Devil's Rumble: Davie Allan & The Arrows Anthology
For the latter half of the '60s, Davie Allan and the Arrows were the kings of teen exploitation film soundtracks, recording a score of them for A.I.P. and other independent studios. The core of that work revolved around Allan's manic, buzz-saw fuzz guitar (typified byThe Wild Angels' "Blues' Theme," a national hit), which was to the '60s biker genre whatMorriconewas to the spaghetti Western. This treasure trove of Allen's decades-unavailable recordings for Mike Curb (his high school choir-mate turned producer and record-biz mini-mogul) mark the first time most of the collection's 40 rare tracks have been anthologized for CD. Allen has long been one of instrumental rock's most unsung heroes, a pioneer of nascent garage punk and tripped-out psychedelia who shrewdly informed the primitive crunch ofLink Wraywith a savory taste forMancini's melodicism, taking the unlikely, electric mélange on the often downright experimental flights of multitracked six-string aggression chronicled here. Culling single sides and album cuts, this collection charts the Arrows' explosion from early, SoCal surf-rooted innocence into the wildly inventive sultans of the sonic psych-out that poweredDevil's Angels,Born Losers,Wild in the Streets, and the other cult '60s soundtracks that form the bulk of this collection.--Jerry McCulley