Music
Red Ray and The Reprobates
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- Red Ray and The Reprobates
The South Bristol Voice once described Red Ray and the Reprobates as being ‘shambolic’ and on your first encounter with this rough-around-the-edges country and rock-n-roll group, you’d be forgiven for perhaps imagining them as a leaderless band of wandering outlaws out to shake-down some far-flung Old West town. The Reprobates have crept into Bristol’s counterculture music scene under the cover of night, before seizing it by the lapels, and shaking it to the core.
‘Red’ Ray Lannon is a bright, cheerful Geordie whose penchant for cider and distinct dislike for big corporations (a fact which receives a subtle nod in the band’s song Scottish Power, I Hate You) has seen him settle nicely into the bohemian arms of the city of Bristol. Bassist (and lead ladies’ man) Stew’s origins in the Grunge scene are plain through his brooding, funky melodies. He adds a postmodern twist to the tried-and-true formula of the genre. Meanwhile, lead guitarist ‘Coyote’ Cam carries Ray’s spitfire lyrics home with perfect harmonies and magnificent guitar-work and serves as a wry foil for the bouncy enthusiasm of the rest of the group. Finally ‘Young Gun’ Jackson – at just nineteen – has earned his place among the Reprobates by carting himself and his drum-set from Cardiff to Bristol with just a couple hours’ notice, to fill-in for a last-minute drop-out.
Self-described ‘dirty, working-class motherfuckers’, the Reprobates are a microcosm of the times – angry young men whose new album Red Ray and the Reprobates perfectly encapsulates a state-of-being felt by anyone struggling to get-by in uncertain times. The Reprobates’ music is harsh, hilarious and a righteous litany against the Sisyphean toil of life in an uncaring, neon world. The retro Cash-esque stage presence interwoven with traces of punk, grunge, and Brit-pop gives a delightfully raucous voice to a generation left-behind.
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