One of the best things about 2017 was the re-emergence of class of Y2K garage sensations, The Buzzards. I mostly knew them from just absolutely slaying the entire game on the Jack White assembled and produced Sympathetic Sounds of Detroit comp, and also a ground shaking video that had made the rounds on the net in the years since. When I heard they’d be putting out a new single and playing Panic In Hamtramck #12, I was STOKED.
The Buzzards always seemed like a chance not taken, like why are they so mysterious, blasting our these stone-killers on comps and putting out these top-notch (but infrequent) singles? Joe Dirty had his band The Dirtys and Luxury Rides. Buzzards Guitarist Maribel Restepo is in The Detroit Cobras. The Cobras were John Peel favorites, along with The White Stripes, so she was likely touring the world. I think some of this explains why we don’t have a proper Buzzards LP, and I hope they remedy that. Or at least knock us out some new singles! Their latest single “You Got Me Down” (Jett Platic/Ziti) came out a few months back and made my 2017 year-end TOP 10.
After I got wind of new rumblings in Buzzards-land, I sent front-Buzzard Joe Dirty a bunch of records and tapes I’d put out over the years with a note inside hoping The Buzzards might do up a song for a comp I’d been working on called Our Voltage. This is the song that he ended up sending me. It’s a legit artifact from the early aughts Detroit rock n roll explosion. Recorded by Jim Diamond at Ghetto Recorders, it’s called, “Tennesee”. I asked him about the song and he said, “It’s about being stuck in Tennessee while on tour and being so broke I had to get a job at the Arcade Restaurant in Memphis. The Bill Monroe part was an inside joke about a friend of mine who once argued that Bill Monroe was from Memphis because he sang “Blue Moon of Kentucky”! He somehow thought Memphis was in Kentucky, haha!”
[bandcamp width=100% height=120 album=2639188483 size=large bgcol=ffffff linkcol=0687f5 tracklist=false artwork=small track=1896349269]
TENNESSEE
Tennessee I’m coming down it’s like friction
Stretch out on the rollaway couch Tennessee
All the paint in the world can’t cover up the mess I’m in aw yeah
and rock and roll has turned my lungs into snakeskin
Looked up and stared at the sun and now I’m blinded
blinded by the blinding lights that I saw
don’t you know yeah baby believing is seeing aw yeah
Catch fire with the soul of Bill Monroe
Tennessee I’m hanging out up on the rooftop
fall down the smokestack again Tennessee
All The soul in the world can’t cover up stress I’m in aw yeah
me again the heat of the summer again
Dropped out and I keep to myself, now I’m crazy
crazy like someone who’s lost his mind
don’t want to know about all the things that I have lost aw yeah
high action high-volume all at a high cost
Tennessee I’m coming back
going to come on in again
Tennessee I’m coming down
in one step
two steps
three steps
four steps
five
All right
All right
Tennessee I’m coming down it’s like friction
Stretch out on the rollaway couch Tennessee
All the paint in the world can’t cover up the mess I’m in aw yeah
and rock and roll has turned my lungs into snakeskin
Looked up and stared at the sun and now I’m blinded
blinded by the blinding lights that I saw
don’t you know yeah baby believing is seeing aw yeah
Catch fire with the soul of Bill Monroe
Tennessee I’m hanging out up on the rooftop
Fall down the smokestack again Tennessee
All The soul in the world can’t cover up stress I’m in aw yeah
me again the heat of the summer again
Dropped out and I keep to myself Now I’m crazy
crazy like someone who’s lost his mind
don’t want to know about all the things that I have lost aw yeah
high action high-volume all at a high cost
high action high-volume all at a high cost
high action high-volume all at a high cost
high action high-volume all at a high cost
