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A rockabilly strip tease

Naughty New Year’s show combines band, burlesque
1352bigjohnbates
Psychobilly rock, bodacious babes

By Nicole Fitzgerald

Who: Big John Bates

When: New Year’s

Where: Dusty’s

Tickets: $35

Big John Bates and the Voodoo Dollz Hot Rod Blues and Burlesque Show deliver a dark and bizarre, but not without humour, one-of-a-kind show that carries listeners into another world straight from hell.

All morals are thrown aside, combing psychobilly rock with naughty burlesque babes into one New Year’s Night of ear and eye candy on the Dusty’s stage in Creekside.

“We are not too raunchy; it’s not dirty,” Bates assures with a chuckle. “The girls are pretty entertaining. There is a lot humour in what we do. We want to leave people with a real sense of fun.”

Not to mention good music.

The band performs more than 100 shows a year, with the majority of their concerts taking place outside of North America. Europeans can’t get enough of the band’s cheeky humour, making even the most Goth sounds lovable.

Bates describes the music on the band’s latest album, Take Your Medicine, as akin to waking up at an after party in the Hollywood hills and finding a dead person in your bed.

“We are certainly singing about topics out of the ordinary,” he said. “The production runs from Jack White to Screaming Jay Hawkins. It’s fast and blues rockabilly based.”

Gospel mania, raw rock and even country work their way into the original music. The high-octane show of ghoulish rock ’n’ roll is definitely the wild card of Whistler’s New Year’s Eve lineup where anything and everything is going to happen.

Tickets are $35 for the show, or show and dinner for $50.