THE BELLRAYS UNLEASH A HI OCTANE BOLT OF BLACK LIGHTNING

I reckon that description sums THE BELLRAYS up, one of the comments to this blistering and outrageously over the top and ferocious performance of the song BLACK LIGHTNING, the title track of their last album in 2010, projects wild woman lead singer LISA KEKAULA as ARETHA FRANKLIN on speed with MOTORHEAD as her backing band.

The real MOTORHEAD always was fairly much a rock and roll band at heart, even if a poor one at that, in reference to the seminal heavy metal group of the late 70`s, the BELLRAYS, who boast a guitarist in BOB VENNUM who seems to play a guitar as lightning fast as Motorhead's LEMMY KILMISTER and a drummer in STEFAN LITROWNIK who goes bananas as much as LARS ULRICH of METALLICA did on songs such as FIGHT FIRE WITH FIRE and BATTERY, could easily be a metal band were it not for the soulful theatricality of Kekaula out front.

Before I forget about him (laugh) the bass guitarist is JUSTIN ANDRES, easy to forget the four stringers who nearly always get upstaged by a singer, guitarist and better than normal drummer in any band. 

THE BELLRAYS have been around for a long time now, after starting out with a self titled debut album in 1990, but have declined the opportunity to achieve superstardom mainly due to the band's dedication to sticking with independent record labels, such as SHOCK, POPTONES and ones I never heard of before tonight like BITTERSWEET, CHEAP LULLABY and ANODYNE.

Obviously the band's seemingly indefinite minority appeal status has always ensured all twelve of the band's original releases have a decidedly left of centre, almost shock rock presentation, maybe a bit like early MOTLEY CRUE without the chainsaw and mannequins or SCREAMIN' JAY HAWKINS meets soul metal (laugh).

You'll never find a description like that in a music magazine so I should copyright that one. I honestly had never heard of them, or at least payed any attention to THE BELLRAYS, before a mate and regular reader of my blog suggested I check the band out last night on Twitter. 

Judging by BLACK LIGHTNING I have a lot of catching up to do, THE BELLRAYS are a great band because they dare to be different and at are just downright entertaining.