(www.crankcountydaredevils.com

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Who woulda thunk it that the sleaziest, raunchiest and most rockin’ Hollywood-style street-metal band would actually hail from Asheville, North Carolina? These boys may be from the sticks but they have that Sunset Strip hard rock sound down better than anyone on the actual Strip has in a looong muthafuckin’ time.

Sounding like the bastard child of Too Fast For Love-era Motley Crue and Faster Pussycat, Crank County Daredevils rip and tear like alley cats in a bag, clawing to get out and bang a bitch. This 9-song-strong Molotov COCK-tail of rawk just flat-out friggin’ rocks from the opening notes of the “Public Enemy #1”-sounding title track all the way through to the LA Guns-inspired “Back In the Nasty.” From top to bottom, this is one badass disc, baby. “Ride the Dog” is exactly what the titles implies, a sex-fueled raunch-n-roll nut-buster carried by a bucket-o-bolts rhythm section (supplied by bassist Billy Velvet and drummer Mark Hammer) “Hammerdown” gets all Nuge-like and gets ya in a stranglehold, while “Line ‘Em Up” could be off just about any Nashville Pussy album and “High” is their double-time metal boogie.

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But it’s the ones with the hip shakin’ mid-tempo grooves that really kill me. “Shut Your Lip” is pure Faster Pussycast circa Wake Me When It’s Over, and is the kinda tune that will forever be played in strip clubs if they hit it big-time. “Bitch Be Cool” is equally thrilling. With it’s detuned power riff (courtesy of Adam Stevens, I presume) and Scotty P’s distorted knife-in-the-throat vocal delivery, the first 30-seconds sound like the sonic equivalent of a barroom throwdown. Pure violence on wax.

This is music for junkies, drug dealers, smut peddlers, alcoholic, addicts, gypsies, tramps, hookers and thieves, baby… or at least kids that wanna dance like ‘em. Makes me wanna fight, fuck and get nasty, and THAT is what I like in a rock album.

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