4 out of 5

Label: Shangri-La Records

Produced by: The Grifters and Doug Easley and Davis McCain

At one point, I read a review that made the comparison that The Grifters were like a lo-fi Stones.  I’ve never been able to get much into the groove of the Stones, but the first Grifters disc I owned – their last, ‘Full Blown Possession’ – made me understand the connection, though I certainly appreciated Grift’s predilection for being less accessible and, generally, more rough around the edges.  And as you go further and further back into their career, recording tracks were stripped away and things just got rougher.  ‘Crappin’ ‘ is the midpoint of this journey.  It’s also – at the points where it lets loose – one of the loudest goddamn albums I’ve ever heard, ushered in most dramatically by the cacophonous blast of distortion that kicks in on opener ‘Rats.’  But the disc doesn’t always have to rattle your eardrums to be effective.  A couple tracks in we get ‘Dead Already,’ which plays with Shouse’s yearning vocals over a harsh, 1-tracked guitar and perhaps some distorted keys  – a perfect pause from the rock-outs of the previous tracks, as well as evidence of the dreadful depth evident in some Grifter’s lyrics, easy to overlook when more beat-based tracks – such as ‘Skin Man Palace’s “I am the mambo king,” opening claim – seem to be sung with a sneer.  Though that rapaciousness is all part of the appeal.  The same song twists into creepy oddity with the next line, “wrapped tight in my tarantula skin,” before breaking into its groove, to be followed by the straight-laced, wistful ‘Arizona.’  Some of this tonal experimentation doesn’t quite pay off – ‘Arizona’ is only a couple minutes long but stalls the disc’s momentum when paired with follower ‘Felt-Tipped Over,’ and a similar stumble is made (after the scream-your-lungs-out awesome punch of ‘Get Outta That Spaceship and Fight Like a Man’) with the instrumental ‘Piddlebach’ and penultimate ‘Here Comes Larry,’ whose wandering rumble is thankfully blasted away by closer ‘Cinnamon,’ which does the job of ending us on a high.  Each of the tracks mentioned have value, they’re just scattered a bit oddly to break up the pace effectively.  Setting that aside though, its amazing how solid each of these tracks are, each one topping the next until you hear that opener again and swear that THAT tops what you were just listening to…  And so on.