Boredom and monotony are some of the worst things when it comes to the field of culture and art. And this is a stone in the garden of many, if not most billy musicians: riding on the legacy of fathers results in terrible self-restraint. But in the case of the album we’re going to talk about today, revenge for a stone thrown into the garden will be scary and cruel. It’s not just about the floral Godzilla on the cover of the record, although not without it. The point is the originality of the material, even if it is completely copyrighted. Today I will tell you about one of the most original psychobilly teams of our time: immensely creative and chaotically unpredictable Lucky’12!
Lucky’12 have existed in the third capital of Russia, the city of Yekaterinburg, since about the beginning of the tenth years. In any case, the first small and dashing Drunkenstein record was released in 2012. Personally, I assume that it was the release of this EP that canceled the prophesied end of the world.
The signature features of creativity were clearly manifested already on the debut album. Even then, the lucky ones were able to play soul strings in a very diverse way, driving the listener into fierce fun (you will never forget their version of Rawhide), then into a kind of dumerian melancholy, as in Until It Sleeps. On the plate, which we will consider today, all this is deepened and multiplied.
Well, before we move on to the main course, a little about the personalities. Only very original people can make such original music. Throughout its existence, two of the three participants have been moving this locomotive of madness nonstop. Alexander Zhernakov a.k.a. Alex`12 – voice, thick strings of double bass and bass guitar, as well as the main creative megamind of everything that is happening. Sasha has a completely recognizable creative handwriting, which is perfectly readable in other projects with his participation, such as Diddley Dogs or the oi-gang “Horse Move”. The main lyrical message is to confront the blues and despondency with such unrestrained fun that not everyone can stand it. And his versatile creativity is best manifested in Lucky`12.
The second formative bone of this lucky combination is His Holiness Denis Zobnin a.k.a. W.Den. And if Sasha is a pretty sophisticated cold head, then Danchik is the warmest heart of all possible. Dan’s playing style is absolutely inimitable. Literally. I can’t imagine that anyone could repeat his parts, at least play something similar. It’s not about technical bells and whistles, but about the combination of a lot of variables, random and not so much, which turns the sound of the instrument into a wayward element.
With the third participant, everything is a little less stable. For more than a decade, a real samurai clan has visited the lucky ones in the role of a six-stringed samurai. I can think of at least three. All of them were good, and on the current album the razor-sharp notes are carved by Vladimir Baum a.k.a Doc’n’stein. He does everything as appropriately as possible, despite the parallel metal life. However, maybe the Russian specifics and we have the whole underground working well together. Because similar things happen, for example, with SlapClaps.
And before we start tasting, I’ll point out the elephant in the room. Firstly, I am a fierce fan of the “lucky ones”, and secondly, they have been my good friends for many years. That is, I will be biased, very biased. Well, at least all the enthusiasm will be justified.
So, the material of “Fear Of Wilting” was recorded in the period 2017-2018, after which all this was heroically reduced by Sasha to 2020. In addition to specially prepared items, the album included a song from the single “Autumn” of the year 2019, as well as a cover of Stray Cats, which previously appeared on the tribute compilation Rumble in Russia Tonight.
At the moment this is the last, but not the last album of the band and its second full-length album. And given the temporal dislocations of the twenties with all this march of apocalyptic horsemen, the record can be considered fresh.
Lucky`12 – Fear Of Wilting mp3
02 The tale of the eye
03 PRS
04 The Foundling
05 Autumn
06 Night of the Knife
07 Boots of God
08 Gearbox Shuffle
09 Storm The Embassy
Listen online or download Lucky`12 – Fear Of Wilting (2020) (mp3, 52 Mb)
The album opens with a cover of the classic oh-her-punk Heart Full Of Pride by the authorship of the Perkele group. At the beginning, there is a significant influence of Johnny Cash with a characteristic “chick-boom”. In general, the creativity of Cash Lucky is addressed very often. Even on this album repeatedly. Maybe the number 12 is a reference to the date of Johnny’s departure to Eternal Life? The probability is small, but not zero. And so in general this is one of my favorite performances of this song. It sounds uplifting and somehow relaxing.
The previous track, it seems to me, was aimed at lulling vigilance … but now it’s serious. The tale of the eye is a very dangerous song. Hearing it, you can burst with laughter in a non-exclusive way. Well, really, it’s been a long time since I’ve lost so much in the voice from music in headphones. The story here is dramatic and intriguing, so I won’t spoil it. Be mentally prepared for everything. I saw (WITH my EYE!) here a reference to the Brown Eyed Handsome Man from Buddy Holly.
And again we return to Mr. Cash, now fully and with the Russian spirit. Satan’s right Hand is a very high–quality Russian-language adaptation. By its verbatim nature, it already has considerable cultural weight, roughly like the version of Big Iron by Marty Robbins, which the neural network Prophet Sunboy sang. In terms of music, everything here has pleasant fatherly vibes, and if Johnny and his Tennessee boys used guitar overload, he would do it somehow like this.
Foundling is finally just a song. Such a normal author’s work, very much in the spirit of earlier creativity. It’s like a song about the resurrected drunk Nikolai Valuev, because that’s exactly what is the norm for Lucky Tvelv. The general pressure, the catchy chorus with very high melisms on the drums, the quotation solo – that’s all I love about this music.
It’s time to turn to the more lyrical side of the lucky ones. Above I talked about the emotional range of the band’s music, and this song is a vivid example of that. Autumn was released as a single a year earlier, in 2019. This, by the way, is the only single in the entire discography. With a somewhat exaggeratedly depressive text, this composition sounds like a macabre dance on the bones of a bygone decade. Well, just a windowless actualochka.
With the next song, everything is very ambiguous. Initially, I was sure that the bilingualism of Night Of the Knife was an innovation of the lucky ones, because there are more than one similar precedents on each album.But everything is much more interesting. Rosemary’s Triplets also had a Russian-language verse, the third in a row and shredded with an accent. However, Lucky aggravated the Russification by translating almost everything and adding a melody from Katusha to make sure. Of course, it turned out great.
The Boots of God tempt me the least. It’s like I’ve heard these riffs too many times before. And such a sound rhythm only harms the very sophisticated chthonic lyrics of the song. By God (in boots), I can’t make out a word.
By good tradition, the album ends with a surfboard called Gearbox Shuffle. He’s fine, but he’s not very remarkable on his own. In general, the final two tracks are somehow too short. They only gain normal timekeeping together.
Well, the bonus (it’s not specified anywhere, but it is) is Storm the Embassy. A cover from the above-mentioned Russian tribute to Stray Cats. And if Stray Cats have the most unusual and uncharacteristic foam for them, then Lucky Twell, on the contrary, it is very characteristic of Lucky Twell themselves. Perhaps this is the only case when it is very difficult to surpass the original and make it better. However, there’s a story about two cakes: both are good.
I like this album, but still less than the previous 2015 Bullydozen. In Fear Of Wilting, it feels like he’s been planning for longer than everyone else before him. And the fear of wilting is real here. After all, for the galaxy of Ural-Siberian musicians, figures and fans of billy culture, the golden era was the second decade of the twenty-first century. And at the time of the record’s release, those times had come to an end, and the new decade was throwing up some really obscene challenges.
But I sincerely believe that everything will continue to be successful and fruitful. And let the flower monster from the garden of psychopathic delights devour everyone who thinks otherwise.
