JULY 11, 2008:
Texas Platters
BY DOUG FREEMAN
The Jungle Rockers
Cool It Out
The sophomore EP from Austin's premier greasers kick-starts with a yelp and riffs that don't ease up until the tank's tapped out. Rumbling out of the garage like Link Wray with a ferocious backbeat, the six tracks mod out the local quartet's familiar rockabilly jive with a pop touch. The opening title track injects a Bo Diddley beat with early Beatles fervor, every line laced with lust so that Jason Borkowski's laughing "I'm gonna cook ya some eggs, baby" winks a leering slouch. "Devil in My Head" unloads a primal pulse behind equally sexual howls, and "Big Mouth" picks up speed with full-throttle licks. Instrumental "Guts" and the grooving "Love Trap" ride surf rhythms, but "Lies" surprises with a smooth lilt that leans as much toward chiming doo-wop as greaser punk. Driving and gritty, Cool It Out does anything but.
"Sweating the sexualized psychotica of the Cramps and duck-walking Chuck’s blues into your pants, Austin’s Jungle Rockers have some advice for you: “Shake it like you do when you wanna get ya some.” The quartet’s self-titled EP is one of the best local releases of the summer, and the slick twang of “Hot, Soft & Sweet” (one guess what that’s about) will give you something with which to mess up your bed sheets." - Audra Schroeder, Austin Chronicle
Relocating to Austin from Cleveland, the Jungle Rockers are a natural fit for Austin’s vintage appeal, and few bands have matched the Continental Club’s rockabilly ethos so well. And while they have quickly and popularly enmeshed themselves within the local scene, it’s also tempting to see the roots of their Ohio hometown both in their Midwest blue-collar drive and as the city’s home to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in their unrepentant melding of rock’s most foundational sounds. The group’s debut, self-titled EP proudly wears its influences on it’s sleeve, and it’s impossible not to talk about the Jungle Rockers without dropping their very conscious debts to Bo Diddley or Chuck Berry licks. But with the energy that the quartet injects back into the sound, their songs are more of a true homage and embracing of that period than a derivative rehashing.
The five songs on the EP admittedly have more the feel of a demo than a proper release, reinforced by the instrumental re-do of opener “Shake It!” and production that doesn’t quite capture their intensity to full-effect. That being said, however, the songs are still an explosive romp of greaser rock. “Shake It!” appropriately introduces the album with a classically cool, surf riff followed by Jason Leonard’s howl of “Shake it! Like you do when you want to get you some!” But it’s the soft drop into an almost old-school R&B sensuousness that makes the song most memorable though: “There’s a moon out, something rustling the leaves. Feel it in the air, makes you quiver in the knees.”
The Rockers’ most popular contemporary equivalent would likely be Southern Culture on the Skids, though where SCotS revel in the shtick of their sound, the Jungle Rockers’ more naturally effuse an attitude of slicked back hair and leather jackets. “Jungle Man” anthematically declares the cultural constitution with punched lines like: “We got the windows rolled down with radio up, get the back seat bouncing to the good stuff. And you better check the way I walk, what I say, how I dress, I’m rockin’ black Chuck Taylors in case I want to jump your fence cause I’m a jungle rocker!” Likewise, “Hot, Soft and Sweet,” the best and most unrestrained of the songs, sweats with the unrivaled underlying sexuality of 50’s rock ‘n’ roll , fueled by a perfect bass groove and irrepressible shouts. Who needs Rockin' Bones when there is new material as fresh and solid as this?! Austin is proudly one of the few places in the nation where such a rockabilly lifestyle is capable of being lived without the least sense of irony, and the Jungle Rockers are its new champions. - Robert Darden, Austin Sound
For fans of The Clash, Buddy Holly, malt shops and the "Pulp Fiction" soundtrack, the Blue Moon Saloon presents The Jungle Rockers. For a hint of Austin's rockabilly group's dirty garage sound, visit myspace.com/thejunglerockers. Clap along to "Shake It!" and shake it to "Hot, Soft & Sweet". - timesPICKS, Lafayette's best of the week's entertainment
