|
| ||
Message Board |
Pictures |
Discography |
Videos |
Weekly Download |
Band Info |
Guestbook |
Links
|
| | |
|
In the company of his fellow Stone Temple Pilots, Scott Weiland wears his post- grunge rock dude trappings well. All dark glasses, bad threads, Jim Morrison-ish poses and Eddie Vedder-y vocals, he pulls off the front man routine with reasonable savoir faire. This solo venture, however, finds him playing dress-up with a treasure trove of sounds, some of which fit better than others, and none of which have anything to do with the blues.
Most flattering are the heavily- stylized tracks that downplay his limited emotional range and emphasize his 'tude. "Lady Your Roof Brings Me Down" verges on flat-out cabaret with sentimental accordion wheezing and a campy oom- pah- pah rhythm giving it a carnivalesque air. "Divide" finds Weiland decked out as a lounge lizard, crooning into breezy strains of Latin- tinged lite jazz. "Son" creeps into more melancholy terrain with poignant cello strains and dissonant guitar flourishes accenting the mood; gentle and just a bit wry, it's probably the most genuine track on the album. The rest is a mish- mosh of pop and rock trimmings copped from just about everywhere: new wave knock-offs ("Jimmy Was a Stimulator" comes up somewhere between Devo and Oingo Boingo, while "Cool Kiss" sounds like it was lifted from something edgier, like Tones On Tail), faux- Bowie ("Barbarella"), and lots of synthetic Beatle- isms wafting in and out between phrases. What really undercuts this record, however, is not the rampant pilfering from yesteryear's hits -- the evolution of popular music is the history of artful plagiarism. The fatal flaw is that there's no substance to justify the theft; Weiland can't pump the tunes with enough personality to truly make these purloined pop gestures his own. Sandy Masuo Copyright � 1994-1999 CDNOW, Inc. All rights reserved. Credit: CDNOW
|
