Thee Exciters: Spending Cash, Talking Trash

Thee Exciters

Spending Cash, Talking Trash
Dirty Water Records

I couldn't list the title in the bulletin since it sounds like a rap album. And trashy Thee Exciters are! These guys sound like they crawled out of a gutter, picked up some instruments, and proceeded to completely empty a bar's liquor supply. Vocalist Paul Le-Brock sounds like he spent the night taking shots of whiskey and chain smoking only to wake up the next day and start over early in the morning while Justin Cunningham's tube amp is turned up to "11" and channeled through a three fuzz boxes. A scratchy voice and some mean, fuzzed out and downright nasty guitar. Spending Cash, Talking Trash is for the garage rock purist. It just doesn't get any more garage than this.

To make things even more primitive, there's a true caveman rocker complete with ape noises on "Ugly Face" combined with just a hint of surf and a pounding beat from Richey Walker that could scare your parents. That's a damn good thing. Rock 'n' roll should always scare your parents. A standout track is "Guts for Garters" which could easily be mistaken for "Your Body, Not Your Soul" from Cuby and The Blizzards, but only after making sure the original tape is sandpapered down almost to the point of not being playable.

Spending Cash, Talking Trash is 12 tracks of fuzzed out garage rawk that will sucker punch any garage afficionado into realizing that Southampton is only secondary to Detroit. These guys sound like a Stooges vs. Sonics bash over the head with guitars brawl, but with survivors! The songs are basic r&b thrown in battery acid. "Bringing Me Down" highlights that basis and then amps it up with a super loaded bass from Alex Tapps and then trashed up with Justin's riffs and occasional Townshend monkey swings which sound like emphatic statements. One also just can't get away from the perfect scream-howls from Paul, but the song descends into an all out guitar/bass wail that goes beyond the basic. The following track "Chillin' Truth" follows the same premise but has it sped up to a southern fried beat that will get even the most knuckle-walking troglodyte to the most uptight, tailor made drainpipe pants hipster to stand on two feet and start moving.

Spending Cash, Talking Trash, the debut full length album from Southampton's Thee Exciters has too many good songs to mention. It was also recorded in mono, which makes it sound even more uncivilized. If that's not enough to get your RAWK on, the CD version contains an entire live set from Dirty Water Club's 10th Anniversary weekend in October 2006.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is your brain:


This is your brain on Thee Exciters:


Any Questions?