Garbage Days Revisited #93: Tigertailz - "Bezerk!" (1990)

"Forget about the crowd and turn it up loud!" - Tigertailz - Noize Level Critical

We seem to have covered a lot of late '80s Brit glam bands in Garbage Days Revisited in recent weeks. Some of them have been genuinely cool low-slung scuzzy rock 'n' rollers (Gunfire Dance), some of them have been daft drunk rock 'n' roll hooligans (the Babysitters, Soho Roses). But I guarantee you this - there were none as downright silly as Tigertailz. Basically think Pretty Boy Floyd. But with better tunes. And also Welsh. I mean, you're at least intrigued by that, right?

Tigertailz were formed in Pontypridd in the mid-'80s by singer Steevi Jaimz, guitarist Jay Pepper and bassist Pepsi Tate (possibly not their real names). A series of drummers came and went before the group settled on American ex-pat Ace Finchum in time for their '87 debut Young And Crazy. Hands up, it's a decent effort but the trouble is Jaimz's vocals. He's not a bad singer, a bit Paul Stanley a bit Mike Monroe but his vocals just don't quite suit the Sweet style glam-pop stomp of the material. Either way, he and the rest of the band didn't really get on in the first place and he'd either jump ship or be pushed (depending on who you ask) soon afterwards leaving the band needing to start from scratch with a new frontman.

They would duly find him in the form of Kim Hooker, previously bassist with fellow valley natives Rankelson (basically think a Welsh W.A.S.P.). Hooker basically had the sort of utterly insane OTT screech that made Ronnie Keel look semi-reasonable and it's that which basically elevates the band's second album Bezerk! from decent-ish sleaze rock like Young And Crazy to something that's so utterly ridiculous that, much like Cats In Boots' Kicked And Klawed, you can't help but love it. 

The jewel in the crown was the album's lead-off single Love Bomb Baby, the nearest thing Tigertailz ever got to an actual proper hit (it just to say scraped the Top 75), basically a near-perfect three minute glam metal pop song. Basically, if the Sweet were still going in the late '80s then this is what you'd like to think they'd have been coming up with and praise doesn't come much higher than that.

The album pretty much continues on that vein throughout - it's so utterly silly that it goes right out the other side and becomes perversely brilliant. Sick Sex, Noize Level Critical (oh yeah, they had a Slade-like propensity for replacing the letter s with the letter z in their song titles as well), I Can Fight Dirty Too and Call Of The Wild being sheer daft-as-feck Saturday night party anthems that sound just perfect after ten pints at your local '80s rock club. Similar to Keel's Lay Down The Law, it's only the token power ballad (look, it was 1990, this was kind of compulsory back then) Heaven that kind of breaks up the momentum but that aside, it’s pure no-brainer brilliance - basically think Poison if their albums weren’t just three great singles and the rest all filler.

Sadly, it wouldn't last. Bezerk! just to say beat the clock before the grunge iceberg hit the glam metal Titanic but by the time of the follow-up, it's safe to say that the band had very much gone out of vogue. Initially, the group changed their name to Wazbones (probably best not to ask...they'd also replaced Ace Finchum with new sticksman Andy Skinner by this point) but eventually just called their third album that and put it out under the Tigertailz moniker. Unfortunately, it was a mis-step with the group attempting to do a full on 180 by going thrash but unfortunately despite the fact they'd kind of dabbled in this area before (their B-sides collection Banzai includes covers of Metallica's Creeping Death and Megadeth's Peace Sellz (But Who'z Buyin'?) (sic)), it just didn't work and the band called time on things soon afterwards.

It isn't quite the end of the story of course. Tigertailz would reform in the 21st century, initially with a Jaimz/Finchum line-up with Hooker, Pepper and Tate putting their own version together a couple of years later - in that way they actually beat L.A. Guns to the whole "two line-ups who can't stand each other" thing by a couple of years. The inevitable court case ensued, the Kim/Jay/Pepsi line-up won and Steevi rechristened his version the Steevi Jaimz Band.

Jay has kept his version of Tigertailz going ever since even surviving the sudden and tragic loss of Pepsi Tate from cancer in 2007. They've gone through something of a revolving door line-up in recent years with about five lead singers in the last decade, most recently Rob Wylde, formerly of your correspondent's old favourites Teenage Casket Co and more recently Midnite City who left earlier this year. A few new albums have surfaced although with titles like Bezerk 2.0 and Thrill Pistol, it's kind of felt like the inspiration's been on the wane for a while now unfortunately. Despite this though, Tigertailz can comfort themselves that they'll always have Bezerk! as a marker to lay down and it's not a bad little record to have in your arsenal. If you've not heard it already, give it a listen, leave your ego at the door and just tip yourself a drink and enjoy it. For simple no-brainer rock 'n' roll fun, it does the job perfectly.