Music releases

Stick 'Em Up

Stick 'Em Up

By The Perpetrators

Released
Wednesday, October 30, 2013
Catalog No.
1472
Stick 'Em Up

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"Smokes 'n Chicken"

Stick 'Em Up

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"Sweetgrass"

Stick 'Em Up

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"Take You On"

The Perpetrators
Stick 'Em Up (Independent)
Just when it looked as if popular music was getting a little too serious -- what with its endless debates about the sexuality of Miley and Robin or the sincerity of Kanye and Jay Z (all of which are necessary, but also kind of exhausting) -- along come the Perpetrators to remind us that this music thing is supposed to be fun, damn it.
Fronted by guitarist extraordinaire Jay Nowicki, the Winnipeg trio (rounded out by drummer Ken McMahon and rotating bassists John Scoles and Ryan Menard) is a meat-and-potatoes, blues-based roadhouse band that knows full well that kick-over-the table, full-tilt boogie is the perfect soundtrack for release at the end of a day.
That's not to say Nowicki and Co. can't be keen observers of life and its foibles. Among these 10 bloozy tracks on the vagaries of love, travel and getting paid, the trio offer up a tune that can proudly take its place alongside One Great City as a quintessential Winnipeg song.
To the backing of a rollicking shuffle, Smokes and Chicken is a talking blues tale of two small-time, strong-arm robberies, one downtown and one in Transcona. The premise is almost comic, until the tune picks up intensity and Nowicki's refrain of, "Get the gun outta my face, I spent my money on smokes and chicken," becomes an aggrieved howl. It's a stunning piece of work, delivered with requisite anguish.
And, of course, the grin and wink of a survivor. **** (4 Stars)
DOWNLOAD THIS: Smokes and Chicken
-- John Kendle

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