Monday Morning Blues on Left Lane Cruisers' "Gettin Down On It"

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Left Lane Cruiser isn’t winning any medals or getting any love from fancy magazines, never mind a shout out, but they are, right now, probably down in the basement of some smoky outpost, in front of a throng of white trash, toothless truckers and some stoned and longing grunge fans, ripping hard into the blues. High society isn’t quite their game. Their game is dingy bars, mean slide guitars, and pork n’ beans – that and getting drunk all the time (on their first tour of Europe, one of their blog posts read: “Europe is Fornicatin amazing. We have full sized billboards over here with our picture on them, and like 200 people at the shows. F**k man, and we are drunk all the time”). They are a two-piece blues band from Fort Wayne, Indiana. I’m not quite sure how I found out about them, not sure how they made it to Europe, probably the wonders of the interweb, but for the slide guitar lover, the duo is brilliant.

Their sound is pure, boot stomping blues punk – a salute to the rawness and down home soul of the Midwest. It’s a fresh blues like the Black Keys, yet more white trashy and dirty. Anyone with any sort of decency will probably be deathly afraid of them. The raunch ripping off Fredrick “Joe” Evans IV’s guitar is like a Mack truck barreling down Hell’s Highway. The lyrics would probably be horrific if you could hear them, judging by the brashness of Mr. Evans’ voice, and the titles of the songs like “Big Mama” and “Amy’s in the Kitchen.” And the drumming, done by Brenn “Sausage Paw” Beck, is hectic but simple, loud but in control. A common blog word used to describe them is “Whiskey,” or maybe chain-smoking and whiskey.

They have two albums out now: Gettin’ Down on It (Hillgrass Bluebilly Records – re-released 2009), and Bring Your Ass To the Table (Alive Records – 2008). They are not touring currently, but play shows in Fort Wayne, Indiana frequently. Here’s “Big Mama” off Bring Your Ass.