It's said that
Andy Warhol became the manager and mouthpiece for
the Velvet Underground after a failed attempt to form a rock band with several other artists, which should serve as a lesson to us all about visual artists who decide to start making music. But there are exceptions to every rule, and Liz McGrath, former
Tongue vocalist and fanzine editor who is now best known as a painter and sculptor, has eased her way back into music in partnership with photographer turned songwriter
Morgan Slade in a new project called
Miss Derringer. Creepy-crawling through a set of lean blues-based tunes about lives lived either on the lam or in a trailer park,
King James, Crown Royal and a Colt 45 shows that
Morgan is a talented lyricist whose obsessive tales of love and crime are a fine match for McGrath's whiskey-burnished but curiously innocent voice, and the roots-conscious backing (featuring members of
los Cincos,
Bulima Banquet, and Skeetertruck) balances slop and enthusiasm while getting the balance just right. While this album isn't as consistent as one might hope, for a first project from principles who pursue music as a second job these days, both the songs and the execution are effective and absorbing, with McGrath and
Morgan making for a potent combo on the epochal "Twelve-oh-Six" and the grim but jaunty "Open Casket Funeral." A punk-conscious crossbreed between blues and country with lyrics
Jim Thompson would have admired,
Miss Derringer make a hell of an entrance with this album; let's hope they have another one in 'em.