Sunday, October 16th, 2011

"There Is A Light That Never Goes Out"

Dum Dum Girls cover The Smiths

Photo via SubPopSub PopEverything about Dum Dum Girls is pretty danged American, from their California garage rock-meets-’60s girl-group sound to their vintage biker pin-up aesthetic, but hearing them take on arch-English mope-masters The Smiths as they did for the closing track on their He Gets Me High EP earlier this year, you can easily imagine an adolescent Kristen Gundred swooning over romanticized notions of rainy Manchester as much as SoCal’s sunny beaches. But maybe it shouldn’t be any kind of surprise – their band name does come half from The Vaselines’ debut album.

On the same note, it’s not surprising that Gundred would look to another American gone Anglo for inspiration for their new album Only In Dreams; the way she evokes Chrissie Hynde’s vibrato all over that record is uncanny. Look to hear it live when they play Lee’s Palace tonight. And while The Smiths won’t be playing anywhere live anytime soon, fanatics can shell out for the exorbitantly fancy Complete box set, which is out this week.

MP3: Dum Dum Girls – “There Is A Light That Never Goes Out”
Video: The Smiths – “There Is A Light That Never Goes Out”

By : Frank Yang at 9:45 am
Category: Chromewaves Radio

Tags: ,

RSS Feed for this post2 Responses.
  1. Bruce says:

    They did play said Smiths cover last night, which sounded great! As did Kristen/Dee Dee’s voice, indeed very Chrissie, which elicited cheers for the long-held high notes on Coming Down. And the girls’ harmonies were very impressive. Stars in the making all around!

  2. Dum Dum Girls Only In Dreams Competition « The VPME says:

    […] Dum Dum Girls cover The Smiths (chromewaves.net) […]