Austin Lounge Lizards – Never An Adult Moment

Have you ever wondered what would happen if surrealist filmmaker Luis Bunuel made a movie about Richard Petty, the king of NASCAR? The Austin Lounge Lizards have. They even wrote a song about it, “The Illusion Travels By Stock Car (Petty/Bunuel)”, one of many strange and delightful ditties on their new Sugar Hill release Never An Adult Moment, perhaps the most aptly titled album of the year.

There’s a long history of humor in country music, from the Hoosier Hotshots to Homer & Jethro to Kinky Friedman, and the Lizards have earned a place on this honor roll over the past two decades and eight previous albums. This time they take on such timely topics as health care (“Rasputin’s HMO”), loco local liquor laws (“100 Miles Of Dry”) and the dilemma of the aging slacker (“40 Years Old And I’m Living In My Mom’s Garage”).

What saves these parodies from slipping into mere cornpone is the band’s superb musicianship — an energetic mix of country, bluegrass, Texas swing and conjunto — and a high degree of intelligence. In addition to being country music’s most irreverent band, the Lizards are probably the most over-educated: The group counts former philosophy grad students and self-described “recovering lawyers” among its members. And lead Lizard vocalist Hank Card is an honest-to-god part-time administrative law judge.

But all that fancy book learnin’ hasn’t dulled the Lizards’ satiric skills a lick. For a bunch of eggheads, they’re pretty damn funny.