Immortal Lee County Killers2 :The Real F*$ked Up Blues
by Reggie Ballumtime - 4/3/2003
Those who missed The Immortal Lee County Killers 2 at The Union last October will get a second chance to see one of the most electrifying acts touring today. The folks who saw the bands' first Athens performance will surely return. In contrast to the multitudes of stripped down "punk blues" duos touring the country these days, ILCK2 play it heavier, meaner and faster. They take the blues and smash it like a $2 guitar.
You could say that sweat, energy, volume and desparation set apart the ILCK2 sound. Chet El Cheetah Weiss (guitar/vocals) primarily plays slide on his one-of-a-kind bastard guitar through two extremely electrified tube amplifiers set atop two time-beaten speaker cabinets. One set for treble, the other for bass. He uses an a/b box to switch between the two, or run them both simultaneoulsy. Vocally his lungs have literally destroyed P.A. systems. J.R.R. Tolkien's (The Tolkien One - drums) big beat is essential to the ILCK2 sound. When asked to describe his style, The Tolkien One simply responded "WOOOOOOO!"
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The duo chose to name themselves The Immortal Lee County Killers after their home in Lee County AL, Jerry Lee Lewis, and a burning desire for immortality. These guys were bred on the likes of Skip James, Hound Dog Taylor, The Stooges, Black Sabbath, Rolling Stones, John Lee Hooker, John Coltrane, and Pussy Galore. Combining these influences with their own uniqueness, ILKC2 play a new kind of music distinguished, but not limited by their roots. The New York Press wrote , "The Killers make (names witheld) look like a couple of blues prudes...the Killers violently slash and burn through the blues with nasty noise." Consider ILCK2 has performed with the like of Mississippi blues legend T. Model Ford to seminal punk rockers The New Bomb Turks to acid rockers Nebula.
Here's a recent interview with The New York Press.....
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The first time I saw the Killers play live was at the Vegas Shakedown. That was a pretty amazing show-it was over 110 degrees in that little club and everyone was hot and tired and you guys took over the whole event in just one set.
Chet Weise: Well, I guess first I've gotta tell you that the Tokien One is the new drummer for the Killers.
So you're no longer with the Boss...
Tokien One: Oh, I'm the boss, baby.
CW: He's the new boss. That was Doug ["the Boss" Sherrard] who played the Shakedown and that was his last show. The Tokien One has played four shows with the Killers, but we played together in the Quadrajets for years. But yeah, the Shakedown was fun. I was disappointed that some bands canceled and quite a few folks that I know didn't come to the show 'cause of the terrorist stuff. It was understandable but disappointing too.
TO: Lots of bands are canceling tours and stuff and that just don't need to happen. People need to step up to the plate. It's entertainment and our job as professional entertainers is to go out there night in and night out and make people forget about their shitty little lives. If we can make them forget about their shitty little lives for, you know, 10 minutes, then we've done our job.
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Chet, watching you play is crazy because you get totally possessed by the music. When I saw you in Vegas you were like an electrified sweatrag with a guitar.
CW: Playing is kind of my therapy. I don't think I'd be alive today if it wasn't for playing music. I don't lose my shit offstage very much because I lose it onstage. [Laughs]
Before you started playing music you were losing your shit a lot?
CW: I can't remember when I wasn't playing music. Growing up in Memphis helped me out a lot 'cause I used to go downtown and see the blues performers and they used to let me–when I was 14 or 15 years old–come into the blues bars and serve me liquor and I'd watch, like, Albert King and that left quite an impression on me. And if there's any record that really got me going it was probably a record by John Lee Hooker called Lonesome Mood. They've repackaged John Lee Hooker so much that now I think the record's called If You Miss 'Im, I Got 'Im.
How'd you start going down to the blues bars in the first place?
CW: Good question. I guess I was trying to find something different to do. I actually grew up in a suburb called Germantown–pretty typical upper-middle-class boring stuff. So going down to Beale St. and seeing all those street parties and music was quite exciting.
What do you think about all these current bands mixing punk and the blues, bands like the White Stripes and the King Brothers and in some ways Delta 72?
TO: We're the only band that matters! The other bands are just jumping on the Killers' bandwagon. We emit electricity and entertainment 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, seven days a week, and that's including leap year too. We're king shit of fuck mountain. Why would anybody want to fuck with us?
I like that attitude. You've only played with the band a couple times and already you're the best.
TO: It's real simple for El Cheetah and El Tokien to pull this off 'cause all those other bands that you mentioned, they're not from the South. They don't have any idea.
CW: Delta 72 has more of the Philadelphia soul kind of sound and the White Stripes, I really like their records too, but they're a lot different from what we do. It's more country-blues-oriented and a little louder, messier, dirtier. The White Stripes are kinda like Motown and we're kinda like Stax. I think the punk blues that's going on now is going full circle, where the music's ended up back where it started and it's stripped down–like the White Stripes are a two-piece, the Soledad Brothers are a two-piece, we're a two-piece.
TO: We're the best two-piece, by the way, if I did not say that before. We're the best damn two-piece the world has ever seen.
Different bands have their different takes on the blues, but what I love about the Killers is that your songs are some of the fastest and craziest.
CW: I think the speed comes from being in the South and listening to, like, Mississippi Fred McDowell and some of the people from the hill country. They really get things moving as far as their tempos go and that's something that I've been really into.
TO: The Tokien One has come to the conclusion that people, whether they like to admit it or not, like their rock 'n' roll music like they like their sex–they like it fast and they like it hard.
CW: But just like sex, every once in a while we'll throw in a good gospel ballad just to switch positions [laughs]. The next record that me and the Tokien One are gonna do, it's gonna be pretty rocked out but we are also gonna put in some acoustic stuff, some gospel stuff, an Otis Redding song and maybe a Washington Phillips song. We'll probably slow this next one down for a couple of tunes.
Now, Tokien One, I know Jerry Lee Lewis has been kind of the patron saint for the Killers. Are you a fan of the man as well?
TO: The Tokien One likes the Killer. We see eye to eye on a lot of things. The other night the Tokien One went down to Beale St. and he looked over and Jerry Lee was just dancing on the ivories and he looked over and said, ‘Tokien one, you, too, have great balls of fire!'
The Immortal Lee County Killers 2 will be performing at The Union Saturday April 12th with Geraldine, Reptilian Records' The Means, and We March. Don't miss it!!!!
