Pet Mosquito - Village Idiot

I’m an old person and for years I have heard other old people bemoan the state of rock’n’roll.

They proclaim there aren’t good bands anymore or go on and on about how much it was better back in the day.

Attitudes like this lead to old people only buying albums by artists they have been familiar with for decades.

Also, this is a gateway to old people only coming out for bands they have been seeing since their youth, reunion tours or bands with one original member.

This frame of mind will have your head in the sand and prevent you from missing out on great rock’n’roll and what the youth are bringing to the table.

No, it isn’t easy keeping up with great rock’n’roll, but think of the people who were your current age and passed on — Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, Eddie Cochran and Elvis Presley in the fifties.

Sorry, I’m still snickering at the older punks that couldn’t be bothered checking out bands like Brainiac, Oblivians, Quadrajets, Lunachicks, New Bomb Turks, The Humpers, Teengenerate, Dead Moon, The Figgs or Guitar Wolf.

Not to be all Jon Landau (Bruce Springsteen’s manager), but Pet Mosquito from Carbondale, Illinois, are currently the best rock’n’roll band in America and just may be the future of rock’n’roll.

I have been bedazzled by them from my first exposure.

That first time seeing them, I knew nothing about them and was blown away by their live performance at DCDK in Memphis at a Gonerfest aftershow.

It turns out that besides being a fantastically entertaining and energetic live band, they are super nice people who instantly were down to the idea of performing in Green Bay.

Pet Mosquito graced Titletown with their presence last July at the GBUFO Invasion Fest 2024 and, as predicted, won a whole slew of new fans in Wisconsin that night.

Pet Mosquitos’s set that night was solid gold punk garage rock and within days after the festival last year, it was already planned to have them back on day two of the festival in 2025, right before a dazzling Wisconsin headliner.

That mission was accomplished when it was announced that Green Bay’s very own Smart Shoppers would be headlining day two of the GBUFO Invasion Fest 2025 on Saturday, July 26, at the Historic Riverside Ballroom.

So if you haven’t had the chance to see Pet Mosquito yet, I implore you to give them a chance. Warning — if you are an older person you may have a lot of fun and be flashed back to when you were aged 14-21. This is how I feel every time I see them live.

Do they match up on vinyl? Are egg prices high? Is the Pope Catholic?
They most certainly do and even though I’m sitting at a closed GBUFO all alone listening to Village Idiot, I’m getting a dance party vibe/feeling going on big time.

Favorite tracks are the title track, “Is There a Man Around?,” “Bucky Shred the Cosmic Gnar,” “Toilet Bowl,” “Late Breaking,” and “Overalls” — with its hypnotic beat and spooky surreal tones, it makes a great way to close this album down tempo after the roller coaster ride of RNR this album takes us on.

Bravo, Pet Mosquito!