The Fix

The Best Side Project Ever

Until someone saves my baby and me from the fire, my perception of a hero will remain vague at best. I won’t discount or remove myself from Jungian archetypes, but this is an age where we’re categorically asked to name our heroes as a means of self-definition (MySpace, anyone?). So our heroes are, in part, an idealized reflection of ourselves, and the last time I checked, that familiar mirror has enough cracks to throw back a hundred different faces. Then what does it mean when I say that Hot Snakes are unsung heroes to me? I think I’m the kind of person who feels that virtually all the best things in this life remain removed from the glare of ubiquity, willfully contained in a world of their own. So, strangely, I see Hot Snakes as heroes all the more for their marginal presence in the greater scope of music history. Hot Snakes were too old, too good, and too self-satisfied to care about making anyone else like them, but that’s fine. I’m happy to toot their horn for them, and here it is: Hot Snakes are a special band, and you should listen to their music.

When Hot Snakes put out their first album in 2000, that abominable wet fart of a genre called rap-rock was finally in its death throes, and mainstream hip-hop got addicted to stupid pills and started becoming, more and more, a fatuous caricature of itself. (Soulja Boy, what?) Meanwhile, The Strokes came on the scene, were hailed as saviors of rock ‘n roll, and put indie rock on the map, for better or for worse. I say this because, in the most technical sense, indie rock has become a genre, a sound, and a look as opposed to a way of creating and marketing one’s music. (History is cyclical and record labels are co-opting motherfuckers: the same thing happened to both “punk” and “alternative” rock. And get Our Band Could Be Your Life to read up on the original indie rockers.)

But I mainly bring up the dubiousness of “indie rock” to point out that, if nothing else, Hot Snakes were the definition of indie–meaning independent–rock. Lead guitarist John Reis created a label, Swami Records, for the specific purpose of putting out Hot Snakes’ first album. Singer/guitarist Rick Froberg is a gifted illustrator who did all the artwork for Hot Snakes’ albums, made their promotional posters, and designed their website. And, perhaps most importantly, it was clear from the get-go that Hot Snakes simply did not give a fuck. They wrote songs and put out albums at their own leisure (although three albums and a live EP in four years isn’t really making music “leisurely”), toured when they wanted, littered their lyrics with inscrutable in-jokes, and, to the detriment of fans, never really took themselves seriously as a band. The twin nuclei of the group were very involved with other projects: Reis with his main band Rocket From The Crypt and his new label in San Diego, Froberg with his artwork in New York. In this way, Hot Snakes are the best side project ever. And yet, at the same time, during their brief existence they captured the ethos of what real bands (ideally) should be all about. As my man Frank Costello said, they call that a paradox.

To date, Hot Snakes represents the artistic zenith of Reis and Froberg’s long but intermittent partnership. Fresh out of high school in 1986, the two formed the band Pitchfork in San Diego before guaranteeing their punk rock immortality with the influential math-rock outfit Drive Like Jehu. Hot Snakes are correctly seen as a leaner, more concise version of Jehu, a band noted for their sprawling, structurally complicated tunes. Hot Snakes’ songs are invariably beat-heavy, guitar-centric blasts of punk ‘n’ garage fury, and for the casual listener, they all might sound the same on first listen. From raw debut Automatic Midnight onwards, the band didn’t change the formula much, they just kept streamlining their aesthetic; they cut out all the fat of a song and presented only what was best. This is why Hot Snakes will never be as obviously influential as Jehu: the succinctness that defines Hot Snakes songs is evidence of an artistic maturity that can’t be imitated after a few years playing shitty punk rock. (Less is more because it’s harder to do well.)

Misguided critics marginalized Hot Snakes on the basis that they aren’t doing anything particularly new, and, for that, they claim, the band is less than relevant. But while Hot Snakes’ music was made within the context of pre-existing sounds–recalling Suicide, The Wipers, Mission of Burma, Neu!, and even Ennio Morricone–they transcended any influence with their idiosyncrasy. There’s the ingeniously inventive dueling guitar work that is neatly summed up with descriptors like frenetic, sinister, and catchy. It’s a testament to Hot Snakes’ talent that they filled their songs with indelible hooks–sometimes several within a song–without ever sounding saccharine or trite. The minimal use of distortion allows every melodic turn to be that much sharper and the rhythm section, already a lurching beast, to sound all the more explosive. Riding over it all is Froberg’s voice, an instrument that warrants more detailed description:

In the traditional sense, Rick Froberg does not have a good voice. It’s best described as a bark, a yelp, or a howl; it’s reedy, a bit adenoidal, and often sounds strangled when he reaches for those high notes. And, yet, it is captivating and ideally suited for the music; he knows how to use his voice. In short, while he does not have a good voice, per se, Froberg is a great singer, and that distinction makes all the difference because–eight-octave range my ass–if a singer doesn’t know how to use his/her voice, what’s the point? In this way, Christina Aguilera is a terrible singer (case in point: the “look-what-I-can-do!” raping of “Lady Marmalade”), and Froberg is a great one (case in point: every Hot Snakes song).

Oh right, the songs. Well, in the spirit of “less is more,” I’ll describe two:

“10th Planet” is a highlight of Hot Snakes’ debut, Automatic Midnight. The guitars play a game of one-upmanship in the opening seconds, and the tension keeps rising, suggestive of an imminent showdown. The tension finally bursts, and the band sounds like the last gang in town as they take the offensive. We’re privy to a reckless tour through a city of ghosts, propelled by a one-note death march and a pummeling back-beat. The song threatens to overwhelm the listener until the uplifting chords of the break chime in, but any elation is grounded by Froberg’s sober declaration: “It’s a dead, dead, dead town.” Froberg’s lyrics manage to be both corrosively dead pan and, at times, maddeningly elliptical. You know he’s pissed at something, at someone, but exactly who or what isn’t clear. And whether he’s being sarcastic or earnest…well, it could really be either. Or both. “10th Planet,” like many Hot Snakes songs, is beautiful in the way that Larry Clark’s early photography or Paul Bowle’s short story fiction is beautiful–a striking combination of bleak fury and detached sympathy.

Hot Snakes’ last studio album, Audit In Progress, closes with a surprise. “Plenty for All” is the poppiest song they’ve ever written, and fittingly contains the most overtly optimistic lyrics that Froberg has ever sung. Over a fist-pumping rhythm section and a ridiculously catchy clarion guitar line, Froberg berates the narcissism of this generation and implores us to look beyond ourselves: “Your patrons, your guests/Manufactured phonies hung-up on themselves/Bring ‘em all with you/It’s all for the best/We got space out here in the West.” This song sums up the lyrical tone of Hot Snakes’ songs with equal measures of caustic indignation and resigned compassion, and it’s heartening to hear them quit on a note like that. Speaking of which…

When Hot Snakes quit in the summer of 2004, it was done matter-of-factly and without any explanation beyond the fact that the band simply wanted to stop. They made a last tour of North America before Froberg posted a brief hand-written farewell note on their site that, somewhat aptly, manages to come off as both affectionate and cynical:

“Thanks for sharing this with us. We’ll miss this–and you. We made a few great friends. I hope things get better, but they probably won’t. Love you still. -Rick Froberg”

Since they called it quits, Reis and Froberg started new bands, Reis having started The Night Marchers with original Hot Snakes drummer Jason Kourkonis, and Froberg is now with Obits. Both groups played their first shows this year, and while they’re predictably good, that indefinable magic that permeates Reis and Froberg’s music–and distilled to perfection with Hot Snakes–is missed. Hot Snakes made it look easy, and if you break it down, it doesn’t look like much without modifiers: three peerless albums, two incendiary live releases, a faultless live show and–poof!–they were gone. In regards to Hot Snakes and their prerogative, John Reis summed it up back in 2001 in an interview with Punk Planet: “We’re driven by the explosive sounds of punk rock and rock ‘n’ roll music. In this day and age, where it seems like style is so much more important than actual substance, you have rock ‘n’ roll in blackface–it’s all become self-parody. You have just nauseating amounts of irony added and complete lacking of anything meaningful or anything that has that explosive quality… it’s kind of like going into an Old West town where they made westerns–you see all these buildings, but behind them is nothing. You have these big, heavy sounds, but there’s nothing of meaning or substance to anchor that to anything, so it’s just floating bullshit being shoved down your throat.”

Hot Snakes are officially “sung” heroes now. Their work is still out there, so go and get it. Pass it along if you feel so inclined. This blunt tool of language might as well be used to sing of the things that bring us happiness, and hopefully I’ve done that here. Spread the joy. Like Amiri Baraka said, “You got to be a spirit. You got to sing–don’t be no ghost.”