Shop our Big Takeover store for back issues, t-shirts & CDs
Follow The Big Takeover
New music from Robbie Quine, headmaster of the Barbarellatones Surfing Academy (not an actual entity, though it should be), is always more than a pleasure – it’s a gift wrapped in gold lamé and sequins that smells oddly of Gardenia Elizabeth Taylor perfume and cheap malt liquor. Every CD from The Barbarellatones makes me happier than the last one, and that makes me happier than a pig in a tuxedo.
In typical twisted fashion, Surf Narcs opens with “Time Warp” from The Rocky Horror Picture Show (featuring Josie Cotton of “Johnny Are You Queer” fame in the role of Magenta), only it has the lumbering, unsteady gait of “These Boots Are Made for Walkin’.” From there, as you can only imagine, it’s a sexy swirl of glam, new wave and roots punk (i.e., The Cramps and Gun Club), with that necessary bit of surf to keep us dressed in our bathing suits while a chorus line of drag queens dances around us. There’s the Ron Asheton-fueled psyche-punk of “Iggy Pop!,” the synth-laden Roxy Music-ish “Lesbotron” and perhaps one of the best break-up songs of the decade, the new wave trash of “It’s All Your Fault!.”
As silly as Robbie can be though, he’s really at his best when he writes ballads, which can be as silly as the next song, though with that twinge of sadness that every ballad needs to be successful. The Bowie-esque “Violet Fire” is perhaps one of the most straightforwardly honest songs Robbie has ever written. “Bird of Prey” is actually a quite beautiful love song to – of all things – a pet falcon. In “Medication Time,” a haldol/lithuim haze wafts out of the speakers while recounting the day-to-day activities of a mental patient. It all ends with “The Last Party,” a depressing little ditty that would fit perfectly on Lou Reed‘s Berlin.
If that doesn’t sell you, Surf Narcs was produced by Paul Roessler of The Screamers and Twisted Roots and 45 Grave, whose keyboard prowess also graces this CD.
Sometimes I wonder if anybody listens to The Barbarellatones but me. I hope so – they’re way too much fun to be my little secret.
