Sin Serenade

By Jim Phillips, Contributing Writer, 7-21-06

I’ve heard this kind of music called a lot of things: rockabilly, shockabilly, alt-country, rural punk (Okay, I made that one up) and on and on and on. Sin Serenade are a slinky-cool guitarist and singer, a female stand up bass player and a thunk a thunk a thunk Carl Perkins drum beat. What do you call that? I call it one thing: Cool. And cool is big where I come from.

Check out Sin Serenade on Saturday, July 22, at Cell Theatre or catch them on their West Coast tour. Click here to listen to "Tractors Dig Me." - New West

We are all sinners. And if you're reading this column, you must like music. Those two concepts— sinning and singing— are the basis for a local band called Sin Serenade.
Conceptualized and led by a man they call Lucky Donohue, the group is a throwback to a time when country music was the most rebellious form of music around. And though modern country music is far removed from those roots, it's exactly what Donohue seems fascinated by. Add to that a wicked punk rock sensibility and raucous, hell-raising lyrics and it makes for a band that Albuquerque hasn't seen in a very long time.
Roughly hewn like a sport coat made of burlap, the idea behind Sin Serenade, which also includes upright bass player/vocalist Antonia Montoya, guitar and lap steel player Michael Henningsen and drummer Mark Armijo, isn't about high fidelity. The group recently released a self-titled five song E.P. that sounds as if the group is playing in the back of a pickup truck traveling down a country road. Donohue's vocals are tinny, scratchy and gravelly, Montoya's bass is plucked with abandon and keeping time is a snare drum that rattles like an angry sidewinder's tail. It's loose. It's live. It's reckless. And if you like your country music served on a paper plate, it's downright beautiful.
The only way to understand this sort of thing is in a live setting and coincidentally, that's just about the only way to get your hands on this E.P. In the next two weeks, Sin Serenade will give you three chances to do just that, including Saturday, Dec. 17, at Atomic Cantina (315 Gold SW) with The Giranimals and Bo Salling and The Brakes Are All Gone Band. Show starts at 10 p.m. No cover.
On Dec. 23, the band plays Launchpad for The Ground Beneath CD Release Party with Anesthesia, Torture Victim and Suspended. Sin Serenade goes on at 9 p.m. sharp. Cover is $5.
And if you like spending your New Year's at a honky-tonk bar, well, you're out of luck.
But Sin Serenade's performance at Burt's Tiki Lounge on New Year's Eve is about as close as you'll get. Show starts at 10 p.m. No cover.
- The Albuquerque Journal, 12/16/2005

The past week has not only confirmed my belief that Albuquerque has one of the strongest live music scenes in the country for a city this size, but it has one of the strongest live music scenes in the country, period ... I hopped over to the even cozier Atomic Cantina to catch local country faves Sin Serenade. Though I heckled it at its last Atomic appearance, it showed me just how serious it is about playing early, stand-up bass-driven outlaw country with a gritty rock 'n' roll sensibility ... - The Albuquerque Journal, 8/26/2005

... Sin Serenade’s pile o’ twang is the Knitters on valium, washed down with too-green backwoods Kentucky bourbon. Except for Henningsen’s lap steel : here, substitute mescaline for the downers. It was country bop n’ roll all the way ... - Wig Wam Bam no.70, 10/2005