Jerry Teel & The Big City Stompers

Jerry Teel and The Big City Stompers - Jerry Teel and the Big City Stompers (Album)

Album reviews for Jerry Teel and The Big City Stompers:
» Jerry Teel and the Big City Stompers - Jerry Teel and The Big City Stompers
by text_edifice | Monday, June 30

Label-mates with the Beasts of Bourbon and the Drones (on Spanish label BANG! Records), Jerry Teel is one crusty nugget of a hillbilly rocker. His band, The Big City Stompers, play honest-to-goodness country rock that stomps and thunders down disused railroad tracks in search of moonshine, freedom and kissing cousins. Mining the deep dark halls of inbreeding Appalachia their albums rust-tinged artwork and impenetrable track titles – MC Call Mississipi Mosquito Scratch?! – promises rough-as-hooch hay-rolling fun washed down with a little mescalin.

All is not as it seems however, Teel and band actually come from New York City and the album' drawling fiddles and chicken-picked banjo's soon give way to a bubbling mix of rockabilly, country, dub and psychadelia. The combination of two previously unreleased albums has caused a lack of cohesion that intersperses some very focussed material with zany desert-rockers. The spaced out Chicken Snake, for example, comprises three minutes of dubby organ accompanied by the distressed calls of barnyard animals. Perhaps of some documentary interest in terms of the bands development, these tracks seem half (or perhaps just really) baked.

Stoner jokes aside, the album is, initially at least, a really interesting gumbo of music, instrumentation and roughshod playing. Unfortunately repeated listens and too many unfocussed instrumental tracks leave a nasty impression of studio-excess-driven self-absorption.

- TheDwarf.com

Ecco una band davvero estrema. Non aspettatevi rumorismi, sperimetazioni ed astrazioni fatte in musica, Jerry Teel & The Big City Stompers incarnano il vero spirito punk anche se non suonano punk. E' l'attitudine ad essere sovversiva, perché sfornare nel 2008 un disco di folk-country, quello vero delle origini e senza compromessi è una mossa davvero audace. Questa è la vera world music, così uguale ad un passato tanto remoto quanto ancora di grande fruibilità. E' come fermarsi in un pub della provincia americana o in qualche paesino irlandese (in fondo molto del country ha origini proprio nelle verdi terre del quadrifoglio) e restare ad ascoltare qualche vecchio cow-boy suonare con la band tra una pinta e l'altra. Quattordici brani che si dividono tra episodi autografi, cover e un paio di tradizionali che non soffrono trasfigurazioni di sorta: è tutto esattamente come qualche secolo fa. Musica piena di sudore, polvere e passione, fatta di storie mai perse nel tempo, di malinconia da spiriti nomadi ed erranti. Esiste un'America lontana dalle lucì delle grandi metropoli, migliaia di chilometri distante dal caos, dove esistono ancora strade non asfaltate che costeggiano i campi, dove la notte cala davvero e puoi vedere tutte le stelle della volta celeste. Dove la sera per divertirsi basta quella vecchia chitarra malandata, un'armonica e un fuoco acceso che illumina le poche persone attorno. E le storie ingiallite dal tempo già conosciute, che non smetteremmo mai di ascoltare, ci accompagneranno fino al sorgere del sole.

Visita il Myspace di Jerry Teel
Visita il Myspace di Jerry Teel & The Big City Stompers

- Vitaminic

Ken je beperkingen, dacht Jerry Teel en hij nam voor deze plaat vooral covers op. De uithoek die noise-blues heet, kent hij inmiddels op zijn duimpje dankzij een carrière in onder veel meer Honeymoon Killers, Chrome Chranks en Boss Hog. Maar de op ontploffen staande countryvariant die hij met The Big City Stompers opnam beheerst hij nog niet in alle finesses, al heeft hij er een beetje aan gesnuffeld toen hij in de legendarische Knoxville Girls speelde. De minst aansprekende tracks die we hier vinden, zijn dan ook van eigen hand. Als hij met andermans werk aan de haal gaat, blijkt dat het met zijn gevoel voor wat wel en niet werkt in dit genre wel snor zit: "Loretta" van Townes Van Zandt en de klassieker "I'm Gonna Burn Your Playhouse Down" zijn de absolute hoogtepunten. Jammer dat we die al op de eerste helft van deze plaat te horen krijgen. De instrumentaaltjes (jawel, van eigen hand) zijn gedurfd, maar meestal niet ("Mc Call Mississippi Mosquito Scratch") of slechts half ("Chicken Snake") geslaagd. Hetzelfde moeten we dan maar zeggen van deze plaat als geheel: voor de helft zeer geslaagd, voor de andere helft matig gelukt.

File: Jerry Teel and The Big City Stompers - s/t
File Under: Fucked up country die ze in de grote stad nog niet helemaal in de vingers hebben
- File Under

I went out to Glasslands the other night and caught the triumphant return to NYC of this ex-Honeymoon Killer, Knoxville Girl and Chrome Crank. Jerry Teel and The Big City Stompers. Their show was awesome and reminded me of early Creedence Clearwater. It was down home and had solid roots.

The Big City Stompers formed in late 2001 after the break up of The Knoxville Girls. Jerry and Pauline Teel called up some good friends and started to play around with some old country songs. Jerry owned The Funhouse on the corner of 4th Street and Ave. B in NYC, and that's where everyone would gather to jam, drink, smoke and have a good time.

Don't miss them if you get a chance to catch them on this revival tour. - Brink.com

Jerry Teel, who fronts The Big City Stompers, wasn’t only the driving force behind the seminal 1980s NYC punk-a-billies Honeymoon Killers (though best remembered as the band that fathered Jon Spencer Blues Explosion - were important in their own right long before ) , Little Porkchop and The Knoxville Girls, but was also a member of Bosshog and The Chrome Cranks. While Jerry sings and plays guitar, The Stompers include his lovely and talented wife Pauline Owens Teel on vocals and cha chas, long-time house bassist for the entire Lower East Side, Pink Monkey Bird and The Dog Show’s main man, Jerome O’Brien on the low strings, JJ Jenkins formally of The Poolside Cowboys, The Humbuckers, and Alana Amram and the Rough Gems on Lead and Slide Guitar, and Heavy Creatures’ Patrick Kauffman on drums. While Jerry has a killer voice, writes solid rootsy songs, and selects choice covers, the Stompers lay it down with a lively no bullshit American a style with both Basement Tapes breadth and plenty of grit(s). - Jonathan Toubin NYNT - New York Night Train

Home Album Reviews Jerry Teel and the Big City Stompers - S/T Jerry Teel and the Big City Stompers - S/T
Written by Jens
Tuesday, 22 July 2008 12:34
(Bang! Records)

Holy Hee Haw! Jerry Teel of Chrome Cranks, Honeymoon Killers, Boss Hoss, Knoxville Girls etc. takes a (permanent?) break from the hip New York noise rock scene and goes down south with some nitty gritty hillbilly honky tonk. Well, he ain't the first, his Boss Hoss buddy Jon Spencer travels that country fried road as well, but Jerry and wife Pauline and the Big City Stompers do even it better and more convincing. The legendary Sadies also help out on a handful of tunes, which certainly doesn't hurt, haha. Half originals, half covers (incl. Townes Van Zandt's "Loretta") but all heart and soul. This twangy hootenanny is highly recommendable, especially for folks who are tired of lame alternative C&W and fake Americana. Twang on! Comes in
http://www.myspace.com/thebigcitystompers

( The Stompers must mention that they have been playing since 2000. Others might have followed, but Teel is the pioneer of Country/Roots music in NYC )



- LOWCUT

We've recently mischaracterized Jerry Teel and the Big City Stompers as a country band because that's what they used to be. They're so much more now. Teel is a New York underground legend, dating back to his days with dirgy noise-rockers the Honeymoon Killers, the equally noisy, faster and more fiery Chrome Cranks, gothic garage/Americana band Knoxville Girls and now this unit. He ran the popular Fun House Studios on the Lower East for years before relocating to New Orleans…just in time to get wiped out by the hurricane. It's nice to have him back.



The band is vastly more energetic: they still play some country, but they're putting the kind of sometimes offhandedly sarcastic and sometimes actually menacing noir spin on it that's characterized most everything Teel has been involved with. This show started out hot and got even hotter as the night wore on. They opened with a boisterous country shuffle, lead guitarist JJ Jenkins putting some corny bite on his lead lines for a deliberately satirical feel. Their second song saw Teel and his inscrutable retro rock goddess wife Pauline trading off on vocals; the third, an eerie, fast shuffle possibly titled Follow Me featured John-and-Exene-style harmonies, the bass playing a minor progression against major chords, building tension.



After a swaying, pounding, Crampsish country blues, Jenkins opened the next tune with a classic Stones riff while the rhythm section did a spot-on take on the other, less glamorous Glimmer Twins (that's Wyman and Watts in case you didn't know), Jenkins doing his own spot-on Keith Richards when it came time for a solo. A slow country ballad and a garage song that could have been the Blues Magoos or for that matter the Fleshtones were next, followed by a scorching, guitar-fueled version of Loretta, the sly, swaying country tune that was a massive audience hit in this band's previous incarnation. Then they did Shaking All Over. But unlike virtually every other band that covers this old garage chestnut, they held back: when they got to the hook at the end of the verse, it was almost as an afterthought, maintaining the night's dark intensity. They followed with a surprisingly short version of the Knoxville Girls hit Hillbilly Boogie.



Teel and cohorts saved their best for last. Midway through their slow, blackly hypnotic, absolutely psychedelic encore, it was as if for about 90 glorious seconds, it was 1984 and this was True West onstage, Jenkins played gentle, beautifully fluid Richard McGrath style Telecaster melody as Teel went nuts, furiously chopping at a single chord like Russ Tolman at his most demented and inspired. Like cocaine, with one big difference: coke will kill you, while stuff like this will actually make you live longer.

Categories: Live Events · Music · New York City · Reviews
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- LUCID CULTURE