Cheetah Whores

MUSIC PROFILE: The Cheetah Whores

By Frank De Blase on September 22, 2010

The Cheetah Whores have experienced great tragedy and outrageous adventure. Now the bad prepares for the next phase in its career, having provided music for a new Roger Corman flick.

"We're in that sort of limbo right now," says Cheetah Whores singer Liz O'Brien, "where we've gone from crazy, kitschy local band that people like to go see and rock out to, to where we're gonna be now."

Where that is, exactly, remains to be seen. Formed in November 2006, The Cheetah Whores is a five-woman - O'Brien, drummer Joey Pitts, guitarists Heather Jones and Meg Austin, lap steel player Therese O'Brien - and one-man (bassist Gary Douglas Archer, Jr.) operation steeped in volatility and unpredictability that thrives in spite of itself. There are tempers, plenty of alcohol, and of course the chaos that ensues when you add rock 'n' roll. But despite the hijinks - and the low-jinks - this band can play. It has a new album, "Bang Bang Baby," and recorded the theme song to the new Roger Corman-produced flick, "Sharktopus."

But vinyl and film aside, the Whores' true medium is the stage, where the band serves up badass barroom boogie with a truckload of hot-blooded soul and stone-cold r&b. It's reminiscent of an era when Ike and Tina were still doing blow and exchanging blows.

When the band locks in, it's magnificent. When it doesn't, it's equally magnificent - just watch out for flying debris.

There are plenty of bands around that pledge allegiance to the loose, to the raw, to the unexpected. And they spend months in rehearsal perfecting that calculated spontaneity. Not the Whores; sometimes they're prepared for a show, sometimes not. And sometimes it's the audience that isn't prepared. It's a nightly roll of the dice.

"They're all different," says Pitts. "We've had shows late at night where we're completely wasted and they're real sloppy, but there are these real crazy psychedelic parts with us experimenting and riffing off each other, which we never would have done, and it's really cool." So for the pure rock 'n' roll fan, there has never been a bad Cheetah Whores gig. But a few have come close. Take, for instance, the time the band plugged a male dancer into the act.

"We had him dress as a woman and strip dance," say Pitts. "And be our freaky dancer on stage."

"He tea-bagged my mom," O'Brien says. "And then Party Pat [bassist at the time] just walked off the stage." Good times.

"We tend to have good shows if there's strife between a couple people," says Pitts.

"We're like a family," Austin says. "We love each other. You fight with your family, but then the next day, it's fine. We forgive each other."

O'Brien weighs in: "You can have problems with three people or four people in a band," she says. "We're keeping a band together with six people."

The band endures despites the ups and downs. The band faced the worst possible scenario when it was first starting out, when bassist Shalonda Simpson was murdered in August 2007. Earlier this month Tahsean K. Eaves was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison for her murder.

"The worse thing that could ever happen to a band happened to us," Pitts says. "It brought us together. It also made us kind of depressed. But it definitely gave us the resolve to keep going," she says.

Knowing its background, the band's humor, recklessness, and joy seems more acute, since it springs from a place of loss and pain.

Frankly, it's kind of hard to distinguish a good show from a bad one with this band. The Whores put on a great performance no matter how crumby the circumstances or how shitty its members feel. The disaster is always frosted with fun, like a wrecking ball wearing a tiara.

"I think one of the funnest shows ever was at The Valentines Day Massacre," says Pitts. "We went on at like 2:30 in the morning. It was Liz's birthday and we gave her a cake and she cried and we smashed it. We played a Rod Stewart song and everyone was going nuts."

A good show for O'Brien is "any time we get paid at the end of the night," she says.

But it can't stay loose forever; the band has recently begun to hone its chops at The Standard Lounge's open mic night every Sunday.

"We're the house band," says Pitts. "So we actually get to jam out with each other, which I think is going to be really, really good for us."

O'Brien agrees. "You can sit there in a band practice and not get anything done the whole night you're there," she says. "An open jam actually makes you have to perform and practice at the same time."

But at the core of the Whores is something that can't be fixed, or broken, or completely understood; its soul. Every note that comes out of this band, every beat, every lick, is honest and without forethought. This band is genuine. O'Brien's alto is bright and creamy, sexified by its share of cigarettes. She anchors herself center stage and wails, one hand on the mic, and one hand holding a drink with equal priority. The choreography on stage is essentially a function of each musician's approach to her (or his) instrument. Time is kept with a hip sway, a head nod, and a foot stomp except, in the case of Pitts, who pummels and swings all four limbs maniacally, like Keith Moon with boobs.

Still, the Cheetah Whores isn't all slop and sleaze. In fact, the bedlam is frequently ignited by the audience. When it really counts, the band can pull it - and keep it - together. When Hollywood calls, there's no time for screwing around.

B-movie bigwig Roger Corman was working on his latest thriller, "Sharktopus." For those of you oblivious to context clues, sharktopus is an underwater beast that's half shark, half octopus.

"He needed a trashy soundtrack," O'Brien says. "And we were the band to do it."

O'Brien's uncle, Declan O'Brien, directed the flick and brought The Cheetah Whores (which could actually be the title of a Corman flick) and "Sharktopus" together. The demo of this sensational swingin' surf a-go-go tune was written and recorded in four days in Pitts' living room. The final version, and the rest of "Bang Bang Baby," was recorded at Saxon Studios. The Whores tune "Hot Rod Hell Kitten" is also featured in the movie.

Since being posted on YouTube, the movie trailer - which features the Cheetah Whores' theme music - has received close to 500,000 hits.

"We have fans in Kenya, Europe, and North Carolina," Pitts says.

The album will be released at the screening of the movie here in Rochester. From there, it's that limbo O'Brien mentioned before. But the Cheetah Whores are ready.

"We all have jobs we wouldn't mind quitting," Pitts says. "We're ready to go." This most likely includes a change in behavior - or maybe not.

"We're the Cheetah Whores," says O'Brien. "We're not the Cheetah Pretty Princesses."

"We're Hamilton Street trash," Archer says. Still, Pitts thinks they can clean up the act a bit behavior-wise and rehearsal-wise.

No more drunken pandemonium? No more squabbles? No more tea-bagging?

"Well, you know," says Jones. "Some things can stay."

News:
11 track Debut CD Bang Bang Baby
Released September 2010 - William and Mary Anna Towler, City, Greater Rochester's Alternative News Weekly

I don't know if you remember the post back in August about the Cheetah Whores.
That was basically about their great tune for the new movie Sharktopus.
Well now they have a great new album out, which includes Sharktopus and you can get it/hear it right here. - Bearly Rambling

The Sharktopus Song is sung by the up-and-coming all-female band, The Cheetah Whores. The band was handpicked by Sharktopus director, Declan O’Brien (Wrong Turn 3, Rock Monster, Cyclops) to write and sing the breakout pop song based on their unique, catchy sound and high-powered live performances. - TV by Numbers

Okay. So I saw Sharktopus. :) Yes. A BIG smile!

I’ve been waiting for SyFy to air this movie ever since I saw the trailer a few months ago, and I gotta say I was not disappointed. This was everything I had hoped for!
That is to say, it fully lived up to my expectations of having lousy acting, bad production, horrible effects and everything else you have learned to live from SyFy.
If you are into the campy horror movies and can watch it all go down with a smile, I fully reccomend this. Wife and I laughed our butts of. This was so much fun.
One thing that really is a much higher standard than the rest of the movie is the soundtrack.
The tone is set early on by the Cheetah Whores, who have the title song out on their brand new album. Check ‘em out, they really rock! :)

EDIT: I have now purchased the album myself, and taken it with me to work and listened to it a few times. I gotta say, this is a great little CD. Good, fun, straight forward rock and roll, borrowing styles from pretty much all the shelves. I find hints of punk, 50's rock, classic rock, surf rock, psychedelic, rockabilly and so many other styles in there. Even a hint of The Beatles is to be found in the beginning of "I Lost Myself".
The songs are well constructed, catchy and well performed, and pretty much every single track managed to get my foot stomping away on the beat and brought out a little smile on my face, making this a very pleasurable day at work.
Coming from Rochester, NY and been in the music business since 2006, these gals (and one guy) really sound like they know what they want and what they are doing.
I wish I could compare this CD to something else that I own - to better describe them - but Cheetah Whores are really a different beast, they found their style, stick to it and do it well. They are completely themselves, yet strangely recognizable.
But what am I talking about? I don't need to describe - Just check out the music player below, crank the volume to 11 and put on your best Party Army Boots - I think you will like these folks. - www.kingkeld.com

The Cheetah Whores singer Liz O'Brian oozes the kind of lust I like. She cruised a coupla gears over sultry as the band rolled beneath her at the Bug Jar Saturday night. It was definitely her party, if you know what I mean. There's just something about a woman losing her voice that sends me. The band is obviously a little new, still waiting for the music to tell it what to do. The various aspects of the group that dominate, however, are incredible. Joey Pitts is one of the most maniacal, unconventional, fascinating drummers I know. She doesn't play the drums, she pounds them. She loves and believes every beat. El Destructo's fingerprints are all over this band and he brings in an understated cool that bridges the gap between the swagger and the power. His cheap guitar feedback fed the chaos; a chaos the rest of the band will enjoy as it matures, I'm sure. The Cheetah Whores is a big band for such a primitive strain --- like The Brian Jonestown Massacre, for instance. Once the nuance sprouts, The Cheetah Whores will become one big wall of shake. - Rochester City Newspaper

CONCERT REVIEW:

Cheetah Whores at Water Street - 2010

It wasn't a huge crowd, but I was still impressed with the hundred or so who braved the outdoor suction to catch the Cheetah Whores with Velvet Elvis at The Club at Water Street Wednesday night. "I'm here to support the Whores," I overheard a girl say as she handed her ticket over at the door. "You gotta love the Whores." And I do. I mean, who doesn't? This band is a beautiful disaster that prevails in spite of itself. To watch the band play is to see it teeter on various precipices. And the direction the band is taking lately has seen it switch from a soul train to a lowrider. The sound seethes with a primal, psycho-sexual beat. It reminds me a bit of The Cramps. The lap steel is a nice touch, especially when wielded as a theremin. The vocals are a nice touch when wielded as a come-on. The drums are a nice touch when wielded like a tantrum.

By Frank De Blase - City newspaper Rochester New York

Like everyone with taste, I tuned into SyFy's Sharktopus a couple of Saturdays ago. But it took me a while to actually watch the movie because I rewound the opening scene half a dozen times because I fell in love with the theme song. It was a perfect mix of surf, garage, punk, and camp, The Creature From The Black Lagoon crashing the Beach Blanket Bingo.

The Sharktopus theme song was written by the Cheetah Whores, a five-sixths all-female band who just released their debut album, Bang Bang Baby, last week. Bang Bang Baby is eleven tracks of fun, clocking in just shy of forty minutes. The Cheetah Whores are an awesome mix of classic '70s punk, surf, '50s/'60s girl groups, garage, and psychedelic rock, with every taste and genre accentuated with Therese O's haunting lap steel guitar. The lyrics are at times hilarious, at times serious, dealing with themes as vast as the Cheetah Whores' influences: murder, dive bars, crappy ex-boyfriends, even crappier jobs, bat cancer, dangerous girls you'd be foolish not to get to know better, and the famous Sharktopus. I love this album and have been listening to it nonstop the past few days. While the band is relatively unknown, Bang Bang Baby should change that.

Smitten as hell, I wanted to know more about the band. Luckily, head Whore Lizzy O was kind enough to answer a few questions for me:

Thanks for dropping by to answer a few questions today, Lizzy O!
Thank you for having me.

First things first: why Cheetah Whores? How did you guys come up with the name?
"I'm a street-walkin' Cheetah with a hand full of Napalm!" It has nothing to do with The Cheetah Girls, we had the band name before they were born but there's a little bit of whore in every little girl.

I love your album, Bang Bang Baby. My favorite track is "Sha Na Na Na," which musically reminds me of one of those classic boyfriend dies on a rainy night songs from the '50s. What's your favorite track on the album?
I'm not sure. It mostly depends on my mood. "Here He Comes Again" is my favorite right now.



I hear The Stooges peeking through on "Hot Rod Hell Kitten" and "Bat Cancer" sounds like something Lux Interior would have liked to have written. Who do you cite among your influences?
Robert Johnson, Roky Erickson, the Holy Trinity: Lou, Iggy, and Tom, Miss Wanda Jackson, and I do love punk '70s-'80s-'90s. I could go on and on.

The song "Bang Bang Baby" sounds like it's just itching to be plucked from obscurity and placed in a pivotal scene of a Tarantino film. How did you get your songs "Hot Rod Hell Kitten" and "Sharktopus" featured in the movie Sharktopus?
Nepotism. My uncle Declan O'Brien directed the movie. No one but my family would ask a sleazy tramp act like The Whores to do a movie soundtrack!

<a href="http://cheetahwhores.bandcamp.com/track/sharktopus-2">Sharktopus by Cheetah Whores</a>

Did you get to visit the set? Did you meet Roger Corman? Did you get to pet the Sharktopus?
NO! I wish. Only in my Sharktopussy dreams.

Have you guys gained any national exposure from having your songs in the movie?
Somewhat but we are still eating mustard sandwiches without the bread so we got some work to put in before TMZ and Perez Hilton start talking about which one of The Whores was arrested this week.

<a href="http://cheetahwhores.bandcamp.com/track/here-he-comes-again">Here He Comes Again by Cheetah Whores</a>

I know a lot of bands say that their records never come close to capturing their "live sound." How close does Bang Bang Baby come to a Cheetah Whores show? What are your live shows like?
I think on a sober, well-rested day we are true to recorded sound, but at a normal show we drop a little drunken slop and swagger in the music and our stage shows get crazy out of control with riots and flying mic stands. We do invite a lot of tamtastic tambourine players to join us on stage as well.

Do you guys throw in any cover songs on a regular basis?
"Season Of The Witch" and "Bring It On Home" and the drummer wants me to sing "She Bop" in Spanish. I don't speak Spanish.

Ooh! "Season Of The Witch" is perfect for you guys! Alright, it's time for The CB3, the three questions we ask every guest. Thriller or Purple Rain?
Purple Rain, hands down. I love Prince, that sexy little man.

Debbie Gibson or Tiffany?
Tiffany. She got naked for some porn mag! She is tough. Team Tiff!

<a href="http://cheetahwhores.bandcamp.com/track/i-lost-myself">I Lost Myself by Cheetah Whores</a>

Pretty In Pink or Sixteen Candles?
"Whats a-happenin', Hot Stuff?" Sixteen Candles is great, but I love that song in Pretty in Pink: "Rave-Up, Shut-Up" by The Rave-Ups. It's a toss-up.

Molly Ringwald and I have the same B-Day. I was born 2/14/78. She was born 2/14/68.

Thanks for dropping by! I hope you guys sell a million copies of Bang Bang Baby!
Yeah, me too. Mustard sucks.

Need more Cheetah Whores? You can buy their album here. Their official website is here. They're also on Facebook and Twitter and MySpace. - Culture brats

If the Sharktopus Trailer Doesn't Blow Your Mind, You Have No Soul

Rev up your typing fingers, B-Movie buffs, it's time to start freaking out on Sci-Fi message boards. Roger Corman is back in all of his campy glory. That's right, SyFy's Sharktopus finally has a trailer! And it. Is. Awesome.

If the Sharktopus Trailer Doesn't Blow Your Mind, You Have No Soul

If the Sharktopus Trailer Doesn't Blow Your Mind, You Have No Soul

Sure, it's only 2:13 long, but through this cinematic masterpiece of a trailer, we've already learned so much about the illustrious Sharktopus.

* It has a Beach Blanket Bingo-ish theme song (sung by The Cheetah Whores—no, really) that we will all be humming for the rest of summer.
* I bet the Sharktopus has a 100% record for predicting all worldwide soccer matches (take that, Paul).
* When it comes to the Roberts' family, a movie about a killer half-shark, half-octopus terrorizing a beach town will most certainly be on my must-see list over a two-hour self indulgent white girl problem, ahem, Eat, Pray, Love. Point to Eric Roberts.
* It can walk on land, swim in water, and could all around kick the ass of any other overgrown sea creature... or land creature, at that. I know it's early but I'm crossing my fingers for Sharktopus II: Sharktopus v. Dinoshark.
* Girls in bikinis, guns and yachts. Because, why not?
* The sharktopus is a killer ladies man.
* I guess there's a plot too. Turns out the sharktopus was a Navy experiment gone horribly wrong AWESOME!

I'm sure there's more to flip out about, but I'm too busy setting my DVR for Sept. 25th to make sure I don't miss out the most groundbreaking television event of the season. - gawker.tv