The Bellrays: Ready Steady Go!
LP | CD | DL
Released: 30th August 2024
The BellRays continue to do what they do best and deliver rock ‘n’ soul with a punk twist that is second to none.
The album cover for Heavy Steady Go! shows an afro styling, deadly stiletto wearing, black singer, with a skinny white dude, long hair covering half his face, sitting pillion behind her as they tear up the tarmac on a beast of a motorbike. That’s the BellRays attitude crystallised in cartoon form. And if you want a defining example of Rock ‘n’ Soul then The BellRays provide it in spades. Though this album leans heavily (emphasis on heavy) on the classic rock sounds they heard growing up rather than soul. But the voice of Lisa Kekaula is forever soulful.
The BellRays, formed in Riverside, California, by Lisa Kekaula and Robert Vennum, have been mixing up punk, rock and soul since 1990, with a fiercely DIY ethos. But, as Kukula explains, this mixing of styles hasn’t always pleased everybody: “We stand apart and reactions like ‘not punk enough’, ‘not rock enough’, and ‘THAT’S not soul’ only fuel us more. We revel in our fearlessness to share what’s in our heads and hearts whether it’s understood or not. The most important thing is that we believe what we write and what we play. Our songwriting comes from a place that’s really deep and wide and in Heavy Steady Go! We realised that what we had created came from the impact point of this crater.”
The latest album was recorded over two years in two cities. In Tucson, Arizona, Kekaula and Vennum were joined by Mark Cisneros (bass) and Ron Miller (drums) both from Kid Congo & The Pink Monkey Birds. In the second session in Riverside, California, they were joined by drummer Craig Waters (Cody Chestnut, Andre Williams, the Countdowns) and Nico Miles (bass).
Album opener, I Fall Down, sets the tone for the album: a quick drum roll and the heavy chugging beat kicks in. Then this: I never wanted heaven/Until I wanted you. The soulful voice of Kekaula ranges from deep as a hell’s mouth and high as an angel’s wings, and takes the listener with her. The songs builds up momentum perfectly and is a brilliant opening to the 9 songs that will follow.
There is the blues-rock road trip of Hard Drive; Snakes with its sleazy blues riff, and the country-blues of Down On My Knees. There is the more punk sonic attacks of One More Night, which is alive with sensual, up-beat excitement, and the snarling guitar, chugging out muted chords, of All The Rage.
California has a surfer guitar twang and a wistful air, smattered with a scent of California pine and ozone in the notes, which builds up into heavy guitar licks. Wolf’s Sun has a sensual, sinister feel as it creates an image of a rising red sun over shimmering desert heat. And if C’mon doesn’t get your booty shakin’, then you’re probably already dead.
Album closer Whatever Turns You On is sultry dirty blues with a guitar buzzing like a vibrator. It drips with seductive heat and, quite possibly, has the sexiest use of a kazoo in a song ever.
With Heavy Steady Go!, the BellRays get you up, knock you down, gut punch you, rip your heart out, raise you to heaven and drop you to hell. This is rock ‘n’ soul at its finest by a band that’s been honing its craft for 30 years.
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You can find The BellRays online here, Facebook, Instagram, and X.
All words by Mark Ray. More writing by Mark Ray can be found at his author archive. And he can be found on Threads, Instagram and WordPress
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