The band The Gun Club from Los Angeles is considered to belong to the punk scene. It’s also common to think that punks don’t play their instruments well, in particular guitars, and in general, if you don’t play well, you can just call yourself a punk and not worry. However, it was obvious from their debut album that in the case of Jeffrey Lee Pierce, we are dealing with a serious musician, so convincingly did he demonstrate his mastery of the guitar. By the sixth album, this mastery should be called virtuoso. Their style is called punk blues. This is quite natural, given the leader’s love of root music.
The Gun Club is called the greatest unknown American band. This is a truly exceptional and underrated team. Their musical career did not work out in their homeland, although they had a very good start. They recorded their 1st album, Fire Of Love, and suddenly became in demand on the other coast of the United States – in New York and Boston, which caused envy and indignation in California. They went on tour to Europe, where they were well received, and in the United States they were considered almost traitors. Lucky Jim (1993) was recorded in the Netherlands, where the band found their final resting place. In the late 80s, Jeffrey Lee Pierce was filmed there on national television.
By the time the Lucky Jim album was recorded, The Gun Club had turned into a trio. Jeffrey Lee, despite his young age, was already in very poor physical and mental shape due to years of systematic alcohol and drug abuse. He was also deeply depressed, but in this state he recorded his best album. The album plunges you into the depths of despair, but Jeff, as a musician and guitarist, appears here in the highest quality. Before that, he traveled to South Vietnam and Cambodia, of course, he was attracted not by historical sights, but rather by the availability of drugs. This trip helped him to crystallize his feelings and experiences, he wrote 11 songs, which formed the basis of the playlist. Unrequited love, betrayal, anger and regret are the themes of these songs.
There are 2 ballads on the album: Lucky Jim and Idiot Waltz. The minimalist harmonies and repetitive notes make them look like incantations. Lucky Jim is about a man, a kind of alter ego of Jeffrey, whom he met in Vietnam in the early 90s: everyone is waiting for Lucky Jim, sitting on the terraces of hotels and cafes. The Russians are also mentioned there: “The soviets beside the quay, Run back to the freighter.” And the song ends with a creepy phrase – everyone wants a piece of it to burn: “Everyone wants a piece of you, A piece of you to burn”
Idiot Waltz – dancing in the headlights and falling. And this is practically an epitaph:
“It was foolish to be alive.”
It was foolish in a foolish time”
The Gun Club – Idiot Waltz
Turn on the headlights
For the Idiot Waltz
Turn on the lights
Watch us fall
There are great guitar solos in “idiot waltz”. At the 1993 concert in California, The Gun Club, Lucky Jim and Idiot Waltz performed at the end of the program. This shows that these two songs were very important to Jeffrey.
A House Is Not A Home is a furious new wave about bright promises at the beginning and hopeless loneliness at the very end. Love and relationships are over, life’s landmarks are lost. I think everyone knows this. Poignant lines: “Now, a house is not a home/I’m out in the street tonight/A house is not a home/I’m without her heat tonight.”..
Now, a house is not a home
I’m the one degraded
A house is not a home
All of life has faded
Cry To Me is in the best traditions of black delta blues, there are a small number of notes in the intro, played very beautifully and convincingly. The song is about a friend on whose shoulder you can cry: “Yes I’ve heard/Of your misfortune/Our misfortunes/Are nothing new”. Kamata Hollywood City is a song with a magical riff about a stranger in Tokyo, love and alcohol. During his second visit to Japan, Jeffrey falls in love with his then girlfriend’s best friend, muse and bass player Romy Mori. It ended with the loss of both of them, of course, it didn’t go unnoticed for him.
Ride is a homage to Jimi Hendrix. Up Above The World and Day Turn To Night are fast psychotic punk acts.
The Gun Club – Lucky Jim (1993)
02 A House Is Not A Home
03 Cry To Me
04 Kamata Hollywood City
05 Ride
06 Idiot Waltz
07 Up Above The World
08 Day Turn To Night
09 Blue Monsoons
10 Desire
11 Anger Blues
Listen to Lucky Jim (1993) online (mp3)
Download in the archive (125 Mb)
Musicians:
Jeffrey Lee Pierce – vocals, guitars, arrangements, production
Romi Mori – bass
Nick Sanderson – drums
Bart Van Poppel – organ
On this album, Jeffrey sings cleanly and hits the notes. If in other works, in some places of the songs, he deliberately deliberately faked, thus placing accents, then everything is sung more canonically correctly. The album sounds like mainstream blues rock at times, but that’s just a plus. Previously, there was a constant struggle with his demons in his music, in some places he played deliberately dirty, but now the demons are gone, purity has appeared, but this purity borders on desolation.
Jeffrey is the author of all the songs, with the exception of one Blue Monsoons track, which was composed by Romy Mori (she continued to play in the Gun Club, despite the fact that Jeffrey’s close relationship with her had been over for 5 years at the time of the recording of Lucky Jim), and Simon Fish played drums here. It’s an instrumental, and it stands out from the album with its more life-affirming mood.
Desire is about a devastated person, about the fact that everything has come where it has come, and who am I to want anything at all. And there remains only the cry of this desire. Post-punk in form, which was quite major musically without these lyrics and vocals, turns into a minor one with them.
The final Anger Blues is really a traditional blues, an ode to pain and despair: “Oh, she got the devil/With her I can only lose/Just strummin’ through my life/Singin’ this anger blues”. Album completion. And the musical path of The Gun Club. Jeffrey will be gone in less than 3 years.
I listened to the album. Nothing like that, just an instrumental with a life-affirming mood came out at all. And the rest of the songs are good. It’s just a pity, there’s not a single track that would be a real bomb. Just hard rock from the nineties. And yes, I liked Anger Blues the most, as I expected. So thanks for the article. In general, what was written about is what I got.