Gun Club

Who knows how Jeffrey Lee Pierce managed to meet him in person. Perhaps through the intercession of his idol Robert Johnson; perhaps after a bender on the streets of New Orleans; or maybe after one of the countless fixes that would follow him all the way to his grave in 1996, officially caused by a brain hemorrhage. But after listening to this album, anyone will be able to reach the most obvious of conclusions: the pact had expired, everyone must pay their debts to Him, Jeffrey included. Because how else could a mere mortal have given birth to a work so lucidly evil, so demonic?

Robert Johnson, we said, the Delta blues, but not only that: the hard-blues of the Stones (and who else? Remember, He's always involved...) and Californian punk-rock, with a pinch of country if you like. In practice, rock in its most dazzling and darkest wickedness, a reminiscence of its African origins where tribal magic is a well-established creed.

And so it all fits: the hallucinatory sexual visions of "Sex Beat", where Ward Dotson's swaying, vigorous guitar - a man born equally of the swamps and of New York - accompanies the obsessive rhythm hammered out by the drums; the delirious voodoo rite of "Preachin' The Blues", where instrumental fervor explodes into terrible blazes of fury. Or the drunkard's blues-rock of "Promise Me", with its sobbing guitar and a viola as hypnotic as only John Cale's can be, lurking in the background.

And then the apocalypse: a distorted hurricane set against supersonic slide guitar, the fiery rhythm of the most energetic punk-rock, Pierce desperate yet more aware than ever of his seductive power; "She's Like Heroin To Me" is the peak of the record and of blues-rock as a whole. Alongside that track, "For The Love Of Ivy", dedicated to Poison Ivy of Cramps, plays out as a mad dash into darkness and the unknown, with its powerful rhythmic and instrumental surges.

Jeffrey Lee regains some of his mental faculties on "Fire Spirit", itself malevolent with its otherworldly bassline, but these are isolated moments: delirium tremens reclaims the band's soul in the infernal rampage of "Ghost On The Highway", where the frenzied slide guitar streaks by, accompanied by the spasms of the frontman who, like a new Charon, ferries the damned souls on their journey to hell, "you're lost forever to the living men".

"Jack On Fire" carries the listener through the tangled alleys of New Orleans; the mysterious magical aura that permeates the city during Mardi Gras takes shape through Dotson's hypnotic visions. Pierce, like a voodoo sorcerer, is able to ensnare even the most iron-willed listeners, with a delivery steeped in madness while remaining fully aware of his own infernal mission; and he proves it once again on "Cool Drink Of Water", where he babbles drunkenly yet smoothly over a blues for alcoholics. His shamanic aura is malevolent, on a par with that of sacred monsters like Morrison and Jagger.

The record thus contains a broad catalogue of musical languages, but succeeds in blending all these sonic forms into an explosive concentrate of rural punk-rock, drawing heavily on the macabre iconography typical of the American Deep South. Rob Ritter's bass and Ted Graham's drums provide a foundation that can be both forceful and soft, depending on whether Pierce launches into breathtaking accelerations toward the unknown or hypnotic blues chants. Dotson's guitar is unfailingly perfect, in its brilliant pairing of different and seemingly clashing styles, swamp blues and punk frenzy chief among them.

Drawing on the darkest, most demonic side of rock, Gun Club manage to smooth over seemingly insurmountable divides, uniting the violence and speed of urban punks with the slow, inexorable cadences of the American South, delivering an adrenaline-fueled, magnificent masterpiece of evil.

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30/10/2006