Barney’s Boogie Train – Jukebox Attack
EMG 00761
Beat It – Rock’n’Roll Outlaw – In The Summertime – Sweet Home Alabama – Sweet Home Alabama – Way Down – Paint It Black – I’m On Fire – Brand New Cadillac – Nothing Else Matters – Shadow Play – Gene And Eddie – Sex & Drugs & Rock’n’Roll – I’m Running Free – Somethin’ Else
If there’d be an award for the most recreative rock’n’roll album, BBT’s latest LP would figure in good place to get it. This German trio had the idea (almost a concept) to cover songs from different horizons, especially the ones you’re not used to hear on a rock’n’roll/rockabilly album, and play it in their own “billy” sound. Except for two or three songs the result is really excellent.
Among the best you’ll find Michael Jackson’s Beat It (which reminded me an old interview with Lux Interior saying he considered Jackson as a great rockabillly vocalist), Rose Tattoo’ Rock’n’Roll Outlaw (but you can’t go wrong with Angry Anderson and his gang), Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Sweet Home Alabama that starts like a Johnny Cash tune before exploding and Paint It Black that almost manages to make you forget the Quakes version.
Other notable renditions are Bruce Springsteen I’m On Fire, turned into an upbeat country song; Metallica’s Nothing Else Matter (which is in Barney’s hands a jazzy number close to Satan Takes A Holliday) and my favorite Iron Maiden’s I’m Running Free (from their first album), which stays quite close to the original, but it would have been a mistake to change such a killer beat.
Equally good is Barney’s self penned number Way Down.
More dispensable are Mungo Jerry’s In The Summertime, but I never really liked this number. Gene & Eddie and Something Else are not among my favorites neither, maybe because they stay too close to the originals or being already rockabilly/rock’n’roll songs (and very well known ones) the surprise doesn’t work like it does with the other numbers.
Anyway these are minor reproaches and this album is very good. I hope they’ll do a volume two (and maybe they’ll include one AC/DC song).
Fred “Virgil” Turgis
