Published on Dec 1, 2003
With an album titled
Lady Luck, a casual music fan might think of Broadzilla as
nothing more than a crack music act that is just happy to have laid
some tracks to wax. But, considering the fact that this trio has
won the Best Hard Rock Band award from the Detroit Music Awards the
past three years, it would be wise to dispel that notion. It might
be more prudent to believe that the title
Lady Luck actually defines words of modesty.
With obvious influences ranging from the big rock sounds of
bands like KISS and Ted Nugent, Broadzilla have recently embarked
on an international audience with a September, 2003 re-release of
the same album in the U.K. Demand must be high as the girls have
been on two separate tours of the United Kingdom having generated
an initial buzz worthy of a repeated invitation.
Vocalist and guitarist Rachel May, aka Rachelzilla, has a voice
that screams an angry likeness to a young Pat Benatar. It’s an
impassioned voice that is very suited to complement her aggressive
lead guitar work which, paired with bassist Kimzilla (Kim
Essiambre), has the ability to come across with a fury resembling
the Fast Eddie Clarke and Lemmy Kilmister tandem during their
Motorhead days. “Burn Baby Burn!” is the track that showcases this
claim the best.
No offense to Lemmy and the boys, but some of Broadzilla’s best
work on
Lady Luck is reflected on the tracks where the structures of
the songs aren’t so in-your-face. The title track has such an
obvious Benatar sound laid over riffs that KISS would be proud to
own. (Sorry, Mr. Simmons. I use the ownership claim figuratively!)
It’s this repeated formula that makes this album so refreshing.
Unpretentious rock n’ roll filled with big hooks hasn’t sounded
this good for a long time.
In addition, the lyrical compositions of the songs are pretty
captivating. I’ve now learned that a liquor snatch is a “drunken
fool” who is still “hung over from the night before.” Somehow, I’m
sure the inspiration for such words in the song “Liquor Snatch”
were found on a dusky night driving through the rough and tumble
stretches of Detroit’s Michigan Avenue.
With an opening verse of “You’re the kind of guy that white
trash girls adore, but your mullet’s been out since 1984,” the song
“Y Did You Have 2B Psycho” avoids the many of the tired lines that
hard rock songs tend to gravitate towards. Actually, this song is a
pretty vicious and succinct dart thrown at the male groupie action
Rachelzilla professes to be exposed to in every town Broadzilla
plays. The rock and roll cliché that this song avoids would
easily be something along the lines of don’t mess with the bull,
you’re gonna get the horns. Kudos for Broadzilla’s lyrical
departure in this area.
I am also noting that guitarists Christine Sixteen and Mary
Currie of the rock band Mensen seemingly lift the opening guitar
riff of Broadzilla’s “Four:Twenty” track when they performed their
song “Keep Up” on their recently released
Oslo City album. I’m sure it’s coincidence but it’s that
riff that I praised as being the catalyst for launching such a good
effort back on
9/16/2003. The fuzzed-out riff
does the same justice for “Four:Twenty” as it does for Mensen’s
song.
Another song not to be overlooked is Broadzilla’s cover of
fellow homegirls, the Supremes, when “Love Child” is performed. In
fact, Broadzilla’s version is so hard-rock sounding that I at first
missed the correlation to the original. In my book, that’s the sign
of a cover song worth performing.
So, how can you dispute an album that was recorded in the midst
of a band winning three successive Detroit Hard Rock Band of the
Year awards? With the city of Detroit and hard rock being
synonymous with one another, I surely can’t.
Lady Luck is a gem worth its weight in gold.