[usr 7.5 text=”true”]
REVIEW – Out of the streets of Las Vegas comes the screaming, shouting and singing of the SquidHat Records tribute to Prince. Like most tribute records, this one has bands that go out of their way to re-invent the song, while others just pay homage and be close as they can be to the original. Also like most tribute songs, some songs work better than others. When you think of the strides punk has made in the last 30 years, punk has been featured on many tributes to many genres of music. I believe a punk tribute to Prince would be the most scary situation for any band to jump into. After all, Prince is an icon and his songs are timeless and still today sound like the first time you heard it. An artist who was far ahead of his time with a music genre that also has showed no signs of quitting and only gets stronger with age.
The Heiz gets the party started with Delirious. As the opening track this is the perfect example of what this cd is going to offer you, you have the hints of Prince but you have a band that is totally taking this song and putting a modern day punk spin on it. Where Prince’s version got people dancing in discos, this version will have people moshing in pits. What a smart and catchy opening track.
New Cold War doing I Would Die 4 U, is psychotic and so damn addictive at the same time. Talk about a song that is so far away from the original, where the Prince version came across as a love letter. This cover comes across as someone outside your window watching you. How brutally heavy and addictive this song is. By far, this song is something truly I was not expecting from this record. My god are these guys fucking amazing.
Sister by Negative Nancys is another slice of that Vegas Punk scene. Another home run for a band that when people hear their debut will know how exciting music is going to get. They do this song some justice and make it their own by the end. Very sexy cool. Now, finally it is time to get up and get funky. Frank and Deans version of Jungle Love is the biggest shock for me. i did not see this song being pulled off, much less improving on the original. This is the song that it seems every band these days has to cover in one way or another, but yet they all seem to fall to be bordering on mocking instead of complimenting. Frank and Deans got the memo, and they compliment it and also I was shocked that this song had that much energy and passion. Speaking of which, the return of The Dirty Panties also gets one up and dancing when they give us Raspberry Beret. Another song that should have failed but yet the band got the energy and passion of the original and added their flavor to make people forget it was a tribute song.
Jack U Off by The Quitters falls into the category of so odd that I cannot believe I like it. This song will clearly divide people by its silliness but yet win over most by the catchiness and just all out fun it has. I am on the fence on Guilty by Association doing Let’s Go Crazy. This band I feel if they did 1999 or Little Red Corvette would have been such a better result, they fall short on this song just for the fact that they tried to hard to give us the Prince spirit but forget their own. That is the same feeling I got from the Purple Rain cover by Mercy Music. This one to me would be the hardest one for me to accept. Afterall, this song is in my top ten of all time. Mercy Music are a good band but I feel they picked a cover that was doomed to not work out no matter how they tried.
The rest of the cd is fair, nothing really bad or great about it. I really liked the bulk of the cd and I feel that for Prince fans this may be a tough sell, but if you are punk fans, this could be an easier sell. All in all, this was not the worst, but beside the 5 or 6 songs I went on about, the rest was fair.
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