Fictional “goth psycho metal” band featured in Ben Elton’s 2009 novel Meltdown, about the global financial crash.
Fictional “goth psycho metal” band featured in Ben Elton’s 2009 novel Meltdown, about the global financial crash.
As their retro name suggests, it’s as if you had travelled back in time to San Francisco in about 1965 and wandered into a bar to hear an early incarnation of, say, Quicksilver Messenger Service or The Great Society. Only they hail from Mexico City, and are happening now. A raw, bluesy psychedelic rock band formed in 2010 and led by Electric John, they are a great live act whose first gig outside Mexico was, appropriately enough, at the Whisky a Go Go in LA. Check out Movin’ or Miles of Wisdom and other examples of their work on SoundCloud.
Formerly The Vibratos, they were the house band at the Whisky a Go Go, Los Angeles, in the mid-1960s. Cory Wells was the lead singer, and another future Three Dog Nighter, Danny Hutton, produced their version of Hey Joe. They featured in the film Riot on Sunset Strip and, here, in an episode of The Beverly Hillbillies.
“The name came from a comment about the number of potential band members we had.” They ended up with four, fittingly for a barbershop quartet. And here they are. Of more interest, perhaps, is the question: what would happen if the entire population of China jumped in the air at once? Not very much, according to German researchers who persuaded 50,000 people to engage in synchronised hopping, accompanied by the band We Are Heroes. The conclusion: “People cannot start an earthquake by hopping.”
“The black Slade” sounded like this.
No relation to Don and Phil Everly, this is a very funny ukulele band from Sheffield who specialise in cover versions with slyly reworked lyrics. So Bob Marley’s No Woman, No Cry becomes No Oven, No Pie, Buffalo Soldier is Buggered Up Shoulder, and Daft Punk’s Get Lucky becomes Got Mucky. The band, who describe themselves as devout Pientologists, say their work is inspired by civic pride in their home city, exemplified by this version of Sheffield Calling.