JOINTLY fronted by Reverend D. Wayne Love (he raps) and Lowry Love (he croons), Alabama 3, a Brixton based seven piece country and western techno outfit, come across as the contemporary version of the Blues Brothers.
Part preacher, part pimp, all, fake southern drawl, the Reverend D. is the merry ringleader of this voodoo circus. "I can't help myself", he feigns, "but I know a man who can!" The Brixton wide boys start slow and deliberate, their low and funky techno combing a cool cowboy harmonica with a throbbing, perfectly judged back beat and a blissed out country twang. Their single, Ain't Goin to Goa, says it all: a post house parody on sex, religion, drugs and politics. Or is that punk, plagiarism and situationism? It's difficult to tell when the air is thick with so much irony. One thing that's certain, however, is that everything is a homage to Elvis and that "Presleyterian way of thinking".
Yet, for all their attitude, Alabama 3 display a real affection for their source material. Their cover of John Prine's Speed of the Sound of Loneliness is testimony enough to that. On paper, the concept of putting an 808 kickdrum to the likes of Robert Johnson, The Eagles and Hank Williams would seem like the greatest blasphemy on stage, it sounds like the most obvious thing in the world. With a self assured swagger that oozes charm and self confidence by the bucket load and their tongues firmly planted on everybody else's cheek, Alabama 3 could have the perfect antidote to everybody's pre millennium tension. Or what we know better as that (erm) tricky condition.