Jesus Lizard Head CD

The Jesus Lizard: David Yow (vocals); Duane Denison (guitar); David Wm. Sims (bass); Mac McNeilly (drums).

Additional personnel: Suzy Korn, The Hanger Men's Choir (background vocals).
Principally recorded at Chicago Recording Company, Chicago, Illinois in December, 1989.
Personnel: David Yow (vocals); Duane Denison (guitar); Mac McNeilly (drums).
With drummer Mac McNeilly in to provide a little more human swing to the proceedings -- appropriate given guitarist Duane Denison's own jazz-madness tendencies -- the Jesus Lizard fully launched themselves on an unsuspecting world with HEAD. The brutal, bass-heavy slam of the music, testament to the uncredited engineering/producing abilities of Steve Albini, gives the whole record a punch that most indie rock didn't have at the time, looking ahead to where similarly minded groups like Helmet (also produced by Albini) would end up soon enough. The McNeilly and bassist David Wm. Sims rhythm dictates the songs, letting Denison and vocalist David Yow both find their own way over the chugging brusqueness as they see fit. Yow for the most part sounds like he's singing through a wall or through a huge amount of cotton gauze, making his lyrical tales of violence, twisted living, and the like one for lyric-sheet readers to work out, but the amped-up roars and leers evident in his vocals do a fine job on their own. Then again, the song titles aren't exactly ones to suggest flowers and roses, as "My Own Urine," "Waxeater," and the perfectly creepy "If You Had Lips" make rather clear. Yow's Birthday Party worship is now one more readily shared by the band with McNeilly's presence, the fusion of dark blues and proto-punk rampage -- "My Own Urine," in fact, being a good example of just that -- let to run loose. The stentorian stomp of "7 vs. 8" and the stabbing attack of "Good Thing" in particular might as well be early Cave on the vocals, Yow in mad-preacher mode in excelsis. There's a definite weird playful touch all the band's own, though, whether it's in the sassy strut that starts "If You Had Lips" or even, on the start of "Pastoral," a bit of chiming guitar prettiness. (The 2009 remastered reissue of Head included the complete contents of 1989's Pure EP.)
The place to start for those new to the Jesus Lizard, this two-fer collects on one CD the first EP release (Pure) and first LP release (Head) of the notorious '90s noise rock band. It does a fine job of completing the picture of the band's early work. ~ Chris True