JEFF the Champions

I remember like five years ago I was probably skateboarding in my mom's driveway and listening to Blink 182 and a friend of mine called me and told me I had to get to Grimey's immediately because this band JEFF was playing a show and he had never seen any band play like them.  Then a couple years after that I remember being at their parents' house listening to Jake's reggae records and playing ping-pong and thinking like how these brothers were exemplars of cool without even trying or realizing probably.  And back then, like still, JEFF the Brotherhood was the baddest headbangingest band in town, a heavy metal band with like a rap entourage attitude.  Their house shows used to start with a loop of the intro to this Three Six song and end with all the lights and floor fucked up and everybody sweaty and bruised.  Kids in Nashville were waiting on when they would get their due recognition, since it was palpable that it was a matter of when.

Having signed to a distribution contract with Warner Music Group, having been chosen Rolling Stone's band to watch a couple weeks ago, having been featured on Jay-Z's website last week, and then yesterday with their new LP, We Are The Champions, streaming on NPR--man, and that's not even all of it.  Their dad/label-owner Bob Orrall (who is also an awesome artist) said to the Nashville Scene, "We Are the Champions deserves to be heard by the world."  Hell yeah, Bob.

The album is a refreshingly simple but still fast and fuzzy and fucked up trip towards good vibes having good times with good friends and cheap beer.  So check it out and buy the album on June 21, on Infinity Cat, or your local record store, or your local Virgin Megastore, or wherever music is sold.

Natural Child new album and interview etc.

Natural Child's debut LP, 1971, came out last Wednesday, 4/20. The kind of album it is, it's such a surprising and exciting thing to hear, because yeah it sometimes sounds like the Stones or more generally an album from 1971, except it's in 2011 and these are just some regular dudes; they haven't made history yet. But then, these songs are cause enough to reconsider how regular these dudes are. They're regular, I mean, in that they're not millionaires yet, not headlining music festivals at any California speedways yet, not making movies yet. On the other hand, the songs aren't regular at all, and the feel and the attitude, and that they did all this stuff all the while being just some regular dudes--none of that is regular. It's really new, however reminiscent of old it is. It's a sound that nobody's putting out, but that everybody's getting into. But it seems like Wes and Zack and Seth have been into it for a while; the Stones and Stooges and Neil Young and Bob Dylan and all those 60s and 70s rock and folk and blues records that everyone's looking for are their influences, except that they've figured out how to keep it at that, at just influences, and how to keep their sound theirs. The result is this solid album, which is like a showcase for how to be inspired but original, rock-n-roll but honest and still confident, high as fuck but at the same time talented as fuck. So the album rules.


The interview here is from a couple weeks ago. I talked with Wes and Zack on Skype about the West Coast half of their nationwide tour. After, I sent them a transcription to look over, but they had already left for the East Coast, the other half of the tour. I wanted to wait until we had it all straight before putting up this review and everything, too, so that's why it's only being put up now. I heard from Wes last night; he said the interview was "fucking hilarious" and "perfect." I asked him how the rest of the tour went and he asked me, "You ever seen Jackass 2? Jackass number two. It was just like that."

Here's a couple of back-to-back tracks from 1971.

"Yoko" - Natural Child

"Let It Bleed" - Natural Child

Pick up the album from the Infinity Cat store.

Also, I encourage you to check out Nashville's Dead's hell of a good album review. It's like, after reading that review, I had to think really if there was a point to writing this one.

And don't forget the interview below!

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Natural Child

Natural Child is Wes, Zack, and Seth. They all have hot girlfriends and they roll the best weed in middle Tennessee. Their lives are probably going to be like this pretty soon. The last time I saw Natural Child was at this basement show near Belmont University in Nashville, and they were getting showered with beer and there was some guy hanging upside down from like a support beam.Everyone in the crowd was freaking out but in a way that was like, Yeah let’s get fuckin crazzzy 2nite! But then when Natural Child played their last song—which I’m pretty sure was called “Bad Man” and hasn’t been recorded yet but was, that night, like this thirteen-minute-long heavy kind of bluesy jam that went in and out of “I’m a Freak” by Wicked Lady and ended with a kind of Bad-Man-motherfucker-that’s-it-we’re-worn-out-how-are-you-all flourish and silence—when they played that song everyone was freaking out but more just still, watching, an internalized freak-out, because it was an unexpected sound and it went all the way, into something that everyone could recall from like the Rolling Stones and Iggy Pop and also like the damn blues which I guess is typical but this was harder and more badass and it was new and in front of them, and they couldn't believe it. It seemed like it made people remember that rock-n-roll is still fucking cool. The last song felt kind of like an announcement: this music is the music that you want to hear more music sound like. I mean that's how I felt, anyway.

A week ago Mark from yvynyl made the suggestion that 60s pop is going to be a big deal in 2k11, and I totally agree. But I think that that brand of rock-n-roll that's soulful and psychedelic but also kind of characterizes the 60s as a bad trip in which Brian Jones died in his pool is also going to be a big deal in 2k11--except I think in 2k11 it'll be funner and badder and less depressing--pool parties instead, etc. And Natural Child is going to be part of that big deal, I hope. As mentioned, they’ve been playing shows with Strange Boys, and VICE is putting out a Natural Child/Strange Boys split sometime in the near future, I think. They’ve also played a couple shows in NYC with Black Lips; one of the shows was on a boat in New York harbor (and I guess Brooklyn Vegan was there). About two weeks ago RCRDLBL posted one of their songs, “Nobody Wants to Party with Me,” and a long time ago Terry Richardson posted a photo of some dude wearing a Natural Child shirt on his tumblr.

They’ve got two 7”s out, as well as a cassette called Bodyswitchers, which will soon be available on vinyl/iTunes. They're right now working on an album of new stuff called 1971; look for it next year/in 1971.

These two songs are the first two tracks from their 7” called White Man’s Burden, the back of which looks like this.*

"White Man's Burden"

"Ray Thompson Blues"

You can buy their stuff through Infinity Cat Recordings.And don’t forget to check out their blog: naturalchildband.blogspot.com.