Archive Review: The Forty Fives' Get It Together (2000)

A single glance at the cover of Get It Together – ultra-cool blue tinting and black bars across the front end of what appears to be a Dodge Challenger – would lead one to believe that they’d be in for some serious retro shit with this CD. After a single spin of this turbo-charged effort from the Forty Fives, you’d know that your first impression was right. Fuck trends, the Forty Fives kick out some honest jams with Get It Together, reminding one of the halcyon days of rock when a man cruised around the city streets in a high-powered, solid-steel muscle car and cranked tunes out of the stereo eight track.

A sociologist might have looked upon this ritual as a sort of rapidly moving mating dance but it was more like a “coming-of-age” music thing – attracting the opposite sex was just an additional benefit. The Forty Fives sound like the best of what was playing on those car stereos in the late sixties and early seventies, skillfully blending surf guitars, Motown soul, Beatlesque Britpop and roots-rock with a garage feel. With a musical mix like that you’d expect Get It Together to be a lively affair, and it is, jumping off the line like a heart attack and hitting 100mph before you can blink an eye. If you have to ask, you never lived it, bunkie. This is real sledgehammer rock ‘n’ roll for guys who like it straight, no chaser, and if none of us can revisit those old days again, the Forty Fives are living proof that the memory lives on… (Artemis Records)     

Review originally published by Alt.Culture.Guide™ zine, 2000