The Hot Seats
Album: Feel
Label: Self Released
Tracks: 12
Website: http://www.thehotseats.net/

Appalachian high calls to Virginian bluegrass, jug band stomps and some elegant bluegrass, The Hot Seats are fully immersed in an endless whirl of southern States radio shows broadcast long before anyone had even heard of a certain Mr E Presley.

The music flows thick and fast, at once raucous, rowdy and rockin', but also measured, controlled and in places (only a few) capable of poignant restraint. For the most part the banjo, fiddle, washboard and double bass deliver their rat-a-tat-tat with some bravado and no small display of expertise.

By the third or fourth listen it's possible to detect more outlandish influences - tracks like Beasties in the Sugar, Here To Get My Baby Out Of Jail and I Wouldn't Take Her To a Dogfight echo the more vaudevillian moments of Beefheart, The Purple Gang or The Fugs, while Hard Working Man and No Plans suggest a penchant for Johnny Cash and Reminisce calls John Prine to mind.

Nick Churchill
www.thegranvillechambers.co.uk