AUGUST 2008 ONLINE EDITORIALS

Demon Funkies - Punk Junkies

By Nathan Harper

Is it funk? Is it punk? Or is it a pair of misnomers for a hard-rock band that has little in common with either style? With an album title like Punk Junkies it’s reasonable for the listener to expect an angsty swarm of power-chords, and yet that ferocity is in as short of supply as the little-heard funky baselines that a name like the Demon Funkies seemingly evokes.

In fact, the Demon Funkies aren’t all that funk or punk, instead taking form on their second album as a sort of generic, all purpose rock’n’roll outfit that hit all the expected stops, some with more punch than others. “Punk Junkies” is an album of “ones” – the fast one, the heavy one, the bluesy one, etc., - and each song does about what you’d expect it to once its role has been identified.

“Whooping Cough” is the fast one, and it’s a burner with all appropriate speed, however on this track, as on the entire record, vocalist Ryan Chrys never commits with the kind of punch that this type of song needs to really broadcast raw rock-energy. The track “GD Funk” – the funky one – name-checks funk greats Wonder, Brown and Clinton, and for this reason suffers the most from the flat vocals. When James Brown wailed in to the mic he did it with absolute abandon and you could hear it - if the Demon Funkies could channel even a part of that energy they would be better off for it.