The Jesus Lizard, Suckling

Strange times: Trump’s president, billionaires are launching cars into space, and Jesus Lizard wild man David Yow tossed the opening pitch at a Dodgers game – fast, high, and outside. Some 31 years after the Chicago-by-way-of-Austin quartet started, their physical approach remains similar. Bassist David Wm. Sims says Yow isn’t expected to do anything unsafe despite occasional stage diving, but he himself suffered a meniscus tear during the band’s December dates.

A recent viewing of Jim Jarmusch’s Stooges doc Gimme Danger added insult to injury.

“In the interview, Iggy was sitting on his foot, with his leg tucked completely under him, which I completely cannot do anymore,” laments Sims.

Battle scars aside, he, Yow, guitarist Duane Denison, and drummer Mac McNeilly still conjure the highly distilled essence of blistering touchstones like 1991’s Goat and 1992’s Liar when they occasionally reunite. Given the austere conditions under which the Steve Albini-produced albums were recorded, there’s no trickery other than nailing it down.

“We just wrote the songs as we wanted to play them in clubs in front of people, and then we went and recorded them that way,” Sims says. “We didn’t really have the wiggle room to get fancy with that process.”