Record Reviews

originally published February 16, 2005


TISHAMINGO
Wear N' Tear
Magnatude

Last time out, Athens rock band Tishamingo recruited producer John Keane to help it record an album that would open jam scene doors. The band's barefoot, feel-good live shows didn't hurt the cause. Soon enough it earned a well-deserved solid reputation along with a healthy regional following.

This time out, the band's enlisted another very capable producer - the very busy David Barbe. While Wear N' Tear is home to musicianship rarely matched by Tishamingo's contemporaries, it's unlikely to earn them the same indie cred garnered by other local Southern rock crossovers like the Drive-By Truckers and Southern Bitch. Like most Southern rock, it's timeless and familiar. It's perfect for singing along, yet mostly unimaginative. You'll find songs about gangsters, ("Legend of George Nelson"), fishing ("Smoked Mullet) and several odes to booze (like "Hillbilly Wine," in which I'm convinced that the wine is a metaphor for a woman).

The highlight reel begins with a genuine delivery of Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Poison Whiskey" and the complementary nature of back-to-back tracks. "Magic" is the standard haunt-rock ballad built to unhook bra straps in the backseat of a Gran Torino circa 1975. If you can't seal the deal in roughly four minutes, not to worry, there's a smooth transition into the slick and sexy instrumental "Rome" that buys you a little more time.

David Eduardo

Tishamingo is performing at Gus's on Saturday, Feb. 19.

DODD FERRELLE & THE TINFOIL STARS
The Murder of Love
Two Sheds

Ferrelle's latest release finds him and his band the Tinfoil Stars further refining the edgy power-pop sound that dominated 2002's Always Almost There. Tracks like "If You Could Be" and "Lightning Strikes" are built upon dinosaur-sized hooks and become showcases for both frontman Ferrelle's fiery delivery and Michelle McClure's, Tim Adams' and Dan Orchick's ever-dependable support.

Ferrelle has described the songs off Murder as fitting together to document the end of a failed relationship. This is no big thematical stretch - for Ferrelle or any other performer - seeing as that's what most rock, blues and country songs tend to be about anyway.

The album itself, though, is drenched in 1980s college rock/ Americana colors (jangly guitar, soaring vocals, David Barbe's anthemic production) but still exists comfortably out of time. It's inviting enough that such well-tested subject matter becomes high drama, and the band tops off The Murder of Love with a straight-faced tear through Abba's "S.O.S" many degrees removed from its regular station in the guilty pleasure file.

Michael Andrews

Dodd Ferrelle & the Tinfoil Stars are performing at Tasty World on Thursday, Feb. 17.

WEATHER RADIO
The Rest of Weather Radio
Independent Release

Dear Michael Wehunt,

I normally don't respond to mail, particularly after the holidays. First quarter, you understand, is my time to kick back. But the Christmas gift you asked for this past year was especially intriguing, and after the elves and I managed to make it happen, I gave in to curiosity. Your request for "A Blend Of Two Sorely Missed Bands Like Neutral Milk Hotel And Cocteau Twins But With A Personality All Its Own" sounded beyond my abilities, but damned if we didn't pull it off. For obvious reasons I chose Athens as the setting and bestowed ample talent upon Angie Grass, Chris Grehan (Nutria, Possibilities), Brody Boyer (Black Kites, Now Denial) and Tom King (Love Tractor). They chose the name Weather Radio and back in the late '90s and early '00s used a long and strange list of instruments, including fishing poles and water buckets! I laughed till my belly shook like a… well, you know.

Angie's playfully haunting voice truly does channel the spirit of Cocteau Twins' Elizabeth Fraser (albeit in English rather than gibberish), and the atmospheric tone of most of the songs would certainly leave Robin Guthrie with visions of sugar hiccups dancing in his head. "I Don't Know 'Scream'" is my favorite song with its enchanting line: "As far as I've seen / Tops of trees, Green / Monkey Clouds / On a blue movie screen." That's enough to make Jeff Mangum smile, but add in the banjo that anchors the song and you never know - he might rush back to the studio any day! The other eight tracks are nearly as good and carry that momentum well. So Weather Radio ended up giving me a gift I'll be enjoying all year long.

Many thanks,

Santa Claus

ATHICA hosts a Weather Radio CD release party on Saturday, Feb. 19.

GROOVEJOINT
One-Life Epic
Independent Release

If GrooveJoint is having fun, keeping the electric bill paid and rent up to date, then who cares what some guy writing for the free local rag thinks? That said, GrooveJoint may have the potential to cure, until now, terminal diseases and afflictions, and if this is the case they should stop making records at once, and tap into this potential. In the event the band stops something like Alzheimer's in its tracks then their album One-Life Epic and this scathing review become very trivial in the grand scheme of the GrooveJoint legacy.

Epic came advertised as having (among other things) reggae, Latin and Middle Eastern elements. Unless they're emulating rock bands from foreign lands that grew up on heavy doses of mostly loud, obnoxious modern rock I think I missed all of the aforementioned influences.

The hip hop, funk and new rock they promised - it's all there. It feels like angry music you'd expect from kids that spent their youth feeding cassette decks with mix tapes of 311, Sublime, and pre-Rubin Red Hot Chili Peppers they dubbed straight from the local FM station. So many identities tug at the band from every direction, and the result is a manic album with jagged transitions that tries to accomplish too much too quickly. Silver lining? The players are quite obviously skilled - here's hoping they settle down on the sophomore effort. Unless, of course, they cure cancer first; that'd be the only way to excuse an album as lacking as One-Life Epic.

David Eduardo

GrooveJoint is performing at The Ritz on Friday, Feb. 18.

AQUALOVE
White Sparkle
Independent Release

The concept album can be a deal breaker or a deal maker. Frank Zappa had The Grand Wazoo, the Who had Tommy, the Drive-By Truckers had Southern Rock Opera and Green Day have American Idiot. Now our own Timi Conley and Aqualove have White Sparkle. Unlike the aforementioned critically acclaimed albums the link for this concept album seems tenuous. It sounds like a Southern-glam-rock-disco-opera but apart from the subheadings for the songs it is void of a cohesive narrative.

If you've seen one of Aqualove's Ziggy Stardust shows, you'll know that Timi has a serious Bowie obsession, which serves him well - in that performance and on that night. As an album, however, White Sparkle comes across as the musical expression of an indulgent personal fantasy: that fantasy being (I'm guessing here) that Timi is the Stardust-era David Bowie fronting Queen in the year 1975, and nobody has got around to making Hair. So Conley is the groundbreaking mega star of the belated Age of Aquarius; born in the deep-deep South and spreading around the entire developed world. Unfortunately it's not 1975, Hair has been and gone, Conley doesn't have the vocal charisma of Bowie or Mercury, and White Sparkle just comes off as a noisy jumble of some of the best musicians this town has to offer sounding very, very, very dated. I think Conley is a vibrant and exciting part of the local live music scene: this album is not.

Ben Gerrard

COULIER
Cool, Cooler, Coulier!
Stickfigure

Athens rock band Coulier is both hilariously enthralling and aesthetically frustrating. Also, the band is alternately incredibly musically proficient while nearly always boyishly adolescent, and there's the rub; the members of Coulier obviously have a massive knowledge of the genre they're operating in (loosely defined as "somewhere between grindcore and cock rock"), yet seem to wink at the audience as if to say "we know it's kind of cheesy so don't think for a minute we take this seriously." Except that they do take it seriously. It was not unusual at all for the band to spend over 10 hours a day in this studio when recording this album, and that's okay.

That said, Cool, Cooler, Coulier! has its shining moments: the entire first half of the album, for instance. From the moment the band rips off completely the opening riff of Black Sabbath's "Black Sabbath," the band is off and running through the most coherent tracks of the album. Although song titles like "Start Believing in Dreams And Others Will Catch The Fever" are an intentionally silly mouthful, the first tracks of the album are rock solid. Especially wonderful are the times the band breaks from punching out every single note and glides seamlessly into smooth, guitar-rock movements.

Overall, Coulier's debut album succeeds, but repeated listening seems required for entry into their world. Technically, the album is a physical challenge in which the bandmembers aren't content to merely hint at maddening chord changes and songs with thousands of tempo changes. No, they actually fill the tracks with 'em, and that's why Coulier is very hard to grasp right out of the box. While some might find their antics tiring or even trite, Coulier has the goods to back them up. That is to say, perhaps the scene would benefit greatly from bands that actually know what they're doing (or at least have a rough idea) and take their music seriously but almost nothing else. Especially themselves.

Gordon Lamb

Coulier is performing at the Caledonia Lounge on Monday, Feb. 21.

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