The Upper Crust

Dismiss Boston's Upper Crust as a joke rock band if you must, but give them this much: They're actually funny, and there's as much rock as mock to their singular brand of "roque." Moreover, you can see and hear elements of their shtick rock in a slew of bands that have come since, from the Darkness to Les Savy Fav. The gimmick -- a hedonistic band of foppish, powdered-wigged 18th-century aristocrats -- might suggest limited returns if not for the method-actor conviction delivered by frontman Lord Bendover, guitarists Duc D'istortion and Lord Rockingham (a.k.a. Ted Widmer, who left to write speeches for President Bill Clinton), drummer Jackie Kickassis, and bassist Count Bassie (successor to the Marquis de Roque). They don't just put on airs for cover shoots and stage wear; they stay gleefully in highfalutin character for every single song -- from the opening title track of their 1995 debut, Let Them Eat Rock, to the gentry's lament, "You Can't Get Good Help," which closes 2001's Once More Into the Breeches. Granted, the musical attack suggests a range of influences that begins and ends with AC/DC (right down to Bendover's dead-on Bon Scott sneer), and the debut claims the lion's share of the best material -- most notably the saucy "Little Lord Fauntleroy" and the hilarious "Friend of a Friend of the Working Class." But there's plenty of worthy riffs and double-entendre wit to go around on The Decline and Fall, the swaggering double-live Entitled, and especially Into the Breeches, which earns an extra half star for the salacious kick Bendover brings to "Badminton." (RICHARD SKANSE)

From 2004's The New Rolling Stone Album Guide