Ignored             Obscured              Restored

Today’s post was written by a guest contributor, KJ Nolan, who last penned for the SotW in August 2010.  KJ and I have been friends for 40 years when we met Boston College and worked at the school’s radio station – WZBC.  As you will see from today’s post, he still keeps up with new artists.  Of course, that’s no surprise to me! TM

Late to the party, as usual, I didn’t hear about the Courettes until my missus got a tickle about their fourth album in her Facebook feed.  Shortly later, our copy arrived, one of many times she has been the one to bring new music into our home. I was immediately hooked.  The album echoes Blondie, Lucious Jackson, Ronnie Spector (not to mention La La Brooks, who makes two appearances on the album), Brian Wilson (one of their engineers is an alum of the “Smile” sessions”), sixties fuzz punk and the Wall of Sound, just for starters.

The Courettes are Martin Couri, a fellow from Denmark and Flávia Couri, a gal from Brazil.  The two met when their respective bands were gigging together.  Joining forces, they built up a strong reputation over the course of three albums and such singles as “Want You Like a Cigarette” and “Boom! Dynamite”.

The Soul of . . . the Fabulous Courettes was released last September.  Martin, on drums, and Flávia, on a bad-ass Silvertone and other guitars, are joined in the studio by Søren Christensen, who produces the tracks and layers them with keyboards.  The album is a little more slick and a wee bit more Americanized (there is a “Boom” song here, too, and Flávia pronounces it “bewm”), but their power is undiminished.

The Soul of… takes no prisoners from the get-go.  Recognizing that the best rock & roll songs are about sex, the kids blast away with longing, hunger and joy on “You Woo Me”.  A Farfisa organ, another sure sign of a great rock & roll song, whines insistently, while Flávia makes clear what her protagonist is after.

Don’t leave me hanging

Don’t make me sad

I’ll give you something

That you’ve never had

Come on baby

You drive me mad

You’re in my mind

It’s all the time

You’re just my kind

I cannot hide

You woo me

Yeah, you woo me

Oh, is that what the kids are calling it these days?

[A side note: all lyrics are approximate.  With no online lyrics that I can find anywhere, I resorted to listening over and over.  I even took advantage of YouTube’s adjustable playback speed.  And you know what?  “Woo Me” at 50% speed isn’t half bad!  It’s got a languid, bluesy feel that I find entirely satisfying.]

My personal favorite track is “Here I Come”.  It’s another up-tempo barn burner driven by a clever little rhythm riff that stays with you.  Once again, the female protagonist is openly predatory, warning “You better stop, there’s nowhere to hide.”  The chorus arrives, the band roars into overdrive, and our heroine declaims:

Some day

I’m running your tail

I’m coming your way

I’m gonna getcha, getcha, getcha, getcha

Some day

I’m coming your way

I’m running your tail

You better watch your back, here I come!

Thanks, hon.  If you need me, I’ll be hiding under the bed.  But I’ll shave first, just in case.

The last track for this post is one of several “My ex is a douche” songs strewn through the album.  I guess we all knew someone who made us feel that way, but wait!  Turns out that this one isn’t about an old boyfriend at all.  This one (like another one, more obviously worded) is about her abusive father, who passed away some years ago.  Flávia says in the band’s page on the website for label Damaged Goods (damagedgoods.co.uk/) that “Don’t Want You Back” is “about his death and how he still has a power over me and bringing me down and what it’s like to break free from that.”  The song pulses and swirls at a slower tempo, punctuated by tube chimes. The intent is unmistakable.

Still haunting my dreams

Breaking my schemes

Causing me sorrow once again

I’m glad that you’re gone

Forever gone

I don’t want you back

Never, never again

Hurt by lover or parent, the emotion is universal. “Don’t Want You Back” plumbs it memorably.

Bonus stuff: the kids played SXSW last spring, for about 35 minutes.  The Soul of… was still months away, so they didn’t play any of the songs from it, except for “SHAKE”, their final number, now out as a single.  It’s just the two of them, and the show is raw and raucous.

It’s been half a century since the Ramones changed everything.  Pop music has gone in lots of directions since then, as has that subset we call rock & roll.  The Courettes harken back to when untrained teenagers with cheap guitars first took the stages of their high school auditoriums, and they synthesize everything worthwhile that followed.  Here’s to seeing them make it big.

Enjoy… until next week.