Mike Bennett Reviews, August, 2003

Scroll down for reviews of the latest releases by The Cosmic Rough Riders, Dwight Yoakum, Cheap Trick and The Dandy Warhols.



Robyn Hitchcock
Luxor

(Editions PAF)

robynhitchcock.com

This is Robyn Hitchcock's second self-released LP, the first being his two CD set of Dylan covers. Apparently, he must have liked the independence. On this 13-track collection, Hitchcock eschews much in the way of accompaniment to his acoustic guitar and voice. The result is yet another fine solo album, as Hitchcock apparently has an inexhaustible supply of songs that build on his inspirations (Barrett, Byrds, Dylan and Lennon) with Hitchcock's by now well-established persona.

This record is not as emotionally resonant as the masterful Moss Elixir or as downbeat as the compelling Eye. This may be his happiest solo platter. Though the songs are pretty mellow, the melodies are buoyant, befitting some of the best love songs he has ever written. It's not just that Hitchcock sings "I love you in real life/and not just in this song/that's coming out of me,"it's that he sings it with a vigor that tells you he feels the love. The track, "One L", is bopping pastoral strum perfection, with the chorus a rhythmic procession of "Michele", Hitchcock revealing the 18-year old boy underneath his slowly graying (though aging quite well, thank you) exterior.
Indeed, there is a relaxed playfulness on many of the tracks on the record. "Ant Corridor" has a bounce akin to Groovy Decoy's "How Do You Work This Thing?". The song is a trifle, but I'm a sucker for a stuttering acoustic guitar part and ultra-silly lyrics: "Home is where the sugar is/ant corridor to my heart/add some honey to it Ms." The song is like wacked out Louis Jordan gone acoustic folk. "Solpaderire" shows off Robyn's bottleneck guitar skills, and darn it, he's having fun. And "You Remind Me of You" is so fetchingly romantic, with Hitchcock's voice drenched in wonderment and pure love.

His Dylan and Barrett influences are found everywhere, filtered though Hitchcock's whimsy. After Hitchcock notes in "Penelope's Angles" that "she's got a thing about yams", he then let's you know that "I am not a yam!". "Idonia" is tinted in Blonde on Blonde, with a classic sing-song melody and great lines like "all the ghosts in love with you/they crane their sorry necks/like a Viennese machine/that just discovered sex". A circular pattern of guitar notes frames, appropriately enough, "Round Song", a song that sounds like it came from the past. It's a lovely piece of music.

The highest compliment that can be paid to Hitchcock is that some of the best tracks on the album sound like they could have fit on some of his prime early releases. For example, "The Idea of You" could have easily fit with the tunes on I Often Dream of Trains. This song not only has an indelible hook in the chorus, but it's full of distant lead guitar parts that haunt and place the song in just the right emotional context.

There are a couple alright instrumentals and a couple other just alright tracks, which make this album second tier Hitchcock. Which is still a very lofty tier. At this point in his career, Hitchcock is so incredibly comfortable in his musical skin that this disc has a fetching intimacy -- you've invited your long time gangly eccentric English trobadour to your flat and he's here to charm and entertain you.

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Cosmic Rough Riders
Too Close To See Far

(Measurer)

cosmicroughriders.com

Mike Bennett

Having toiled in semi-obscurity for a few years, Cosmic Rough Riders got their break when Alan McGee's Creation Records issued Enjoy The Melodic Sunshine, which took tracks from prior albums and introduced a band who filters sunny Cali-rock through a Teenage Fanclubby spin cycle. Their music is pretty and envigorating.

The band experienced a major personnel change after the success of Sunshine. Singer Daniel Wylie left the band to go solo, meaning that primary songwriter Stephen Fleming takes on more responsibilities, i.e., vocals. Impressively, the new album stays the course, with more slices of light rocking pop songs that are smooth without being overly slick. It's impossible to dislike the album -- the question is how this instantly appealing album stands to repeat plays. I will let you know that I have graciously decided to sacrifice some of my listening time to answer precisely that question.

And, gentle reader (and to any of you ruffians out there), while not every track is an out-and-out winner, there are plenty of songs here that made me want to hit the repeat button. Indeed, the first track is so damn good that it's possible to forget that there's more album left. Yeah, I could quibble as to how many more sun-rain metaphors I need to hear in my increasingly limited lifetime. But y'know, you can't get much more essential than sun and rain, and hooks aren't much more essential than the one on "Justify the Rain". Heck, it fits a patented formula that has worked in power pop since Badfinger and Big Star. A pretty verse melody with a sensitive low key lead vocal, leading directly into the big rousing chorus. This song, in particular, brings back great memories of Dodgy. The chorus has a fiendish dual hook -- the melody supporting "we've been waiting so long for summertime/to justify the rain" and the plucked notes of the lead guitar part playing along -- two super memorable pieces of music that go together like chocolate and peanut butter.

To paraphrase Martha and the Vandellas, summer's here, and the time is right for Cosmic Rough Riders. Yeah, the lyrics are pretty basic and there's no real pretense other than lifting you off the ground with another massive hook. And sure, the music lacks much in the way of rough edges. But pristine does not have to mean sterile or lifeless.

Far from it. This is shown by the Riders' ability to tug at the heart strings as well as they uplift. Of course, they tug in the most appealing fashion. "Life During Wartime" is silky smooth, with well placed keyboards and guitar fills augmenting the wistful melody (comparison points -- Fountains of Wayne tracks like "Sick Day" and "Hackensack" and some of Sloan's more Cali-‘70s-rock influenced tunes) and the tender vocals. Fleming barely sketches out the love gone wrong/military conflict metaphor, but he really doesn't need to, since the song is so subsumed in an aura of heartbreak. The band marries this moonier approach with it's brassy chorus acumen on "Kill the Time". Like almost everything the Riders do, this pays off in another convincing track.

Mark Brown and James Clifford show that while Fleming may lead the band with his tunesmithing, they can come up with something that meets Fleming's standard. "Stupid You" is mid-tempo jangle with distant background vocals that suddenly races to a peak during the chorus. Dynamics, anyone? Whether by function or design, Brown and Clifford do not outdo Fleming in the lyric department. However, they come up with the best instrumental middle eight on the record, a brief interlude of (relatively) clanging chords, pounding drums and perfect harmonies. It doesn't last nearly long enough.

This is summer captured onto a disc. Fourteen tracks may be a bit too much, not because of any gigantic lack of quality, but more because the band doesn't quite have enough variety in its sound and so songs blur together in a couple spots. Regardless, the Cosmic Rough Riders have a great sound that conveys a lot of feeling, so why not sit back and enjoy?

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Dwight Yoakam
Population: Me

(Audium)

audiumrecords.com

Oh my. He just needed his batteries recharged. For years, Dwight Yoakam released one fine album after the other, mixing in a few classics with some very good full lengths. It would be hard to think of any other country artist who could match Dwight's artistic success in the long playing format.

Yet he hit the wall. I'm guessing it was a case of having his finger in too many pies -- he was acting (well), directing (not as well) and doing other things. His final records for Reprise bear this out. Near the end of his stint with the label, Yoakam kicked out a live album, an acoustic album of old songs and an all-covers disc, along with two original solo albums, the first one terrific, the second lackluster. Talk about a holding pattern.

This new one finds Yoakam sounding as fresh as ever. And he doesn't try to do too much. Just find good songs -- some of his own, some other folks -- and sing the hell out of ‘em. Joined by guitarist-producer-partner-in-crime Pete Anderson, things are kept simple. The album stakes out a countrypolitan honky tonk turf that is midway between Buck Owens and Glenn Campbell.

"The Late Great Golden State", penned by Mike Stinson, is an intriguing opener. A punchy tale that is about as pro-California as "Streets of Bakersfield" was pro-Bakersfield. Maybe the song is a sign that Yoakam has soured on Hollywood, as the song talks about how Cali may just be too much for a cowboy nowadays. The song is a country song with a bit of rock swagger – the backing vocals have a cheesy prominence that harkens back to country top 40 of the early-‘70s. Timothy B. Schmit of Poco/The Eagles is one of those backing singers. Talk about a stamp of approval.

Speaking of harkening, Yoakam goes back to Songwriting 101, relying on smart turns of phrases and simple honky tonk backing of his early years on brilliant tracks like "Fair to Midland" (love the pun). This tale of a man who threw away his small town love for a future that he's now also discarded is sung by Yoakam with matter-of-fact resignation, as he realizes how far away he is from the place he probably should have stayed. This song is the essence of country, with just enough details in the lyrics and a performance that fills in the emotional gaps.

While songs like "Stayin' Up Late [Thinkin' About It]" and "An Exception to the Rule" (with a wonderful descending/ascending melody that would fit Buck Owens as well as the early Beatles) aren't as emotionally gripping, they are guaranteed smile grabbers with their effortless bounce as Yoakam details the "lessons that I learned/at sorrow's school."

The centerpiece of the album is the moody title track, where Yoakam conjures up a low-key howl. The essence of the song is a modern day version of a cutting Hank Williams paean to loneliness. However, Anderson and Yoakam layer on other elements, with a chorus that rouses, sounding like a slowed down Dixieland march. Lee Thornburg plays a muted trumpet solo that has a tinny quality that only adds to the old school nature of the proceedings. The genre juxtaposition is unusual but utterly natural, and more importantly, it serves the song. The uplift of the chorus, fueled by Gary Morse on the banjo, is a ringer, since each chorus ends on a downbeat, with Dwight as lonely as ever. This is one of the more striking tracks of Yoakam's career.

Yoakam also has time for an inspired duet with Willie Nelson on "If Teardrops Were Diamonds", a weeper in the vein of Yoakam classics like "South of Cincinnati" – the song fits Nelson's voice perfectly and he delivers a great performance. The cover of the Burt Bacharach and Hal David's (by way of Dionne Warwick) "Trains and Boats and Planes" is brilliant on so many levels – not just because it fits with the overarching theme of escape and return that pervades the album, but it makes the standard sound fresh (particularly hearing Anderson and fiddler Scott Joss dual lightly while Earl Scruggs picks on his banjo) and shows how Yoakam is fully back on top of his game.
This disc is probably one more killer track shy of a classic, but it offers 10 reasons why you can't ever count Dwight Yoakam out. It's good to have him back where he belongs, making great records.

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Cheap Trick
Special One

(Cheap Trick/Big 3)

cheaptrick.com

A funny thing happened to Cheap Trick en route to following up their eponymous 1997 release. Basking in the glow of that disc's deserved raves (a disc that has held up very well over the years and ranks among their best), people focused on what a great band they are and always have been. The full Budokan concert was released on CD and the band began a series of stands playing their first four albums in their entirety. They played with their hometown Rockford, Illinois symphony. Bands clamored to tour with the band that never stops touring, from old warhorses to cutting edge alternative acts.

And the label that put out the 1997 disc folded -- almost right after the disc came out. In the meantime, speaking of discs, Bun E. Carlos's back problem deteriorated to the point that he needed surgery. So Bun went on the rock ‘n' roll disabled list. These circumstances all lead to an uncharacteristically long layoff between albums. Six years appears to have been too much time.
The end product is a bit frustrating. Part of the frustration is because the band still sounds great, from the ensemble playing to the amazing vocals of Robin Zander, one of the all-time great rock singers. Another part of the frustration is realizing that for about a decade, the band got endlessly dicked around by Epic Records, leading to lackluster records -- this isn't a great Cheap Trick album, but this is a few notches better than those discs, as there are no embarrassing songs. And some of the frustration is that the band hasn't cooked up enough top drawer songs in the six years since the last album.

Two songs certainly belong in the upper echelon of Cheap Trick classics. "The Scent of a Woman", which has nothing to do with Al Pacino's Oscar-winning film, is a passionate opener that is in line with songs like "Tonight It's You" and "Stop This Game", literally drowning the listener in hooks. The song itself is both a mea cupla to femmedom and a celebration, as Zander puts on a hairshirt big enough for all the men in the world. A very inspired track.

The other gem is "Best Friend", which shows that the Trick's rediscovery of its sinister side on the last album is still bearing fruit. The song never reaches a crescendo -- it just builds and builds and builds. This is where you can hear the demonic side of Robin Zander – the side that obviously influenced a young Kurt Cobain and lots of other singers. Rick Nielsen adds "Heaven Tonight"-style backing vocals and sharp guitar while Tom Petersson provides pretty much the only melodic elements with his unusually nimble bass parts, contrasting his usually heavy bottom end.

This song is preceded by another one of the better tracks, "Sorry Boy", one of two songs where Steve Albini contributes his recording deck skills. This shows off the monolithic side of Petersson on bass, while Rick Nielsen goes for spidery lead guitar licks and Carlos lays down a fat beat in the verses while still showing off his crisp rat-a-tat drum fills in other spots. This is less catchy, relatively, than "Best Friend", but the swampy theatrics and Move-from-hell instrumental coda that ends each verse are quite cool.

But "Sorry Boy" exemplifies the biggest flaw on the album – songs that sound like first drafts, coasting on their inherent Trickiness, without every hitting the massive chorus. You can appreciate the little touches, like the Japanese-sounding guitar bits that punctuate the McCartneyesque chorus of the title track and the piles of psychedelic (think Jeff Lynne-era Move, latter day Lennon-led Beatles) touches, especially Nielsen's guitar on "Pop Drone". These are nice tracks. There was a time during the ‘80s that these would have been clear cut highlights on dull albums. Of course, this is a band that has plenty of album sides with almost no dull notes.

What is lost on this record is a sense of self-editing. This manifests itself on radically different songs. "Words" plays in the verses like a light hearted Hall & Oates album track from their ‘80s hitmaking heyday, Zander showing off his playful side. Unfortunately, this goes nowhere. After screwing around with this for almost two minutes, the song sports probably the best middle eight on the whole album – it's about four times as good as the rest of the song – then it's back to screwing around. Sigh.

Then there are the two album closers, "Low Life in High Heels" and "Hummer". They are two somewhat different versions of the some song. The former is recorded by Mr. Albini, and it has an entirely different production sound than the rest of the album, befitting it's slinky post-modern boogie. Unfortunately, the song itself seems like a half-done demo, awaiting the extra killer elements. I hope they explore this sound and style more, but with something more finished. The second version is produced by Dan The Automator (the DJ of Dr. Octagon and Handsome Boys Modeling School fame). He just adds some more effects to what is generally the same track. The fact that both versions of this song made the album is indicative of the indecisiveness that keeps it from being special.

However, lest we forget, 10 years ago it would have been hard to imagine that folks like Steve Albini and Dan the Automator would have even the slightest interest in working with Cheap Trick. I think that most of the responsibility for the less than grand results falls on the songwriting of Zander, Nielsen and Petersson. Still, it could be that they need more guidance from an active artistic producer – they could look in the past (Jeff Lynne, maybe?) or towards someone more contemporary (Billy Corgan's concision on the Zwan disc shows how well suited he might be). Regardless, this great band can still make a great record. This just isn't it.

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The Dandy Warhols
Welcome To The Monkey House

(Capitol)

hollywoodandvine.com

For Courtney Taylor-Taylor and his bandmates, style has primarily been the substance. The Dandy Warhols mix of shoegazey dream rock with bursts of tight buzzy pop tunes really came together on 2000's Thirteen Tales From Urban Bohemia. Having fully realized that approach, the Dandy Warhols have turned to someone who has hung out with Andy Warhol to guide them to new vistas. Duran Duran keyboardist Nick Rhodes helms all but one track on this project.

And project is a good way to describe this, as it's somewhat of a chore to listen to this album. For the most part, it sounds like a stoned minimalist version of the sonically impressive, but song bereft albums that Duran Duran has been trotting out ever since their halcyon days faded in the horizon. This is dance music you can't dance to, pop music that shows only slight effort in being catchy. One wonders which was higher -- the recording budget or the drug budget.

Unfortunately, not a whole lot of anything went into the songwriting. Though Rhodes gives the record polish, Taylor-Taylor clearly made a conscious decision to strip down things considerably. Simplicity can be a virtue. For the most part, it is not so here, because most of the songs here are premised on bare bones grooves that are played so tamely, the songs sometimes seems to float off the disc. This is not helped by Taylor-Taylor's whispery vocals, which convey so little energy.

Typical of the approach is "Plan A", which vamps (though vamp makes it sound stronger than it is) on a blues-funk pattern. The repetitious nature of the song is undermined by the weak playing -- if the band played it forcefully, this would probably be a good track. Instead, it sounds like a pristine demo for a commercial jingle.

Now it's not like there isn't the slightest trace of catchiness here. However, I question how willing a listener is to be beaten into submission by thin hooks on tracks like "I Am Over It" and "I Am A Scientist". The latter song has a lite dance thing going on and starts promisingly (with the tag line "we've got to live on science alone"). The rhythm track is good enough to give it a passing grade. Yet this song could have been developed into something so much better -- instead of settling for being pleasant.

There are a few of tracks where things really come together, highlighting what could have been. "Insincere Because I" percolates at mid-tempo, with some nifty melodic keyboard touches. Speaking of melody, the chorus here relies on an actual melody, as opposed to rhythmic repitition of a phrase. The warmth of the tune provides a better contrast to Taylor-Taylor's slacker cool. There isn't a song quite like this in the Dandy Warhols catalog, and it's special.

Two other songs that stick are "You Were the Last High" and "We Used to Be Friends". The grooves dig just a wee bit deeper and the songs are just a bit more memorable. The latter song even breaks a sweat during the relatively bombastic chorus.

However, the majority of the album is a musical shrug of the shoulders. I think that Rhodes gave the band the sonic backdrop it wanted. But I don't think he got the best performances or songs out of them. There's enough here to show that this shift in style could bear fruit, but The Dandy Warhols need to up the energy if they expect anyone to shake his or her ass.

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