Under the Radar shines a light on lesser-known cover artists. If you’re not listening to these folks, you should. Catch up on past installments here.

Bass + Drum – Guitar = All Rock.

That’s how singer Ivan Russia describes Mr Russia: Guitar-less rock and roll. A conceit like that might color every aspect of the music – a one-trick band, so to speak – but it doesn’t. In fact, you forget it pretty quickly. The tunes stomp along on their own momentum with what the Chicago Sun-Times’ Jim DeRogatis called “a slash-and-burn mix of adrenaline and melody.”

Add a touch of spooky glam and you’ve got killer cover-song potential. The trio delivers. They’ve appeared on tribute albums to David Bowie, Radiohead, and Nick Cave. For each they prepared a video using found or filmed footage (similar to what we saw from The Peptides). For “Boys Keep Swinging,” a faceless girl cryptically explores her apartment. “The National Anthem” (the Radiohead song) blends public-domain footage of girls dancing with creepy A-bomb PSAs. Finally, The Birthday Party’s “Wild World” uses footage from a ’60s zombie film called Carnival of Souls (yes, it is streaming on Netflix). Continue reading »