Slim Cessna's Auto Club at TT the Bears
On Further Review / Photographic Evidence
by Emma Dessau
The Scene: TT the Bear's Place in Cambridge - 7/22/2009
by Emma Dessau
The Scene: TT the Bear's Place in Cambridge - 7/22/2009
DENVER GOLD RUSH - I attended the University of Colorado at Boulder my freshman year of college. I spent much of my time there at the school’s radio station, where I was frequently told, “You MUST go see Slim Cessna’s Auto Club.” Now I understand why. Hailing from Denver, this group of awesomely deranged cowboys put on a show at TT the Bear’s Place in July that brought out Boston’s inner wild, wild west.
Slim Cessna's Auto Club
"This is How We Do Things In the Country"
"This is How We Do Things In the Country"
VETERANS and IT SHOWS - Slim Cessna’s Auto Club has been performing since 1992. Their most recent album, 2008’s “Cipher,” is out on Jello Biafra of The Dead Kennedy’s record label, Alternative Tentacles. It is hard to come up with the words to describe a Slim Cessna show: Biafra has said they are the “country band that plays at the bar at the end of the world,” which is a great summary.
INSTRUMENTS EVERYWHERE - The stage this night was packed tightly with drums, banjos, guitars, a piano and an upright bass, not to mention Slim Cessna and Munly Munly, their vocalists, who are instruments within themselves. Dressed in black pants and a black shirt, the red haired Munly Munly looked like the country version of the grim reaper in contrast to Slim Cessna’s burly cowboy appearance. Throughout the show, the two reach out and touch everything: the audience, the cameras of the audience members, each other... Nothing is safe.
Slim Cessna’s Auto Club infuses traditional ballads with fierce psychobilly and punk revival sounds to create a genre of their own. Numbers like “Children of the Lord” and then “This Land is Our Land” hit on all cylinders this night and they took the crowd to a whole new level of excitement. Slim stood on the amp throughout most of the show. As a finale, he let himself fall onto the crowd, which suspended him aloft in the middle of the club. There, he preached and sang to his new congregation.
Slim Cessna’s Auto Club is no newcomer to music and with a performance like this, I would say it's safe to say they will be around for a long time. To see them is to love them, so keep an eye out for their next show!
Comments
Emma writes: Numbers like “Children of the Lord” and then Woody Guthrie's “This Land is Our Land” hit on all cylinders this night and they took the crowd to a whole new level of excitement.
Actually, the song Emma's referring to is an original song called "Americadio". It's the 4th track from Slim's new CD "Cipher". Although it mentions lots of parts of the US, like the Woody Gutherie song, it's not the same song at all. Woodie's song is an anthem to happy togetherness, while Slim's song is an extremely dark foreboding/celebration of American evil and possibly the rise of an American Satan and/or Jesus? (in my humble opinion).
It's difficult for me to discern messages of good from pure evil in this band and that's FANTASTIC!
Check out a video of Slim's "Americado" here: www.myspace.com/slimcessnasautoclub
AMAZING!