THE FORTY-FIVES are a rock-n-roll band in the purest sense of the word from Atlanta, GA.
Having started up back in the lazy summer of 1998, guitarist Bryan G. Malone, bassist Mark McMurtry, and drummer Adam Renshaw worked tirelessly honing their sound as a trio. The band ingested and spewed all the best of early rock and roll, including Kinks and Beatles-era hooks, the explosive live delivery of the Who and the MC5, and enough smarts to make it all cohesive. A bit later, Trey Tidwell rounded the band out, playing the crazy Hammond B-3 sounds and providing a much needed target for vicious and relentless derision.
This formative Forty-Fives line-up would then soon be in the studio recording demos for what would become the GET IT TOGETHER LP (Ng Records, 2000). After a relatively quick in-and-out to the studio netted the material they needed for the record, the band hit the road. Soon they were opening for the likes of Link Wray, Andre Williams, Wayne Kramer, Marky Ramone, The Real Kids, The Dickies, The Fleshtones, etc. Out on the trail, the local press began to issue forth seals of approval, ensuring the band would rarely if ever make any money.
The band then went on to criss-cross the U.S.A. countless times, stopping in at a number of studios to record new material before a brief stint at the legendary Sun Studios in Memphis. Soon they recorded a full length record with Rick Miller from Southern Culture on the Skids. The result would be the bands sophomore effort, a raucous, rollicking grinder of a record appropriately entitled FIGHT DIRTY within whose 12 songs one can sample The Beatles (Hamburg-era, of course),the Kinks and Chuck Berry. Yes, more of the glorious same for THE FORTY-FIVES- a healthy helping of rock and roll anthems like left hooks and jabs, not to mention the occasional kidney shot.
After the Release of FIGHT DIRTY the band continued to tour througout 2003 and into 2004.
Then the sons of bitches toured with everyone from the The Dictators, The Detroit Cobras, The Dirtbombs, The Datsuns, Reverend Horton Heat, Shonen Knife and The Gore Gore Girls to The Supersuckers. Between tours, the band went into Detroit's Ghetto Recorders studio with Jim Diamond (the White Stripes, Andre Williams, the Sights) to record their full-length HIGH LIFE HIGH VOLUME. The title says it all.
This is an album that like most of their previous ones, resisted sales of almost any kind. Ah, such is the life of a band that insists on playing music their own way with the reckless abandon of drunken teenagers.
After that it gets kind of murky. There were those trips to Europe. The Reading Festival, Leeds, Festivals in Denmark and Spain. Opening up for the MC5 in Amsterdam. That night was nuts. THEY SMOKED REEFER WITH JOHN SINCLAIR. It all seemed so innocent. Those were the good times. When they came back to the states they were homeless, yet everywhere they went people said congratulations. It didn't matter anymore. Depression had set in and it became apparent to all around something drastic was about to take place. Soon the keyboard player would eat himself, the bassist would have a skin allergy and the drummer would walk into a local department store never to be seen again. It was suspected for a time by authorities he took a position in middle management but this could not be verified....
