Back in Southern Culture On The Skids’ salad days, the crazed garageabilly trio—guitarist/vocalist Rick Miller, bassist/vocalist Mary Huff and drummer/vocalist Dave Hartman—would often practice and sometimes open for themselves as the Pinecones, an evocation of the West Coast psych/folk/country influences that rarely surfaced in the SCOTS regular output. The threesome’s groovy new album touches on a lot of their favorite ’60s reference points, but they’re heavily refracted in the band’s cracked rockabilly funhouse mirror. From the reverbed go-go shimmer of album-opener “Freak Flag” and the gothic surf-meets-Mamas And The Papas vibe of “Dirt Road” to Buck Owens-channels-Hank Williams toetapper “I Ain’t Gonna Hang Around” and the spooky Appalachian psychedelia of “Grey Skies” to the backwoods Big Star-tributes-the Doors slink of “Waiting On You,” SCOTS does exactly what it has always done from a slightly different but equally colorful and skewed vantage point.
—Brian Baker
