One song that always comes back around is “Louie Louie”. Is this one of the greatest songs in rock and roll history? I think so. If not, then why do so many bands play it? Is it the primal chord changes, the simple driving backbeat, the mysterious (and possibly obscene) lyrics? Any band that’s worth their salt has played it, or modified it and called it their own (see “Wild Thing”, “I Can’t Explain”, “Blitzkrieg Bop”, and so many others). Does the mere act of playing the song give them some kind of membership into a brotherhood of Louie? Is this the secret handshake of rock and roll initiation? Perhaps the guys from Mudhoney could tell us. This Sonics tribute album- featuring Mudhoney’s Mark Arm, Steve Turner and Dan Peters, plus a few more of Seattle’s finest indie rockers- contains a frenetic version of the song. But I’m not going to ask, you know how prickly secret societies can get.
Along with “Louie Louie”, this record has all the Sonics tunes you would expect from a tribute album: “The Witch“, “Psycho”, “Strychnine”, “Have Love, Will Travel”, “Dirty Robber”, “Boss Hoss”, “You’ve Got Your Head On Backwards”, and a bunch more. Sixteen in all, a whopping eight songs per side for this vinyl-only reissue from Jackpot Records. Details about the project and its original release are hard to come by, but who cares? It sounds great. Mudhoney are the perfect band for the job. They stem from the same Pacific Northwest garage punk blues family-tree that spawned The Sonics. The production is appropriately dirty and analog, and all the essential elements of the music are in place: organ, guitar, saxophone, and gritty blues howl. I can’t think of a better singer than Mark Arm to take on the junkyard-dog delivery of Gerry Roslie.
So did they feel compelled to appease the gods of garage by including “Louie Louie” on this album, or do they just love the song as much as everyone else? We may never know the answer, but if you find yourself pondering it, the important thing is that you buy this record and play it LOUD.
