Live Review from The Independent
10.28.02 @ Trash, London UK

text S Price

The one thing the garage rock revival has lacked so far -- surprisingly, given its Motorcity origins -- is the funk. Enter the Electric Six, a quintet from Detroit Rock City. Formerly The Wildbunch, they had already split up when Soulwax included their single, "Danger! High Voltage", on their 2 Many DJs mix album.

[PLEASE NOTE: This is not accurate. The band re-activated in spring of 2000. They recorded "Danger! High Voltage" in Summer of 2000. The original High Voltage single was released by Flying Bomb in the fall of 2001 and the song appeared on the Soulwax compilation in 2002. By that point the band had been in uniterrupted operation for close to two years.]

A thunderous garage-disco monster, it has the same hysterical momentum as the Osmond's "Crazy Horses" or Elvis' "Way Down", with singer Dick Valentine, in a Brian Blessed baritone, yelling lines like "Fire in the Disco! Fire in the Taco Bell!" while a certain guest singer under the name "John S. O'Leary" squeals "Danger! Danger! High Voltage!" in a voice uncannily similar to the Sweet's Steve Price.

The track became so popular that the band reformed

[AGAIN: The band reformed months before even recording "Danger! High Voltage"]

and they're here in their lounge lizard suits to slay Trash with what has become a dancefloor classic. John S. O'Leary can't be here, but his part is gleefully and shrilly fulfilled by the crowd. The rest of the Six's repertoire rocks just as hard, low-slung riffs colliding with bellowed buzzwords ("Jaguar!", "Nuclear war on the dancefloor!" and the like), but if they just played "Danger! High Voltage" five times in a row, nobody would complain. The contest for the single of 2003 is already over.

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