 PEAVEY AMPS POWER-PUNKERS VISQUEEN WITH RAW 5150* TONEPeaveyPosted 2004-03-31 March 30, 2004, PEAVEY INT'L. HEADQUARTERS—You know the saying, "I'm so happy I could burst"? That seems to be the motive behind Visqueen's songwriting. All 10 blasts on the Seattle natives' rollicking, raw-as-razors debut, King Me, explode with gleeful, manic melodies, Who-like percussive bombast and adrenalized, buzzing guitar riffs. But there are plenty of other reasons to love Visqueen, too.
If you're impressed by critical praise, try this: top Rolling Stone critic David Fricke hailed King Me as "a high-speed, sugar 'n' steel picnic from start to finish," and Amazon.com placed the band at No. 9 on its Best of 2003 list, well above arty critical darlings like Radiohead and The Mars Volta. Need credentials? Bassist Kim Warnick led the lauded Northwest punk band The Fastbacks for 20-odd years.
Guitarist/vocalist Rachel Flotard, a transplant from New Jersey bred on Elton John and Led Zeppelin, founded Visqueen after penning much of the material that comprises their debut. She recruited Warnick and Ben Hooker, a propulsive, Keith Moon-esque basher on drums, and the group's chemistry was instant—prompting them to enlist producer Barrett Jones (Foo Fighters) to capture all the glory on the immediate, infectious King Me.
But while Visqueen is truly the sum of its very capable parts, Flotard's gritty Peavey 5150 guitar amplifier sets the tone for King Me, from the opening feedback of "Vaxxine" to the crunch of "Lovely Guilty."
"The Peavey 5150 just brought out the band," says Flotard. "As a three-piece, you need to sound like a 12-piece, you know? Not necessarily as loud—although the 5150 is loud as hell—but you certainly need the tone and the warmth, and that amp brought it for me."
In order to welcome the 5150 into the fold, Flotard had to dump a succession of inferior amps, including her first love: "The cabinet had a white snake print and fake leather and I loved it," she says ruefully. "I thought it was hilarious. But when I played the 5150 I could not believe the sound that was coming out of it. I always wanted that crunch effect and that deep thud chug."
Visqueen will tour the West Coast during April, beginning in Missoula, Mont., and wrapping in Sacramento, Calif. Watch for the band's second record in late 2004 on BlueDisguise Records.
Peavey Electronics Corporation is one of the largest manufacturers of musical instruments and professional sound equipment in the world. Peavey holds more than 130 patents and produces more than 2,000 products, which are distributed throughout the United States and to 136 other countries. To find out more about Peavey Electronics and its artists, visit www.peavey.com.
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