The Jesus Lizard

Fillmore New York at Irving Plaza; Mon 16, Tue 17

Photograph: Joshua Black Wilkins

For the first half of the 1990s, Chicago’s the Jesus Lizard was the most ferocious live act in America. Ask anyone who frequented indie shows at the time and they’ll verify that this assessment is not journalistic hyperbole.

Drunk and disorderly singer David Yow turned perverse rage into an art form. His grisly lyrics, transmitted via muffled grunts and distant wails that never overshadowed his peerless backing band, depicted with wit a surreal universe of killer pygmies, phantom limbs and odious sodomites. While the id-driven vocalist bounced off the walls, flashed his scrotum, shoved your girlfriend or massaged your beau’s nipples, guitarist Duane Denison played spacious riffs and arpeggios that surgically implanted surf, jazz and rockabilly cool into trebly noise-punk bluster. Bassist David Wm. Sims and drummer Mac McNeilly adroitly reined in the ruckus with hostile but swinging thunder, pitched midway between Led Zep muscle and Birthday Party dementia.

After a brush with major-label mediocrity and a decade-long breakup, the Jesus Lizard reunited this year to plug Touch and Go Records’ definitive editions of its pivotal early discs. (Cheers to the fastidious remastering job by Bob Weston and original engineer Steve Albini.) Filthy thrills abound, especially on 1990’s Head and 1991’s Goat, but onstage is where this infamous quartet truly shines. According to recent reports, Yow doesn’t drop trou so readily in 2009, but the group’s general potency remains nothing short of awe-inspiring.—Jordan N. Mamone

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