Houston’s The Nerve-Curlers were in a playful mood on a recent evening at their East Downtown rehearsal space; Connor Pursell, lead guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter for the band wore a Lucha Libre (Mexican wrestling) mask and initially communicated mostly in grunts while drummer Ken Dannelley interpreted for him and bassist Neil Jeffrey also joined in on the conversation. Dannelley announced that Pursell’s wrestling persona is “Bee Sting” as Pursell grunted that he got stung by a bee.
The Nerve-Curlers have a fast tempo surf/surf-punk sound with elements of psychedelic rock and post-punk and have recently recorded and released their second cassette of music with five new songs aptly titled Second Term; the band will have an official release show for Second Term on June 6 at Black Magic Social Club in Houston.
“I won’t say it’s a departure but I think it kinda is, it’s a more overtly political release than the previous one,” says Dannelley. Pursell who writes all the lyrics for the band in addition to the music, describes himself as “pretty much a socialist; I’m a leftist for sure” and reflected his politics by wearing a “Free Palestine” T-shirt with cutoff sleeves for the interview along with the wrestling mask.
The cover art for the Second Term cassette is a depiction of 25th President of the United States William McKinley’s assassination in 1901 by anarchist Leon Czolgosz; the back cover is a picture of an old voting machine which had tabs on them that voters would pull down for the person or issue they wanted to vote for. Amusingly, the tabs look like burnt out cigarette butts in the art.
“We just like cassette because it’s a viable, quick way to get stuff out,” explains Dannelley. “It’s the cheapest way to produce 50 copies of something and nobody really gives a shit about CDs,'” adds Pursell. “Vinyl’s too expensive but somehow tapes are making some sort of weird vintage comeback and it’s cheap to produce.”
The band briefly went through all of the new songs on their cassette which was again produced by Mike BBQ like their last release.
“Plagued”
“It’s a political climate record, just the political climate that we live in,” says Pursell. “It’s what we’re kind of plagued with and what he have been dealing with,” adds Dannelley. “Politics and how horrible it is and the times we live in.”
“Rack Rider”
“Rack Rider is a very intricate instrumental that we recorded with BBQ Mike and we had this really intricate set up with a recording instrument, it was called a rack rider, that’s how deep that was,” explains Pursell. “We didn’t have a title for that.” Jeffrey says it was briefly called, “Surf Instrumental Number 2, or whatever.”
It is a surf instrumental song; No irony was intended in the original track name. Dannelley does let out a scream on the recording that he describes as sounding like the awkward scream that ended Howard Dean’s political career; the infamous enthusiastic “Yeeaaargh!” primal scream meant to fire up the crowd after finishing third in the Iowa Democratic caucuses on January 19, 2004.
“Good To Be Alive (2020)”
“That’s actually the most political one from 2020, that’s the year I wrote it, it’s George Floyd, the violation of civil rights in Minneapolis, the riots, all the shit that sucked about 2020.” explains Pursell. “That was my kinda take on it.”
“You Wonder Why”
“Another plague song,” laughs Pursell. “About birth control, rent control, how the workers get screwed over and the state of Texas getting rid of any fucking rights we have, the state that claims it’s all about individual freedom.” “One of the best takes I read all week was something about guns don’t kill people but certain people sure seem to be really afraid that books are gonna turn people gay,” adds Jeffrey.
Jeffrey is referring to Texas House Bill 1375 – Civil Liability for Bookstores introduced by Rep. Nate Schatzline that, if passed, would have allowed individuals to sue bookstores and other entities for selling or displaying materials considered “harmful to minors.” Critics of the bill fear any books about LGBTQ+ issues could be targeted by conservatives in Texas under this law. The bill did not get a second reading, making it effectively dead.
“Dig Your Own Grave”
“It’s about non-unionized labor,” says Pursell.”Capitalism feeding on its own,” adds Dannelley. “Everybody has this mythos that you can pull yourself up by your own bootstraps, ‘the problem is you lazy libtards is you’re not working hard enough, you need to pull yourself up by the bootstraps,’ well I don’t have a boot to pull myself up with, you know? ven a hamster on a treadmill can get off the treadmill at some point, you know?”
Of The Nerve-Curlers music, Jeffrey explains, “Connor writes the songs, he writes the melodies and we just kind of come up with the bass and drum parts that seem to fit.”
Longtime music scene veteran Dannelley is actually in three bands right now, he’s in Cornish Game Hen and Committeemen in addittion to The Nerve-Curlers and he has spent a lot of time in band rehearsals.
“At a band practice we run through a set, like all the guys have a set list and then if anybody’s got new ideas you present them to the band, some bands, like us with Connor, ‘here’s the song play it,’ some other bands like ‘I’ve got a riff a few ideas a few lyrics what are you guys thinking’ you build upon it, depends on the band, depends on the dynamics of the band,” explains Dannelley. “Connor came in like ‘I am the songwriter,’ and they’re great songs so I’m fine with that, kinda makes my life easier because it’s like ‘here’s the song,’ I don’t have three guys looking at me like ‘what are you going to play on drums Ken?'”
After the upcoming casette release show, The Nerve-Curlers are looking to perhaps do some more live shows in late July as well as recording a cassette follow up to Second Term, as Dannelley proclaims they are a cassette band and Pursell agrees, saying, “We’re only going to do EPs on cassette from now on we’re not going to do full albums cause the attention span of people can’t handle an entire album these days.”
“Get out and support your local music bands,” concludes Jeffrey. “Yes, support your local music but also get out and support live music venues in general.” “It’s a tough time and they deserve it and even bands I don’t like are working their asses off, shockingly enough.” adds Dannelley. “Save the Texas praire chicken.”
Asked for any final thoughts, Pursell , always the jokester, said “I only have analog thoughts.”
The Nerve Curlers perform June 6 at Black Magic Social Club, 7036 Harrisburg with The Wheel Workers and Only Beast.
