Video premiere: Luther Russell, ‘Corvette Summer’

Kevin Bronson on February 26th, 2019

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L.A. native Luther Russell’s new full-length is titled “Medium Cool,” which sells the album a bit short. For fans of guitar-slingers from the 1970s, Russell’s album — his sixth and first since 2011’s gobsmacking 25-track “The Invisible Audience” — might be the coolest thing since cruising the old San Fernando Valley in a sports car on a warm summer night. (Or whatever the millennial equivalent of that is.)

Russell, once of ’90s rockers the Freewheelers, has worked with the likes of Robyn Hitchock, written for television and film, teamed up with Big Star drummer Jody Stephen in the duo Those Pretty Wrongs, produced several emerging L.A. artists and even written songs with Weezer (on “the White Album”). He’s long been a power-pop craftsman, a purveyor of sharp licks and indelible hooks, and on “Medium Cool” he leaves maximum rough edges (for him) on 10 songs that embrace the Los Angeles he knew as a kid.

“Corvette Summer” is just as it sounds — an ode to cars and where they could take you, literally and metaphorically. “You’ll be cruisin’ for a sweetheart / down on Van Nuys Boulevard,” he sings, longing for a candy apple red ’Vette.

The song, Russell says, is “based on the Mark Hamill ‘vehicle’ from 1978, a defining movie of my nascent rock ’n’ roll consciousness.

“In my head was Todd Rundgren circa ’72, the piano from the Stooges’ ‘I Wanna Be Your Dog’ and a smidgen of Paul Stanley, which I couldn’t help. Maybe something transmitted when I tapped his shoulder at a Cat Stevens concert a few years ago,” Russell adds. “The rhythm section, Jason Hiller and Derek Brown (the Eels), do an ample job of levitating the track so I can let the solo rip on my cheap Mexican David Gilmour-style Stratocaster, which [is featured] in the clip, and can now be found on display at Black Book Music in Portland, Ore.”

The video for the song, filmed by Russell’s sister Savannah Spirit and directed by the U.K.-based collective Left Coast, harks back to those halcyon days and their soft focus, the memories sharpened by the song itself. All thta’s missing is the Corvette itself.

“Medium Cool” is out on Portland-based Fluff and Gravy Records. A cassette release is planned via Burger Records as well.

||| Watch: The video for “Corvette Summer”