SEE Magazine: October 2, 2003

minutes and 46 seconds of The New Romance will feel a bit like a baseball game. It’s evenly paced and full of miniscule dramatic events that never cause any outright pandemonium or heartbreak. Like baseball, The New Romance sags a bit in the middle and pauses a little too often to adjust its uniform. But, also like baseball, it’s entirely pardonable in view of its good-natured competitiveness and unpretentious charm.

The New Romance is Seattle-based PGMG’s second full-length, hot on the heels of last year’s critically acclaimed Good Health. Though more self-assured than its predecessor, The New Romance isn’t a drastic departure in terms of style. The group’s angular, intertwined guitars and emotive female vocals are equal parts Fugazi and Rainer Maria, but PGMG have a knack for paring down some of the genre’s overstatements in favour of simpler, pop-influenced songwriting.

After a few more spins, The New Romance will still feel like baseball, but all the subtle cues and engaging idiosyncrasies championed by die-hard fans become apparent. Though the album could initially be taken for predictable, it’s clear that PGMG are simply unconcerned with wowing the listener through gadgetry or sonic innovation. Instead, the CD offers a solid batch of energetic anthems that make it an enduring, rewarding listen.

"Peaches" Nisker claims she’s not a feminist. Which probably saves Canadian feminists considerable embarrassment: Merrill kicks hard, but aimlessly, unless puerile has become the new political.

To her credit, Merrill doesn’t claim to be a musician either; her duet with Iggy Pop is fun and inspired, but she mainly displays a talent for rudimentary Groovebox programming and repeating expletives like "shit," "fuck," "tits," and "dick" ad nauseam. Plenty of moo–not enough milk.

Before becoming a self-professed sex-icon, Merrill did create an educational arts program for kids. Whether her reincarnation under a fruity moniker is a continuation of those past scholastic ambitions or not, is difficult to assess. But, beyond attracting pubescent wankers and shocking social conservatives, there’s little here that warrants attention from those among you who actually have a sex life.

Laibach, the first East-European group to make a lasting impact on the Western scene. As their wardrobe, mannerisms, and sound have been appropriated by mainstream vaudevillian acts like Marilyn Manson and Rammstein, Laibach return to their musical roots–the aggressive minimalist electro pioneered by Deutsch-Amerikanische Freundschaft more than 20-years-ago.

Framed within the contrast of Slavko Avsenik Jr’s neoclassicist choirs and Uros Umek’s sensual techno, Laibach–the musical department of the NSK, the New Slovene Art collective–recapitulate the core themes of their oeuvre over the past two decades: the totalitarianism inherent to democracy, the mental prisons of religion, the West’s fear and envy of the East, and the destructive greed at the heart of capitalism which dresses contemporary fascism in a business suit rather than a brown shirt.

Some familiarity with the Slovene and German idiom may be required, but Laibach’s bare bones are presented here in plain English for those with limited knowledge of applied philosophy and political science. It would be easy to dismiss this as a load of elitist claptrap, but chances are that if you don’t get it this time, you were probably never meant to.

Cheez Whiz. There I said it. I found the secret ingredient to pop albums. The cheese makes all the difference. Wait. Cheez Whiz isn’t really cheese now is it? But it has that special something that makes you go, "I know I waaaaant it." Okay, so it’s no great mystery that most pop music wouldn’t be as tasty if it didn’t have a scoop or two of that infernal orange glop, but we’re overlooking the second part that is "whiz." And Seal certainly has that special something.

The tall Englishman who gave us classics like "Crazy" (still pretty good) and the Space Jam soundtrack remake of "Fly Like An Eagle" (still pretty fucking blah) is back with his aptly-titled fourth album, IV. It plays out like an old Sting CD, complete with shmoozy string arrangements and spacey keyboards, but the magical "whiz" factor still accounts for a lot in saving the album from being a complete disaster. Yes, Seal has a heart of gold and the vocals that go with it. He seems to truly believe in what he sings, and it counts for a lot, but most of the album sounds like a re-heated EZ Rock recipe. Or was that CHEEZ-E rock recipe? I digress. The soul is still there, in its right place, with a few highlights–"Heavenly...(Good Feeling)" and "Get It Together")–but to find those few precious moments you have to spend a lot of time scraping off that thick smelly orange crust. It’s probably more than most of us can bear. For hardcore (and I mean REALLY hardcore) fans only.

You have to give Buck 65 his due. He’s one uncompromising dude, rappin’ it out in all his white-boy glory full of trailer-park attitude and honky storylines. If you can find another rap artist that has more to say about getting stranded on the side of the road and visiting crummy gas stations, then you certainly deserve those bonus points that earn you a bag of chips at Petro-Can. There are good things to be said about Talkin’ Honky Blues –and a few lousy things as well.

Let’s start with the negative so we can finish on a positive note: To put it bluntly, Buck 65 isn’t Eminem. His lyrical schemes tend to be a little redundant, even though he’s using every word available in his little black book of rhymes. His delivery is fluid, if only because he always follows the same pattern, and his raspy voice tends to be a little grating. Just call it an "acquired taste." And, if the melodies created by his backing instruments are strong, it gets difficult to differentiate one song from the other.

On the positive side, the music is probably the main attraction on Talkin’ Honky Blues, the first four tracks being the perfect example of a good combination of rhythm & blues and hip hop, complete with folk guitars and a country feel. The album flows in a mix-tape fashion, one song blending into the next with only a few silent breaks between tracks (which compensates for the lack of variety on the lyrical delivery level by making the album a single unit).

Talkin’ Honky Blues is no groundbreaking achievement, but it should be respected for its honesty. With a little more variety and a better vocal mix, one that feels like it’s part of the music instead of a separate entity, he could become a driving force in his own right.

Ska-punk, that bastardly fusion of two genres that couldn’t be any more different, has been waning in the past few years. Established acts like Less Than Jake seem quite content to distance themselves from the sound, and older workhorses like Voodoo Glow Skulls and The Mighty Mighty Bosstones are either running out of steam or fading off into the night. The mix is tired, the formula has been plundered a few times too many, and yet–out of nowhere–comes a new group by the name of Streetlight Manifesto who prove, with Everything Goes Numb, much like the Bosstones did last year with A Jackknife to a Swan, that ska-punk can be worth another look.

For a good indication of their sound, keep in mind that half of Streetlight Manifesto’s members, including lead singer/guitarist Tomas Kalnoky, used to play in New Jersey’s Catch-22. Catch-22’s Keasbey Nights was a pretty decent ska-punk album that had flashes of brilliance but often not enough musical maturity for it to be truly considered (as some indeed do) a "classic." Five years after Keasbey Nights, Kalnoky has re-emerged with a very fresh sounding sequel. The energy and distortion that you’d expect is here, but the main differences from most other ska-punk fusions lies within the horn section, which carries itself with the dignity of an eastern European orchestra. As well Kalnoky’s atypical songwriting rises above the pack–you won’t find any tracks dealing with lesbian girlfriends or giddy odes to binge drinking on the album; instead, Kalnoky grapples with suicide, abandonment, college-age disconnection, and he spins a narrative from the perspective of a bank robber. That may sound like a downer, but it isn’t. You’ll understand once you find yourself hunched over the liner notes, devoutly mumbling the lyrics to yourself and bobbing your head to the bursts of pseudo-Russian choruses.

Being the unsuspecting music listener that I am (cough, cough), I innocently thought Adam Green was dedicating his five song EP to his current/ex/future girlfriend, Jessica. That would have been cute considering the bittersweet melody that popped out of my speakers late one night, guitar strings plucking away in the moonlight... until Green took his first breath to sing about... teenybopper princess Jessica Simpson? Wha..?

I don’t know what’s more confusing: the lack of any form of logic in Green’s lyrics, or him singing them with such conviction. Does it deserve a warm round of applause or a seizure-induced shake of the head? Green isn’t Beefheart, Buffet, or even Zappa, but he sure takes himself seriously enough to convince the listener that what he’s doing has some sort of merit (between two fits of laughter, a buddy of mine found it closer to Phoebe’s musical genius on Friends). If singing about Jessica Simpson conjures up images of "purple bulldozers" and "injections of cortisone," then let Green make a double album as soon as possible. Word to the wise, Greener: those dictaphone songs you recorded when you were a kid ("Don’t Smoke/The Bronx Zoo 1989") stopped being interesting after Beck made them his trademark on Stereopathetic Soulmanure... and that was 10 years ago. Get with the program.

Somewhere between "How You Remind Me" and international superstardom, it has became cool to hate the hometown team. So Nickelback’s kinda derivative, but they’re just a rock ’n’ roll band, right? Sure, if a product this calculated and prefabricated can be called rock. The same formula that plagued Silver Side Up repeats itself here. Some fiery riffs and rumbling rhythms ("Flat on the Floor") carry into an ultra-polished generic pop single ("Someday") and peter out into utterly forgettable grunge-rock filler until the next single pops up near the album’s end ("Another Hole in the Head").

Same old, same old, but Kroeger’s reputation as an everyman lyricist is in trouble this time. "The ladies love those limousines, you know they’re going to show up every time," he sings on "See You at the Show."

Masturbatory bling-rock is not a good fit for Nickelback, and it changes the tone of The Long Road from bland to incredibly lame.

When it comes to bands from Scandinavia, I think the general rule is to approach with caution. Even though they have lulled us into submission with a steady train of alt-rock as of late, we must be vigilant, for they may unleash yet another onslaught of ABBA on our poor, tortured souls. (Okay, so I’m paranoid and a protectionist). The Ricochets pass the screening process; they seem too tortured themselves to release any saccharine, joyous pop anthems. Thank God almighty.

The concept of The Ghost of Our Love, judging from the cover, is simple enough: the band is locked in the room from Blur’s "Song 2" music video and forced to grapple with the demons of past relationships, present relationships, and Billy Joel’s piano. Well, at least, that’s what I got out of it. The result is a pretty mixed album: at the best of times moderately catchy piano rock; at the worst of times dull and lackluster; and all of the time moody and introspective. I’d elaborate further, but discussing the unremarkable is a tedious exercise for both of us.

Hmmm, how can I put this delicately? You know that obnoxious guy at the front of the bar who thinks "chicks can’t rock"? Well, I think I just heard the album that he was talking about.

Not that there’s anything overtly offensive about Fake, the second album from these four girls from T.O., it’s just that there’s nothing really there at all. It’s as aurally tasty as mayo on Wonder Bread.

The album offers nothing surprising, innovative or remotely rememberable–just another earnest female voice oversinging beige rock-ballads. The music sounds like it was an afterthought, and the singer’s dead-sober seriousness is self-indulgent and boring.

Oh, and then there’s the cover of Velvet Underground’s "Femme Fatale." Why this needed to be unleashed on the world I’ll never know.

"We don’t need fortune, we don’t need fame/We don’t need bright lights to read our name/All we ever wanted was just to play," sings bassist Mike Herrera on the opening track "Before." So they have moderate aspirations, and just do it for the music. That’s commendable. Hold on, this second track sounds familiar ("Play it Loud"). Oh right, it’s the song from the new PEPSI commercial where they’re shown rocking out for the "PEPSI Youth." Okay, maybe a couple million corporate bucks, and the music of course, and they’ll be just fine. Remember, they don’t need much. All hypocrisy aside, the new MXPX is about as exciting as refilling your fountain soft drink. Come to think of it, one could say their music is sugary sweet, readily goes flat, and is safe enough to be consumed by millions. Wow, this analogy really works!