Blast from the Past: Luscious Jackson

A few weeks ago The Wife allowed me (yes I am whipped... don't you judge me!) to buy some music on iTunes and while searching for some songs that I lost during the great computer crash of aught 7. While searching, for some reason the band Luscious Jackson popped into my mind and remembered that I had lost one album during a move and a second one was lost in the crash.

Back when I was in high school and working at the Ponda-gross-a in Russell, Ky, my friend Tiffany (see you finally made the blog) kept talking about this band Luscious Jackson that she saw at Lalapalooza (yet again I feel old). Since I knew she was cool I gave them a listen. What I found was an interesting mix of sounds that really does not fit one style of music. They infuse jazz, hip hop, blues, disco, rock, dance and pop into their sound. Plus all four members of this all girl band seemed completely different, but they messed well. Jill Cunniff did most of the vocal work and seemed to be the energy and "face" of the band, to me she always set the tone of the song. Vivian Trimble appeared to be the quiet one playing keyboards and back up vocals. Vivian added the jazz and disco sound created through all of their songs. Gabby Glaser has this smokey voice that sounds hot as hell that made songs like City Song and Strong Man wonderful. She also was a fabulous guitarist she could do reggae, funk, rock and everything else. The backbone to the sound was Kate Schellenbach, who was the original drummer for the Beastie Boys when they were a punk band, her sound is the driving force in every song. She is amazing drummer, she has high energy and I truly believe she is one of the best drummers I have ever seen.

As the picture indicates earlier this year they released a greatest hits album of course I used most of my allotted money on the album. It's a solid album that takes me back to my younger days. Most people are probably have no clue who Luscious Jackson is, and in all honesty they had only one "hit" and that was 1996s Naked Eye. A real shame that only one song made any noise. Most of their last album Electric Honey had a sound that I thought played well to the mainstream and I was a little shocked that the song Ladyfingers never took off. If you ever need some high energy music try listening to Luscious Jackson.