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Rating: Stick Men with Ray Guns were an atypical group in the Texan punk scene.
In the land of the Dicks, Big Boys, and Butthole Surfers, they, hailing from Dallas, certainly did not constitute an anomaly, but fate reserved an eccentric destiny for them. They lasted from 1981 to 1984 and were a sort of niche group, with their own following and their own music, without aligning themselves with any of the many American scenes (L.A., San Francisco, NY, etc.), not even the local one.
They revolved around the figure of the singer, Bobby Soxx, a cynical and visionary nerd-punk (a sort of disgusted and wounded Milo Aukerman). I don't believe they ever released anything, but they made history, and in 2002, a small Austin label (Emperor Jones Records) put all their available material, composed of 23 tracks, some recorded live, on CD.
I mentioned above "their own music" because in 1981 I don't think there were many bands playing like them; most groups tended to write songs that were 1:30" long while these SMWRG played slowly and long, obsessively. Slow and heavy hardcore rather than fast and short. Their songs progress like old rusty steamrollers, they are cadenced and clanking. Occasionally, the guitar grafts a loudly psychedelic solo onto this terrible base. Bobby Soxx chants a corrosive, perverse litany.
A song like "Scavenger of Death" seems like the musical manifestation of the American nightmare of the '80s, of human dismay and alienation. The American Dream is an armed drunk wandering the streets. Essentially not far from the last three legendary tracks of "My War" and from Flipper, the SMWRG anticipated a sound that would later be called sludgecore and which encompasses bands from the Bostonian Kilslug to Drunks with Guns, up to EHG and Brainbombs (if you like these sounds, these Swedes are amazing).
For my tastes, a marvel I recommend, certainly too desperately obsessive and "metropolitan" for those who, even in hardcore, seek a moment of escape.
Ps...the cover is amazing...
Tracklist
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