JOSIE COTTON
By Bill Sherman
"Invasion Of The B-Girls"
1.
Maneaters Get Off The Road
2.
Green Slime
3.
Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls
4.
Girl In Gold Boots
5. Run
Pussy Cat
6. Who
Killed Teddy Bear
7.
Shiawaseo Yobou (Lets Try To Be Happy)
8.
Black Klansman
9.
Goodbye Gorilla
10.
Maneaters Get Off The Road (Ursula 1000 Remix)
Josie Cotton knows what I want.
For most 80's survivors, Miz C., is primarily known for her
novelty cult single, "Johnny, Are You Queer?," as well as a
memorable performance in the high school concert sequence of
Valley Girl. To cognoscenti of smart-and-sexy retro pop femme
vocalists, though, she's also much loved for her debut elpee,
Convertible Music. A bouncy pop-rock confection which also
featured the choice track, "He Could Be the One," plus a swell
remake of "Jimmy Loves Mary Ann," it clearly established Cotton as
more than just a One Joke Wonder, even if only the hard-core
pop-rock addicts paid attention at the time.
Today, our heroine arrives on the CD racks with Invasion of the
B-Girls (Scruffy Records), a ten-track set of theme songs from
such 60's & 70's era drive-in features as Russ Meyer's Faster,
Pussycat, Kill! Kill! and The Green Slime. While new
wave peers like Belinda Carlisle (whose Go-Go's first performed
"Johnny" in concert) scramble for dubious pop respectability by
attempting to reestablish themselves as serious chanteuses, our
Josie keeps focused on stuff that matters. Like girls in go-go
boots.
A few of these cuts (e.g., "Maneaters," the theme to Herschel
Gordon Lewis's She Devils on Wheels, and "Run Pussy Cat")
will most likely be familiar to anyone who's ever attended a
Cramps concert , or listened to the bootleg CDs of tunes that
these psychobilly greats have taught us. Some are more obscure,
though, even to devotees of psychotronic cinema. I've never had
the pleasure of viewing Ted V. Mikels' Black Klansman,
though judging from its organ-ized heavily relevant theme
(performed with early solo Cher-like brio by Cotton), it sounds
like a flick I definitely need to see. Ditto Who Killed Teddy
Bear?, which sounds like something John Barry or Lalo Schifrin
would've tossed off back in the day (check out those swoony
real-world strings - straight out of some wannabe James Bond
rip-off.)
All of B-Girls's tracks (co-produced with Geza X and Bill
Rhea) have the sweet shell of 60's studio plasticity, with Cotton
smoothly moving from Nancy Sinatra bootsiness to Claudine Longet
style breathiness. To my ears the primo tracks are the more rockin'
ones: "Maneaters," with its "Pushing Too Hard" guitar licks;
"Green Slime," "Pussycat" and the harmonica-sweetened "Girl in
Gold Boots," which evokes the girl-in-a-cage go-go scene better
than the Mikels cheese fest from whence it came. The only misfire
is an end-track dance club remix of "Maneaters" an obvious
ploy, but it doesn't match the garage-y grandeur of Cotton's more
punkishly performed original.
Cotton even has enough bad taste to respectfully include the
leering shouted asides to "Pussycat" ("Faster, faster! Harder,
harder!") as well as Beyond the Valley of the Dolls'
bizarro summary narration. ("Theirs was not an evil relationship,
but evil came because of it!") For those who prefer their B-treats
a little more family friendly, she also tackles Mothra's theme
(playing both of the pixie twins) and offers up a touching
"Goodbye Godzilla."
Tuff gals and the King of
the Monsters: like I
say, Josie Cotton knows what I want.
