Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
If you’re part of the in-crowd then you’ve wasted the opportunity life affords you to be a cynical individual, to feel the desire of the recklessly abandoned and the fiercely misunderstood; for nothing feels quite so good as understanding that refusing to play the games of those who only want to be there for the chance to show their face in the limelight is arguably the only church you are require to worship in.
Some pay lip service to the ostracised whilst keeping their distance, the anti punks who dare suggest that they too have leanings which they shoulder the beauty of being out of the loop, yet enjoy the privilege of being in the clique, of restricting oxygen and example of others from behind the curtain to which they appear, grinning, sniping, oblivious to the scorn they unfold.
To be stood chanting with rebellion in the heart of the Church Of The Pistoleros is to be unique, not part of some glorious vanity project that has the status symbol of the Wizard in his green emerald city presiding over the gullible and the damned, and as tracks from the Gypsy Pistoleros new album crash against the eardrums so the faithfully irreplaceable are rewarded for their eccentricity and non-conformity.
Through rampages and musical riots such as Shadow Walker, Last Train To Nowhere, I’m In Love With Myself, the excellent Last Of The Comancheros, Hide Behind A Smile, and What Happened To The Old Town?, the ferocity of spirit displayed by Gypsy Lee Pistolero, Kerry Pistolero White, Shane Pistolero Sparkz, and the new engine on the drums, Pip Pistolero Sampson, run through the walls in the way, taking no prisoners in their crafted assault in the senses and giving the cliques and the gatherings a taste of what they could never hope to understand; that in the isolation of great art others stand tall in diverse company.
Church Of The Pistoleros is hardened steel, it is the extremes of the edge, and yet firmly accessible with a courageous heart willing to be set free from the ties of the disingenuous congregations. An album of sincere heartbeats and an assembly of musicians at the top of their game; this is the church in which to be bound.
Gypsy Pistoleros release Church Of The Pistoleros on May 2nd via Earache Distribution.
Ian D. Hall