It’s been three years since Legends of Motorsport got behind the wheel of their hotted up VJ Charger, but old habits die hard and before you know it they’re doing circle work in the local shopping centre carpark.

Legends’ 2009 model is a shiny beast, retaining its classic vintage looks, but sporting a brand-new turbo-charged engine. On Yeah Uh Huh, mainstays Richard Fyshwick (vocals, organ) and guitarists Jean Claude Vangelis and 2Stroke bring rookie drummer Hertz Van Rental into the fold. He shares the backseat with now-departed hair bear Whisky Ago Go.

While they perceive no need to alter their winning formula of high octane riffs, greasy garage organ and quirky lyrical content, it does feel like the band is growing musically. Different songs emphasise different aspects of their sound and songwriting styles. Tracks such as ‘Freedom’ and ‘Pushin The Envelope’ exhibit an organ-driven ’60s garage pop immediacy that clearly earmarks them as singles, while other numbers like ‘Up To The Challenge’ proudly display their stoner rock riffs. Then there are anomalies like ‘Mumbai Taxi’, which features Tim Wold from Kids Of Zoo on sitar. Tim may not be Ravi Shankar, but he imbues the song with enough exoticism to justify its addition.

The thing that has always set Legends apart from the garage rock norm has been their playfulness and tongue-in-cheek approach to lyrical subject matter, and on Yeah Uh Huh they deliver some absolute corkers. ‘BBQ’ tackles one of the big issues of today: how to deal with screaming children at backyard barbeques. Fyshwyck’s solution? Throw another baby on the barbie and everybody wins. Elsewhere, ‘From Work’ celebrates the fine Australian tradition of pilfering as much stationery and office furnishings as possible from one’s place of employment. The justification, of course, is that you’re sticking it to “The Man”. Midnight Oil, eat your hearts out.

Yeah Uh Huh is a brilliantly good-natured album of catchy, overdriven rock’n’roll that can’t fail to put a smile on your dial. It treads a fine line between a sincere love of riff-driven high impact music and wry observational humour that never feels like a smart-arse novelty act. It’s hard to think of any other band that achieves this as convincingly as The Legends. The only explanation I can think of are their Tasmanian origins, which have always allowed them to view the alluring world of rock’n’roll from an ironic distance, leaving an indelible imprint on the music they’ve been creating for over a decade now.

It’s probably best not to analyse why they do too deeply, but to just get into it. Like the driver doing circle work in Ben Morieson’s terrific album cover photo, it’s the kind of music to be savoured in the moment.

by René Schaefer