Brian Setzer - The Knife Feels Like Justice

After The Stray Cats broke up for the first of several times in 1984, guitarist and frontman Brian Setzer seemed determined to prove he could do a lot more than make like Eddie Cochran, and his first solo set was 1986's surprisingly ambitious The Knife Feels Like Justice. Leaving his rockabilly influences at home for the time being, Setzer reinvented himself as a thoughtful heartland rocker on this set, which shows clear influences of Bruce Springsteen and John Mellencamp's work of the period, and his snappy retro guitar work was replaced by the jangly peal of a Rickenbacker, though his fretwork was no less impressive in this new context, especially on the rollicking "Radiation Ranch" and the atmospheric title cut. Read More