RHUM

Some time back before most of us were born, a great schism occurred in rock'n'roll.  Some of its disciples - the precursors to 80s hair metal and the U2s, Jets and Kings of Leons of today - decided rock was all about fancy clothes, deceptively crisp and radio-friendly production and catchy power ballads. 

Disgusted by this betrayal of the Original Sound, another faction led by Iggy and the Stooges and the Ramones disappeared into the seedy depths of rock and roll to take drugs and electrocute themselves in pools of sweat and beer, not to be heard from by the mainstream again until one K. Cobain emerged from his trailer park to rip apart commercial radio for a few brief, glorious years.

Firmly belonging to the second camp, Destroy All Monsters was formed in the mid 1970s with feline, feral, extremely-sexy-but-would-probably-kill-you Niagara as its front woman.  The band was so damn rock'n'roll that it never even managed to release a proper album before it disintegrated again in the 80s, but decades on Niagara is still ripping it up on stage for anyone brave enough to attend a show. 

St Valentine's Day Massacre is a live recording of a show from 2008 in which Niagara is backed by Sydney's The Hitmen, an authentic underground Australian band from the 70s.  The album contains a savage, raw, electric set of Stooges, Destroy All Monsters and Hitmen tracks being blasted at a defenceless crowd in southern Sydney.  Niagara is a powerful presence - she shakes and shrieks her way through the set as the band thrashes relentlessy on in her wake. 

The recording itself is good (if mastered a little on the quiet side), and conveys the rawness of the music - tracks are cut short, Niagara has shouted one-way conversations with the crowd, the guitars crackle and you can smell the beer and sweat coming out of your speakers.  This kind of music is elemental: I would love to round up every tamborine shaking hipster and uptight, strutting pop-rocker from this year's festival circuit and make them attend a show like this at gunpoint to remind them that the music they grew from still has a brutal, wildly beating heart.

4/5 (unless you are looking forward to Powderfinger and Groove Armada at the BDO, in which case put a minus in front of that).