See I rob banks, I pull pranks,
Non Serviam – Frank Turner
So Frank Carter has gone pop and Frank Turner has gone punk. It all swirls around and around. Of course Frank has made noises this hefty before. He’s the frontman of Möngöl Hörde ferfrikkinfrickssake. But this? This is a declaration of intent. The opening track to his new album. Released in the future. In the…
Off With His Head – Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes
Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes know that. Special guest vocalist Cassyette knows it too. The best song in the world is the one you’re digging right now. And right now I’m digging Sticky the album. Off With His Head the single and everything else on this record released just a matter of days too late…
Montana – Frank Zappa
I am saying you can’t do that on stage anymore. I am saying we’re quite a short distance from the end and quite a long distance from the last all out full on pair of heavy duty, zircon encrusted tweezer. And that will not do.
Headache – Frank Black
The album henceforth known as TOTY featured 22 songs. Of the 21 others on that record I cannot recall a single one being played anywhere except at home on my record player. It was Headache and only Headache which seemed for a while to be everywhere. The huge pop harmonies and infectious acoustics barrel this…
Go Get A Tattoo – Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes
The Rattlesnakes are in party mode. Frank makes the trip to the artists chair seem like a rite of passage and a vital experience you wanna have. The chorus is of existential dread and end of days dystopia and yet it sounds like you don’t wanna miss it. The songs tight beat and guest vocalist…
Sticky – Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes
Along the top of a buoyant bass line and then a battery charged strimmer of a guitar sound Frank is doing a sort of Hip Hop Grandstanding intro the likes of which, may well be what we can expect from the album with this title track.
The Gathering – Frank Turner
Playing like he’s stolen a song from The Hold Steady and convinced Tad to play a Slade riff for him I’m excited by this track. Honest lad that he is, I saw this morning he’d already tweeted to Craig Finn to apologise for that. These two acts are the same species. Pure bread mongrels of…
My Town – Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes (feat. Joe Talbot)
after a year of lock down and music taking weird twists and turns, this is an exciting side quest. The two of them in a Godzilla Vs. King Kong of U.K. punk Under Pressure style show down. Our new Freddie & Zavid have at it. An exciting prospect for sure. I wasn’t expecting techno pop,…
Fire – Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes
Beautifully packaged in a sleeve that echoed the original albums art work (but after the flames had been extinguished). As ever the vinyl was a thing of rare beauty, just like the music was a thing of rare ferocity.
Son Of Mr Green Genes – Frank Zappa
Frank’s a bit of a mage. He’s been in the periphery of my musical vision since day 1. Waving his hands around like a lunatic and causing people to smirk at the nonsense of it all. When I was a tiny little kid the men in my family liked Frank. They looked like Frank and…
One For My Baby (And One More For The Road) – Frank Sinatra
The Rat Pack had the pick of the first half of the 20th Century’s songbook to choose from. From Hammers and Bernstein to Bacharach and David to Lieber and Stoller. They all laid brick for the firm at one point or another. Of course in the music snob prejudice stakes it didn’t help that every…
End Of Suffering – Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes
This band. This incredible band. This faaakin’ band. They’re my local heroes. I ran into Frank in my local garden center recently. That’s how local this band are. Their first album was a revelation to me. The incredible Blossom showed a return to the hard sounds of Frank’s first band Gallows, after his power pop…
Crowbar – Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes
Mawnin’. The first truly vital release of 2019 got to the rock and roll world a fortnight in. Frank Carter and his band of merry men have had album number three in the can for a while now. The hardest working band in the UK took the last half of 2018 a little easier than…
Make America Great Again – Frank Turner
From the politically powerful Be More Kind album (what times are we living in where that is a contentious thing to say?) Single number 37 from that record, Make America Great Again is a stealth agit punk tune dressed up as a happy little pop ditty. Frank makes a tit of himself in a bow…
Baby Snakes – Frank Zappa
There are so many more suitable submissions to choose from the prolific and absurd Frank Zappa as a notch on this particular bedpost but we’re going to go with Baby Snakes because out of context is where it sounds like the most fun. If you’re ever just letting the technology throw out songs in random…
Reasons Not To Be An Idiot – Frank Turner
This was the first Frank Turner song I heard. It found me at a time I needed it to. It’s got a great central conceit to it’s lyrics, about not getting wrapped up in your own ego. It tells you that you’re not the center of the universe. It also tells you everyone else is…
1933 – Frank Turner
“Stop asking musicians what they think he said softly as poured himself a second drink And outside, the world slipped over the brink” Frank’s back! He’s angry man. Frank has some stuff to say. He doesn’t have all the answers. But what he does have to say makes a lot of sense. Last time Frank…
Spray Paint Love – Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes
Well this is unexpected. FC & TR (let’s not ever shorten the mighty Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes to that again) only released their second album in February of this year. It was jammed full of the sort of tunes lesser punk bands (which right now is mooooost punk bands) would take a career to…
I Still Believe – Frank Turner
So we conclude ‘Songs about Music’ Week with one of my favourite records of the last ten years. Some people are big on Frank and his strain of Folk Rock. Some have an issue with the school he went to (I mean… What?) Some think the fact he used to be in a punk band…
Original Sin – Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes (Feat. Bobby Gillespie)
The feedback from Stuka’s original vocal is cleaned off and here he is reprising those verses all shiny like. As this once brutal blunt punk band swath their sound in horns, synths & washes of static to fade out
Goo Goo Muck – The Frank Pop Ensemble
If the timelines are awash with Eddie Munson solo’s shot in bedrooms on iPhones and the dance moves of The Batcave are being done in the front room on Christmas Day. If Kate Bush is taking WAP’s place. There’s hope. We are living in a period that may well be remembered as The Great Reset.…
The Drugs – Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes (feat. Jamie T)
Inky Frank, You’re a saucy one. Inky Frank, your a naughty one. Less than 12 months since Sticky and it’s guest riddled 10 tracks the punk rock collaborator is teaming and scheming with another colourful character from planet indie. This time it’s the once bright young hope of the genre Jamie T. He of the…
Farewell To My City – Frank Turner
Here it is. The Closing track. Of Course. It’s about London. My London. Frank’s London. But Let’s pretend it’s about turning in. About getting old. About songs and iPods and websites and saying hello to your old friends, just to share a drink and a story or two and then say goodbye.
We’re being quite frank here. Quite a lot of Franks that is. We got Turners, Sinatras, Carters, Zappas and Blacks.
Don’t mention the tension
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Steve For The Deaf 