Mysterious, notorious, and beautifully fucked up, Royal Trux was a shape-shifting, style-hopping outfit unlike any other. Never was their sound more unique than on their second full-length release, the ceaselessly fascinating hazy haymaker of a double-album Twin Infinitives. Conjured into existence by the core Royal Trux duo of Neil Michael Hagerty and Jennifer Herrema, their wizardry is getting a fresh limited edition silver vinyl 2LP reissue June 14 through Fire Records.
Prior to the emergence of Royal Trux, Neil Hagerty was a member of Pussy Galore, and in fact the two entities coincided for a time. The self-titled debut by Royal Trux was released in 1988, Pussy Galore’s Dial ‘M’ for Motherfucker and final album Historia de la Musica Rock came out in ’89 and ’90 respectively, and Twin Infinitives landed in store bins just in time for Christmas in ’90.
For a brief while, Royal Trux was even categorized as a Pussy Galore side project, but it didn’t take long for Hagerty’s union with Jennifer Herrema to be properly assessed as its own consistently evolving (and therefore unpredictable) thing. On the first LP (reissued by Fire in April for Record Store Day with copies still available), the sound was a sort of late night loner blues damage with some psych touches and Noo Yawk junky-punk attitude thrown in. Initially hitting the lobes as jagged and loose to the border of discombobulated, upon repeated spins the strung-out logic of the debut was revealed.
A few other examples of the early Royal Trux sound include two songs on the 1988 ROIR noise rock compilation cassette The End of Music (As We Know It), the ’89 “Hero Zero” b/w “Love Is…” 45, noted as Drag City Records’ first release, and the ’90 “Spike Cyclone” 2×45 on Vertical Records. This material extended their twisted approach while deepening Herrema’s contribution, and those who’d soaked it all up were prepped, at least to an extent, for Twin Infinitives (also notably Drag City’s first full-length LP release).
Put another way, ears that were receptive to what Royal Trux had already laid down would likely be open to and eager to hear the twisted gush of Twin Infinitives, even if they weren’t full prepared for the sheer breadth of the set’s four sides. Many others would outright reject the recording, which is a totally valid response, but equally legitimate is that Royal Trux, rather than tailor their sound for the ’90s mainstream (just around the corner), were instead fixated on pushing the limits of noise as personal expression but without jumping the fence into full-blown abstraction.
Throughout the record, Royal Trux grapple loosely with song form, though none of the tracks get within a thousand yards of the pop sphere. Well, a distinction can perhaps be made for early the barrage of drumbox beats and ranting heard early in the side-long “(Edge of the) Ape Oven,” as it registers as roughly comparable to Ciccone Youth’s pop deconstruction as commentary from the same era, but in this case even more (much more) fucked up.
Along with an occasional spurting synth, those drum machine rhythms are one of Twin Infinitives’ defining characteristics. Guitar gristle is still abundant, even as the level of blues damage is lower. Still, “Yin Jim Versus the Vomit Creature,” fitting for its monster movie title, does sound a bit like a severely drug addled duo incarnation of The Cramps (Lux and Ivy, naturally).
Important in the analysis of this record is that Hagerty and Herrema could play these songs over and over; the proof in the pudding is the What Is Royal Trux? VHS cassette released by Drag City in 1992. There’s also an alternate version of Twin Infinitives track “Jet Pet” on the ’91 Matador Records compilation New York Eye and Ear Control. Royal Trux weren’t tight, but they did have control over what they were doing, even as Twin Infinitives essentially captures lightning in a bottle.
Make no mistake; Royal Trux was never not a sweet mess, even during their major label ’70s Southern rock-influenced period. Twin Infinitives has been described as Hagerty and Herrema’s Trout Mask Replica, and that’s fair, as it is the apex in their discography, standing apart from achievements before and after. But it’s also analogous to 1/2 Gentleman/Not Beasts, a document of two people laying it all on the line and coming up with something gloriously new.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
A+
