Excellently executed solo project from the Keystone State (Pennsylvania oughtta sue that weak-ass beer with the mountains on the can for character defamation) that makes me touch the doll in the same spots as 20/20, the Jesus & Mary Chain and the one good Pixies album (i.e. the fourth one) did... and i kinda like it, so don’t tell anyone about what happened. Of course, i didn’t really like it when he was touching my Neil Young spot, and i was just confused when he was rubbing my Paul Simon unit, but the guitars were always up good’n’loud in the mix, so what the fuck did i care? Owing to the stylistic mish-mosh in place here – although the album has a certain beefy uniformity to it, things run the gamut from minor-chord laden ballads to things like “Lookout,” which sorta sound like “Electric” era Cult playing Hollies covers (which is good) (and definitely on the correct side of the Graham Nash timeline) (implying that the side where he leaves the Hollies to be in a band with Neil Young would be the wrong side) (which is right) – a whole hog recommendation would be a bit like passing off Neapolitan ice cream as Strawberry, so i’ll just state for the official ledger that about a third of this record is great, and another third isn’t half bad. Which i guess makes it three-sixths great? I think i’ll listen to “Lookout” again. You can check the math independently. BEST SONG: “Lookout” BEST SONG TITLE: “YOU!” FANTASTIC AMAZING TRIVIA FACT: I was flipping through a free issue of Rolling Stone last week and on that little chart in the back where they list the Top Ten in record sales at one random record store somewhere in America each issue, this CD was #10. I still say it’s pretty good, though.
–norb (Get Hip!)