Babylon Dodge by Biker Priests
The mid-90’s. Tough years, if you’re old enough to remember. We got by how we could. In the winter it was apples and coffee. In the summer, it was oranges and popcorn, anything to keep the belly full.
Sometime back then, without any clear path forward, I set up a little studio in the spare bedroom of my upper flat in Hamtramck and started making some recordings. I had some gear of my own, but most of it was borrowed - a Fostex 4-track cassette recorder (with only 3 tracks, really), an Alesis SR-16 drum machine, some sort of ART digital reverb unit, a couple pedals, a boom-box for monitor speakers, a microphone, my guitars and amps.
I shared some of what I made with some friends, but other than that I didn't really know what to do with it all. Time passed. Wars started and ended. Babies came, and older folks passed on. Eventually, Jawbone happened and kept me busy for several more years, and I didn't really think about these at all. Not too long ago though I had another listen and thought they were still worth sharing. I thought the songs were good, and I really liked the sound of that drum machine.
And so Biker Priests were born. Biker Priests is a band, a side project, a money-laundering scheme, a grift, a prayer chapel, an insult, an embarrassment, an audio liquidation, a necessary evil, a last will-and-testament, a fever dream, a skunk beer, a dandelion, a moment in time, a rock and roll dream.
Plans going forward? Dunno. I’ve got a few more songs in the vault if I can get them in good enough shape, but mostly Biker Priests is a way going forward for me to put out anything I want without overly-messing around with what I’m doing with Jawbone. ABBA covers, disco, collaborations, whatever, it’s all on the table.
Tracklist
| 1. | Babylon Dodge | 1:51 |
| 2. | Keep Walking | 3:50 |
| 3. | Is He Dead Or Is He Steady | 1:53 |
| 4. | Busy Being Drowned | 4:14 |
| 5. | You Used To Fall In Love | 3:34 |
| 6. | Tarantula Blues | 5:27 |
| 7. | The Blues Is Easy | 4:08 |
| 8. | Cannonball Blues | 3:37 |
| 9. | Midnight Devotee | 3:41 |
Credits
License
All rights reserved.
Biker Priests is a band, a money-laundering scheme, a grift, a prayer blanket, an audio liquidation, a necessary evil, a last will-and-testament, a fever dream, an insult, a skunk beer, a dandelion, a moment in time. It’s a side project of my main musical project Jawbone. It begins as a collection of 4-track cassette demos that I had recorded pre-Jawbone. The future is unwritten.