After spending the past several years backing power pop-smith Nick Lowe, Luchador-masked instrumentalists Los Straitjackets have surfed back to the fore with Somos Los Straitjackets, their first non-collaborative full-length release since 2012. The new album, however, sports a few songs that will be familiar to the outfit’s keenest fans.
High Wire Act, for instance, originally featured on Los Straitjackets guitarist Greg “Gregario” Townson’s 2022 solo release, Beyond the Horizon, as a clean-picked bossa nova before Los Straitjackets reworked it with uproarious, motorboat-rudder Dick Dale-isms.
Founding guitarist Eddie Angel also brought Spinout – the riptide-clearing cut he originally recorded with the Neanderthals in the early ’00s – into the modern age for Somos.
“A lot of these songs have a history,” Angel says. “It’s not necessarily a bad thing, as long as you bring something new to it.” In the case of Spinout, Angel upgraded his surf-strumental with a key change, guest hollering from SpongeBob SquarePants actor Tom Kenny and a primal new solo.
“I’m kind of known for these real dumb rock ’n’ roll solos,” he says. “I just played way up on the 17th fret and stayed there for the whole solo. I was trying to boil it down to the simplest, most primitive lead.
“Neither Greg nor I think of ourselves as super-pickers, where we’re gonna dazzle you with our guitar chops,” Angel continues. “We think of ourselves as songwriters – but within that, we can do certain things.”
Though Somos reimagines Los Straitjackets’ collective past, something extra-fresh was the big gear-swap on Cry for a Beatle. The sevenths-spiked Merseybeat homage has drummer and songwriter Chris Sprague hitting a 12-string, while bassist Pete Curry beats the skins and Angel rips low-end hammer-ons as the requisite, McCartney-esque four-stringer.
It’s less apparent, but the Fab Four also inform the thick-browed trash-rock of Numbskull, via one uncannily parabolic quarter-note motif. “That’s the solo reversed, like the Beatles did on Rain,” Angel says of the walk-down-to-walk-up effect. “We just thought it was so ridiculous to put in a song like Numbskull, this kind of art-rock idea of a backwards guitar.”
While Somos reflects the nearly 40-year-old band’s heritage, it also points to their future. Three album tracks feature Angel’s son, Simon Heeran, on guitar. Recently, the younger six-stringer – who also plays with country-rockers Wasted Major – has even slapped on a glitter-sequined mask and taken on the stage name El Niño to fill in on the occasional Straitjackets set, as Townson has stepped away from touring.
“He’s 24, and he’s got this young brain, man,” Angel says proudly of his guitar-slinging progeny. “He can just soak things up. He’s a fast learner, and he’s got good chops. All he needs now is seasoning – the thing that just comes with time. But anything we throw at him, he can play.”
In other words, the kid’s no numbskull.
- Somos Los Straitjackets is out now via Yep Roc Records.
- This article first appeared in Guitar World. Subscribe and save.
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