Venerable Chicago noise-rock freaks the Jesus Lizard don't really strike me as musical-theater types, but their latest heaving riff-spray is apparently their riff on a Broadway classic. Allow deranged guitar genius Duane Denison to describe the band's new single "Westside": "'Westside' goes along with the previous single, 'Cost Of Living,' which was subconsciously influenced by Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story, and hence the name. Really." Hmm. OK.
"Westside" is a lumbering, gargling monster-beast of a song, and it doesn't suggest the Jets and the Sharks rumbling so much as the moment when a shambling atomic sludge-monster emerges from the Hudson and steps on both gangs, crushing all of them into viscera. But maybe David Yow, the Jesus Lizard's even-more-deranged frontman, can shed a little more light on its inspiration: "There is a part in 'Westside' where the lyrics say, 'Give him back his arm.’ That was inspired by David Lynch’s Lost Highway, when Robert Blake’s character says, 'Give me back my phone.'" Right, sure. I'm honestly not seeing that connection, either, but it makes more sense than the West Side Story thing.
Just last year, the Jesus Lizard came back with Rack, their first new album in 26 years. They followed it shortly afterwards with "Cost Of Living," the stand-alone single that Duane Denison mentioned in that first paragraph up there, and now we're also getting "Westside." It's like they started releasing phlegm-coated urgh-splat rock music again, and now they can't stop. We should be grateful for whatever weird shit inspired the Jesus Lizard to get back into fighting shape. Hear "Westside" below.
"Westside" is out now on Ipecac.
