Ray Wylie Hubbard

A down-and-dirty, growling, swampy roadside bar romp through things demonic and divine. Hubbard’s slurred vocal incantations—almost but not quite spoken recitations—are punctuated with perfect, amped-up stinging guitar lines and slapping drums. Whether invoking Joseph Campbell and the gods of Mexico or tattooed Ramona’s like of malt liquor, it’s a tour through cultural variances of religious thought. God smokes cigarettes and hopes for a few kilowatts of sweat and grace. The Devil drinks whiskey, mumbling that the world’s a scam. Hubbard’s righteous indignation—he’s equally seduced by high heels and over-easy eggs; he has two nickels and a paradigm and is long gone into a lingerie and whiskey-soaked room—is a provocative conjuring of the perils and possibilities of sin and redemption, where heartaches and grease are the only calling cards.