Courtesy
It occasionally crosses my mind that the entire concept of “genres” in music might just be the creation of lazy music critics who are looking for an easier way to describe a musician and can’t think of the appropriate analogy or descriptive phrase to bring it into the minds of their readers. For this reason we get B.S. terms, such as “alternative rock,” which describe nothing yet pigeonhole musicians into a particular trend or style, making them easy to classify, so that music critics and radio programmers don’t actually have to do the creative work involved in reviewing music. In defiance of this, here is a group of recent releases which in some way or another defy easy genre classification.
First is the latest from G. Love, “The Hustle.” A combination of modern folk rock, rap and pop rock, the album is a testament to the songwriting abilities of G. Love, though that is not necessarily a good thing. At his best he is a passable folk songwriter, inoffensive and as bland as decaf coffee. But when he starts rapping, he transforms into something hideously, horrendously worse. His raps are sub-par to the point of being almost embarrassing to listen to.
A particularly odious example is “Back of the Bus,” wherein Mr. Love sums up the wonders of male-female relationships in the poignant line: “In the back of the bus it’s a make-out session / She’s got the salad and I’ve got the dressing.” What impresses me is that someone actually thought that was a good line, committed it to paper, recorded it and released in to an unwitting public. I also wonder if it ever occurred to Love that a white guy rapping about how great it is in the back of the bus might have some sort of negative connotation. But I digress.
The music on the album is actually above par for most releases these days, making me wish that the vocals had been cut and a few decent guitar solos added. This could have been the instrumental album of the year, but, alas, we’re just stuck with another G. Love release.
Next up is Mountain Con’s “Dusty Zero Dirty Ones.” Mixing rock, some hip hop, a slight dose of left-wing politics and some inventive samples, the album is a really great record waiting to happen. Though recorded in a basement, the rough edges have nothing to do with the sound quality itself. But occasionally the song structure is just not tight enough, or the melodies are just a bit too corny, or the guitar riffs are just a bit too derivative.
This is unfortunate, because buried within the album is some pretty great work. Songs such as the haunting “I-5” and “False Horizon” (which starts off a little cheesy but is redeemed by an almost transcendent chorus) show the potential for an album of spot-on songwriting and musical construction. Close, but no cigar.
The debut from Head Automatica, “Decadence,” comes a little closer to being on the right side of really good, but also suffers from a similar problem of consistency. Made up of the lead singer of the hard-core punk band Glassjaw and mostly produced by Dan the Automator, the album combines the speed and energy of modern hard-core punk with disco beats and dance remixes. Ambitious, but the execution is not as powerful as the ideas behind it. Some tracks, such as the standout “Please Please Please (Young Hollywood),” bring forth the best of the collaborator’s strengths into moving bursts of raw power.
But often the album slips too far to one side or the other, falling into the clichés of punk and dance just as easily as it comes across with the best elements of each style. What remains is a collection of failed experiments surrounding a few good songs and an album that shows promise but few actual results.
The last of these is the debut self-titled album from the Los Angeles band The Shore. In contrast with the albums above, this is a group whose members take no chances, play it safe and wouldn’t know a risky move if one bit them on their fashion-plate asses. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this music, but there is equally as much worthwhile about it. It’s ballad rock, heavy on the string arrangements and sorrow and as empty as a passing wind.
How many words for “bland” are there in the English language? I came up with quite a few while listening to this album, but the truly infuriating thing about the whole affair is that the band isn’t bad, but for some reason can’t seem to come up with a memorable line or arrangement. It’s almost ambient, except that ambient music is intended to influence the mood of people listening to it on a subconscious level. The Shore can hardly accomplish that. At least failed experiments are dynamic in their failure, but this will pass through our culture without even a whisper.
