Great Girls Blouse

Andrew Olson (Reader Weekly)

http://www.thefountainheads.com

Minnesota is a harbinger of many great bands. Mixing all forms of music we seem to adopt whatever suits our moods and styles. With that transient musical sound different influences burrow into our minds and lives.. After time the different tunnels lead to something new, a light at the end?

Disc’s never fully understand a live show, they only let our ears idle till they swell again with music. Great Girl Blouse’s new disc 147471 starts you up, while seeing the band live at Pizza Luce on Saturday, March 26th will get you moving. The band consists of husband and wife duo Amy (guitar, vocals) and Jason (bass) Chorney and Brian Remme (drums). The band has been together for eight years, inheriting it’s name from Liverpool, England. The story goes that while studying abroad the local saying, "big girl’s blouse", an insult meaning "sissy" stuck in their mind and was altered into "great girl’s blouse".

Amy Chorney grew up in New York in a musical family playing violin, jazz ensembles, and in Irish bands. When she met her future husband Jason the daughter of a choral director and operatic voice coach became a rock singer. This all added up to make Great Girls Blouse is a juxtaposition of classic dirt and modern rock.

Dirt you say, that can’t sound good? Well reader, let me explain a bit about dirt. When a press-kit contains a description of an amplifier and has a description like, "pre-CBS 1965 Fender Bandmaster head that was rebuilt by Wisconsin’s Flat Tube Amplifiers, with a matching 4-ohm 2x12 cab" we know there is some dirt in there. Dirt is what the Stones flew to America to try to capture in their albums in the sixties. It is that little sound that only emanates from true equipment of the era. Listen to an old Sun recording of Elvis or blues records.. The dirt is what is hidden in songs, it is comforting to hear and expensive to recreate. Rock ain’t about being clean man!

Song one on their disk 147471 is titled "he played". It has a Rolling Stones guitar surge in early and Weezer changes throughout. Amy Chorney has a voice like Robert Plant tried to emulate. It is that high pitched frontman sound of The Darkness, but from a girl…. Where it should be coming from.. Basically she has the voice that every rock guy would die for. In Great’s bio the sound is described as, "Pushing on your chest, crushing the soft, fleshy tissue within.. Like a faulty roller coaster safety bar."

The song, "all right" is alt/grunge with a resonating ska guitar. The bass flows, and bubbles up in a libation of swirling rock. Not often does hard rock sound so smooth, and when the song speeds up the guitar gets even better. The dirt is there on "monster" and echoes down a tunnel with the bass slithering like a snake behind. Namesake, "147471" highlights a slight New York influence.. The Strokes vocal effects were used with a scary tone. The song is deep and says, "now what you carrying in those thoughts of yours, do you know what commitment is for? And it’s the last time I thought you’d go into the depths to try and doubt your soul." Melanie once wrote the lyrics, "If you do me wrong, I’ll put your first and last name, in my rock and roll song." Hopefully the commitment part of this song was worked out?

"Guilt trip" is modern rock with quick singing like an Outkast song. It grabs you when you hear the CD and sounds like new things to come. The guitar on this song and "I will not come down" is very Minneapolis. The interesting thing is that these last few songs utilize a lyrical format that is becoming popular. The words are fast, and almost compliment the piece musically. You don’t catch all the words, but it sounds great.

To a generation captivated by never understanding the lyrics to rock, but memorizing rap songs music has many facets. What did Nirvana say lyrically? What did they say musically? How about Snoop Dogg? Great Girl’s Blouse opens a new Pandora’s box of questions about music today.. And they have a few answers too. Check them out, the live show comes highly recommended.