Young Heart Attack: Mouthful of Love (2004)
It seems like only yesterday (well, maybe last week) that I saw Young Heart Attack play a SXSW showcase with great verve and gusto, then decided to seek out their now 20-year-old first album, the suggestively named Mouthful of Love.
But the year was, in fact, 2004 when I saw the quintet of Chris Hodge (vocals/guitar), Jennifer Stephens (vocals), Chris 'Frenchie' Smith (guitar), Steven T. Hall (bass), and Joey Shuffield (drums) playing their home-base of Austin, TX.
However, the group did have to "reach" across the Atlantic (or vice-versa) to find a champion in music journalist and Gay Dad founder Cliff Jones, who would go on to produce their first set of 7-inches and this full-length for XL Recordings.
Molded on classic '70s hard rock, with a nod to the MC5, whose "Over and Over" is covered here, Young Heart Attack distinguished themselves from the competition with the two-headed frontline of Stephens and Hodge trading microphone hysterics.
And I do mean "hysterics" (but in a good way), because both the gravelly Stephens and the strident Hodges tear through their bandmates' frantic three-chord barrage on the title track, "Tommy Shots," "Sick of Doing Time," and "In Luck" like a flame-tipped Q-tip through ear-drums.
But don't panic!
Young Heart Attack stop just short of instigating full-blown cardiac arrest on slightly-less-crazed rockers like "Starlite," "Misty Rowe," and "(Take Me Back) Mary Jane" -- one of numerous marijuana references here, in lieu of genuine stoner rock characteristics.
Well, there's also the GTO parked on the album's cover, but these references are why, as an avid supporter of the era's underground stoner rock scene, I was somewhat suspicious of hipster-endorsed hard rockers like Y.H.A., Burning Brides, The Sword, et al.
Call me a contrarian and a nitpicker (I am both!), but it always irked me that certain bands earned automatic indie rag coverage just because maybe they bathed a little more often, or sported better haircuts, than stoner rock's true ugly ducklings.
But this debate was rendered moot when, despite decent media attention and U.K. tours with The Darkness and Motörhead (*), Young Heart Attack broke up in '06; only reforming two years later long enough to record a second and final LP called Rock and Awe.
All this being said, this is a fun little record from a fun little live band.
* Incidentally, Lemmy Kilmister made a guest appearance on Y.H.A.'s cover of AC/DC's "Get It Hot," found on the B-side of their "Tommy Shots" single.
More ‘00s Hard Rock, Stoner Rock & Hipster Metal: Arctic’s Arctic, Bad Wizard’s Free and Easy, Bask’s American Hollow, Children’s Hard Times Hangin’ at the End of the World, Clutch’s Earth Rocker, Danava's Unonou, Danko Jones’ We Sweat Blood, The Datsuns’ Outta Sight/Outta Mind, Dead Meadow’s Dead Meadow, Elbrus’ Elbrus, Elephant Tree’s Elephant Tree, Fu Manchu’s King of the Road, The Glasspack’s Powderkeg, The Hellacopters’ Disappointment Blues, Mammatus’ The Coast Explodes, My Sleeping Karma’s My Sleeping Karma, Queens of the Stone Age’s Rated R, Snail’s Feral, Sasquatch’s II, Sweatmaster's Sharp Cut, The Sword’s Age of Winters, True Widow’s I.N.O., Thulsa Doom’s The Seats are Soft but the Helmet is Way Too Tight, Turbonegro’s Apocalypse Dudes, Witch’s Witch, Witchcraft’s Witchcraft, Zen Guerrilla’s Positronic Raygun.
