By Ryan Sexton, Assistant Entertainment Editor
The Roast Beef Curtains are a band serving up fresh cuts of Rock, Reggae and Dub from Long Island. If you missed them at Bar Social on April 24, they will be out and about spreading their eerily West Coast vibes at various locations in the greater New York area this summer. They also have a surprisingly polished EP available, “Pleasure.”
Immediately evident from a listen to the EP is that The Roast Beef Curtains are a lot like 311, minus the white pants and Learjet tours. Perhaps just as much, The Curtains are evocative of the band Pepper, a Hawaiian outfit that got big enough to get a ringtone, but not much further. Like Pepper, The Curtains have an honest, antihero aspect to their lyrics and songwriting that makes their CD quite approachable. There are no mentions of lunchmeats or deli accoutrements on the disc however.
“Rabbi David,” a song about a conflict of faith, is as amusing as any on the five-track CD. A la Bloodhound gang, there are plenty of questionable lyrics about sex and women. “Fifth Base Girl” is a “wrong way” inspired tale of debauchery and sexual sordidness that seems a little contrived. It’s hard to tell if The Roast Beef Curtains would be making the music they are without bands like Sublime, Pepper and 311. Those kinds of questions don’t matter much though when the bass is hitting you like a freight train and the guitars are scraping you up with reverb and mid range buzz; the songs seem like they would translate very well live.
What is not apparent from the CD, but would be from seeing the band perform, is that they excel at dubbing their instruments live. This means that while they are playing, they are simultaneously manipulating effects pedals that can record, loop and modify their sounds- effectively changing each song while they play it. It’s a lot like juggling chainsaws, but probably a little more dangerous, because if they screw up, the audience will likely leave. So far though, no complaints have come down the wire. A full length release, according to their website, theroastbeefcurtains.com, will be coming out at some point in 2010.
The Roast Beef Curtains are Mike Celano, Andrew Gedacht, and John Carey ( www.theroastbeefcurtains.com)
