Following the release of Ballin' Jacks' new single 'Life's A Gas Leak', we caught up with the London 5-piece to find out more about the songs they love. Check out a pick from each band member below and don't forget to listen to 'Life's A Gas Leak'.
1. Lou Reed - Walk On the Wild Side
Joao: How great it is to have this - a very chaotic time in history captured in a song. Fantastic lyrics, the best bass line ever, produced by Bowie and ends with that sax solo. Doesn’t get better than this! 2. Buddy Miles - Down By the River - Live 1971
Euan: Written by the great Neil Young of course - I love the one note guitar solo in the original but personally speaking, it can't compare to the 1971 Buddy Miles Live version. The whole band is just phenomenal. It's an absolute masterclass in building and releasing tension. Just try to listen to this and not scream when it hits the climax around the 7 minute mark! The whole audience must have been about four foot off the ground by that point. I don't think you'd ever come down after seeing something like that... Life changing stuff. 3. Nina Simone - Stars - Live at Montreux 1976
George: The song was written by Janis Ian, but Nina brings it to life here. You feel and believe every word and it's incredibly moving. Definitely one of the greatest live performances of all time.
4. George Jones - Things Have Gone to Pieces
Rudy: They said that when George Jones sang a song it stayed sung. I love the mixture of vulnerability and control in his voice. Also one of the great country songs ever written.
5. Royal Trux - Juicy, Juicy, Juice
Freddie: Juicy, juicy juice; juicy, juicy juice. From the abrasive opening onwards, the call and response refrain is insistent, despite interruptions by countryesque breakdowns, only semi-intelligible. Over nearly 6 minutes the music transforms and swells into something totally different. It would be meditative if it weren’t so harsh and weird. The strange, unbalanced, signature Trux sound, the unplaceably tragic feeling it takes on when the harmony moves the minor each verse, the bizarre delivery of the line which takes over the response “re’in rah’n loose”, (“rocking, riding loose”, perhaps? I’m not sure), the endless build until the bottom falls out at the end - I love it.
Ballin' Jacks - 'Life's A Gas Leak':