Scroll down for reviews of the latest from RockFour, sparkle*jets uk and Sugarbomb

Cockeyed Ghost
Ludlow 6:18

(Karma Frog)

US Release Date: May 22, 2001

www.cockeyedghost.com

Sometimes the whole music (or art or writing) business can seem like a gigantic chaotic runaround - no logic as to who makes it, and even less justice served in the ways that fame and fortune are meted out to the select (and often undeserving) lucky few. The seasons offer their annual harvests of sour grapes, with the hills and valleys and annual pop shows always heavily populated with talented folk who press on, in spite of the odds and the frustrations. Ultimately, there is a point of epiphany/existential crisis where one realizes that this is what it is, for good or bad, fame or obscurity and that the real motivation is the music (or art or writing) itself.

This struggle is captured well in Adam Marsland’s song “Burning Me Out (of the record store)”, wherein we get the elation, frustration, litigation, justification, realization about creation and new expectation of his particular journey. It’s a great song, based on true events, and on most CDs it would be a sole highlight, but not on Ludlow 6:18. This CD is packed to the brim with talent, overflowing with a wide variety of musical styles and intelligent thoughtful lyrics.

Having heard respected colleagues speak the praises of Cockeyed Ghost, I made it a point to catch up with their music this post-holiday season. My only regret is that it took this long to join the party - this is a CD of rare grace and power. It wows you at first listen and grows even better over time. Adam Marsland and his new supporting cast for Cockeyed Ghost take you on a memorable journey over the dusty trails of Route 66, deep into the heart of bleak times and out the other side.

This guided tour begins with the short gentle reflection of “Ground 0:00”, pondering a life spent wandering in circles, conjuring better things, then segues into the title track. “Ludlow 6:18” is the start of our travels, a decision to leave town and move on. With daylight kissing night out the rear window, the song is a reminisce of 11 years spent in sunny California, drunk with musical hopes and expectations gone unanswered in “the glorious futility of playing in a band”. How poignant the observations: “Did you know those hillside letters used to spell Hollywoodland? / I guess the city drops what it don’t need / Especially if at last you don’t succeed.” It’s a catchy song whose upbeat belies the nature of deep thought contained within, a man literally and figuratively at a crossroads.

Next up is a song that matches its predecessor in poignancy. In “Ginna Ling”, the ears hear a bouncy, rocking, love song with hard guitars and drums framing an infectious melody sung out front (with choral harmonies). In actuality, the lyrics tell of the singer’s struggle to comprehend a beautiful young woman’s suicide, someone he didn’t know well but thought he loved. Marsland’s voice cuts a wide swath here, from ranging falsetto to softly spoken confession, but always remains emotive and honest. Thoughtful intelligence rules the proceedings here, covering what apparently was a true event without getting maudlin: “Sometimes I have this crazy dream / I break down the door, yank out the keys, drag her out of the car and scream / Ginna, someone loves you!” There is hope and redemption, even in events we don’t fully understand.

There isn’t a weak spot on this CD. All the tunes are memorably infectious, displaying great vocals and harmonies backed by one very tight band. This new and impressive lineup is comprised of Robert Ramos on bass, Severo on guitar and Kurt Medlin on drums and percussion. You get great harmonies on the bouncy “Karma Frog”, taking on the disappointments of a love with promises of karmic retribution: “This is what you have, this is what you did, this is what you’ll get”.

“December” lets Marsland do his Ben Folds turn, using keyboards and soothing falsetto to counter a suicidal and bleak disparagement of the holiday season. Not necessarily one to include on the Xmas mix CD, unless you like yours with a soulfully heavy dose of reality. “How Can You Stand It” asks its own musical question under the camouflage of a catchy rock anthem in this musical homage to an existential crisis point: “Does everyone feel this lonely? / Does everyone get this bored? / And if so, and if so, how can you stand it?”

“The Foghorn” turns up the funk meter in a song that recalls early Steely Dan fare. Marsland asks the big why, delivering soulful vocals in his tuneful examination of nothing less than life itself. “Tears of Joy” is a thanks and tribute to other unknown musicians, kindred spirits who inspire in their own right: “You tickled my ears and trickled out tears of joy”.

The album takes a western turn for its final two numbers. “Theme from Ludlow 6:18” is an instrumental that holds its own with great surf rock anthems of the early 1960s. This is traveling music for the imagination, taking you from California off into the desert and beyond. “Old Trails” is an apt closer, history being related from one traveler to another. The soft ballad is a pretty tribute to America, its trails and mysteries, crumbling to an eventual dust in time, leaving only traces and memories (like the fate that comes to any one of us).

What a solid collection this is, challenging the mind and heart and spirit with music that runs the gamut from guitar- and drum-driven rock to dreamy ballads. Out of his own personal turmoil in music and life, Adam Marsland has transformed moments of struggle into memorable songs. He has done this with the kind of wit and smarts and honesty that inspires genuine hope in others, reminding us that it’s okay to ask the big questions, even if we don’t find all the answers we need.

With Ludlow 6:18, Marsland has captured his talent as never before, comfortable with his new band members and easy in this place of existential journeying. This is music from the heart, eclectic in that it’s a celebration of all that’s unsure about life, this journey we’re all on. It covers a wide range, and never disappoints. Come join the introspective celebration and hear for yourself. In this world of musical sameness, Cockeyed Ghost’s Ludlow 6:18 stands out as a rare treat where catharsis, music and invention meet up to provide one great ride.

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RockFour
Another Beginning

(Rainbow Quartz)

Release Date: February 5, 2002

www.rockfour.com

Taking old sounds and making them new is not easy to do well. The phrase “pale imitation” comes to mind when considering how many try and fail. However, when a band manages to build on past influences and use modern technology to enhance the sound, it’s a pleasure to behold. Such is the case with RockFour’s first global release Another Beginning, where the ‘guess-the-references’ provides another level of enjoyment beyond the fun of merely listening to the music.

RockFour is the real deal, serving up sounds that are all across the board in an impressive display of musical talent and versatility. Lyrically they also manage to find a happy medium, ranging adeptly in a nice balance between mind and senses, with trippingly appropriate inscrutable phrases sprinkled throughout. Factor in that these four lads come from Israel, and you have an additional level of pleasant surprise. From their sound, you might guess England sooner than Holon, the Tel Aviv suburb where RockFour had their beginnings. In 1990, they began playing together during free evenings while enlisted in the Israeli military, at first covering mostly Beatle songs, then developing a repertoire of originals (both in Hebrew and English).

With a shoestring budget, they financed their first album for under a thousand dollars, then started playing all over the place to build fan support. In a year, the record had sold over 7,000 copies - quite an achievement for such a young band. By 1994, the group went from three to four when bassist Marc Lazare joined the existing lineup of Eli Lulai on vocals and guitar, Issar Tennenbaum on drums and Baruch Ben-Yitzhak, who now moved from bass to lead guitar, piano and mellotron.

The group soon began to function as a whole, with each member contributing to new songs under Baruch’s direction. This led to the group’s second album (1995’s The Man Who Saw It All), which was the first to reflect the band’s love of late sixties to early seventies rock music and contained many lengthy songs with complex instrumentals. Critics in Israel loved the CD, and it got major airplay on radio and TV (videos). This led to other projects that took the group away from their original music, and an overall feeling of frustration. Israel was a closed circle for the group, who kept playing the same clubs again and again. The dream was to become successful abroad, to exploit their potential beyond what Israel had to offer.

To make this dream a reality was a process that involved translating some existing songs over to English, and a commitment to work more intensively on English-language material, including writing new songs in English. The language switch was not unnatural for RockFour. Lazare and Tennenbaum both are native English speakers, from Australia and Canada, respectively, while Sabras Lulai and Ben-Yitzhak grew up listening to English on The Beatles’ and other records. While some in Israel saw the language change as an abandonment of their native culture (some fans were lost due to the switch), RockFour knew it was just about the music. “English is the language of rock n’ roll,” says Lulai. “It’s like how Italian is appropriate for opera.”

By 1999, the group had signed on with Israel’s Earsay Records to record in English for a larger audience. Supermarket was released in 2000 to rave reviews and some new international interest. A need for an official website became apparent, and so one was created wherein their new audience could find reviews, music information and the latest news.

The group toured a short time in the Eastern U.S., then returned to Israel, where they opened for several larger international bands, before returning to the studio. In June 2001, RockFour released their sixth collection One Fantastic Day to yet more acclaim, good reviews and decent sales. Which brings me to this current release. In the interest of growing RockFour’s listening audience further, the band signed with Rainbow Quartz. This larger American label has taken 8 tracks from One Fantastic Day, 4 tracks from the earlier Supermarket along with one new song (the title track) and created Another Beginning.

In a sense, it’s kind of a ‘best-of’ as introduction, and the quality shows on almost every track with treble sounds aplenty, ringing guitars, superb basslines and great drumming. “Government” is a catchy song that marries psychedelic pop with The Beach Boys (one can’t get enough Korg synth playing as theremin), while dissecting the unsavory corruption inherent in politics: “Here it goes again / Isn’t it time to change the government? / Here it goes again / Isn’t it time to find our innocence?” “Oranges” takes more 1960s psychedelia and mixes it up with the jangly Rickenbackers of The Byrds, with alternately sensual and paranoid lyrics: “Grey’s the color in my mind / Never black and white / A thousand shades before my eyes / Afraid of almost anyone / Come eat oranges with me / Peel them with your fingers / Down where people cannot see /Let yourself go free”.

“One Fantastic Day” starts off like a lost track from <I>Pet Sounds</I> with particularly good Brian Wilson-type bass by Lazare, then switches gears into some hard-guitar punk rock middle bridge, before returning to the sweet surf guitars, with suitably psychedelic lyrics throughout. “President of Me” is one of several heavily Beatle-influenced tracks here, though to be honest it really reminded me in parts of The Rutles’ spot-on parody “Let’s Be Natural”. Lulai does sound very Lennon-ish here, and there even is a lyrical mention of a “double fantasy”.

I think my favorite here is the overly Beatle-y “Smell Of Sweets”, a track that could fit comfortably onto The White Album. What RockFour has managed to write is a song that seems to be predominantly Lennon-ish, with little bridges of McCartney touches fused within. Lulai does a fine vocal turn in the role of John L., while Lazare shows great versatility in capturing Macca-type bass and Ben-Yitzhak does impressively well with just the right subtleties in lead guitar and piano bits. This song manages that rare feat - being both a tribute to the past and a solid original.

“Route 66” could sneak onto the Nuggets collection (and you’d be hard pressed to pick it out from the others, it’s that genuine sounding). “Superman” shows that the group can handle slower-tempo ballads in a song that is carried by its strong vocals. “Flowers” lets Tennenbaum loose a bit with some bongo work, though his drumming and percussion work is strong on all tracks.

The song called “Everyone” (formerly titled “Where The Byrds Fly” on its past release) is another favorite. This catchy melody with its layered Rickenbacker guitars, great bass lines and pounding drum rolls, speaks to the unreliability of ordered systems: “Everyone is having fun / Alcohol, dribbles, stardust and nicotine / Everyone carries on / They say it's nice out here / But then it disappears / For further information / Call The One”. It’s a modern psychedelic gem.

If you are a fan of that Nuggets collection, The Orgone Box, or Cotton Mather, or like to hear definite traces of the past’s triple-B trilogy (Beatles, Beach Boys, Byrds) in your modern music, chances are good that these four lads from Israel will stay a long time in your CD player. With three of the four group members contributing songwriting skills, there is variety and talent here that seems to get better with each new release.

Another Beginning truly is just that: a new label and wider distribution, and a great chance for those unfamiliar with this up-and-coming Israeli band to hear what they’ve been missing. If you think great psychedelic pop only comes from the U.S. and the U.K., think again!

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sparkle*jets u.k.
Bamboo Lounge

(Smile Records)

Release Date: February 26, 2002

www.sparklejetsuk.com

Bamboo is a fast-growing plant that offers strength and flexibility, much in the same way as the sparkle*jets u.k. Bamboo Lounge provides musical muscle and range. Before one even gets to spin this one, you get the treat of the CD packaging (graphic design courtesy of the talented Susan West and Michael Simmons), which includes a little cocktail umbrella encased within your plastic jewel box. As you pull the CD booklet out of its sleeve, you are treated to the exotic drink menu of this fictional cocktail lounge, and you won’t find more cordial hosts than the four members of sparkle*jets u.k.

Every song is a mixed concoction on this lyric sheet menu, the song times presented as prices. If you think that’s fun, just wait until you give the music a whirl - according to this bartender, it’s four parts fun, four parts chutzpah, mixed with sly rock and pop references from the sixties through the nineties, stirred well with energy and talent and topped with a maraschino cherry. This heady mix packs a wallop, but leaves you wanting more.

Okay, so you put your CD into your computer’s disk drive to give it a spin…but wait…something else pops onto your screen. It’s a little cell phone that reads “SJUK”. Talk about value for your CD dollar. Not only do you get 14 tracks of exciting studio music, you get welcomed into a multimedia bonus room of the Bamboo Lounge. Here you get the choice of looking at the lyrics to each song on your screen, or perhaps you’d like a whole extra CD’s worth of live song performances (12 songs) from this past year’s IPO. Additionally, there are photos, fonts, even a video of “Hate Your Hair”, plus another 15 bonus tracks (demos and the like). All in all, probably the most music you’ve ever gotten from any one CD.

This is just the kind of wacky happy surprise you can expect from the likes of sparkle*jets u.k., a band named for the Gretsch guitars they envisioned for themselves post-fame. The “u.k.” merely is a humorous tag added to garner attention, provide some continental cache and distinguish them from the long list of bands with sparkle or jet in their names (they’re from Orange County, California).

Since the release of their first CD, 1998’s In, Through, and Beyond, the group has logged in extensive touring time, entertaining crowds from coast-to-coast with their rollicking musical antics. In between original CDs came an unusual marketing idea, as sparkle*jets u.k. enlisted 20 bands from the Los Angeles area to cover their tunes on a self-produced tribute CD (to themselves) I Love The Sparkle*jets U.K..

This was a bold move, to say the least, and somewhat unprecedented in the annals of rock history. Still, the tribute CD met with favorable reviews.

How dare a band be so audacious? The answer can be found in the music, obviously. The sparkle*jets u.k. are a talented quartet, and can sport a number of different powerpop styles (3 of the 4 are songwriters). The majority of the songs are penned by guitarist/vocalist Michael Simmons, resident computer geek of the band. Still, many other of the songs are written and sung by the charmingly quirky Susan West (who also plays guitar and sports a voice that demands your attention). Jamie Knight co-writes a few here as well, playing bass while on leave from his high school librarian duties. Larry Doran pounds the drums when not manning the counter of your favorite cool record shop.

“Monster” leads off the proceedings, with Susan West serving up an Ann Wilson-ish vocal that will get your Heart thumping, with a lyric that reminds you that monsters can be girls too (convincingly presented). Probyn Gregory adds some nice horns as well. We get a similar Wilson-ish vocal on the rocking “They Shoot Square Dancers, Don’t They?”

“She May Be Nice” gives us the other sparkle*jets u.k., with Michael Simmons pleasant voice harmonizing nicely with Susan’s, in a catchy romantic ditty that steals a wee hook from Kiss (heaven forfend) and still manages to win you over. How could one not love simple-yet-true lyrics like: “She may have eyes of blue/ Killer thighs and a boss tattoo / The toast of every guy in town / A whole wardrobe that oozes style / Breaking hearts with just her smile / She may be nice, but she ain’t you”.

Sweet harmonies lead into the slower-tempo ballad “Sorry”, serving up a sort of David Gates/Bread feel to this lover’s apology (with a nice touch of flute from Lisa Jenio). In “Consult Your Physician”, Dr. Susan West uses her lovely voice to play both speaker channels to the hilt, reminding us things are not as bad as they seem: “You can agonize till your agony is your heaviest load / Come on, get happy!”

The thing is, sparkle*jets u.k. can make even the bad times seem fun. “So Gone” is a catchy soft rock anthem from Michael Simmons and Jamie Knight exploring bitter memories of a relationship gone horribly bad. “Real Nice Time” is the Susan West answer to similar subject material. Again, how can one not warm to such lyrics as this: “Did you have a good time? / Did you have one with lime? / Did someone say l’chaim? / Did you tell her you’re mine? / Well I hope you had a real nice time without me”.

“Beautiful Girl” lets Simmons show his lounge lizard chops as he romances said beautiful girl with “the only song that’s true”. No stranger to jazzy lounge music, he also impresses with the intriguing and exotic title instrumental “Bamboo Lounge”(complete with wild monkeys screeching).

Fans of loud punk rock will enjoy “Hate Your Hair” (but fleetingly, since it clocks in at only 42 seconds). “It’s Gotta Happen” is an infectiously wonderful hand-clapping piece of pop that reminds all of us striving for greater things that “it’s gotta happen” even if “it sure ain’t happening now”.

“Nobody’s Girl” reminds you of all those wonderful songs from the seventies (back when radio still had promise - ah, nostalgia). “A Nice One” wins as the song that made me smile the most. Here Susan West explains why she wants to write a nice pretty song, rather than another mean one, telling us how one is necessary to appreciate the other: “It’s smog that makes the sky look pretty / It’s hunger that makes your food taste good / And you don’t know you’re happy until you’re sad”.

There’s a full and varied menu of songs and styles presented here, and you’ll want to drink of these libations liberally (I haven’t even touched upon any of the extra music) in order to best digest it all. Fun and talent meet up at the Bamboo Lounge and you get a great musical bang for the buck. Drink up and sing along with sparkle*jets u.k., but always watch out for the wild monkeys.

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Sugarbomb
Bully

(RCA)

Release Date: September 25, 2001

www.sugarbomb.net

With February comes Valentine’s Day and there’s no better time to review a CD I love. This CD was to be my great evidence arguing a new resurgence of melodic power pop in the mainstream. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, see how RCA (a major record label) released this impressive collection from a formerly indie act out of Fort Worth, Texas. Listen as the foreman plays it for you now, enough hooks to open your own bait-and-tackle shop, harmonies and great voices for days, clean arrangements and solid guitars, clever lyrics, strings (what production values), complex melodies and note the strength of that songwriting. This is a day for celebration, a day of hopes renewed, a day that shall live in infamy…but no…the alarm rings and I wake to another reality entirely.

In truth, this unlucky band had been unceremoniously dropped by RCA even before the CD’s actual release date, abandoned in the alleged downsizing of the label’s operations (staff and artists) following the atrocities of September 11th. So much for justice in the music industry; so much for the new power pop hope. Yet, even with the label pulling out, we still have this wonderful CD to listen to, aural evidence of what could have been as we dream of a not-too-distant future where happy musical endings exist.

Bully offers eleven refreshingly varied songs that represent all that’s good in melodic powerpop, in the tradition of Queen, The Cars, The Beatles/McCartney, Todd Rundgren/Utopia, Jellyfish, ELO, Squeeze, Cheap Trick and numerous others. This polished quintet is comprised of Les Farrington on keyboards and lead vocals, Daniel Harville (guitar and other lead vocals), his brother Michael Harville on drums and vocals, Greg Bagby on guitar and vocals, and Kelly Riley on bass.

Sugarbomb came together in March of 1998, and played their first show that October. At first they wanted to be called Starbelly (after Dr. Seuss’ Star-bellied Sneetches), but when they realized that Starbelly already was taken, they chose a new moniker of two extremes. “The sweetness of sugar and the chaos of a bomb fits our music and personalities,” Michael Harville admits.

The band toured extensively in the Dallas area and throughout Texas, which led to a signing with indie label Rainmaker Records and a 1999 release of their first CD Tastes Like Sugar. For their major label release, the band re-recorded five songs from their earlier CD, while adding six new standards. They brought in producer Mark Endert (Fiona Apple, Madonna, Semisonic, Vertical Horizon) and the results are inspiring as complex harmonies, crisp guitars, distinctive keyboards, difficult rhythm fills, and lush textured layers of sound are integrated into a slickly polished magical whole.

One has to wonder if not for bad luck, would this band have any luck at all? While touring in St. Louis, Sugarbomb had its van stolen. Inside that van was luggage, CDs, and all their equipment. “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” notes Farrington. “It was weird because when I walked in the door after that flight home I heard ‘Hello’ on the radio, and my first thought was, “How can I be on the radio and have no car, no money and no gear?”

Talent is the great equalizer, though, and Farrington’s songwriting is phenomenal. "I'm banking on the intellect and good taste of America coming through for us,” says Farrington. “People have so many distractions these days: video games, computers, 500 cable channels. Who has time to study an album? That's why we try to make our music as interesting as possible.”

That much is obvious. Keyboards dive into a swirl of guitars followed by great vocals and banked harmonies in the opener “What A Drag”, giving a good idea of what’s to come. This is a song of pondering about how people change as life goes on like some never-ending dream (“It’s never what you think / Getting harder to predict”). The title track is a great melodic exploration of the horrors of getting bullied, with the pleading chorus: “Could you pick on someone your own size / Get it out of your head that I’m just what you want / Could you give it a rest, let me catch my breath / Go pick on somebody else”.

“Hello”, though not the pinnacle of creativity, proved the most marketable confection in today’s guitar-driven radio marketplace. This easy-on-the-ears welcome back to a desired lover actually charted as a pop-rock anthem, proof that all is not yet lost in the world of music. “Clover” and “Gone” both offer good organ-based upbeat handclap rhythms with electronic fills, and might prove more radio-marketable than some of the other songs, though they’re not nearly as interesting. Even a deceptively simple rocker such as “Waiting” takes unexpected melodic turns, proving why Sugarbomb is more than a cut above your average pop rock band.

In an album of strong songs, four of them stand out as superlative. “Mail Order Girlfriend” is a song that manages the difficult feat of capturing the sound of vintage Jellyfish. It perfectly orchestrates this tale of a pathetic sad sack who waits endlessly for a love correspondence gone sour. “Motor Mouth” is my personal favorite, boldly marrying the sweet harmonic sounds of Queen and Squeeze with modern beat-driven hip-hop phrasings, as the singer confesses his embarrassment at never knowing quite when to shut up. It’s a brilliant achievement.

“Posterchild For Tragedy” is a lovely piano-led gentle ballad in the style of Eric Carmen or Wings-era McCartney. This demand for a lover’s return really emphasizes the emotive strength of Farrington’s vocals, as he ponders the unsatisfactory options: “The silence is deafening / Must I face another day without the rhythm of your voice that echoes inside me / It’s a song I’ll never sing / Maybe there’s a chance that I could carry on with your memory / Maybe there’s a hope that I could live in the shell you left of me/ Maybe I could last a while as the poster child for tragedy / I’m afraid that couldn’t be”.

Last and certainly not least is “After All”, the best post-Freddie Mercury Queen-type song ever written. When Sugarbomb perform live, they do an amazing rendition of “Killer Queen” and if imitation is the highest form of flattery, then Queen should be very flattered. “After All” is a highly catchy put-down of an egotistical blowhard, again with lyrics that are better than most: “Everything is easy always having an excuse / Always in the market for a ritual abuse / Lack of opportunity is knocking at the door / Sitting on that good-for-nothing ass forevermore”.

The clever twists and turns in the songs of Farrington and Harville make this both exciting and special. The talent shows itself over and over, in surprising key, mood, and tempo changes, as well as in wonderfully rich harmonies - this is the very definition of melodic power pop. Will kids today respond to something other than sticky sweet saccharine manufactured hits produced by some formulaic Swedish pop machine? The label-less Sugarbomb remind us with Bully that intelligent lyrics and sing along melodies still can work.

For now, the band presses on, touring and hoping to find a new home. RCA’s Nipper may still be listening for his master’s voice, but the shame is that it won’t be singing definitive melodic power pop.

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