Fire of Love

Hey Chat GPT, compose an incredibly generic "punk record" using the same drumbeat on every song, and make sure to include every punk trope into the lyrics.

Ok that all said, I feel like this album probably had a big influence on John Dwyer of the Oh Sees. "Jack on Fire" Sounds like a mid-album track you'd find on an Oh Sees album nowadays.

Awesome album! I have heard reference to TGC in the past (and enjoyed a cover of one of their songs by the Japandroids) but never dug in. This is some seriously good stuff! 4.5/5

2.5

Although I like this genre, I've never heard of the band or the album. I thought the beginning was very promising. It sounded like a lot of fun. However, the rest of the music sounded very similar. It didn't inspire me. I probably won't listen to it again. 3/5

Punk has never been my favorite genre, but this was fairly enjoyable

Where has this been my whole life? Demented blues punk and the singer sounds weirdly like Jonathan Richman. It's like if someone merged the Modern Lovers with the band playing instruments made from corpses in From Dusk Til Dawn. Slaps.

This is about what I expected. It had some four and five star elements, but some of the language used wasn’t…cool.

Rockabilly mixed with blues and punk. Interesting concept, but failure to execute.

Favorite songs: For the Love of Ivy, She's Like Heroin to Me, Preaching the Blues

Least favorite songs: Promise Me, Jack on Fire, Cool Drink of Water Blues

2/5

'We can fuck forever but you will never get my soul.' Ten years the senior of the Jon Spenser Blues Explosion, this is the OG coming together of punk and blues music. Not that punk isn't always already indebted to the blues, but The Gun Club is a particular marriage of sentiments. What I love about their record is how much history you hear - Robert Johnson, of course, but also The Velvet Underground, New York Dolls, Suicide, The Modern Lovers, Patti Smith, not to mention early rockers and auras of American culture in general. It even gets poetic: 'In the stillness of the mosquito sunset.' But points are deducted for racial slurs. Tho Pierce was of mixed race, he fails to harness these words effectively or authentically. Still, a revelatory listen.

What the fuck did I just listen to?

I appreciate creativity and experimentation. I usually appreciate post-punk - my love of recent post-punk revival bands is what led me to this project in the first place.

It's just... on a personal level, as a listener, I'd like this album more without that infernal country-style twang.

Pretty solid mix of punk with blues and rockabilly. Opens up with a total banger to grab your attention before it shows off its weirder moments. That's how you do it! I dig this.

This isn't necessarily bad, but it's really samey. It's the exact same style and energy throughout the entire album. I couldn't differentiate any of the tracks.

2.5 rounded down.

I really enjoyed this album. Great mix of punk/post punk/psychobilly and stuff that bands I love had to be inspired by. Great stuff.

A couple of interesting moments that stood out as more "jazz" adjacent, and other moments where you could tell grunge music would eventually take inspiration. However all together it's a pretty shabby album that doesn't offer much in the way of an interesting listen. 2/5

It’s a 2.5 star album for me. I don’t mind listening to it, but it sounds like it could be from the 50’s not 1981. There is fun in it but not enough creativity to round up.

For this review, I will not include the alternate takes tacked on at the end of the 2020 remaster.

I can't say I've heard of The Gun Club before. From what I gather, they were considered one of the first punk bands to incorporate blues, rockabilly, and country music in their sound. That's the vibe I got from their debut album Fire of Love - taking a lot of the rockabilly elements such as the rhythmic swings and adapting them to faster tempos, fuzzed-out guitar work, frenetic vocals from Jeffrey Lee Pierce, and lyrics that are more violent and sexual. It's a solid and at times fun album in that regard, though not exactly mind-blowing and it does lose steam with the penultimate track "Cool Drink of Water" which is a slow, plodding cover of a traditional song.

Fire of Love was a neat find on this list and I can see how The Gun Club helped pave the way for later garage rock bands like The White Stripes and Japandroids. Give it a listen.

Reveal thoughts: Never heard of it. Released in 1981. This is gonna suck.

OK, not sure it sucks, but it's not my thing. It kind of sounds like punk meets rockabilly? Some songs kind of have a blues-y type sound. This will be a tough ranking because I don't really like it, but at the same time, I can *just* see why it's in this project. It's sunk, mostly, but it's not exactly like the other punk from the era, and you can hear the influences of other types of music.

In the end, though, I just don't like it. It's too long, especially for a punk album, too repetitive, and too dated. 2 stars.

Fairly generic post punk bollocks, nothing earth shattering, just here.

Punk blues lees ik. Te weinig blues. Te veel punk.

Ugh. I had a headache before listening to this and it definitely didn't help. 1.45