The key to enjoying the raucous rock ‘n’ roll of Jay Reatard is to not analyse it too closely. Just let your body go – soon a synchronisation will set in and you’ll be away with its rollicking rhythms.
Hailing from Memphis, Jay Reatard (born with the surname Lindsey – ‘Reatard’ comes from the moniker of his first band, The Reatards) is an old-schooler whose brand of punk is both tuneful and broken, fractured at a surface level but beating to the throb of the purest, most instantly engaging indie-pop. We’re talking a mixture of Supergrass and The Replacements, the Wipers and Weezer. It’s straight-up verse-chorus-verse, borderline brain-dead arrangement sense on display; yet addictive qualities are in abundance, as hooks bury themselves deep while Jay hollers and screeches, croons and coos. About what? Things that rhyme, mostly. Like I said: don’t get too close.
This is the man’s second singles collection following one released via In The Red earlier this year, and as its title suggests it compiles his releases to date for the Matador label. (As an aside, it’s worth noting that despite Reatard’s epic productivity, he only actually has one album proper, 2006’s ‘Blood Visions’; a second one, for Matador, is expected next year.) It begins with a firecracker by the name of ‘See/Saw’, which lifts an old Cure riff (or is it Harvey Danger?) and sets it against next-to-no-fi production and percussion that sounds like wooden spoons on upturned saucepans.
You’d think that anyone with as many releases beneath his belt as Reatard (only Canadian hardcore mob Fucked Up run him close – check Wiki for a run down) would suffer in the quality control stakes, but as ‘Matador Singles ‘08’ rolls on, it’s soon apparent that the man’s filtering process is finely tuned. ‘Painted Shut’ presents an acoustic guitar to the fore, its six strings strummed with a great urgency while Reatard’s yelps fit neatly between the spaces in sound – ostensibly it’s a song about keeping schtum, yet delivered with such playful ferociousness it’s tough to imagine anyone not singing along given exposure enough. ‘You Mean Nothing To Me’ comes on like a piece of deranged Rugrats incidental music, prior to our protagonist’s raspy introduction.
Of much interest to this writer is the inclusion of Reatard’s cover of Deerhunter’s ‘Fluorescent Grey’, the title-track of an EP from the Atlanta space-rockers released last year. To call the cover on-the-edge is an understatement: Reatard has never sounded so at the brink of sanity, tip-toes on the border of absolutely losing it. By far the longest track here (although shorter than the Deerhunter original), it’s a sign that, when the mood takes him, Reatard can work introspection, albeit of a frenzied variety, to his distinct advantage – not everything needs to be a garage-toned squall.
One of the most urgent offerings here is the boisterous, and all-too-brief, ‘Dead On Arrival’, which is pretty much exactly the opposite of our man Reatard – new to many though he is, he’s an artist as good as fully formed, and already with a catalogue of potential crossover hits to mine. Matador have signed wisely – given the right lucky breaks, this lanky-haired brute from the American south could have a clutch of classics still up his sleeves.
Jay Reatard tours in November – get tickets HERE.
