Blood on the Saddle - Poison Love

Name: Blood on the Saddle
Album: Poison Love
Year: 1986
Style: Country College Radio, Cowpunk, Alt-Country
Similar Bands: X, Blasters, Lone Justice, Screamin' Sirens, Cramps, Rev. Horton Heat
"One-Word" Review: Train Jumping Hobo Country
Based Out Of: Los Angeles
Label: Chameleon Records

 Cover, Record

Record, Back

Poison Love (1986)

1. One Step Away 3:56
2. Police Siren 2:05
3. Steal You Away 2:12
4. Poison Love 3:07
5. I Though I Heard Some Thunder 4:10
6. Johnny's At the Fair 2:35 / 
7. A Bed of Roses 2:48
8. Colt 45 1:49
9. Promise your Heart to Me 2:20
10. Down and Out 1:54
11. In the Pines 3:04 (cover)
12. A Mother's Love 2:53
13. Abilene 4:20

Album Rating (1-10): 6.5

Members & Other Bands:

• Rod Botelho - Bass, Mixing (Bobbi Bratt, loafin' Hyenas, Groovy Rednecks)
• Greg Davis Vox, Guitar, Banjo, Mixing, Producer (Vandals, Candye Kane, Dead Hippie, The Drivers, Vandals)
• Hermann Senac - Drums, Percussion, Vox (The Loafin' Hyenas, Crowbar Salvation, Guilty Hearts, Skull Control, Bea Pickles, Ether Hogg)
• Annette Zilinskas - Vox, Harmonica (Bangs, Bangles, Ringling Sisters, Medicine, Screamin' Sirens, Don Coyote, Leaving Trains, Weather Bell)
• Larry Menshek - Engineer, Mixing
• Barron Abramovitch - Engineer, Mixing
• Beatrix Zilinskas - Design, Illustrations, Photos

Unknown-ness: Never heard of this band. But from the name and the untracked VHS looking artwork + year, I imagine this will be some dark, cold new wave with lots of synth and goth themes.

Album Review: It was not that- definitely not synth, new wave or goth. This is a jangly college radio version of country rock, with heavy lean on the country element. Although i would not associate the sound as punk at all, they came from the Cowpunk movement, apparently more raw on their first album. The songs are definitely more driving and foot stompin' than typical country. The band name is taken from a Tex Ritter song of the same name that was played by Big Al; one of the animatronic bears at Disneyland's Country Bear Jamboree. Annette was in the band the Bangs, which became the Bangles, but left them to join this band right before the Bangles first record came out (but after an EP). Her vocals are strong on the whole album, especially on their cover of traditional folk song In the Pines, which sounds an awful lot like House of the Rising Sun. "Johnnie's At the Fair" sounds like a traditional native american song.

Stand Out Track: Colt 45, In The Pines

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