The cat is back and he needs a good hard rocking….
Danko Jones is so rock n roll that his song “Going To Be A fight Tonight” was used on the Royal Rumble. And while you wrestle (sorry) with that consider this: rock isn’t a style of music to Jones, it’s a lifestyle.
The story goes that when he was six years old he heard Kiss and realised that he too, well, loved it loud and he’s still flying that flag with his horns up all these years later.
Jones is one of the most astute of hard rockers, and so steeped in the history of what he does is he, that he’ll know as well as anyone that “You Are My Woman” sounds like Thin Lizzy. Christ, there is no doubt that he wrote it sound like Thin Lizzy. It does. And it’s brilliant.
Jones writes songs about rock in the way that Manowar do about metal. “Wild Cat” starts with one. “I Gotta Rock” is as simple as you like, “My Little Rock n Roll” which follows, struts, shimmies and shakes like prime – and primal – garage rock and “Out Tonight” is pure hedonism which is so desperate to, well, rock that it starts with a guitar solo.
“Wild Cat” is completely shameless in its pursuit of fun and is one of the simplest albums of the year. “Got a band/need a stage” offers the first line of the funky “Do This Every Night” and anyone looking for a hidden agenda in “Let’s Start Dancing” ain’t gonna find one. If on the other hand you look for the soundtrack to the best night of your life then it’s right here.
The title track swings from the cheap seats and finds the target, and there’s a real genuine groove about “She Likes It” that is anything but fake.
With that matters turn to the bedroom. Let’s not beat about the …urmmm…bush “Success In Bed” is low on AC/DC style double entendre, but knows its way around dirty old sass, and if “Diamond Lady” is a touch more nuanced then the outcome is still the same.
“Wild Cat” actually ends with what might be termed The Danko Jones Manifesto, “Revolution”. The world is going to hell, it suggests, but its got the solution. “When the riots start, what’s going through your head?/When the two of us can’t spend the night in bed.”
So there you have it. We’ve got a madman in the White House, we’ve got an evil government over here that sees 30,000 die as a result of its social care policy, and we’ve got racial intolerance and Brexit causing chaos, but Danko Jones gotta have it and he’s gotta have it now.
That’s what “Wild Cat” is about, that’s what rock n roll is for and that’s why both are ace.
Rating 8/10
