Dazed and Confused, October 2002
Little White Lies

text STUART WRIGHT photography KAI REGAN

Waking Electric 6 (formerly The Wildbunch) at 11am in New York, a gravely voiced Surge Joebot (guitar) immediately jokes, "You may want to talk to M (the drummer). He's in amazing shape." A hungover M quickly responds, "No, we've been up for hours. In fact, we just got back from jogging."

Formed in 1997, this Detroit five piece jolted into action around singer Dick Valentine's desire to be a weatherman, but that didn't work out. Their debut single "Danger! High Voltage" is a fantastic impression of KISS doing disco and features the guest vocals of the unknown John S. O'Leary. Isn't that Jack White? M says, "No, we had an internet contest for singers."

Surge describes himself as a generalised megalomaniac and paranoiac. For example? "We went for KISS tickets and they left me in line, like a bunch of idiots. When they came back I was hiding under a truck. I thought that 'they' thought I was a communist and wanted to kill me. And I don't even know who 'they' are!"

"A little inaccuracy sometimes saves tons of explanation," wrote Edwardian author of nasty short stories, Saki. Detroit's latest garage rock/disco pioneers Electric 6 rewrite this theory. They are wrapped up in layers of untruths so exaggerated that no end of explanation would unravel who they are or what they are about.