Clark Westfield aka The Aristocrat of Crime and Puppy Mills aka The Snitch comprise the magically delicious The Gay Blades. Anyone who’s anyone knows that duos are hot these days. From matinees at the strip club to funky fresh outfits like Eagles of Death Metal and The White Stripes, the fine art of the musical pair has come up with more than a few sweaty and sticky hot moments.
The Gay Blades are no different. Probably inspired by Zorro and his homosexual brother, these guys leave it all out in the open with their brand of spastic, expressive pop rock.
A flip through the sleeve of Ghosts, the band’s full-length debut, unveils a band with good humor and a strapping sense of storytelling. Song titles like “Bob Dylan’s 115th Nightmare,” “Robots Can Fuck Your Shit Up,” and “Why Can’t I Grow a Beard?” illuminate this duo as a plucky, smart-alecky invention.
While the humor expressed in the album notes and on the band’s MySpace page discloses what appears to be a couple of jokers, the music of The Gay Blades uncorks a different set of possibilities. The raw emotion and agile soul of this duo is incontestable, even if the pop punk stylings are a little too formulaic at times.
Shit starts with the “O Shot.” A funky little guitar-and-drum split given some extra flavor thanks to Jeff Plate’s bass, this ditty rocks with chunky chords and vibrant percussion. Mills slaps the snare hard, crashing through the rest of his kit with sweltering glee.
The storming rock epic blast of “Bob Dylan’s 115th Nightmare” continues the trend, as Westfield lets loose a barrage of hard lines. “You never captivate, you just capitulate,” he says. “And you follow all the trends.”
Elsewhere, The Gay Blades pry the emo box open and pinch out a startling amount of emotion. “Dog Day Afternoon” is a miserable, bloated bit of music-making. Punctuated by the Aristocrat’s bawling vocals and a wall of sniveling, depressing guitar, this is the theme for the prom of rejected kids everywhere.
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