Burden Brothers
Once, long ago in the land of Texas there was a band called the
Toadies. The Toadies toured near and far and I was lucky enough to see
them about 10 times in the course of my time in university. I really liked
all of their music. Todd Lewis wrote songs and sang for them. The subject
matter was often dark with songs like Possum Kingdom discussing
bodies found in the Texas lake of the same name or Tyler about breaking
into the house of a girl that the narrator was in love with. When I saw them
in Nacogdoches during school I got to talk to the band a couple of times. It
was brought up once that the lyrics were really dark and Todd just said “Yeah,
I’ve got issues.”
So, many years have passed. In between the Toadies released a second album
after a long hiatus and much waiting for a followup to Pleather.
Then after a while a live album came out and that marked the end of the
Toadies.
This brings us to my latest new music acquisition, the
Burden Brothers. They hail from Texas and the people I know in the band
are Todd Lewis from the Toadies and Taz Bentley, formerly the drummer for the
Rev. Horton Heat (amongst other rocakabilly outfits). It appears as though
the bass player, Corey Orr, was in Chumbawamba, intersting. To continue, this
album is very reminiscent of the Toadies thorough Todds singing and lyrics, but
because the writing includes Taz the sound is different in a good way. This
is definitely a good album and is quickly finding a place in my collection.
Now I just have to wait until I’m in Texas near where they’re playing or they
make it out to California. It will be worth it.
