They have captured the imagination of crowds and critics alike with their blend of ’77 punk power, skilful playing, soulful slide blues, and razor-sharp social commentary, delivered with a distinctly British wit.
Each a consummate player in their own right, frontman Gary Lammin (formerly of Joe Strummer protégés Little Roosters), bassist Martin Stacey (Chelsea), and drummer Chris Musto (Johnny Thunders, Joe Strummer, Glen Matlock and The Philistines) can collectively lay claim to an extraordinary chemistry.
They boast a singular sound which has brought them a faithful, fast-growing following.
While many with a part to play at punk’s point of impact hold vivid memories of the moment, and honest ambitions to re-capture its thrills, The Bermondsey Joyriders’ belong to a rarer breed. Still believing in people power and the endless possibilities that punk‘s uprising from the underground symbolised, The Bermondsey Joyriders resist replicating a 70s blueprint to the letter, instead retaining a feel of the movement’s most intrinsic elements; the immediacy of aural direct action, and the excitement of seeing
it in effect.
Having dashed out 2009’s raw ’n’ riotous self-titled debut in a single, manic 10 hour studio sprint, the trio took a more considered approach to second album ‘Noise & Revolution’, and were amply rewarded for the time they invested. An ambitious concept piece narrated by Detroit counterculture icon John Sinclair, the album initially took shape on stage, where the band repeatedly aired it live and in full, with Sinclair delivering his fire and brimstone spoken word segments from behind a lectern. Upon release it was greeted by a chorus of critical praise and voted Vive le Rock magazine readers’ Album of the Year, before swiftly selling out and going to a second pressing.
In 2014, they followed that mould-breaking crowd pleaser, with third album ‘Flamboyant Thugs’, which is perhaps the most potent realization of their bizarre blues-punk brew to date. Along with the howling golden-era Stone hooks, slide guitar and urgent New York Dolls rhythms, there come hints of the Small Faces in Lammin’s lively Cockney wordplay, stomping flashes of glitter rock, crazed psych-blues moments, and a touch of testifying MC5-style garage rock, when Sinclair makes a slight return to contribute a spoken intro and outro to the title track. In sleeve notes included with the vinyl edition, veteran NME scribe and John Lee Hooker biographer Charles Shaar Murray opined that ‘Flamboyant Thugs’ is The Bermondsey Joyriders’ “graduation piece, channeling and distilling both their individual musical pasts, and everything they’ve learned and discovered since they’ve been working and playing together, into one hectic rock and roller-coaster”. It’s time to get onboard for the ride.
