Over the past five to six years, there has been this one man who has provided a majority
of the music I listen to every single day. That wildcat bloke from the British Isles, the one
they call Billy Childish, along with each and every band that he has been involved with
since the late 1970s, has had an immeasurable influence on my musical tastes ever since I
picked up a Headcoats album way back in '93. At the risk of sounding cliché, I'd say that Mr
Childish has been at the forefront of what might best be known as "garage rock" for more than 20
years. Whether it be his Beatles/Kinks-influenced early stuff in bands like The Pop Rivets and The
Milkshakes, or the more punk-influenced Mighty Caesars from the 1980s, or his more present-day
work with The Black Hands, Thee Headcoats, and Thee Headcoatees, all of Billy's music is rather
raw and wild-sounding-copied by many, but never outdone.
Childish has a discography that is as varied as it is lengthy. The late '70s stuff has a real 1960s Brit-pop sound
to it you know, lots of harmony-filled songs about girls and whatnot. The two Milkshakes albums from that
era, while somewhat hard to find these days, are filled to the rim
with Beatles-esque melodies that never fail to make
the fingers snap and the head bob from side to
side in pure contentment.
With the onset of the 1980s, however, Childish
and his band Thee Mighty Caesars took the path
toward a rawer and brasher rock 'n' roll style, sort
of a Kinks meets the Ramones in an orgy of three-
chord madness with a liberal amount of blues,
punk, and even surf-rock-inspired tunes to boot.
The Caesars put out three or so albums and a
spattering of 7"s throughout the 1980s, and then
Mr Childish moved on again, this time in a couple
different directions. One of his projects, the Black
Hands, was a bluesy/early '60s ska-sounding band
that put out an album in the early 1990s. All the songs
(even a cover of "Anarchy in the UK") have a folksy,
drunken sound to them, giving off the feeling that they were
recorded in some dumpy English pub instead of a studio.
Little Billy's main preoccupation throughout the 1990s,
however, has been with the bands Thee Headcoats and
their female sidekicks, Thee Headcoatees. Basically, what
the man has assembled this time is a combination of all the
stuff from his past bands and projects into one, semi-cohe-
sive unit. While Thee Headcoatees (Kyra Rubella,
HollyGoLightly, Ludella Black, and Bongo Debbie) have two
albums under their belts, most of the songs are covers or are
written by Childish himself, and the boys in Thee Headcoats
(Bruce-drums, Johnny-bass, and Billy-guitar) play most of the music
while the girls handle the vocals. In fact, Thee Headcoats and Thee
Headcoatees are essentially one and the same band when onstage.
Each of the girls will sing a few songs, then Billy will sing a
couple with the girls on backups, and then they
might even all switch around a bit-maybe Billy
on the drums, Holly on the bass, Johnny on gui-
tar, and Bruce and Kyra on back-
up vocals while Ludella
sings the lead. Whatever
the
case, however, a
Headcoats/Headcoatees
show is jam-packed with
nonstop good music-a crazy
gospel chant here, then a punked-
out Mighty Caesars tune there, followed by
a poppy Headcoatees song after that, and so on
and so forth.
When I saw them in Hollywood back in June, they
must have played for a solid two hours at the very
least, and I'll be damned if I wasn't right up in front,
squashed against the stage and loving it throughout
the whole set. At this time, no new Headcoats album
seems to be in the works, but there are at least four or five full-
length LPs that they have recorded since 1990, so there is no lack
of good shit to check out. Combined with all the Headcoatees
recordings and all the stuff from his earlier bands, as well as a
few new recordings with HollyGoLightly on the Sympathy For
the Record Industry label, I'm sure there is enough Billy
Childish music to go around for everyone.
THEE
HEADCOATS
WORDS
BY ANDY HARRIS
AND PHOTO
DRAIN TH
THEIR NEW ALBUM
FREAKS OF NATURE left to b
FEATURING "ENTER MY MIND" & "SIMON SAYS"
Produced by Sank with Drain sth.
except Simon Says by Max Martin
Management: Andy Gould
and Rob McDermott for AGM
1999 The Island Def Jam Music Group.
A Universal Music Company
SEE DRAIN STH ON TOUR THIS FALL
THE ENCLAVE
CHECK WEBSITE FOR UP-TO-DATE TOUR INFO, SOUNDCLIPS AND MORE: WWW.DRAINSTH.COM
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