| The Last Vegas play the kind of rock and roll that so
many bands seem to have forgotten about. They do not whine and mope with indy-rock
self-indulgence, they do not get angry with the exhausting poses of a hard-core band and
they do not bask in the feigned sensitivity of so many pop bands. They just rock in the
best and oldest fashioned sense of the word. Catchy melodies sung with a snarl and a log
of swagger, and heavy guitars topped with the addition of roots instruments such as
organ and harmonica make this band a welcomed throwback to the days of gritty garage
bands. Finally, a band that has not forgotten that rock and roll is supposed to be about
sex.
What I like best about these guys is that they
know rock and roll is rooted in the blues. Not blues in the Johnny Lee Hooker sense, or
even the Blues Traveler sense, but in the sense of some of the hardest driving bands of
decades past. Sixties garage rock knew where it came from, as did some of the best
southern rock of the seventies. Last Vegas knows it not through simplistic chord changes,
but through a kind of dirty roughness that only the blues pioneered.
The vocals remind me somewhat of the late
Michael Hutchence of INXS or the forgotten eighties band the Escape Club, but there is a
bit of Mick Jagger in there too. The guitar work gives the band a bit of a heavy edge at
times when the usual rhythm work gives way to chunkier, more aggressive leads and chords.
While it may be argued that the three songs that make up this EP are similar enough to be
indistinguishable, the sound these four guys produce is good enough to put on repeat for
so long and so loud that the neighbors start to complain.
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