My bills aren't the only things that are 30 days late...

Big Head Todd and the Monsters – Black Beehive

I’m not sure why they named the album “Black Beehive”, but it would have been more accurate to call it “Black Keys, Kinda” since it has that minimalist, low tech guitar-centric thing that the Black Keys perfected with their last album. There’s a lot of throwback rhythm guitar in here…using a pinky to play rock and roll rhythm…it makes parts of “Josephina” sound like the Kinks’ “Victoria”…anyway, the upshot is the songs are good, uncluttered and uncomplicated, the vocals are interesting sounding and it is a good listen through and through, though nothing stands out as great or awful 3

Collective Soul – Collective Soul

One of the better albums of ‘90s…it’s interesting how after nearly 20 years it holds up so well. Songs like, The World I Know, Gel, December, Where The River Flows, and Smashing Young Man are all top shelf, and were big radio records in over the past 20 years. Great guitar work, solid vocals, great production and the overall quality of the songs make this a “classic” album even though it’s too new to be considered “Classic Rock”. 4 ½.

Drive By Truckers – English Oceans

In the early ‘70’s, The Raspberries put out an album called “Starting Over”. The first track, “Play On”, was a Beatle/John Lennon influenced rocker. Another track, “Cruisin’ Music” was an homage to the Beach Boys…”Shit Shots Count” sounds like an Exile on Main Street influenced rocker and “When He’s Gone” had Patterson Hood channeling his inner Neil Young. After those two tracks, it sounds as if DBT is letting Mike Cooley carry the ball a little more. His songs (or at least the ones he sings) are more interesting to me than the Patterson Hood tracks. In any event, this is good, not great, but at least it means they’ll be touring and that’s worth enduring a B+ album rather than an A… 3.5


Sandinista and Human Switchboard…The dog ate my homework, but I loved the Clash so what could be bad about that GH. Anyway…see you all this month, maybe???