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Ruyter Suys (pronounced Rider Size) and Blaine Cartwright of Nashville Pussy are barreling down the Atlanta highway in their hot-rod. Cartwright is behind the wheel and Suys, his wife, is riding shotgun, describing scenery on her wireless phone as the duo tool past the city's finest bowling and eating establishments.
"Atlanta's a great place to live," says Suys. "There are parties
and stuff going on, like, always. We went and saw Junior Brown one
night, and Kiss with Ted Nugent the next night. There's always shit
going on in this town."
The Vancouver-born guitarist says the group decided to call Atlanta
home because "it was one of the cooler towns we played in. When we
started off the band we were in three different states. We never
had that hometown problem where you play locally until you get good
enough to get on the road. We were instantly already on the
road.
"Initially, the whole band moved to Athens, Georgia," she
continues, "because we could afford the rent. It was really cheap
but it's just depressing, man. It's totally R.E.M.'s town. We used
to see Michael Stipe, like, on a daily basis. You go into the
coffee shop and he'd be standing right in front of you in line
ordering his decaf latte with soy milk. So as soon as we could
afford it we got the hell out of there."
It's little wonder that Nashville Pussy never felt at home rubbing
elbows with Stipe. The co-ed quartet, which in addition to Suys and
her husband and singer/songwriter Cartwright also includes
amazonian bassist Corey Parks and drummer Jeremy Thompson,
personifies the "sex, drugs and rock & roll" motto better than
any other existing hard rock act. For proof, one need look no
further than the band's 1998 Mercury Records debut Let Them Eat
Pussy or their just-released, riff heavy sophomore disc,
High as Hell (TVT).
Produced by the Fastbacks' Kurt Block, who also manned the board
for their first effort, the twelve-song album integrates such
spirited components as whiskey, marijuana, porno flicks, Lynyrd
Skynyrd, AC/DC and the Sex Pistols. Aural blasting material like
"Struttin' Cock," "She's Got the Drugs," "Go to Hell" and "Piece of
Ass" highlight the results. Subtlety is not Nashville Pussy's
poison, as the group bypass innuendo in favor of raunchy,
frequently depraved and often-brilliant redneck party music.
"It's like good old-fashioned, humping-in-the-back-seat-of-a-car
rock & roll, man," says Suys. "It's the stuff that got you hot
when you were seventeen, and it still works today. It's like a
contemporary version of the music that made you do all that shit in
high school. We're trying to rekindle that feeling. That's what got
me into music in the first place."
Nashville Pussy's origins begin with Suys and Cartwright, a native
of Kentucky. "Blaine and I met on the road," says Ruyter. "His last
band was on tour in Canada and we had a fling and went crazy
[laughs]. You could say it was a one-night stand gone
wrong. We knew each other just three months before we got married.
We went to a monster truck rally that day to take our minds off it.
We smoked a bunch of pot, went to see Megasaurus and then got
married."
Suys says she and her husband "magically stumbled across" the rest
of the band, California-bred Parks and the Austin, Texas
transplanted Thompson. "We like to say it was God's will that
brought us all together," she laughs. Indeed, what would a
Nashville Pussy show be without Parks' patented fire-breathing?
"Corey's old boyfriend used to do it in his band and she learned it
from watching him," Suys explains. "When we found out there was a
six-foot-three bass player who could breathe fire, we were like,
'You've got to exploit this talent.' The lamest thing we could do
now, is make her play the bass and not breathe fire.
"There's been a serious lack of cool dudes to fall in love with in
rock in the last few years," she continues, noting that the only
reason she even watches MTV anymore is because Britney Spears "is
hot." "We kind of tried to create a band that we would want to go
and see. The only difference is that I'm the guitar player that you
want to fuck now."
JOHN D. LUERSSEN
(June 3, 2000)