ANGRY JOHNNY

"RAZOR BLADE SUIT"

1. Razor Blade Suit 2. Jennie
3. My Best Friend 4. I've Got a...
5. Baby Tonight 6. Death Is Driving A Pontiac
7. I Don't Like Russel 8. When I Woke Up
9. Measure Me Up For A Coffin 10. Mess On The Floor
11. From The Bottom 12. My Time
13. One Last Time 14. Put The Gun Down Bobby
15. Go Out Dancing

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Being another compilation, RAZOR BLADE SUIT is an uneven mix of humor and horror, but the parts that are greater than the whole are damn funny, and damn scary. 
 
MY BEST FRIEND is a joke that's too long in the telling, but the ending -- with the guy left to sit around and grumble at his t.v. set --  brings a smile.
 
I DON'T LIKE RUSSELL could be the idle threats of a blitzed blowhard down at the local bar, who's more likely to harm himself by falling off of his stool.
PUT THE GUN DOWN BOBBY is a standoff between a lawman and a desperate gunman, while the mother looks on -- the made-for-t.v. version of the widescreen epic "High Noon in Killville". 
 
JENNIE seems to be an ode to a trustworthy girlfriend, but don't pat yourself on the back too much if you see it coming:  The reason she will never stray, or go away, is that she is dead on the floor.
 
I'VE GOT A... sounds like the exhausted ramblings of a fugitive killer.  The song, like the man it is about, seems to be running on fumes.
Angry doesn't visit the Old West often enough.  It's a setting that compliments both his gun-toting philosophy and his mandolin-toting band.  In MEASURE ME UP FOR A COFFIN, a pair of doomed lovers are murdered by the evil Sheriff, but the pine-boxed hero vows, "If love is a sin/and Heaven won't let us in/we'll walk into Hell hand in hand."
 
Even more suckers than usual try to off themselves this time out, with Old Scratch as their Kevorkian guide.  BABY TONIGHT finds another betrayed lover trying not to be forgotten by ceasing to exist.  
ONE LAST TIME is more poetic -- "No winners/only losers here/an emptiness/and empty beers." A funeral organ adds a metaphysical sorrow to the earthy proceedings in FROM THE BOTTOM.  
The song that has the last laugh, however, is MESS ON THE FLOOR -- an infectious little suicidal ditty that finds Angry kazoo-ing his way beyond the veil.
GO OUT DANCING is like those spooky montages on "Twin Peaks", when the one-armed man or Bob would appear and start speaking in riddles.  You're not sure what's going on, but whatever it is, it's creepy.
     
WHEN I WOKE UP opens with yet another killer in yet another gore-soaked room, who takes to the highway, hoping -- like "The Hitcher" -- for someone to finally stop him.
The title track is a dead-on look out from behind the eyes of a psychopath, the tune Jack the Ripper might whistle while he works.  "I might kill her/I might cut her/I might leave her in the gutter."
 
This release would be an entertaining enough serving of Angry's leftovers, but the inclusion of DEATH IS DRIVING A PONTIAC makes it a must-have.  At almost seven minutes, this is the craft of songwriting at its purest:  One man, one guitar, and one hell of a story.
  
A pair of serial killers prowl the back roads in a '66 Catalina -- "The Devil don't drive Mopars/The Devil don't drive Fords" -- following orders from Satan on their Delco radio. "Sometimes he sounds exactly just like David Allen Coe/sometimes Bobby Darin/sometimes Barry Manilow."
         
Cowboy and Eugene are the baddest of the bad men Angry has ever sung about.  They leave bloodied bodies wherever they go, from a sodomitic convenience store robbery to a horrifying wedding massacre that makes "Kill Bill" look like "Scooby Doo".
But fear not, the hunters are also being hunted, by a changed man who once rode with them.  "Gabriel enlisted me in the army of The Lord/Traded my damnation for a Dan Wesson .44." 
So evocative is this tale that you find yourself hoping for a great final showdown between the trio, sort of "The Bad, The Badder, and the Ugliest".  And indeed, this may come to pass; Angry is writing a novel about these three.  He tells me it would make a good screenplay, too.  Or maybe a graphic novel.
But you now what I'm thinking?
Concept album.
Or, you know, all of the above.

DON ADAMS