MUSIC BOX |
MUSIC BOX
Josh Bell
Damon Hodge
Martin Stein |
The Black Jetts (2.5 stars)
Bleed Me
Local garage-rockers The Black Jetts have gone through more lineup changes than Fleetwood Mac, but frontman Gabe Stiff has a purity of vision that transcends whomever his bandmates are at the moment. On the Jetts' first full-length release (from LA's Dead Beat Records), Stiff and his cohorts pound out 11 tracks of pure rock exuberance.
While the Jetts' raw, '70s-influenced sound has won over local critics and hipsters, on record there's not much to distinguish them from the legions of bands unleashed ever since the Strokes and the White Stripes first opened the garage doors. Even at just a little over half an hour, the (deliberately?) low-fi production quickly becomes grating, and the Stooges/T. Rex rip-off riffs offer nothing that hints at originality.
There are some clever lyrics (see "Rehab Love"), and some songs start with catchy riffs, but they almost always devolve into repetitive bores. Unlike another Vegas garage-rock band with lots of buzz—The Killers—the Jetts don't add bring anything new to the already-tired genre. They may very well be brilliant live, but this album is best left in the garage.
Josh Bell
Ani DiFranco (2.5 stars)
Educated Guess
Ani Difranco's latest is recorded in a house on an 8-track reel-to-reel, giving it a roots flavor and an intimate sound. Educated Guess is not just a solo CD, it's one-woman show—she wrote it, plays all the instruments (primarily her trusty guitar), and sings both lead and back-up. She's in fine DiFranco form.
For better or worse, after more than 14 years, she still makes a listener want to burn sage and write letters in the rain to earthy college friends who had a point to make about everything. DiFranco has an opinion—about politics, about sexual politics, about the environment, about commercialism—and she's made a career of expressing her views sharply in her music. "I am an all powerful amazon warrior / Not just some sniveling girl…I know men are delicate origami creatures / Who need women to unfold them…"
Her voice and her guitar picking are engaging—sometimes jazzy, sometimes punkish, always folk— moving at a twitchy, confrontational pace all her own. But the political poetry is sometimes tiresome. Still, if you're in need of a musical dose of poetry night at the independent coffee house, DiFranco delivers.
Stacy J. Willis
Phantom Planet (2 stars)
Phantom Planet
After a decade together, Phantom Planet is entitled to explore more than catchy pop and television themes. So, these good-looking, well-connected LA boys have set themselves up as the West Coast Strokes.
Of course, the Strokes' basic garage-rock sound is ripe for franchising. But it is still a bit disconcerting at how easily Phantom Planet's Alex Greenwald simulates Julian Casablancas' vocals on opener "Happy Ending." It helps that the usually uber-arty producer Dave Fridmann has kept his talents in check and left the sound and mix here more minimal and raw than anything on the Mercury Rev or Flaming Lips discs that are the foundation of his reputation.
There is nothing unpleasant here but nothing compelling. In the end, Phantom Planet (who also seems to have studied a few Weezer discs) prove themselves to be an adequate garage band, thanks in large part to the songwriting skills that made them an adequate pop band on previous releases.
Richard Abowitz