The Penny Black Remedy are the only Balkan infused country and western semi punk outfit named after a stamp that I’m aware of, and I hope nobody else does it, because they do it so well and it’d just dilute the niche genre.‘No One’s Fault But Your Own’ is a storming disc, featuring great tracks like the opener, ’95 Charing Cross Road’, a guitar driven punky-cossack tinged woeful country song, featuring great lyrics like ‘They ruined nearly everything in that raid, But they did not take my heartache, They forgot to take my pain.’ Yet the track remains upbeat, and is a definite dance-along, especially once it all kicks in with a Gogol Bordello styled chants and electric guitar rhythms.
That’s my fear for The Penny Black Remedy, they’re just going to get compared to Bordello, as soon as you say ‘punky’ and ‘eastern-european’ in the same sentence, people will go “oh, like Gogol Bordello!” and I know it. The thing is, the punky moments aren’t that frequent, instead featuring on country and western rhythms and vocals styles, and in the case of singer Keith Thompson, country hats and moustaches (he only has the one moustache by the way).
The album includes everything, all based around a really tight bass and drums rhythm section, it has ska moments, campfire acoustic sing alongs, whiskey drinking chants (yes, I consider some chants to be just for whiskey drinking) and even the occasional quiet heartfelt number.
This album really is the whole package, and I can see it all coming out well live, there’s nothing too fancy, no over the top multi tracking that can’t be pulled off, just driving up tempo tracks which are oh so easy to dance along to, and great sneering vocals and lyrics throughout.
For standout tracks, and if you’re one of those people that downloads a few tracks before you get a full album, try ‘Don’t Count On Us’, a skanking powerhouse featuring both the sultry and searing (in a good way) vocals of Marijana Hajdarhodzic and a great surf style guitar solo. Check out ‘The First Time I Saw Angels’ too, this one really is a country strum-along, it’s got a really Johnny Cash vibe, and with the line ‘Those angels aren’t from heaven, That fucker sent me straight to hell’ how can you not listen to it?
By Rob Barker
Rating: 9/10
Format: Album
Release Date: 18/05/09
Label: Soundinistas
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