Michael McCall's
essay in the booklet of
the 'Still Standing' reissue.
Michael McCall, Nashville, TN
July, 2002
Midway into STILL STANDING, Jason
and the Scorchers' third album for EMI Records, lead singer Jason
Ringenberg presents a cautiously optimistic song about perseverance
called Good Things Come To Those Who Wait. Written by Ringenberg,
the song may have been a prayer for the band's future: If the Nashville
roots-punk band kept plugging along, garnering enthusiastic reviews
and burning down nightclubs with their incendiary live shows, maybe
they'd eventually achieve the hit record they needed to reach a larger
audience.
By 1986, when STILL STANDING was
released, the band owned a fanatic cult following. From the start,
Ringenberg, guitarist Warner Hodges, bassist Jeff Johnson and drummer
Perry Baggs had attracted a wildly enthusiastic following with their
combustible combination of punk-rock energy and country heart. They
described their sound as RECKLESS COUNTRY SOUL, the title of their
debut 1982 EP.
EMI signed the Scorchers in December
1983 and re-released the band's landmark second EP, FERVOR. A rip-roaring
remake of Bob Dylan's Absolutely Sweet Marie earned national airplay,
and the band drew remarkable praise from critics. ROLLING STONE gave
FERVOR and its potent follow-up, LOST & FOUND, four stars, while
NEW YORK TIMES critic Jon Pareles called them "one of the great
rock bands of the '80s.'"
Despite LOST & FOUND'S strengths,
the album didn't find favor with radio - they proved too ragged, too
wild and too twangy for the rock stations that should have provided
them a home. To try and help build that bridge, EMI paired the band
with hot hard-rock producer Tom Werman, who built his reputation by
creating hits with Ted Nugent, Cheap Trick, Motley Crue and Twisted
Sister.
On STILL STANDING, Werman and ace
Los Angeles engineer Duane Barton took the Scorchersí ragged
punch and gave it an '80s metallic sheen. Streamlining the rhythm
section and giving the arrangements a tighter focus, Werman and Barton
polished away the hillbilly twang and punk recklessness and put more
focus on the bandís petulant swagger and bottom-heavy crunch.
While some longtime fans protested,
the results emphasized several of the bandís strengths: Warner
Hodgesí blistering, one-of-a-kind guitar work, Perry Baggs
and Jeff Johnsonís savage rhythms, and Ringenbergís
distinctive voice, which had a moral rectitude rarely found among
rock singers. Most of all, the sleeker sound highlighted what a powerful
and unique songwriter Ringenberg is ñ and always has been.
The band and the record company
almost got their breakthrough, too. Golden Ball and Chain, a Stones-style
anthemic rocker replete with gospel-like background singers, climbed
onto the hard-rock radio charts and could have set up the band for
greater success.
Unfortunately, the band's forward
progress halted there. EMI underwent a drastic corporate shift at
the same time the band's tendency toward excess began to take its
toll on the group. Guitarist Warner Hodges later admitted that he
was partying so hard during this period that he doesn't remember the
four
months spent recording STILL STANDING; those present do recall that
Hodges often showed up at the studio without having slept the previous
night. Bassist Jeff Johnson pushed his limits just as fully as Hodges,
and drummer Perry Baggs wasn't far behind them. Ringenberg, the group's
lone sober member in those days, later wondered how his bandmates
made it through the era alive.
For whatever reasons, STILL STANDING
didn't achieve its goal of transporting the Scorchers to the glory
of smash hits, arena concerts and MTV rotation.
The songs were there, though. Their
fine cover of the Stones' 19th Nervous Breakdown illustrated the band's
ability to redo their heroes' work into distinctly personal statements,
just as they had done with Dylan's Absolutely Sweet Marie, Hank Williams'
Lost Highway, Neil Young's Are Tow Ready For The Country? and other
choice selections.
Plenty of potent Ringenberg originals
were included as well. From the rousing testament of My Heart Still
Stands With You to the whiplash propulsion of Shotgun Blues, and from
the hard-rock thunder of Crashin' Down to the sweet ache of Good Things
Come To Those Who Wait (written with Hodges, Johnson and co-manager
Jack Emerson), the album still stands as the supreme example of how
the Scorchers could have shaped their unique style for mass consumption
without sacrificing what made them so special.
This reissue of STII.L STANDING
also delivers three bonus songs: a Chuck-Berry-in-overdrive version
of the classic road tune. Route 66; a staple from their live show,
Greetings From Nashville, a rebel yell written by Tim Krekel that
toasts the Music City rock underground of the '80s; and an instrumental,
The Last Ride, that showcases Hodges' guitar work while giving a nod
to such influences as Link Wray and Duane Eddy.
Today, the Scorchers are indeed still standing. The original quartet
reunited in 1995 - nine years after Jeff Johnson had departed - because
they wanted to see ìwhat we would sound like when we were all
sober," as Hodges put it.(Johnson and Hodges had spent years
in recovery by then.) Johnson and Baggs have since amicably parted,
but Ringenberg and Hodges still tour on occasion ñ still tearing
it up with their wholly unique take on American music and proving
that, indeed, good things come to those who wait.
