While his musical influences are rooted firmly in the 1960s (or earlier if you add in his taste for blues and rural folk),
Billy Childish isn't a man who puts much stock in looking back. He writes new songs, forms new bands, and turns out new albums at a feverish pace, moving forward in ceaseless creativity. But when his friend and musical inspiration
Don Craine of
the Downliners Sect died in February 2022,
Childish teamed up with his former bandmates from his '90s group
Thee Headcoats and
Craine's
Downliners bandmate
Keith Evans to record a memorial EP.
Childish, bassist
Johnny Johnson, and drummer
Bruce Brand enjoyed the experience enough that they decided to cut a reunion LP, and 2023's
Irregularis (The Great Hiatus) boasts a sense of playfulness that sets it apart from much of
Childish's 2010s work. Musically, this is
Childish and company doing what he's always done, bold and dirty R&B-steeped garage rock with lots of howling guitar work, simple melodic structures, and stomp-down rhythms. On "Mr. H Headcoat," however,
Childish pulls out the Snaggletooth voice that was a staple of vintage
Headcoats sides, "7% Solution" tips its Deerstalker cap to his Arthur Conan Doyle obsession, "Headcoatitude" is a swingin' high-energy blast, the female backing vocals on "The Leader of the Sect" recall the glee of the side project
the Headcoatees, and "Oh Leader We Do Dig Thee" honors both
Don Craine and another primal influence,
Bo Diddley. Though there's never been any doubt that
Billy Childish loves rock & roll, the frisson of three old friends reminding themselves of the joys of dirty rock & roll and having a bash with your mates is audible in these performances, and it makes a difference --
Irregularis (The Great Hiatus) is one of the most purely enjoyable albums
Billy Childish has given us in quite some time, and shows this trio still has plenty of gas in the tank. ~ Mark Deming
![Lazaretto [LP]](http://prodimage.images-bn.com/pimages/0888430639812_p0_v3_s90x140.jpg "Lazaretto [LP]")
![Elephant [20th Anniversary Red Smoke & Clear w/ Red & Black Smoke Color Vinyl]](http://prodimage.images-bn.com/pimages/0810074421577_p0_v4_s90x140.jpg "Elephant [20th Anniversary Red Smoke & Clear w/ Red & Black Smoke Color Vinyl]")
