[Sidebar] April 6 - 13, 2000
[Music Reviews]
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Sound escapes

New: Meat Depressed, Lovetrain, and more

by Bob Gulla

The woodwork serves as a curious place to hide, but that's where it seems like a lot of local bands come from these days. All of a sudden, without a word, a record comes forth from a group, dropped from the skies, unheralded, unexpected, and, largely, underrated. Why do these bands hide? Is it because they can't get gigs and/or other exposure? Or does it go deeper than that? Is playing in a band today humiliating? Is it one of those ignominious pastimes where people who do it don't like to talk about it? Like plumbing? Like undertaking? I never thought so. It used to be that playing in a rock band was a badge of honor, something to wear with pride, like a boss new haircut. Then again, with today's sorry state of pop music -- and teeny boppers and canine rockers like Limp Bizkit giving commercial music a pathetic name -- maybe it isn't such a proud vocation. Still, there are the records. And aliases always come in handy. Come to think of it, the woodwork isn't such a bad place to come from.

Pretty Boy Floyd (demo)
Mike Dinallo had a pretty good thing going with his last band the Radio Kings, with a good, rootsy rock record on Rounder and lots of touring opportunities. But it apparently wasn't quite good enough to hang with, as he broke that band up for good last year. In its stead, guitarist Dinallo -- who also plays in Barrence Whitfield's band -- has teamed with singer-songwriter Tim Gearan in Pretty Boy Floyd, a more decidedly rural album with elements of real country and smoky blues.

Recorded up in Boston at Room 9 From Outer Pace by Sean Carberry and produced by Carberry and Dinallo, the record grinds out some sweet, mid- to slow-tempo homespun roots, country and blues. Among some cool original numbers like the swooning instrumental "Bluebonnet Lullaby" and the rollicking opener "Misery Train," there are a couple of nifty, well-chosen covers: the Sam Collins classic "Lonesome Road Blues" and the old-time standard "In the Pines." Former members of the Radio Kings help out, including John Packer (acoustic bass), Lou Ulrich (bass), and Marty Richards (drums) and their experience punches these songs up admirably.

The production is organic and satisfying, with nary a trick in sight -- just good playing, good singing, good arranging, and some excellent songwriting. Who knows what the future will hold for Pretty Boy Floyd? Hopefully, a deal is in the offing. It helps that they've already gotten off to a great start with this demo.

[] Lovetrain: Almost Home (Burning Bright Records)
From the first few acoustic guitar chords on Lovetrain's new record, you get the feeling you're in for a pretty exhilarating ride. Led by songwriter Dan Lilley, the band travels through a smart set of melodic working-man music, falling somewhere between the wise-guy pop of Marshall Crenshaw, the Jersey sounds of the Boss and Southside Johnny (without the Jukes), and the roots-rock sound of the Cracker clan. Lilley's a heartfelt songwriter with the ability to communicate stories clearly and concisely without resorting to uncomfortable turns of phrase, especially on the sweet "Lovers of the Past" and the telling "Separate Ways."

As an ensemble the group plays with fluency and taste. Lilley never overdoes his vocal tracks, letting his simply expressed lyrics do most of the talking. Mike Sullivan's guitar playing is also sophisticated and tasteful, never overreaching, rarely calling attention to itself. Production-wise, the record loses something on the high-end, cutting off Phil Hicks' cymbals and Sullivan's piercing licks. But then, when you've got songs with this kind of quality, sound becomes secondary to sentiment. And the music simply speaks for itself.
Lovetrain's record release party is on Friday, April 7 at the Century Lounge.

Soulshed (self-released)
Holy f**king smokes! Living Room mainstays Soulshed move mountains with this massive slab of angular metal and extreme dissonance. Spearheaded by the astounding -- yeah, astounding! -- vocals of singer Rick Massa, the record lurches toward a sonic apocalypse, characterized by fire-breathing power chords, poison sentiment, and left-field song structures. Dan deMelo and Josh Floriano kick up a nasty racket on their guitars, but, thankfully, they don't execute everything in dropped D like so many of today's metal magnates. Check out the off-kilter figures in "In My Head" to see what I mean. The rhythm section of Manny Pires and Nelson deMelo hang tough, with profoundly potent teamwork, especially on tunes like "Anthem" and "Death Becomes You."

But the real star of this record is singer Massa, who rips through every song on this ten-cut set like a maniacal impersonator, someone who can change his voice depending on the song and who's listening. On "Rapist" he sounds like Ozzy Osbourne, Jello Biafra, and Slayer's Tom Araya, sometimes in the same sentence. Massa's voice can bend into a seemingly infinite variety of styles, from rapping and screaming to black metal belching and angelic singing. It's a freak of nature, truly, but it keeps this record consistently compelling, if only to hear where the hell Massa is headed next. A fine, abrasive effort, in all, and exactly the kind of disreputable music that should make their hometown of Swansea proud.

[] Meat Depressed: Deface the Nation (Good Cop/ Bad Cop)
Remember how you felt when you spun your first Buzzcocks record, or your first Stiff Little Fingers disc? The guys in Foxboro's Meat Depressed do, and they let us know they've never forgotten that punk-rock high with a set full of blitzkrieg bop. It's high-energy stuff capably performed, with enough sizzle, universal sentiment, and crankin' punk guitar to keep the disc in the player longer enough to singalong to.

Though there are no surprises here and the very concept of making a 1978 punk rock record 22 years later is actually kind of funny, Deface the Nation blasts through its material as if the band itself discovered the genre. Big-ass songs like "Get Away" and the maddeningly catchy `I Can't Hear You," which has one of the great build-up chorus pay-offs in recent memory, really do the trick. You gotta hear it.

For the most part, too, the tunes are terse and to the point. Classic titles like "Armed Farces," "Suicide Is Painless," and "It's Time to Fuck!" breeze by, well, painlessly, instigating, poking fun at, or riling up its numerous targets along the way. So what if they're stuck in the '70s? Meat Depressed -- Peter Walsh, Vic Leemon, Bob Kadlec and John Stone -- like it there. After all, there was a lot to complain about.

WANDERING EYE. Lots of cool stuff going on at the Green Room these days. On Saturday the 8th, you'll find the Sheila Divine packing a wallop, and get this: there's no cover. Head on down. Beer's on me.

Jeffrey Underhill, guitarist extraordinaire of Honeybunch, is happy to report his band has a rare local gig on Thursday, April 13 with Lois and Mark Robinson at the Met Cafe. It's a P Squared Production, of course.

Just so you know, there's a March Against Racism and Police Brutality on Saturday, April 8 at noon. Meet at the Broad Street entrance to Roger Williams Park. The march, marking the 23rd anniversary of the assignation of Dr. Martin Luther, is organized by the Coalition for Justice and Community Reconciliation. Take a stand, eh?

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