and, well, it’s all downhill from there.
Not only do I like this record, I wish I could have used it to annoy my parents as a teen.
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