This is why I love garage music from the 1960s. No record executives here. No songwriter from the Brill Building crafting the perfect song. No producer arrogantly pushing his one-size-fits-all vision on a band. Nope. Just a bunch of kids banging out some song that they wrote themselves. Usually those songs were silly, boorish or just plain bad. But occasionally, it was brilliant.
Here we have the ultra-awesome Judgement Day by The Esquires from Dallas, Texas. The year is 1966. The label is the DIY Glenvalley Records. Dad set the label up, managed them and bought there equipment. (Kudos to dads who do stuff like this for their kids.) And, of course, it is the flip-side of the single that is the real gem. The plug-side, These Are The Tender Years, is far more lame than our cryptic flip-side. Only 1000 copies were pressed and the record was sold at their local roller-rink performances.
It's really hard to imagine what Singer/lead guitarist Charlie Snellings and rhythm guitarist Wes Horne were thinking when they wrote the words to this devil-comes-a-knockin' tale. Perhaps it was taken from a baptist sermon in the religious Dallas suburbs. Perhaps they were just feeling a little devilish.
All through life you laugh and say there is no such thing as judgement day/one night as you lay sleeping on your pillow. And voices start coming through the wall and you think back but you can't recall ever hearing those words ever spoken. They say 'brother your time has come your soul must leave, your body is done.' You say 'what sin have I done to deserve this?'. You say 'I'm not ready to be taken, nor be winged my way to heaven'. Say brother it's not heaven but hell that's waiting. Yeah. And a hole opens up in the wall and that familiar voice does call that says 'brother, follow'. And down that dark pathway you tried to leave your world of sin and pride and then you see that light up ahead. You say 'tell them I can win' then you feel that heat on your skin and then you know where you're bound for. Yeah!
