Crack Sabbath: Better Than Your Kiss Cover Band.

Album: Bar Slut
Artist: Crack Sabbath
Genre: Jazz/Metal (sort of)
Year: 2004
Label: ???

Crack Sabbath is the best cover band that you’ll ever hear. This is not up for debate. Consisting of Seattle’s saxophone maestro Skerik, Hammond organ wizard Ron Weinstein, bass player Keith Lowe and drummer Mike Stone, the group is a veritable who’s who of Seattle Jazz power. I don’t know the group’s history, how they came together or really any details about the schematics, but it’s not for lack of trying. There simply is no information about them anywhere on the Internet. That being said, I’ll tell you what I know and hope to add something to the void of information.

As previously stated, Crack Sabbath is a cover band and the best one you’ll ever hear. I say this because, what other group could possibly produce such kick ass covers of both Charles Mingus and Nirvana tunes on the same CD? That’s right, no one. Most cover bands produce redundant music by simply playing the original work note for note without any variation or interesting contortions. But Crack Sabbath provides us with music that twists and turns so much you’ll have whip lash by the end of the album. Arguably, the best take on the album is their cover of Charles Mingus’s fantastic “Better Get Hit In Yo’ Soul” (slightly re-titled) which follows the original masterfully up until the bridge, where they break down into a cover of Black Sabbath’s Sweat Leaf. Mixing Mingus and Sabbath may sound like sacrilege, but it works out surprisingly well, the two elements brought together by master musicians. Keith Lowe is no Charles Mingus, but then again no one is and he does his best to fill his big shoes and does an admirable job. Skerik and Weinstein completely steal the show on the track, however, Skerik’s roaring sax takes center stage while being augmented by Weinstein’s manic organ. Things take an even more lunatic turn when the group tackles Nirvana’s “Breed” on which Keith Lowe’s grungy bass playing propels the track forward at breakneck pace. As good as it is, having heard the original so many times, I’m completely sick of this song and it’s cool to hear Skerik and Co. breath new life into this dilapidated carcass.

Just because Crack Sabbath is a cover band doesn’t mean they only perform covers. Four of the twelve tracks on the album are original works and all of them are utterly strange. The first is the droning “Crack of Doom” which opens the album and would make Drone Metal masters Sunn O))) proud. “Bar Slut” is a more traditional Jazz cut that demonstrates the groups compositional chops best and is the proper start to the album. The two strangest tracks though, are “Makin Out With My Dad” and “Bukkake Ducati” both of which take the Black Sabbath influence to heart giving us powerful Jazz Metal cuts that would make Ozzy Osborne blow a gasket. These are also the only vocal tracks on the album, with vocalist Brad Mowen growling his way through both of them. With Bar Slut, Crack Sabbath demonstrates some serious ambition and manages to follow through on it expertly. Some may balk at this modern group devouring and reanimating the works of Mingus, Davis and Cobain, but I’m not one of them. This album is solid and it’ll be worth your time to go to the extra effort to find a copy.