Various Artists: Motor Psycho – Lux and Ivy Feel The Need For Speed – CD Review

It doesn’t open so much as lurch—“Shot Rod” snarls like it’s been chained too long in the garage, teeth bared, chrome fuming. From there, the disc burns forward without checking the mirrors. Thirty tracks, zero seatbelts. What’s collected here isn’t music for the living room—it’s the sound of gloveboxes stuffed with switchblades and floorboards soaked in moonshine.

There are no hits. Nothing polished. Just basement-cut rockabilly, roadside gospel, and bad ideas pressed to brittle 45s. A dead man’s jukebox spinning out dust and throttle.

Curtis Gordon claws his way down the asphalt. Joyce Green’s Black Cadillac smolders through the reverb like she’s driving straight out of a breakup and into an armed robbery. Nervous Norvus stumbles through Transfusion like he’s bleeding out through a bad punchline. The Playmates’ Beep Beep is in there too, uninvited, still honking like a drunk horn section in a clown car.

Everything’s a little warped. Tape hiss like radiator steam. Vocals yanked out of blown speakers. You get motorcycles, drag strips, diesel smoke, and even a ‘59 Volvo, god help it. Each track clatters into the next like bumpers on a runaway rollercoaster.

By the time Bobby Troup rolls in with Route 66, it’s less a song than a warning muttered under breath. “Fork In Da Road” isn’t a metaphor, it’s just the sound of two greasy paths you probably shouldn’t take.

There’s no nostalgia here. No curated calm. Just rattletrap engines, overheated amps, and strange voices hollering through static. It feels less like a compilation and more like something you found buried in the trunk of a car that’s been on fire since 1957.

Stick it in. Turn it loud. Keep driving. Something’s following you, and it’s got a two-tone finish and a trunk full of gravel.

You don’t play Motor Psycho—you pry it open, like a garage door that shouldn’t lift, somewhere past midnight with the neighborhood already awake and something barking in the dark. These tracks don’t ask for company. They jolt, veer, cough smoke. Not built for dancing—built to lose control.
Score 7/10

TRACK LISTING

1  Conny And The Bellhops – Shot Rod

2  Curtis Gordon – Draggin’

3  James Gallagher – Ford And Shaker

4  Sammy Masters And His Rocking Rhythm – Pink Cadillac

5  Joyce Green – Black Cadillac

6  Doye O’Dell – Diesel Smoke

7  The Original Starfires – Fender Bender

8  Vaughn Monroe With Orchestra And Chorus – Black Leather Trousers And Motorcycle Boots

9  Leon Smith – Little Forty Ford

10 Don Cole – Squad Car

11 Betty McQuade – Midnight Bus

12 Charlie Ryan And The Timberline Riders – Hot Rod Lincoln

13 Sonny Sheets with Floyd Terry, The Pirates And The Frantics – Wheels

14 Faron Warmer – Cruisin’ Central

15 Bobby Troup – Route 66

16 Little Silvia with Buddy Lucas And His Band Of Tomorrow – Drive, Daddy, Drive

17 The Storey Sisters with Al Browne And His Orchestra – Bad Motorcycle

18 The Playmates with Hugo Peretti And His Orchestra – Beep Beep

19 Billy Duke And His Dukes – Fork In Da Road

20 Aggie Dukes with Band (Buddy Colette on flute) – Swing Low Sweet Cadillac

21 Ray Burden with Wayne Johnson on guitar – A Hot Rodders’ Dream

22 Tall Tonio And The Mello-Dees – Hot Rod Car

23 Vernon Green And The Medallions – 59 Volvo

24 Nervous Norvus – Transfusion

25 Garrett Williams – Motorcycle Millie

26 Mike Page – Long Black Shiny Car

27 Roy Tann – Your Driver’s License, Please

28 Ritchie Deran And New Tones – Girl And A Hot Rod

29 George Stogner – Hard Top Race

30 The Voxpoppers – Last Drag

Label: Righteous
Release: 11th April 2025

Purchase the album, click HERE