The gas can and cheesy orange flames on the cover of the Ape City R&B 7” aren’t nearly foreboding enough for the scorching garage blues contained on the wax. “Firestarter” has a guitar lick nastier than the ones your girlfriend gives you “back there” when passions explode in the heat of the moment, and the drums gallop along loosely, a thumping invitation to shake the stiffness from your hips and move. The lyrics are as menacing as Big Black’s “Kerosene” and delivered with an abject snotty vitriol generally reserved for the face of someone into which you are about to spit. “Wot I Say” could be a variation of the A-side with rapid-fire drum fills and similarly executed guitar leads. I put this in league with the Golden Boys stellar “Whiskey Before Sleep” from a couple years ago. Their Slovenly single was pretty great, but Ape City R&B shows us their next level shit on this release.
–benke (La-Ti-Da)