tobybenjamin – The Great Wild Stars

March 27, 2003October 5, 2020

Four Stars for Tits and Explosions!

The Great Wild Stars.
Tits and Explosions.
Overlord Records.
Rating: 4 stars.
After a nearly four-year wait from the sophomore album that made them modern
rock stars both in their native England and in the U.S., The Great Wild Stars
light up like wildfire on a third effort that is more fully realized and comes on
even sprightlier. Ditching the controversial four-track esthetic of 1999’s Pimps
with Hearts and their 2001 Christmas EP, the sessions for Tits and Explosions put
the lads from Stratford in the studio with legendary Nashville producer Hoss
Bearmountain, who brings newfound polish and sonic confidence. The result has
churning, charming rockers such as “The Blue Light Cruisers” and “Afriquan
Queen” rubbing elbows with quaint pub singalongs like “Brixton Fire of ‘95”
and “The Last Time I Saw Molly Shocks.” But that’s only a start – a year of
heavy touring to promote “Pimps With Hearts” give us a live take on “Enemy
Nylons,” which The Stars worked up during sound checks. Tunes like the
intricate, positively pensive “Adolescent Rain” give you the feeling of a band
that’s only beginning its musical journey – and we’re glad to be along for the
ride. (by Charles Lungren)

December 12, 2001October 5, 2020

“Everything Merry and Bright”, says The New Englander

The New Englander.
December 12th, 2001.
Popular Music.
EVERYTHING MERRY AND BRIGHT.
The Great Wild Stars do Christmas.
By H. Babatunde MacNamara.
As the great Austrian constructionist philosopher Gerte Singlestein once observed, a celebration is only as festive as its newest participant. And so, skipping blithely into the fray of this year’s caroling come the newest major rock band to release a collection of songs
meant to bring the æsthetic of the mosh pit into closer proximity to the yuletide hearth. A Great Wild XXXMas, the new winter-solstitial EP from The Great Wild Stars, is not festive so much as bacchanalian, and not garland-draped so much as mucus-encrusted. In the manner of all great provocations, it at once compels, horrifies, micturates, and spell-binds. A smiling Krampus in a world of grinning St. Nicks emblazoned on every Coca-Cola can, it is the Christmas record we both long for and fear; the wassail we both drink greedily and vomit back up.
It has become a crowded field of late, the rock band holiday record, following the lead of what started as a no-doubt-well-meaning charity venture and has since metastasized into the “Very Special Christmas” industrial complex. The worst of them are one-note jokes – this plus that equals third. Who knew what Smash Mouth would sound like singing “Silver Bells?” Or what Scott Stapp would bring to “Adeste Fidelis?” Well, frankly, who cares? But when an effort to smash open the conventions of December song-singing is coördinated with a genuine mirthfulness and the volcanic grandiloquence of the true provocateur, then fuck me, lads, we might be on to something.
As with all the Stars’ offerings, the inimitable presence of Caesar (who, like the Ghost of Christmas Present, has no surname), looms large over the proceedings. He shouts and cajoles his way through his violent reconfigurations of “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” and “The 12 Days of Christmas” (or rather “XXXmas,” as here presented... though actual pornography seems in short supply) with concentrated verve and unabashed brio. Who knew the words “comfort and joy” could be snarled with such malicious bravado? But his supporting cohort – especially the ever-underrated Leopold on backing (and occasional lead) vocals and keyboards – are equally important. The swirling piano and soaring falsetto on the opening of “Gentlemen” give Caesar the launching pad he needs for his ever-phallic Christmastime rocket to launch into the underbelly of December.
And, somewhat surprisingly, the boys land that sputtering shuttle into a splashdown of genuine bonhomie, in a lovely and understated version of The Pogues’ holiday near-classic “A Fairy Tale of New York”, de-dueted and hammered like copper into a burnished shield against midwinter malaise. Could Shane MacGowan’s “old slut on junk” really have been Mrs. Claus in disguise? Again, who knew?

July 15, 1999September 30, 2020

Roving Tones gives three stars to Pimps with Hearts, July 1999

The Great Wild Stars.
Pimps with Hearts.
Overlord Records.
Melding the angular post-punk of Wire with the sonic boom of Hawkwind, the
sophomore album by The Great Wild Stars comes on like a Panzer doing 80,
and doesn’t let up until the last of its thirteen tracks unfolds. The imperially
named quartet – Caesar, Leopold, Alexander, and Ghengis – have cooked up a
baker’s dozen of fully-formulated songs, taking a huge step forward from their
breakout debut. The tracks on Pimps With Hearts are varied – the Ian Hunter-
esque “Not Tonight” tugs at the heartstrings, and the eminently catchy
“Intergalactic Booty Call” could well the single to break The Great Wild Stars
into the big leagues. More than anything, you get a sense this is a band on a
mission, and with two sterling efforts under their belts, you can’t help but
wonder what worlds they have yet to conquer. (by Roger Hitts)

November 11, 1997September 30, 2020

Daydream review – SCREEM 11/97

SMASH HITTS.
By Roger Hitts.
The Great Wild Stars, Daydream
We get thousands of new releases jamming up our mailbox
on a monthly basis, and it is the sad state of rock
these days 99.9 percent of them justly belong in a
musical Hades for the mere fact we have to listen to
‘em. Then, all of the sudden, a new record towers over
the aural desert like a pyramid over a sand pebble –
we’re talking The Great Wild Stars, baby! The aptly
named quartet has made a whale of a debut album with
Daydream, and you get the feeling this is an arena
rock-level band in bar band’s clothing. The
songwriting is topnotch – think The Kinks-era David
Watts as if channeled by George Clinton – and the
lyrics are driven along with an instrumental force
rarely seen from an outfit still young and maturing.
Let’s hope they don’t mature TOO much though – there’s a youthful vibrancy in songs like “Monkey Suit #9” and the title track to make you hope they always stay Toys
R Us kids. The only drawback after 50 spins is how long we may have to wait before another record separates the
wheat from chaff as convincingly as this shimmering
show. Bravo, ladies!