Bonsai Kitten – Welcome To My World

Thanks to the success of The Horrorpops and The Creepshow over the past decade, a flood of female fronted psychobilly bands has saturated a once small niche.  Not to say most of these bands lack talent, but there certainly isn’t much distancing them from one another.  If you’re like me and have been unaware of Berlin’s Bonsai Kitten’s lengthy underground career, you might be tempted to lump them in with the rest.  But as it turns out, one listen to their fourth full length, Welcome To My World, should serve as a wrecking ball to that rigid thought.

Envisioned back in 2005 (coincidentally the same year as The Creepshow), the self-proclaimed German “Killbilly” group plays their craft with confidence and musical precision.  Sassy redhead Tiger Lily Marleen’s fronts the affair with a domineering stage presence strengthened by her male musicians’ tight upright bass and ample distorted guitar.  Just shy of smokey, but never petite or girly, Marleen fits right in with contemporaries Sarah “Sin” Blackwood or Patricia Day without sacrificing any of her own fiery personality.  She’s a woman’s woman, assertively flipping the bird to those who might discriminate based on gender in lines like “a bitch is a babe in control of herself/and she’ll never suck up to anyone else” on the forceful “Life Is A Bitch And So Am I.”  Her empowerment message continues with tales about a “man-eater” (“That’s Why The Lady Is A Vamp”) and anthem of self-determination (“Cat Scratch Fever”).  Her confidence is bold and attractive, carrying the album from opening to conclusion.

But Welcome To My World is more than just attitude; all eleven tracks strong-arm the listener with a punch of musical muscle.  Tracks like “Welcome To My World” thump along with an infectious rhythm and get-up-and-shout, gang-bolstered choruses, while those like “Zombie Mafia” give a nod to their clear rockabilly underpinning.  There are even a handful of guest appearances and duets by country-psycho mainstays like Hank Ray, and Danny B. Harvey, and even a rare Mad Dog Cole sighting (a personal highlight considering my attachment to his work in The Krewmen).

Taken altogether, Bonsai Kitten handily staves off the psychobilly curse of originality and produces a “Killbilly” monster all unto its own.  So don’t confuse Bonsai Kitten with mid-grade imitators like Kitty In A Casket or The Atomic Aces, this is the type of nop-notch psychobilly that only comes with time.  Welcome To My World firmly plants Bonsai Kitten as genre leaders worthy of taking their place beside their spotlight counterparts.  So if you’re like me and missed out on their first seven years, there’s never been a better point of introduction.