Nous Sommes The Tremolo Beer Gut... Qui Le F**k Êtes-Vous

Album Review

The Tremolo Beer Gut lay it down thick and filthy on their awesomely named third long-player, and first in eight years, a solid half-hour of straight-ahead spy-tinged surf rock. Though these Danes (and one Swede — Per Sunding of power pop greats Eggstone) clearly have a keen and stylistically relevant sense of humor when it comes to song titles and visual design, their musical approach is refreshingly no-nonsense, hardly reliant on the kind of kitschiness you might expect from a group whose output is so firmly rooted in a sound that's over 50 years old. Which isn't to say that this record isn't a tremendous amount of fun, merely that it has an impressive amount of substance to back up its oh-so-crucial style. The Beer Gut are as accomplished as performers as they are as composers (and particularly melodists, being Scandinavian and all), stretching out with some impressively intricate arrangements which complement the obligatory clean-toned, lavishly reverbed guitars with organs, vibes, pedal steel, and more. And every so often they do see fit to throw in a vocal carrying-on and even a punchline or two, as with the animal noises and maniacal laughter of "Zoo Bizzare" and the sadistic countdown of "9 Times the Pain." If you enjoy surf music and have any interest in hearing a contemporary (but scarcely modernized) take on the genre, these guys are well worth getting to know; and you won't need to know Danish — or even French. ~ K. Ross Hoffman, Rovi