They were a band out of time, creating music that sounded about 30 years older than when it was released. And they were a band without a country, as they had to find success in a foreign nation before they could enjoy it in their own.
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None of that stopped Stray Cats from churning out a series of hit singles in the 80s. Of those songs, “Rock This Town”, best epitomized their throwback excellence.
Catch a Stray
Brian Setzer played guitar and sang. Slim Jim Phantom handled the drums. And Lee Rocker joined the party on stand-up bass. That’s right: stand-up bass, an instrument that hadn’t been in style since the earliest days of rock and roll. But this was a band that formed in 1979.
Originating in Massapequa, New York, the band originally shifted between a series of names that included some variation of the word “cats.” By doing this, they could fool local bookers who didn’t like having the same group play two nights in a row. Still, they struggled to gain attention from American record labels that didn’t know what to do with their rockabilly-meets-punk sound and look.
Stray Cats made the move to England because they heard that there was a scene there where their music might thrive. Sure enough, they soon found themselves a hot item in the UK, where labels lined up to sign them. They took the permanent name Stray Cats to reference their move from the US.
“Town” Trivia
Stray Cats found the ideal producer in Dave Edmunds, who had made a career as an artist mining a sound that was indebted to the classics of rock and roll. From their self-titled first album in the UK came “Rock This Town”, which Setzer wrote after being inspired by a particularly fine jukebox in a London bar.
“Rock This Town”, their second single in the UK, went to the Top 10 in 1981. Stray Cats released two British albums in 1981. Once the buzz became loud enough, they earned an album release in America. Built For Speed basically collected the best songs from the two British albums.
Once again, “Rock This Town” made it to the Top 10, this time in the US. (It actually peaked at the same spot, No. 9, on both charts.) The song helped Built For Speed, the unusual hybrid of an album. reach a million copies sold when all was said and done.
Behind the Lyrics of “Rock This Town”
Take the teenagers-in-love drama of “I Saw Her Standing There”, the bouncing thrust of “Rock Around The Clock”, and some sneering attitude, and you might end up with something resembling “Rock This Town”. In the first verse, the narrator admits he has something less than PG up his sleeve with his girl: “Mama don’t know what I got in store for you.”
Once the couple finds a location, the narrator locates a jukebox that’s less than satisfactory. “Well I put a quarter right into that can,” Setzer complains. “But all they played was music hall, man.” In America, Stray Cats changed the offending genre to “disco” to make it more relatable to US audiences.
To drive home the retro point, the narrator’s main antagonist is “a real square cat, he looks a-1974.” Stray Cats’ “Rock This Town” managed to be proudly antiquated and right on time all at once.
Photo by Suzie Kaplan
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