super black market

This band was born in Warrensburg, a Central Missouri town where everybody knew them: Sonny Remlinger –social butterfly motormouth with skinniest black jeans, a quick hand on your shoulder and a smile from here to L.A.; Joseph Remlinger – amiable, quieter, younger, taking everything in, taking late-night notes about parties, vampires and suicides for his brother to sing about; Benn Bluml – quieter still, his gaze gets stuck on the physics problems in his head. Yeah, they had a band, those tall-drink-of-whiskey Remlinger brothers and the Bluml kid. Super Black Market would blow amps and minds with their punk-infused, nihilistic party rock that somehow incorporated pirate tales, crowd singalongs and Chewbacca stomping across the stage. Sonny would snarl like a rock ‘n’ roll lunatic, curled lip evoking an unhinged Elvis singing not “Love me tender” but “You will be a whipping boy!” And in the morning, those rocker boys would wait on you, make your breakfast and ring you up at the Corner Café, where they all worked. But in Fall 2008, Bluml and the Remlinger brothers ran away from Warrensburg. They ran to the other end of Sonny’s smile, to get lost in a new town that overflowed with charismatic frontmen and otherwise cliché band dudes. They ran to L.A. to see if they could find themselves and a new audience for their midnight anthems. Almost immediately, Super Black Market met producer Dean Dichoso, who worked with them on the new EP Pray for War, six feverish rock songs that hit, hook and hang out, blending elements of punk, alt-, hardcore and the Sylvia Plath on Joseph’s nightstand. Standout line: “You are blood and I’m a vampire. We sit and smoke while the room is on fire” (from “I Won’t Forget You”). Half about the past and half about the future, Pray for War reflects the energy and anxiety of ambitious, reckless youth -- articulated from a whisper to a scream by Sonny, set to pogo-ready rhythms and laced with irresistible refrains. You won’t forget it. -Crystal Wiebe Village Voice www.superblackmarket.com