The very first time I heard Turbonegro was at Roskilde Festival in 2005. They were playing in the middle of the afternoon on the Orange Stage and we sat towards the back, watched them and were suitably amazed. I'd heard the name and seen pictures of them, but really knew nothing about them until then. That said, they only spoke to the crowd in Norwegian so some aspects of what made Turbo such a great live band were lost on us that day.
Nine months later I was in the excellent Real Groovy record store in Auckland at the end of a two-week trip around New Zealand and found this double LP tribute to Turbonegro. I'd been meaning to get into them ever since that afternoon in Denmark and this seemed like the perfect opportunity - a bunch of bands I liked (Hot Water Music, Therapy?, Supersuckers, QOTSA, Zeke) and even more that I hadn't heard of covering a whole load of Turbonegro songs. I added it to the small collection of records and cds I was buying and checked out. After a busy two weeks travelling around, everyone else I was with spent the day exploring Auckland but I'd had enough of being a tourist and spent the whole afternoon in that one record shop. I had a great time.
Anyway, the record is brilliant, although in places I think it's more to do with the songs than the bands playing them. I can't play any instruments, but I imagine it's hard to play Turbonegro songs without sounding like Turbonegro. And why would you want to? Highlights include Nashville Pussy taking on Age of Pamparius, Queens' cover of Back to Dungaree High (I was always more of a fan of Nick Olivieri's vocals) and Get it On by Supersuckers (it would be a few years before I noticed the Alice Cooper reference at the end). Lowlights have to be Him and Toby Dammit, but one of those was to be expected.
A particular mention goes to Bela B and his cover of Are You Ready For Some Darkness? I'd been travelling around with a bunch of friends I'd met at university, including a German girl called Nadine. She'd been telling me about this band called Die Ärzte who are hugely famous if you've ever been a teenager in Germany and feature an incredibly energetic singing drummer called Bela B. After I bought this album she told me about how she didn't really get or like Turbonegro, only to then be very impressed that Bela B had contributed a song. As a side note, I ended up going to see Die Ärzte with her a few years later and they were really impressive. What was almost more impressive was how mad everyone went for them and how a forty-year-old man could stand up drumming and singing for nearly two hours straight.
One of the really nice things about this record is the insert with a few words from each band about how great Turbonegro are, a rant from Hank comparing himself to Jesus and Luke Skywalker and great quotes like "Turbonegro wore Levi's Denim or they wore nothing at all". I hadn't realised Turbo had broken up and got back together again until after I bought this record, so I was a little confused by all the comments about them being gone. The rave reviews from bands like Therapy? and HWM music furthered my idea that Turbo were a band worth getting excited about. I also began to understand all the Turbojugend jackets I'd seen everyone wearing at Roskilde.
So over the following months and years I picked up a bunch more of Turbonegro's back-catalogue (including the excellent Ass Cobra I wrote about in December). I also ended up seeing them again that summer in Belgium (I apologise for how shamelessly international this story has been) and they blew me away even more-so. Their set was wedged between Beck (featuring mini-Beck puppets; more on this another time) and Radiohead and I had a great four hours, running between stages trying to catch as much of all three as possible (I bumped into a friend between Turbo and Radiohead who couldn't understand a word I was saying because I was so excited). Hank addressed the crowd in English and it turns out he is hilarious as well as a great front-man. Whilst I was introduced to Turbo a year beforehand, my favourite memory of them is in that sweaty tent that night throwing myself around to Get in On.
Format: Double 12", gatefold sleeve, insert, poster
Tracks: 23
Cost: £8.14 new
Bought: Real Groovy, Auckland
When: 20/04/06
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: no
