We Belong To the Staggering Evening

Ike Reilly’s charm lies in the fact that he asks for salvation quite frequently, knowing damned well that he has no intention of repenting. The devilish genius behind the pop-sensible major label release, Salesmen and Racists _(among a slew of others titles), is back in the saddle with the independent, roadhouse-ready _We Belong To The Staggering Evening. Most of the bluesy, lo-fi songs on Staggering Evening abide by the old “sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll” cliché, with the addition of under-age girls, lambasting the government, making light of religion, occasional drug-induced fist fights and trips to Mexico.

If you’re prone to getting your panties in a wad when people speak out against your cause, Staggering Evening _must be exempt from your scrutiny simply because Reilly unapologetically spares nobody’s feelings in the songwriting, including his own. In the saloon sing-along “Valentines Day in Juarez,” Reilly knocks himself with the line, “Yesterday I swallowed. Today I choked,” while in the campy track “I Hear The Train” he takes a stab at Evangelicals with the line, “Tell your minister he looks real cute in his Lutheran suit.” Album highlights include the foot-stomping, opening track “8 More Days Til The 4th Of July”, the single “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling” and the gritty “It’s Hard To Make Love To An American”. Simply put, _Staggering Evening depicts a world where women are just as risqué as men (if not more so), and where the most debated issues of our time are lightheartedly taken with a grain of salt.

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