CD Review: Fastway - Eat Dog Eat
MVD Audio
All Access Review: B+
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| Fastway - Eat Dog Eat 2012 |
Comprised of rock and roll gypsies eager to reinvent
themselves, the Fastway that churned out the blazing fireball of blues-stoked
heavy metal that was their self-titled 1983 debut was very different from the
confused jumble of imitators and Johnny-come-latelys that hung around at the
end to watch it all come crumbling down. What had been a bona fide supergroup
that combined the DNA of Motorhead, UFO and Humble Pie was, by the late ‘80s, a
shell of its former self. And so was “Fast” Eddie Clarke, once a fret-scorching
dynamo with Motorhead.
Gone was Jerry Shirley, former drum basher for Humble Pie
and Fastway’s indefatigable combustion engine. Gone back home to Ireland was singer
Dave King and that screaming alley-cat wail of his. And Pete Way … well, ol’
Pete, a man without a country following his departure from UFO, never even made
it on that first record, having been shanghaied for Ozzy Osbourne’s band before
Fastway ever stepped foot in the studio – this despite starting Fastway with
Clarke in 1982.
That left Clarke as the sole surviving original member, and
he was having a bad time of it in rehab by the end of the ’80s. In a palace
coup of sorts, Clarke was usurped as Fastway’s leader, and without him in the
driver’s seat, the fractured unit produced the disappointingly synthetic On Target and Bad Bad Girls. Released in 1988 and 1990, respectively, they were
as schlocky and bloodless as the worst ‘80s metal had to offer. Not that Clarke
had much to do with any of it. He was focused on overcoming his addictions,
leaving “Fast” Eddie little opportunity to join Fastway in the studio on either
one of those records, and his absence was felt. All those synthesizers and
computer drums – that was clearly not the “Fast” Eddie way
Influenced heavily by the British blues boom of the 1960s,
Clarke’s blazing leads and tough, working-class riffs – on display during
Motorhead’s most exciting era and found in the kinetic energy of Fastway’s
early days – are born of a taste for simple, uncomplicated music that aims
straight for the gut and seeps into the soul. Perhaps that’s why he walked away
from Fastway in the early ‘90s, covering the old girl with a tarp and letting
rust have at its compromised legacy. He could no longer stand by and watch
Fastway devolve into a glossy, fabricated mess.
No one could have predicted Fastway’s glorious 2012 return –
not Nostradamus and certainly not the Mayans. For two decades, Fastway remained
dormant, but Clarke, possibly troubled by how he’d left things, has restored
the abandoned vehicle, and the good news is it is absolutely road worthy.
Titled Eat Dog Eat, the latest effort
from Fastway is, in many ways, a throwback to a bygone age, one that prized the
holy trinity of guitars, drums and bass and couldn’t get enough of good, honest
songwriting – elements always in abundance in Clarke’s work, here strengthened
by some of the most rigorous grooves and ballsy riffage of his career, not to
mention his searing solos. From the stomping funk of “Freedom Song” to the
nasty, swinging riffs of the hot-wired “Leave the Light On” – the track most
reminiscent of Fastway’s earliest efforts – Eat
Dog Eat is made of strong stuff, as evidenced by the relentless march of muscular,
driving guitars that plow their way through the simmering tension of “Deliver
Me.” In similar fashion, though the mood is much darker and the expansive choruses
grow and fan out like plumes of black smoke signaling a fire in the distance,
“Fade Out” grinds out a rugged, rough-and-tumble existence. Underneath Jepson’s
impassioned, powerhouse vocals and flashing, occasionally sparkling guitars, a raging
undercurrent of bass lines rumble as if an earthquake is imminent – the same
signs of which are evident in the slow-burning “Who Do You Believe?” and those
wah-wah effects of Clarke’s that light up the trac
And while “Dead and Gone” is surely no seismic event, it is
a surprising anomaly for Fastway and “Fast” Eddie, whose aversion to anything
acoustic is well-documented. While the thoughtful lyrics meditate on mortality,
the loss of faith and the recovery of belief, “Dead and Gone” opens with a
stark, melancholy cycle of acoustic-guitar picking from Jepson before he deftly
brushes and strums the golden hair of those strings ever so gently. But, in the
end, Clarke just can’t help himself, and when the words turn hopeful and
downright uplifting and Jepson’s voice grows increasingly defiant, Clarke
provides support in the way of rocky, sharply struck electric chords.
Never one to reinvent the wheel, Clarke is happiest when
song structures have good bones – basic elements like undeniable hooks and
gripping melodies, such as those found in the hard-charging “Sick as a Dog,” a
galloping horse of a track that refuses to spit the bit. By the time “On and
On” shuffles ponderously onto Eat Dog Eat’s
well-worn stage, however, it’s hard not to be slightly numbed by the sameness
of much of the record, or more specifically, the trudging tempos that become a
little too routine and predictable while taking their own sweet time to bloom
into bigger, more dramatic endings. Thankfully, the closer “Only If You Want
It” offers more in the way of soulful, acrobatic dynamics and righteous energy.
On the whole, Eat Dog
Eat redeems Fastway. The imagery of a mangy cur on the cover is not only
appropriate, but it is emblematic of Fastway itself. Fastway is the
malnourished underdog prowling the city streets in search of food, and though it’s
been beaten occasionally,the animal is too tough to die and too optimistic to
give up the fight. That hunger and desperation, not to mention the desire to
restore Fastway’s good name, pushes Dog
Eat Dog toward greatness.
-
Peter Lindblad
