Louis XIV The Best Little Secrets Are Kept
Nearly all bands are influenced by what they listened to as kids. Some tuck it away so you'd never know, never surfacing much in their music. Others slap it on in big chunks. Some make a complete hash of it, not adding anything new or original to add to it so it just sounds like a straight rip off. Fortunately for us there are bands like Louis XIV. Sounding somewhere between Iggy and the Stooges and the Fall they certainly one of the most interesting bands I've come across of late.
A lot of songs on the album sound instantly familiar. There's Jean Genie and Metal Guru on there, albeit swathed in fabulously dazzling new clothes. I'm not putting them down in any way. The San Diego foursome take all the glittery fun of the best Glam rock and punk ideas and bring truckloads of new ideas.
Some tracks like 'Letter To Dominique' sound very British. It's also a scary little track about a girl being tied up and chucked into the boot of a car. It's not the only place that tying up rears it's head, 'Paper Doll', has some distasteful lyrics, but it fits in with the twisted disturbing little world the album inhabits.
There's lots of salacious, drooling sex on here, barking out of the mouth of multi-talented lead vocalist Jason Hill, who manages to sound like Jagger, Alex Harvey and Riff Raff from the Rocky Horror Picture show. There's a beautiful haunting Lennon impression on 'All The Little Pieces'. If you didn't know better, you'd almost swear that was the man himself with George on some hitherto undiscovered Beatles track. It certainly sends a spooky shiver down the spine.
This isn't just any old ordinary album, it's a listening experience and in places funny, spooky and downright scary. Certainly not one for the faint hearted. Keeping up with the sheer pace of the ever changing dark little landscape alone will have you worn out, but it's ultimately rewarding. With all it's entendres, both double and single, it's the best album about sex (that's what it is after all's said and done) I've had the pleasure of for quite a while. While they may not quite have the wigs and grandeur of their namesake, they're well on the way. They rule the rock from their throne of arrogance with, no doubt, women falling at their feet. Long may they reign.