Zig Zags formed a dozen years ago in various Los Angeles back alleys. Together, singer/guitarist Jed Maheu and a sampling of Hollywood’s sleaziest rhythm sections concocted a bruising cacophony of lusty, satanic punk-metal that owed as much to Black Flag as The Stooges. Within a couple of short years, garage rock legend Ty Segall had produced their debut album on hip indie label In The Red, and the band had recorded a single with Iggy Pop.
“People were trading our record around,” Maheu remembers. “This is pre-Spotify, really. They were giving each other copies of the physical record. And people from much bigger bands than us were coming up to me and telling me they liked it. It was pretty amazing.”
A Hollywood set designer by day, Maheu chalks it up to the up-and-down vagaries of Tinsel Town. “I mean, we had some connections,” he shrugs. “Not that it matters that much. I remember being at a famous director’s house for a party once, and the catering person, this poor girl, fell down these stairs. I was helping her up, and she was like: ‘Oh thanks so much, I really appreciate it’. And I remember I said to her: ‘Listen, the line between me being at this party and me catering this party is very thin. So don’t worry about it’.”
Zig Zags’ new album Deadbeat At Dawn is a cinematic cruncher, full of vivid fever dreams like At War With Hell and Altered States that rattle with NWOBHM train-off-the-tracks menace and mosh-pit madness. It’s exactly what you’d expect from an album named after rogue filmmaker Jim Van Bebber’s 1987 gonzo one-man action flick.
“I like DIY filmmaking and DIY music,” Maheu explains. “And when I saw it I was like: ‘This is exactly what I’m into’. Every few months or something I’ll watch a YouTube clip of the scene where he hits the guy in the head with the nunchucks and steals the motorcycle. Nunchucks, man. Getting a pair of nunchucks. That was such a part of my childhood.”
That’s pretty much all you need to know about the album and, ultimately, Zig Zags as well. They’re the nunchucks that split your head open before they steal your motorcycle and probably drive off with your girl, too. And after 10 years of heavy lifting, their rip-riding American rock’n’roll has finally hopped a continent.
“Last night we played in Germany,” says Maheu. “We played five times in the same club and every time it’s packed. People are showing up early to get autographs, and people are wearing Zig Zags shirts, and they come up and they say we’re their favourite band. It’s this weird thing that happens, and it’s fucking awesome. It’s like being Mr. Big in Japan or something.”
Deadbeat At Dawn is out now via Riding Easy Records.
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