Mexican Summer (label)
06 November 2015 (released)
19 November 2015
Talk about tearing away from the gates – this album from Soldiers of Fortune (feat. Stephen Malkmus, Cass McCombs, Brad Truax, Matt Macauley, Matt Sweeney etc.) kicks off with one of the most incendiary riffs I’ve heard in years on ‘Nails'.
Guitars screaming in the background (VERY Ted Nugent in style) nd a pace that leaves the listener out of breath after only a few seconds. This is not one to play in your car if you want to keep your license (telling a copper that you were speeding because the band made you do it doesn’t really cut it).
Follow that with a dense Blues with the whole band lost in the murk of a QOTSA style stoner Blues and you have interest piqued at least.
SOLDIERS OF FORTUNE started back in August 2004 as an ANTI-BAND! The idea was - instigated by Brad Truax - to put together a cracked mercenary “dirty dozen” type of outfit, who were never gonna write songs, never gonna practice, never gonna record music, make any product for public consumption or ever hit the road! Hmmm
Every track here has a different story to tell, as you might expect from a band who meet only occasionally, hardly ever play live together and had to be coerced into recording this album.
Yet, it works. The commercialism of most releases is absent and the sense of ‘making a record’ is too. Instead you have the ultimate jam band – a band who all bring their ideas to the party, all of which are accepted and turned into something rather wonderful.
By rights this could be a 1* review or a 5* - it doesn’t even say what its aims are and achieves everything it promises. I’m settling for a 4* simply because it was so much fun to work out just what the hell was happening and then find I actually enjoyed the album when I finally found out!
