
The '60s psych and garage revival is getting a bit tired—the cliché no less corny now than in 1967—but with the Angels you don't get any of that clever and sloppy punk kitsch or earnest flower power whimsy that's getting so grating these days. No, this is the spirit of rock'n'roll—a good mix of fuck-off fun and lose-yerself death trip transcendence. For all their negligible lyrics and nostalgic rhetoric—that «Turn on, tune in and drone out» Pop Art PR schtick—at least they're not cerebral. This music is sex & death. And if you're not sure whether that's a good thing, you of all people really need to hear this:
- Better Off Alone
- The Sniper at the Gates of Heaven
- Deer-ree-shee
- Bloodhounds on My Trail
- Black Grease
- Doves
- Ronnettes
- Civilization (with Roky Erickson)
- Syd Barrett Blues (by Christian Bland)

«Civilization» is the Black Angels backing original 13th Floor Elevator Roky Erickson! How's that for street cred. It makes Black Angel Christian Bland—whose first solo recording (the blues about Syd Barrett) was issued by French label Dead Bees—less questionable for writing a song about the Pink Floyd firefly, in the first-person. But Bland's home rec guitar noise trades his house for the cosmos. Stellar.
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