Fuck Texas, Sing For Us...

Throughout my vast travels I have come to meet all sorts of incredibly interesting and talented people...

Justin Sullivan is one of them... In fact this blog is named after the nickname he gave me, "harbinger of doom"... because... well... I do doom rather harbingeringly...

I first met Justin in 1989 in Hollywood, California where we proceeded to boot a soccer ball around the Roxy parking lot while discussing the sad state of English football... And then again at Whisky a Go Go in 1993, where I interviewed him for some local LA rag I no longer even remember the name of... These were the halcyon days of grunge, and Justin's band, New Model Army, had just signed a deal with Epic Records, who were looking to market a successful English rock band with folk/punk roots as a "Seattle grunge" (this is my opinion) band...

It did not work.

The "problem" with New Model Army was integrity...
As in, they had too much of it...

When this "grunge" tactic failed to produce the results Epic desired, there was a mutual parting of ways shortly thereafter... Alas, New Model Army would not tour the States again for 10 years...

Integrity...

Tough word...

Attributed to many, earned by few...

Justin and I didn't actually become friends until many years later, when I began "volunteering" to "help" him out with his career... I have on many occasions, tried to get Justin to blog, market, promote, bamboozle, hoodwink, swindle and just plain sell-out... but to his credit, he hasn't... hell, despite all of my cajoling, prodding and whining, he still hasn't even updated his mid-nineties era looking website... he is who he is... a world traveller, a keen observer, a tolerant philosopher... a rock and roll pirate armed with a Gibson SG...

He and his obscenely talented merry band of madmen still play before rabid crowds that number in the thousands throughout Europe, as well as equally fervent hundreds here in North America and elsewhere...

He is successful on his terms, what you see is what you get, and above all, as a friend and fan, I deeply respect that...

New Model Army has a new record out this week, charmingly titled "Fuck Texas, Sing For Us", which was what a New Orleans audience was chanting after Justin explained that he needed to save his voice for the Austin, Texas show the next evening and that another encore wasn't perhaps in his best interest. Alas, the Cajuns did not concur with his sound reasoning...

"Fuck Texas, Sing For Us" is a live record, and New Model Army is above all a LIVE band... seeing them play is like spending a winter's week on the North Sea... beauty, intensity, power, fury, fragility...

integrity...

I am going to be championing friends of mine from time to time in this space... and I couldn't have begun with a better choice...

New Model Army's new CD is available here

Please check it out...

And here is the MySpace Site, which I had to do in a guerilla fashion until he finally surrendered to its existance... (Viva la MySpace!!!)

GO ON... LEAVE YOUR "THOUGHTS" IN THE COMMENTS SECTION...