Hey, just so we’re clear and you don’t think I’m trying to put one over: this is decidedly not a premiere. Pushy‘s debut album, Hard Wish, originally came out in 2018 through Germany’s Who Can You Trust? Records, and hell, I did a premiere for it at the time, and I’m pretty sure it’s been on Bandcamp ever since, so no, not a premiere. But Tee Pee Records is giving the classic heavy rockin’ eight-tracker a domestic US look on vinyl this week, and that’s definitely enough of an occasion for me to want to host Hard Wish again. Not that good records need an excuse anyway, but you know what I mean.

On guitar/vocals in the Portland, Oregon-based Pushy one finds Adam Burke, formerly of Fellwoods, and best known for the striking paintings he’s provided as cover art for everyone from Ruby the Hatchet to Hexvessel to this site to Fit for an Autopsy. He shares vocal duties with bassist Neal Munson, as Ron Wesley and Travis Clow round out the four-piece on guitar and drums, respectively, and across Hard Wish, they tap influences from earliest AC/DC, earliest King Crimson, earliest Judas Priest, not-quite-earliest Black Sabbath and a host of others brash, ballsy and boozed-up. Clow and Munson make a nodder highlight out of early cut “Blacktop,” but from “Fanny’s” to “I’ll Be Gentle,” the focus here is on attitude, on swagger, and songs like “El Hongo,” the driving “Lonesome Entry” and “Nasty Bag” have plenty of that, while “If I Cry” and closer “Lay of the Land” expand the palette a bit with some deceptively nuanced jams built around the live-feeling energy of the recording itself.

Bottom line is there’s plenty to dig here for ’70s aficionados and other-type heads looking for a groove to make their day, and really, again, I’m not trying to say this is a premiere — because it isn’t — but with the Tee Pee release of Hard Wish out this Friday (preorders below, if that’s your thing), I’m just glad to have a chance to revisit it, because it rocks and sometimes that’s just what you need. Anytime Pushy wants to get going on a follow-up, that’d be fine by me.

Please enjoy:

Portland-based hard rock outfit PUSHY are making waves in 2020. The band has announced that their debut album ‘Hard Wish’ will get a worldwide release on chocolate brown vinyl via Tee Pee Records. Boasting the unmistakable swagger and retro flair of rock n’ roll from a time when Woodstock was still young, Pushy descend upon listeners with boisterous, rabble rock vocals, raw, electric guitar riffs and natural percussion that feels all too authentic in contrast to the swath of modern music. Perhaps the most striking quality of Hard Wish is also its most plainly stated; that it sounds so sincerely like four musicians working harmoniously together as one in the same room.

The vinyl release of ‘Hard Wish’ is out May 8th on Tee Pee Records. Fans can pre-order the LP at the link found here.

‘Hard Wish’ Tracklisting:
1. Fanny’s
2. Nasty Bag
3. Blacktop
4. If I Cry
5. El Hongo
6. Lonesome Entry
7. I’ll Be Gentle
8. Lay of the Land

Pushy is:
Guitar – Ron Wesley
Drums – Travis Clow
Bass, vocals – Neal Munson
Vocals, guitar – Adam Burke

Pushy on Bandcamp

Pushy on Thee Facebooks

Pushy on Instagram

Tee Pee Records website

Tee Pee Records on Thee Facebooks

Tee Pee Records on Bandcamp

[Click play above to stream the premiere of ‘Blacktop’ by Pushy. Their debut album, Hard Wish, ships in July from Who Can You Trust? Records and is available to preorder now.]

Classic heavy rock played with conviction, heart and an obvious appreciation for the finer things in life when it comes to riffs — there’s a lot to like immediately about Pushy‘s debut album, Hard Wish. Delivered like their prior split 12″ with Ragged Barracudas (review here) through Who Can You Trust? Records, the awaited release from the Portland, Oregon, outfit conjures a fuzzy vision of ’70s heavy that does more than just boogie, though of course there’s plenty of that as well. From earliest AC/DC to Thin Lizzy, to ZZ TOP, to King Crimson, to a sudden turn from stripped-down KISS strut into an atmospheric prog-out on “If I Cry,” it’s record that makes a point of going where and doing what it damn well pleases, and it even manages to include a wah-drenched revamp of their catchy original demo, “El Hongo” (discussed here) and its eight-track/40-minute run makes for an engaging, organic, live-sounding listen that makes the advice “take it easy” seem like time-honored wisdom.

Comprised of guitarist/vocalist Adam Burke (formerly of Fellwoods), who’s also responsible for the paintings on the front and back of the LP, as well as having done art for this site and a universe of others, Crag Dweller‘s Travis Clow, Neal Munson of Billions and Billions and Ron Wesley of Hosmanek, the four-piece set an easygoing vibe from the very first crashes and shuffling grooves of opener “Fanny’s,” and while they might careen from one influence to the next and offer a bit of zleaze (yup, spelled with two ‘z’s) here and there, it’s all in good fun and Hard Wish succeeds in casting its own identity from the varied elements that make it up, whether that’s the gallop of “Nasty Bag” or the arena-rock grandiosity in the beginning of “If I Cry.”

And there’s a flow at work. Wrapping up side A after “Fanny’s” and second cut “Nasty Bag,” with its nyah-nyah-nyah opening and street-rocking swing, “Blacktop” offers a first glimpse of Pushy‘s progressive side, digging back to the first King Crimson record like it ain’t no thing and pairing that with a proto-burl riff that in most hands would be repelled from the prior stretch like magnets refusing to touch but is absolutely made to work here. By the time they’re rushing through delivering the title-line, Pushy have expanded the context of “Blacktop” an album’s worth, and the fuzzy nod that emerges from there and turns back to the central riff is pure gravy. Only then does “If I Cry” build on the prog edge of “Blacktop” with its own relatively patient beginning and midsection break, the guitars leading the way through about a minute of instrumental exploration that gives way to silence before a volume-swelling solo emerges to wind the way back to the central rhythm, which gets topped with its own victory-lap of a lead before they noodle their way to the end. From that somewhat hypnotic finish, “El Hongo” eases its way in to start off side B with room for a bit of its own psychedelic meandering amid a landmark-feeling hook that’s a standout from the album as a whole.

The boogie is writ large over the secondary leadoff, but at five minutes, it’s not necessarily a mirror of “Fanny’s” at the start of the record, which had a shorter clocktime and more straightforward structure without the midsection departure that some of the longer songs make. In that regard, “If I Cry” is something of a foreshadow for the 10-minute closer “Lay of the Land” that follows “El Hongo,” “Lonesome Entry,” and “I’ll Be Gentle,” the latter two of which are also of the shorter variety. No doubt that vinyl considerations came into play when putting together the tracklisting with four songs per side, getting the runtimes close, and so on, but it’s worth pointing out that it works exceedingly well in terms of the front-to-back, with “Fanny’s” setting the tone literally and figuratively while smoothing the way into “Nasty Bag” and the three tracks that follow before “Lonesome Entry,” which is the shortest of the bunch at 2:27, ignites a speedy Cactus-style brashness with Burke‘s vocals hitting a higher register to match the more frenetic pacing of the verses.

Naturally, those are offset by more midpaced transitional sections and though it’s the shortest inclusion at 2:27, Pushy still squeeze in those tempo shifts before the before the cold ending brings on “I’ll Be Gentle” brings forth more boogie vibes and hooks in both its verse and chorus. There’s a tongue-in-cheek aspect to the lyrics — if I’m not mistaken there’s a reference to a “velvet hand” — but the classic feel of the songwriting and the live-style vibe of the recording come through just the same as on “Lonesome Entry” and really everything else before it. And it’s fitting that the two shorter cuts should give way to “Lay of the Land” at the end of the record, which not only makes the most of its two guitars but brings the rhythm section as well to some of its finest moments.

It’s an unenviable task to summarize what Hard Wish has thus far brought forth in its scope of formative heavy, but most if it appears within the more extended finale, from the patient and progressive opening to the subdued verses and the greater build and release that happens later on. Some parts seem to be begging for organ accompaniment, but I guess one has to leave some ground to cover on a sophomore outing, and as their debut, Hard Wish basks in its inspirations without falling into boogie rock cliché — except where it wants to, as on “I’ll Be Gentle” — and sets up a balance of straight-ahead and more exploratory movements to be toyed with from here on out. It’s a sound that, should Pushy be interested in such things, they can keep growing and expanding, since as we know the realm of classic heavy rock is by no means relegated to the past, and the chemistry between players on display throughout Hard Wish is of the sort that can’t be faked, least of all in such a stage-born-sounding context. From a Pacific Northwest so bent on partying, Pushy bring just a touch of class to the proceedings and remind that not all good times need to be overblown to be memorable.

Pushy on Thee Facebooks

Pushy on Instagram

Pushy on Bandcamp

Who Can You Trust? Records on Thee Facebooks

Who Can You Trust? Records website

Who Can You Trust? Records on Bandcamp

Pushy LP preorders from Who Can You Trust? Records

With a July 16 ship date, preorders are up for the awaited full-length debut from Portland, Oregon, classic heavy rockers Pushy. Dubbed Hard Wish in apparent homage to just how much I’d like my seven-month-old son to take his morning nap right now, the album follows a 2016 split with Germany’s Ragged Barracudas (review here), as well as an earlier 2015 two-songer, If I Cried, named in apparent — and prescient! — homage to that same seven-month-old’s question that if he just screams for 45 solid minutes, will it be enough to make me go upstairs and end his apparent torture. In answer: no.

Anyhoozle, I’ve been waiting for Pushy‘s debut since I heard their demo (discussed here) in 2014, and the group sound like they’ve got their boogie in fine working order on the first public audio to come from Hard Wish, which is second track “Nasty Bag,” which you’ll find streaming at the bottom of this post, along with the preorder link preceded by a snazzy bio.

From the PR wire:

Pushy – Hard Wish

Have you ever watched the 1977 video of Ram Jam playing “Black Betty” in somebody’s front yard and asked yourself, “Why don’t we have bands who party like that anymore?” And after the very first time you witnessed a young bellbottomed James Gang set up their gear in the Mexicali desert and riff through “Laguna Salada” during the opening credits to the 1971 film Zachariah, did you ask yourself, “Are there even any bands this good today?” Or what about that time you laid virgin eyes upon the gatefold to ZZ Top’s Tres Hombres and took in a panoramic photograph that could only be described as a taqueria orgy? Did you ask, “Why can’t a newer style band make me feel this special?”

The answer to all these questions lives and pulses within the four musicians who comprise the Portland, Oregon based hard rock quartet, Pushy. If your ears have yet to be seduced by the God-hammered choogle of Pushy, it’s not too late for you. Their debut album Hard Wish has been captured in the band’s natural element and then released into the wild by the good people of Who Can You Trust? Records – a label that knows how and where to mine the rich ore of timeless rock ‘n’ roll. If the hot buttered distortion of the opening song “Fanny’s” (with its saucy boogie and howling guitar leads) doesn’t put an electric strut in your butt, there’s a pretty good chance that rock ‘n’ roll may be none of your business.

John Fogerty once sang that the people on the river are happy to give. But if you listen closely to the hard and heavy stomp of “Nasty Bag,” it sounds like the people on the river are waiting to kill you. Pushy have the power of rock surging through their veins and sometimes this power channels stories and spirits to help move you into parallel dimensions. Take “El Hongo” for instance – between Ron Wesley coaxing a gold top Les Paul to scream and wail through a tweed Victoria Bassman, and Adam Burke crooning for us to take it easy and close our eyes, there could never exist a reason why we would ever want to not keep on chooglin’. And when Travis Clow and Neal Munson kick off the album’s bookend jam “Lay of the Land” with their callused hands working a well-oiled rhythm section, you can almost smell the grease burning on the gears as the bass and drums pump out a loose and juicy groove that’s just begging for the guitars to rain riffs like there’s a storm in hell and we’re all invited to hang out and drink their beer.”

-Eric Shea (Hot Lunch/Sweet Chariot)

Pushy is: Travis, Ron, Adam, Neal

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Pushy, “Nasty Bag”