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The Whole Story
© 2000 Funky Fu Manchu Music BMI

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The Swaggerts
The Whole Story

Total Time: 37:42
Cost: $9.98 +s/h*

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STYLE: Punkabilly

HOME TOWN: New Haven, CT

Visit The Swaggerts Feralette Records
WEB PAGE

The Swaggerts


1. Rockbottom
2. Bonnie
3. The Whole Story
4. All Wound Up
5. Take A Chance With Me
6. All Day Sucker For You
7. Jezebel
8. American Beer
9. Big Ol' But
10. Telling My Bad Dreams To You
11.  Last Call For My Love
12. Big Beach Jihad

Check out The Swaggerts CD: 
Keepers Of The Quaich

Issue #48                              Apr. '03

Nashville: Its streets are paved with broken hearts, its bars are filled with lost souls, and its recording studios are jammed with every country star and wannabe whoever looked to lessen their load by pouring out their story through a microphone with a bottle of Jack Daniels in one hand and a guitar in the other.

Enter The Swaggerts. Brought to the Music City by Price Harrison of Feralette Records, this balls-out, hellfire, Rockabilly Trio with a punk attitude ripped up the long dusty trail from the Elm City and turned it into a non-stop pedal-to-the-metal binge of excessive R&B driven, rockin’ country twang.

Using the power of George Thorogood and The Delaware Destroyers, less swing than The Stray Cats, the influence of Duane Eddy, Gene Vincent and countless others, and the attitude of The Clash (lent to domestic issues as opposed to political), The Swaggerts toss us into the car and hurl us down the lane – Hit the juke joint and order a double whiskey straight up, it’s going to be a long drive as the tales of love (lost, lusted, conquered, confused, true, unrequited, etc.) pour forth with as much break neck speed as Commander Cody and his Lost Planet Airmen. From the opening track of The Whole Story, The Swaggerts take chase of that Hot Rod Lincoln and they don’t stop until it’s over.

Our driver is Bill “Catdog” Collins (vocals, guitars) and he starts the engine with the manic Rockabilly of “Rockbottom” – He’s been dumped – hard. And, after drowning his sorrows in liquor we are “Rocked to the right”, and “Rocked to the left” along with the motoring rhythm section of  “Nervus” Chet Pervis (bass, background vocals) and “Howlin” Ron Wolfe (drums, background vocals). These lead us to an extended middle bridge – and it must be late because we can feel the darkness as we are driven across, we can hear the car horns warning us of the danger ahead, we see the guardrails passing by like split rail fences - then, when Bill delivers his message to his lost honey in a spoken word reading: “Do you remember the night you walked out on me…/ The night I literally lost my mind?/ I crawled, I begged, I pleaded with you not to go/And something deep inside me broke and died.” we believe him, and we strap in for the rest of the ride.

Bonnie” spits out one of the most perfect fractured love stories ever: That of Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker. It’s basically Clyde’s confession of pure true love for his Bonnie. A romantic fairytale set in the frantic pace of the soundtrack to a life of imminent danger and tragedy – The one, the only; Live Fast And Die soliloquy that reveals the depth of love realized in death together. A pledge, an undying loyalty, delivered as a message to those who cannot see The Whole Story of the passion and commitment of true love.

The Swaggerts tie up the concept of this Album with the title track. After wallowing in the heartache of “Rockbottom” and celebrating ideal (albeit socially faulted) romance with “Bonnie,” “The Whole Story” tells the sorry tale of divorce from a man’s perspective; a point that reveals the heartbreak of not being confronted by your faults, nor the laying bare of the whole truth. Delivered to a pumped romp of solid R&B with the lead guitar carving its way through the heart, we understand his plight, but wonder what the other side of the story might be.

Or, perhaps the other side of the story is that of many. And, through the course of this disc many of those yarns get tossed at us. From the ballads of  Take A Chance With Me,” with its cruisin’ melody and highlight background vocals – the dead-on George Jones modeled “Telling My Bad Dreams To You” and the Down-Low hip thrust of the young “so hot he was on fire” rock, sex god Presley as channeled through Buddy Holly tale of wanton lust and desire for “Jezebel.”

Keeping the pedal down and flying through the back roads of these love stories are  All Day Sucker” giving us the “I wanna get in your pants so bad, I’ll go along with anything” take - “American Beer” celebrating the love of domestic brew with a tip of the hat to Chuck Berry and a riotous romp of southern rock where we can find more boots below the bar than sneakers - The Classic double entendre “Big Ol’ But” gives the account of a woman who is always saying “but…” But, when you hear Bill’s reading you’ll be rolling on the floorboards as you understand that this poor fellow is concentrating so hard on her generous backside that he can’t handle the verbal “buts” that are hampering getting his hands on the physical one. –   And, “Last Call For My Love” races us back into the watering hole for one more shot of libidinous pleasure before we head off down the road again.

The instrumental “Big Beach Jihad” closes our slanted Punkabilly trip to Nashville by bringing us out of the gin mills of human relationships (if love can’t be equated with alcohol – then, what else can it be? [sic] in the right amounts the euphoria is invigorating. But, when mass consumed at/in points of [mental] unbalance, can intoxicate us in many different forms that can/will send us off into many unknown and uncertain places including dark alleys and dead ends) and hurling us back down the highway of love induced emotional frailty without the comfort of slowing to a stop, but jerking to a halt only to find us exhaling and wondering if that was indeed The Whole Story?

Want to find out for yourself?

The Whole Story by The Swaggerts
is available now for: $9.98 +s/h*

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*Shipping & Handling charges:
USA - $3.00 for the first 2 CDs ordered,
                     Add $1.50 per each CD after.
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                          Add $2.00 per each CD after.
Everywhere else -$7.00 for the first CD ordered,
                                        Add $3.00 per each CD after.

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