Labels: Honest Dons
Review by: Mark Skold
Now now, I do know this is an old one, but I only got it the other day, and I need to share a story with you good people. Are you sitting comfortably? Too bad, here I go anyway:
You know how most jazz CDs have very similar covers? This J Church CD cover is in the same style, B&W photo of a guy and a cat playing the piano, plain text on the title and that old logo at the top. Someone at the record store left this CD in the jazz section (why, I know not) and my boss picked it up because he thought it was a John Coltrane spin off or something. Little did he know it was the furious punk-popiness of the band with the most releases in the world!
So he told me this story at the office, and I laughed and swapped it for a shit Miles Davis CD I had laying around. What a stroke of luck!
The Drama of Alienation is the CD that J Church put out on Honest Dons records, and was sampled on their Greatest Shits sampler. I’m kind of familiar to a very small amount of J Church’s other stuff, and I liked what I was hearing. I’ve heard their stuff with the Bis singer on backup vox, which although odd sounding in theory, does work. This one sounds slightly different, but without a doubt in the J Church style.
To me, they sound like a male fronted Discount. But we all love Discount, so that makes it a veritable advantage. Apparently, the 2 bands are touring friends.
This album is ragged, no doubt about it. The singer doesn’t pay much attention to melody, and there’s usually no harmonies or anything, but it turns out to be an endearing quality. It gives the tunes alot of character.
Nobody ever accused J Church of being tremendous musicians, and I’ve heard better. But that doesn’t matter in my world – they can write great songs that lodge themselves in your head all day like a sawblade stuck in your head. But the J Church sawblade won’t cut up your brain and kill you, oh no. The J Church sawblade makes your brain thrive and think and wonder how three punk rock fans can possibly write as many songs as these guys do.
Really simple, catchy tunes that just make you want to sing along. If you’re a stranger to J Church, this one is a good disc to get you started. Officially, I was a J Church virgin until now, and I am hooked.