Endless Boogie hail from New York City, having come together in late ’90s Brooklyn, in fact, but their bluesy stoner-psych-hard rock sounds more appropriate for a back-roads dive bar in the late hours of a wild Saturday night. If this doesn’t read as a significant or especially promising endeavor, through expansion, repetition, and the distinctive vocal approach of Paul “Top Dollar” Major, the band’s qualitative bar gets raised considerably upward. Long noted for stylistic indulgence as a virtue, their new album Vibe Killer streamlines matters a bit, but with no loss of power and eccentricity. It’s out now on vinyl, compact disc, and digital through No Quarter.
The scoop on Endless Boogie is that they formed not to make records, but simply to jam. Although they landed a rather prestigious first live gig opening for Stephen Malkmus in 2001, they didn’t get onto wax until four years later through a pair of insanely limited edition LPs. A widely available full-length finally appeared in ’08 through Focus Level, their debut for No Quarter.
Those familiar with Malkmus’ post-Pavement material can draw a line from his cover of Black Oak Arkansas’ “Keep the Faith” (found on the “Jenny & the Ess-Dog” EP) to the sound shaping the Endless Boogie catalog. The main difference between the two, up until now anyway, has been Top Dollar and company’s disinterest in forsaking their choice of moniker; the handle is borrowed from John Lee Hooker’s ’71 2LP for the ABC label.
Along with an affinity for non-rudimentary blues-tinged groove, Endless Boogie share with Hooker a desire for transcendence through duration. Indeed, the band’s highest-profile releases, namely Focus Level, 2010’s Full House Head, and ’13’s Long Island, are all double albums (and all issued through No Quarter). Additionally, they have a digital release of a three-hour radio session cut for the New Jersey freeform station WFMU.
Vibe Killer scales back to a single platter, but with three bonus numbers the whole still attains 65 minutes. As mentioned above, these modifications haven’t altered the attack, and upon time spent, Endless Boogie’s effectiveness has even been sharpened a little. If asked to recommend an entry point to a young’un spouting admiration for Canned Heat and The Groundhogs, it could easily be this new one.
The opening title track dives deep into the bluesy end of Boogie’s backyard pool. The first two words Major utters are “I am…,” and it momentarily felt like a version of Howlin’ Wolf’s “Back Door Man” was in the cards. But no, covers aren’t really in the band’s bag; instead, they prefer to harness the potency at the intersection of hard rock and psychedelia, minus hair wagging and retrograde riffing, and with a tangible familiarity.
The guitar figure repeated throughout “Vibe Killer”’s eight-plus minutes works up edgy tension as a springboard for raucous soloing, and the single note piano near the end takes us on a trip to Detroit. While a fair amount of stoner-aligned stuff can get a bit goofy in a hip-hugger jeans-custom airbrushed van sort of way, the Boogie avoid that scenario, which isn’t to imply they’re devoid of humor.
I’m mean, mirth is about the only way one can take the line “Give me a nickel and I’ll show you Don Rickles,” the words spoken in a Beefheartian drawl numerous times during “Let It Be Unknown,” though the comedy gains traction through weirdness and surprise. Meanwhile, the band is cooking up some delicious swamp-psych; alongside Major’s guitar and vocals, Endless Boogie features Jesper “The Governor” Eklow on guitar, Marc “Memories from Reno” Razo on bass, and Harry Druzd on drums, with occasional member Matt Sweeney (Zwan/ Chavez) reprising his role from Long Island.
Twenty years of existence has produced a finely-tuned rock machine, and a desire for good times over careerism has kept things fresh. “High Drag, Hard Doin’” is a case in point. Once again, a groove is locked into, a story of some wild characters is spun, ripping solos are delivered, and Major’s demand to “kick out the jams” somehow sidesteps the hackneyed, and by a wide margin.
Yes, that’s another link to Detroit, but geographical range is also in evidence. “Bishops at Large” is a southern-shaded number with a touch of funk, and “Back in ‘74” takes us to St. Louis in the year of its title as Major unwinds a tale of witnessing KISS play an outdoor radio-sponsored show at a kite festival. Humor arises again, but so does a rumination on the intolerance of crowds and the nagging persistence of memory, specifically of how new injuries can trigger thoughts of old wounds. If Vibe Killer has a “single,” “Back in ‘74” is it.
Endless Boogie’s core principles get underscored during “Jefferson County,” the slow bayou ominousness nearing 12 minutes as Major comes off not like Hooker or Beefheart but closer to a slightly drug-bent Tony Joe White. It’s a killer finale for the vinyl, but the CD tacks on the blues-pulse of “Whilom” and the download offers two more instrumentals, “Trash Dog” highlighting their subtle Krautrock influence (think Can), and “Warp, Weft and Pile” conjuring a final dose of cyclical blues-rock.
Endless Boogie was once regularly assessed as a paradise for fans and an overstuffed banquet for everyone else. This is somewhat off-target in my estimation, and yet it’s difficult to deny Vibe Killer’s placement as the unit’s most inviting affair.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
A-
