Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
The sound of Punk is one that never went away, that never got booted in the region’s best left undisclosed or allowed to fade away as some might suggest, it just took itself more seriously and allowed its perfectly controlled anarchy to be found shining away without criticism and having the ideal ammunition to assassinate the sometimes weak and foolish pop industry. Punk remains a haven for the intelligent and the unspoiled, of course at times it manages to go up its own backside and beguile with phantom pleasure but for the majority, it remains an undisguised truth that many will enjoy and tease the ungrateful with energy and heart thumping vigour.
Into this mix of charm and anger, Queen Zee & The Sasstones play with a truth that Punk enjoys, basic enrolment made grand, the cost of making sure that your voice or message is heard never one that should be bound by the limitations of greed and the trappings of money, instead it resounds with the force that made Punk have such a firm grip on the world of music and the anxiety of Government.
In the song Medicine, Queen Zee & The Sasstones, the dynamic of the song is captured against the awful and despairing thought that out in the world, full of reasoned and intelligent human beings, still remains those who believe that so called conversion therapy for those whose parents think that their child, the loved is gay or lesbian. The diary format of the song grips with a tight leash of anger against such baseless and crude thought, that someone could be changed against nature through the ‘miracle’ of science or even the power of suggested prayer is ridiculous at best, evil at worst.
Queen Zee understands this and asks the listener to grab hold of the reality that there is nothing wrong with anyone’s orientation as long as they are not hurting anyone else. It is a stark message, it is a simple one but the combination of the two is something that makes Punk, in its most inclusive form, is perhaps the one genre that understands that simple fact.
Medicine may be good for the soul, sometimes it can make you sicker than you realise, but for Queen Zee & The Sasstones, Medicine is a wonderful message of quality and gravel toned cool.
Ian D. Hall