Roadrunner Classix Revisited: Gang Green

For better than two decades – give or take a year here and there – Boston hardcore heroes Gang Green have pummeled suspecting audiences with the band’s own unique, over-the-top mind-muck consisting of equal parts fast-n-furious punk rock and clashing heavy metal bluster. Unlike the many of the band’s West Coast contemporaries at the time, weak sisters that were more concerned with politics and the environment, or else obsessed with death and destruction, our Beantown boys were just another bunch of lugnuts in love with sex and beer and skateboarding, Gang Green helping lay the foundation for the skatepunk culture that would follow.

Originally formed by vocalist/guitarist Chris Doherty in 1982, the band’s revolving-door line-up and Doherty’s scattergun approach to other projects (he played in three other bands circa 1982-85) resulted in Gang Green recording only a handful of songs for a compilation album, This Is Boston Not L.A. Doherty later revived the Gang Green name with a new band in 1985, recording a couple of EPs and the band’s full-length debut, Another Wasted Night, for Seattle’s Taang! Records label. The album included an energetic cover of ‘Til Tuesday’s hit song “Voices Carry” that would become a fan favorite and a regular part of Gang Green’s live show for years.

It wasn’t until the Gang Green line-up gelled around Doherty, drummer Brian Betzger, guitarist Fritz Erickson and bassist Joe Gittleman that the band found its true voice. This is the foursome that recorded the band’s legendary 1987 sophomore album, You Got It, as well as its equally-acclaimed follow-up, Older…Budweiser in 1989. Gittleman would later leave the band, joining the Mighty, Mighty Bosstones just in time for that band’s brief mid-90s shot at fame, while Gang Green would record the 1990 live set Can’t Live Without It, before being cut by Roadrunner and breaking up (again). Doherty and Betzger would take another shot at the brass ring with their underrated and sadly-overlooked punk-pop band Klover, but would go on to form yet another version of Gang Green in 1997 to record the band’s fourth studio album, Another Case Of Brewtality.

Released by metal label Roadrunner’s sister imprint Emergo Records in 1987, You Got It is, perhaps, the best representation of Gang Green’s dynamic, electric live sound that’s ever been captured in the studio. As much a lesson in speed-metal pyrotechnics as it is raging wildfire punk, the band kicks the pedal through the floorboard with the album’s very first track, “Haunted House,” a sub-two-minute raver with blistering guitar and incendiary drumbeats. Doherty’s voice is strained to the point of breaking, as notes fly out of your speaker like a tornado dissecting a trailer park. From this point, You Got It just gets even more dangerous and out-of-control….

“We’ll Give It To You” begins with a guitar intro that might sound like any ‘70s-era classic rock band if not for the intensity afforded the fretwork, the skatepunk anthem suddenly leaping headfirst into a blur of Motorhead-styled metallic riffs and furious rhythms. A blizzard of ringing chords kicks you in the crux of yer trousers, then “Sheetrock” spirals rapidly into a menacing bludgeon, fitting the listener for a pair o’ concrete galoshes before breaking into a fine extended showcase for Doherty’s manic six-string work. The muscular “Ballerina Massacre” thunders like a quartet of apocalyptic horsemen; Betzger’s drumwork is simply breathtaking, kind of like being smothered by a lead pillow (sans cotton cover), while Doherty and/or Erickson throw a little thrash-n-bash fretwork into the cement mixer along with the listeners’ battered bodies.

There are lots of other fine psychotic breakdowns to be found on You Got It, from the almost-oi Brit-styled ear-thuggery of “Born To Rock” and the 90mph hardcore flash of “Another Bomb” to the fiery City-Of-Angel-inspired diabolism of “Party With The Devil” or the thinly-veiled rivethead evil of “Sick Sex Six.” Throw this tasty little sucker into your CD player, hit ‘shuffle’ and then ‘repeat’ and prepare to be assaulted by a couple hours of high-octane, old school wall-o-sonic-fury hardcore punk, the sensation not unlike running headfirst and banging yer skull against a breeko-block wall a time or three. The game’s over when either the CD stops playing or you slump to the floor, unconscious. DO NOT play more than once a day or you’ll only be fit for a job in the Oval Office, or fitted for a straitjacket (or both)!

Lovingly remastered with an ear towards both the sonic highs and the lows, You Got It is one of MVD Audio’s Roadrunner Classix reissue series CDs, released on a shiny gold disc in a numbered limited edition of 2,000 copies. You Got It is a good choice for the deluxe treatment, arguably representing Gang Green’s best album and, from a historical perspective, providing an important bridge between punk and heavy metal that would become more important as ‘90s alt-rock crashed-and-burned at the end of the decade. Besides, You Got It is more fun than chugging a case of Budweiser and riding your board on that razor-thin rail between heaven and hell, or maybe putting frogs down yer lil’ brother’s boxers…your choice, meathead. (MVD Audio)

(Click on the CD cover to buy You Got It from Amazon.com)