Who the Fuck are The Black Lips?

It’s 1999, the world is about to burst into flames and have monkey demons flying and stuff. Amália Rodrigues dies (maybe the world was really about to end) and in the US two apparently normal high school kids leave home and go to algebra class, with them there’s more firepower then the whole Portuguese country and they kill/injured more people than the Portuguese army in all their history. I’m not kidding, we got ridden of dictatorship without firing a gun. So, it’s 1999, Amália dies and two young boys give rise to the Columbine Massacre. As moral majority as US rednecks can be, instead of restricting fire arms, schools began to kick out students that were the so called, “subculture danger”. Two of these students were Cole and Jared, guitarist and bassist of The Black Lips. So 1999 wasn’t the end of the world as some might though but was it the beginning of the end? For the Black Lips it seemed so, as the original lineup had one death before they even got a record! Later substituted by Ian St Pé, the booze seller for them in young age and with Joe in drums they never changed the lineup again. Well at least when they’re not touring with King Khan (of the infamous King Khan and BBQ Show) who often joins them throughout their rock celebration. The Black Lips have already a small career, spanning through six albums. In 2007 we can find “Good Bad not Evil”, their cornerstone. Equivalent to London Calling for The Clash or Let it Bleed for The Rolling Stones, tracks like “Bad Kids”, “Cold Hands” or the infamous “Katrina” excelled to perfection in the raw garage sound that they had until then, thus creating a new kind of garage-psichodelic-country-punk anthems. Also, they got a little smell of success, appearing in some important covers of magazines and featuring in Conan O’Brien when he, well, still had a TV show. So, it’s 1999. And guess who also died? Kubrick. Guess whose concerts are like watching Clockwork Orange? Ok, they don’t really call themselves droogs, wear white and drink milk, but the malice, the explicit content is all there… they vomit, they kiss, they play guitar with their dicks, they spit, they bleed, they sweat and then… everybody’s doing it, like their song suggestive song, "Everybody's Doing It"! They got even kicked out from India after a few shows in a land, well let’s put it this way, not so used to foreigners playing naked. Outrageous and as real as rock’ n’ roll should be, you get involved with the music, with the antics and most likely you start singing “do you really wanna hold my dirty hands?” and next minute you’re in a stage invasion pumped up with whatever you drink or took from the crazy naked guy jumping up and down in a complete freakshow, seeing chariots of hell driven by amps and sweats! Whoa! And this is not in 1999, this was last week in a Black Lips concert!

By Ranho Ácido