Somebody Shuck Me!!!
Anyone who knows me knows that Orgy is my favorite band of all time. I credit Orgy with being one of the major driving forces behind my transformation from pseudo-rap chick follower to Goth chick who doesn't give a fuck. Anyway, that being said, anyone familiar with my love for Orgy also knows of my complete and utter rock star crush on/worship of Jay Gordon. What people may not know is that closely following my rock star crush on Jay Gordon is my rock star crush on Orgy guitarist Ryan Shuck. My love for Ryan began years ago when Alyce and I spent some quality time with Ryan after a show here at the old Lupo's.
Anyone familiar with the glam rock music scene these days is pretty much aware that Orgy is, sadly, not really doing much of...anything. What you may not know, however, is that Ryan and Amir have started a new band called Julien-K. It's still glam but much more electronic than Orgy was. Ryan sings lead as well as playing guitar and keyboards I believe. Amir, as usual, does everything. I'm not familiar with the other members of the band and wasn't entirely sure how I felt about the music itself but, being the die-hard Orgy fan that I am, I decided that I had to go to Projekt Revolution this year when it was announced that JK would be the main stage opener. The rest of the lineup was incredible also. The main stage was home to JK, Placebo, HIM, Taking Back Sunday, My Chemical Romance and, of course, Linkin Park. The second stage boasted Mindless Self Indulgence, Saosin, and more. Anyway, I've seen every band on the main stage aside from JK, Placebo, and TBS and all are amazing but I wasn't desperately feeling the need to see them all again. Honestly I bought my ticket to see Ryan and Amir's new project. And it was incredibly well worth it. I could have left at 5pm after JK left stage and considered it $66 well spent. Julien-K is far more interesting and...good!..live than they are on myspace...which is the only place I've heard them so far. They were very high energy and kept us up and excited and geared up for the rest of the show. Ryan as a frontman was amazing. He has a style all his own but it's clear (to me at least) where his influences lie. At many points during the show I felt like I was looking at Jay Gordon and not at Ryan Shuck. He exuded sex throughout the show and where Jay was clearly a diva, Ryan looked like he was having a great time. His movements were lithe, liquid, and completely for the benefit of making the crowd know just how sexual he could be. He never got a chance to move like that in the Orgy days and although many of his poses and posturing were stolen right from the book of Jay Gordon, Jay exuded sex in a very different way. He never blatantly displayed himself through dance the way Ryan did. For example, during my favorite song of theirs, aptly titled Systeme De Sexe, he stripped off his shirt and crawled around on the ground in an almost obscene way. I needed to be alone after that song. Haha.
Further similarities to Jay were the sound of his voice at some points. He could definitely give Jay a run for his money on the raspy, growly, deep, hot vocals but he could also reach much higher than I've heard Jay. Probably because JK's sound is much more electronic than Orgy's and a higher register sounds better over the sound. He also used a mic stand in much the same way Jay used to use his mic cord. Obviously he couldn't wrap himself in his mic stand the way Jay used to wrap himself in his cord (the motion that made me want to jump on stage and rape him) but he used it as an extension of himself rather than as a standing prop. He broke his keyboard in much the same way because he was using and abusing it as part of the show. The way their instruments were set up was that the platforms on which his keyboard and Amir's keyboards and other equipment were set up actually rocked back and forth when moved as if they were on some sort of suspension system. Ryan pushed his too far and it went over...a regular occurrence he claims.
I think I would best sum up Julien-K as Orgy meets hard rock meets Joy Division meets The Cure meets club electronica. I really really loved them (and not just because it's two former members of Orgy!) and I think everyone should check them out. Their myspace has teasers of their songs up. For some reason they didn't put up the full songs but there's a good amount of stuff up there. It's www.myspace.com/julienk or you can check out their website www.julien-k.com I highly recommend listening to Systeme De Sexe. The snippet on the myspace is good (hell I made it my song even though it's not complete!) but not enough. The whole song in live performance form from Projekt Revolution is up on youtube. Definitely check it out!!!
I am highly anticipating their club tour following the end of Projekt Revolution. I hope they come up this way. I feel like I'm in the beginning throes of Orgy fever all over again!!!