Diabolical Boogie: Singles, Demos & Rarities 1992 B.C. - 1998 A.D.

The Chrome Cranks were hardly the best or most original exponents of the raunchy punk blues hybrid that began to make the rounds in the early '90s (an assessment frontman Peter Aaron cops to in his liner notes to this set), but their commitment to sleaze and aural damage was second to none, and the rattling bellow of their horny but nihilistic roar has been collected in exhaustive form on this collection. Diabolical Boogie: Singles, Demos & Rarities presents 33 slabs of impure noise from the Cranks, eleven of which have never seen the light of day before, and most of which appeared on singles or compilations that have been dead out of print for years; for fans, this is a treasure trove of tainted candy, and if it's more Chrome Cranks than most beginners might ever need, it makes for a powerful portrait of what they did and how well they could bring it across. While Aaron's vocals — a hybrid of Nick Cave and Lux Interior working at Gibby Haynes' level of psychosis — were the aural signature of this band, it was William Weber's expertly twisted guitar patterns and Jerry Teel's subsonic bass runs that gave his madness its proper platform, and while this set jumps back and forth in time throughout the group's career, nearly all of this sounds of a piece — dark, blues-shot, noisy but dripping with raw, sweaty emotion and more a celebration of their own darkness as a warning against how they got there. Unless or until someone puts together a Chrome Cranks box set, Diabolical Boogie will stand as the last word on their special brand of dirty-ass rock & roll, and it makes for one impressive ride through the gutter.