It Came from Nashville

There's an old-fashioned, good-time quality about Webb Wilder & the Beatnecks that makes this weird outfit fun to listen to. Recorded in the 1980s, It Came From Nashville revels in electric guitars and straightforward rock & roll, which really wasn't the norm for the time unless one counts the Stray Cats. Wilder's vocals possess a dramatic flare that put songs like "I'm Wise to You" and "Move on Down the Line" right over the top in the best sense. At times the material runs close to camp (as with the spoken intro to "Devil's Right Hand"), while at other times it sounds as though it should've had commercial potential ("It Gets in Your Blood"). Mostly, though, Webb, Donny "The Twangler" Roberts, Denny Blakely, Jimmy Lester, and the Ionizer cut straight to the chase, combining no nonsense rockabilly to create little jewels like "Poolside" and "Ruff Rider." As with early rock, meaningful lyrics make way for a more visceral approach, leading to music that you feel in your bones. The re-release of It Came From Nashville in 2004 (also on Landslide) includes a half-dozen unreleased live tracks, lengthening the album's running time to over 70 minutes. Webb Wilder and the gang may have not taken themselves as serious as musical peers like U2 and R.E.M., but they nonetheless created a solid album that harked back to the roots of rock. ~ Ronnie D. Lankford, Jr., Rovi