God help me, I’m a religious man.  I’m also writing music reviews, which means that I’m a music critic.  And, I confess, my convictions about Rock and Roll have dug themselves so deep in my innards to the point of being religious (so to speak) that I’ve lost all hopes of even trying to distinguish the two.  

On account of this condition, I’m plagued by this horrible impulse to try to dig up some well-known artist or hyphenate a series of genres that I consider analogous to Living Better Electrically with the hope of giving you (my dear readers) a better understanding of this band and their sound.


photos courtesy of Jennifer Ayers


But, if I bind my hands with the chains of a conventional music review, I’ll forever be imprisoned by more baseless comparisons and futile analogies that have all but left music (Rock and Roll, specifically,) stagnant since the 1960’s (at least).   

In other words, cursed. 

Therefore, I’ve no choice but to try to convey the music of Living Better Electrically in somewhat religious terms and, I’m certain, not even God will forgive me… 

I don’t care.  I’ll do what I have to do. 

When a nation or a people lose sight of what God or the gods deem to be right, the deities send some sort of prophet or oracle to reorient humanity to the true reason we’ve been put on this big, wet rock spiraling through outer space in the first place.   

Sadly, we lost sight of what Rock and Roll was meant to be a long time ago and we’ve been stumbling around, dumb and blind, in the darkness ever since. 

Until Friday night at Trophy’s, when four prophets came calling out of the wilderness of Jackson, Mississippi and pointed us back to the way Rock and Roll was and is truly meant to be.


Yes, there is a prophetic element to the perfect arrangement of keyboards, bass lines, clashing cymbals, roaring guitar solos and songs of rebellion, love, loss, adolescent angst, unpaid debts, and stories of life and death strewn across melodies that exorcize the demons we try so hard in these modern times to suppress. There were moments that night when such wonders did occur while hearing (and watching) Living Better Electrically on that small main stage in Trophy’s Bar and Grill.   

We all have our demons and God gave us Rock and Roll to let them out. 

And, after the desecration of SXSW by the likes of Perez Hilton and Rachel Ray, I’m willing to wager that might be exactly what brought those four fellas outta Mississippi to Austin, Texas… 

All told, the Clark brothers, Joshua (vocals, guitar) and Jakob (vocals, bass), Chris Michaels (vocals, keys), and Jody Suarez (drums) have tapped into that something that makes great Rock and Roll.  I refuse to try to articulate what that something is, but Living Better Electrically has it.  It is there in the anthem chorus of “Aye Me”, a piece in which the sheer vocal energy and bent distortion refuse to be taken captive by the bastards; the more melodic “Princess Blue” (despite myself, I haven’t heard such supernatural ingenuity since a certain egomaniacal alien graced this planet with his band of Spiders); or“Chin Quivers”, where life and meaning and “all the topical cream” are more than they seem over the soft yet poignant ring of Chris Michael’s piano.   

This is exceptionally charismatic music by a fine quartet of true Southern gentlemen.  Four musicians planted firmly in the traditions of their roots and the inherited legacies of their musical forebears, but just daring (or stupid) enough to stand outside the limitations of classification or genre.  

Living Better Electrically is a distorted, haunted melody echoing a sound that ripples across the massive gap between the insufferable weight of the reality of our lives and the ever-receding horizon of our unattainable dreams.   

Rock and Roll was given to bridge that gap.  And Living Better Electrically is the first band in a long while who have granted me the faith to take that step out into the void along with them. 

But still… 

Could this band possibly be as good as my memory serves?   

After all, they did play a middle slot between two mediocre bands (at best).  Did they just reap the hallowed reward of being “the better opening band”?   

Am I merely impressed by the fact that Living Better Electrically seems to share my penchant for over-arching generalizations and ridiculous hyperbole?   

Or is this all just an effect of our mutual southern sensibilities?   

These are the questions that plague me now.  

I must see them again. 

On May 29th, they will take the stage at Stubb’s with Snowden and Colour Revolt.   Maybe then I’ll find my answers, and you, Oh ye of little faith, will too… 



Definetly check out Living Better Electrically either on crunkbox: http://www.crunkbox.com/music/Living_Better_Electrically or on their Myspace page: http://www.myspace.com/livingbetterelectrically - Check them out at Stubb's May 29th at 9:00..