I really don’t like to make comparisons when it comes to bands that I enjoy, there’s always something different and unique, at least in my eyes, about what I’m listening to. I do not enjoy derivative bands much. So, while Frankie And The Witch Fingers may sound like Ty Segall started a new band with Jay Reatard and they got Charlie Mootheart to join in on the fun, they’re really just a ridiculously talented lo-fi garage rock outfit in my eyes and I couldn’t mean that as a greater compliment. From the moment you start the titular title track on their debut album, Sidewalk, you can hear a deep appreciation for late 60’s and early 70’s psychedelia, refined and captured in the same emphatic and impulsive way, while dragging tricks and sounds from the last fifty years along for the ride. While Frankie And The Witch Fingers seem to incorporate a few more dissonant sounds and breaks, think 13th Floor Elevators or The Velvet Underground, to really spice up the sound and add a level of dissonance to the tightly crafted garage pop melodies, that just seem to melt out of your speakers. Reverberation and fuzz dosed guitars shimmer and undulate in the songs, while echoed vocals float above the instruments, blending in and out of fits of distortion and rave-ups. The bass and drums are like calm pounding waves, powerful enough to chip away at a mountain with out raising an un-needed racket while doing so. Tracks slowly build moment and break into amazing walls of sound and distortion, before fading back into the shadows to reveal the skeletal melody of the song again to let you take it all back in one more time before you’re done. My favorite tracks are when they just hit the gas though, pounding riffs and thundering bass twisting together like a Porsche hitting a lamp post at a hundred and eighty miles an hour, taking your mind along for the ride! Sidewalk has only been released as an extremely limited cassette tape at this point, but word is that might be changing sometime soon but either Frankie And The Witch Fingers is prepping for the release of their second full-length album before the end of the year. I would usually have held off talking to them until the album release but I have to admit, these tunes really got into my head! I couldn’t find a way to buy a tape, hell, I couldn’t even find out who put it out, and I was hoping to score a copy. While I was chatting with these guys though, I just couldn’t help but do an interview; listen to Sidewalk and tell me you wouldn’t have done the same! What follows is a glimpse at a band that in my opinion is on the brink of really bringing the heat. These dudes are just serious enough about what they do to make amazing music and they have enough fun making it, you can hear it through your speakers on every track. After a recent relocation from Indiana to California, I have no doubt you’re gonna be hearing a lot about Frankie And The Witch Fingers before long. In the meantime, get a head start and check out the story so far below, and for the love of all that’s holy – click the Bandcamp link and take in some of the best garage rock you’re gonna hear this side of 1969! - Roman Rathert (It's Psychedelic Baby Magazine, 2014)