JACK BLACK 4/17, EMPTY BOTTLE The self-titled debut LP from Jack Black–produced by former Clash manager Kosmo Vinyl–isn’t quite the straightforward “greaser punk” the packaging would have you believe. The cover may be hot pink and the hair may be full of goop, but Ted Nugent looms at least as large as Johnny Thunders, and “Drive Them Wheels” is a dead ringer for Golden Earring’s “Radar Love.” A few songs are too slow or too tinny, and on occasion front man David Quick lapses into a hot-and-bothered AOR whine. But when he shuts up and plays guitar, even his most derivative licks kick ass.
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Carrie Newcomer 4/17, Schubas Mainstream heartland rock is a far more demanding idiom than you might think–too often it’s taken up by uninteresting people whose sole artistic credo is “self-expression.” But Indiana’s Carrie Newcomer (who isn’t; her new My True Name, on Philo, is her fifth album) has been blessed with both personality and insight, and her smoky alto and eloquently understated lyrics transcend the usual left-my-love-behind-in-a-dead-steel-town blues. When she sings “And the moon shines high over Tucson / Over waters that were long ago dried / ‘Cause the moon don’t care if the water’s not there / It’s high tide,” you know she’s got a firm grasp on the big picture.
BATTLEFIELD BAND 4/19, ABBEY PUB Trying to go back to some imagined golden age to find the “pure” forms of music never works: the best way to keep a traditional form alive is to turn it like a high-powered lens onto the present. The four members of Scotland’s Battlefield Band presumably don’t lose sleep over not being old enough to remember when woad was all the rage and bagpipes were used to scare the living shit out of enemies–they’re not old enough to have fought in World War II either, but that doesn’t stop them from jerking a few tears with an original first-person account of the little-known battle of Saint Valery. On their latest album, Rain, Hail or Shine (Temple), their own reels, hornpipes, ballads, and marches sound right at home next to the 100-year-old tunes they unearth; piper Mike Katz even uses a traditional, “The Canongate Twitch,” to introduce a medley of his own compositions. Though for the most part the Battlefield Band trades in reflective beauty, embers flicker and flare up just when they most ought to, as if Katz or fiddler John McCusker were breathing something flammable into the mix.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): Eve 6 photo by Don Winters.
