rockintheblues-cd-reviews-thesuperchamps

antidepressant - The Superchamps
RightNowRecords (Seattle, Washington)
CD Review by Diane Wells

There's a bit of everything for everyone here, as this group of Seattle musicians and their special guests bring along their influences and experience from numerous other projects (Colonel Packwood, Mugwump, The Delusions, Built to Spill, Goody Blick & The Country Kind and the Groceries).

All of the 11 tracks were composed by (Colonel T.) Porter Harp, who also plays electric and acoustic guitar and displays vocals that sound remarkably reminiscent of early Bob Dylan or Howard Werth of Audience. The other two regular players, C. Timothy Fekete and Kevin "Kubby" White handle bass and drum duties, respectively. Jim "Stackey" Roth, apart from his role as producer of the CD, guests on guitar, backing vocals, organ, lap-slide and pedal steel guitar, and Goody Blick contributes complementary back-up vocals throughout the CD, along with Dave Voss, who also provides excellent guitar licks on several tracks.

Porter obviously refuses to limit his writing to one genre of music, but instead creates a melting pot of rock/country styles throughout the CD that simultaneously blends punk ("don't run"), country ("our town") psychedelic (the stand-out "garden" and "set free") and jangly guitar rock ("hey man" and "memory"), while flavouring it with a nasal twang that identifies it first and foremost as early '70s roots-based rock with a progressive edge. I especially liked his guitar work on the rock anthem, "take a look around", my personal favourite. It reminded me of Grand Funk's "Closer to My Home", but replaced the heavy bass lines inherent in the latter with some major power chording.
Jim Roth, as producer, does a fairly good job, but the phasing technique used in "wasted days", while giving it an ultimately cool sound, seemed somewhat misplaced in spots.

A Canadian equivalent of this CD would be Rodger Brunning's "Scintilla" CD, but American-wise, it definitely has a Traveling Wilburys feel to it.

Overall, the tracks are very creative and catchy, which explains why this formerly popular bar band has succeeded in climbing a step higher in attracting the attention of RightNowRecords.