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One of the most creative duos in alternative rock history, Royal Trux (now sadly semi-unknown) managed to blend vintage Blues (their love for the Stones is undeniable in many of their works), noise, and experimentation (the echo of Beefheart is very strong in their first two LPs) into orgies of sounds that are sometimes disjointed and off-key, but always rich in raucous vocals and perfectly detuned guitars.
Their sound is thus emblematic of complete artistic independence, a vast knowledge of rock history, and an irreverent and provocative attitude. Jennifer Herrema, keyboardist and screamer, and her boyfriend Neil Hagerty (former Pussy Galore) on guitar and vocals, shocked the U.S. underground scene with their debut eponymous album, a lengthy assault on melody and conventional rock song structure. They outdid themselves with "Twin Infinitives," considered by many to be their masterpiece; a mix of dadaist Lo-Fi collage techniques, a lot of Noise-Rock and primitivist Blues, completely marred by perpetual background sounds and tapes chopped up and pieced together randomly. It was labeled as the "Trout Mask Replica" of the nineties.
With this third "Untitled" album, RT somehow return to the 'song form,' perhaps as they had never done before, out of concert necessity. It opens with Air, and already there's a sense of novelty, as an acoustic guitar and an out-of-tune voice perform a melancholic melody, while another distorted blues guitar in the background ruins everything, giving the impression of a sweet folk march sung by a drunk. The following Move, sung together with Herrema, is a classic experimental blues-rock piece in true Royal Trux style, with crooked rhythms and shattered screams, but with a clear melody.
Hallucination is one of those violent Herrema pieces with odd rhythms, whereas Junkie Nurse and Lightning Boxer recall an even more heroin-infused version of the Rolling Stones' 'Sticky Fingers' ballads, sweetly sung by Hagerty. The rock'n'roll ride closes with Sun On The Run.
In my opinion, one of the band's most organic and balanced albums (if one can ever speak of balance with Royal Trux), along with their subsequent and beautiful tribute (in their own way) to the Seattle grunge scene, "Cats And Dogs." One of the best albums to start appreciating one of my favorite bands, less daunting than the first two masterpieces, but still as cutting as only this uncompromising duo has been able to chart the history of rock'n'roll.
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