RETRO-POP ALBUM OF THE WEEK While the copyright police are busy tracking down college students and others who’ve swiped music online, a pop quintet called the 88 has made away with the soul of Ray Davies. The songs on the band’s addictive ‘KIND OF LIGHT’ album (Mootron/EMK, 3.5 stars) are redolent with the twee vaudevillian storytelling of Davies’ best years at the helm of the Kinks – and they’re as compelling as all get out. Ray always had the proto-metal instincts of his guitarist-brother, Dave, to keep his narratives rooted in rock. But the 88 are free to range wider in the Britpop canon, pulling in T. Rex’s brand of apocalyptic momentum at times, but still remaining within earshot of the country-blues flavor of the Kinks’ ‘Muswell Hillbillies’ period. The band’s lead singer and songwriter, Keith Slettedahl, rolls vowels around in his mouth like gumdrops, and reaches for falsetto at times in a way that would make Ray himself jealous; toward the end of “Melting In The Sun,” he scales the register to the Freddie Mercury zone. The band is fully capable of matching Slettedahl’s enthusiasm for period rock-isms, like the backward-masked psychedelics that close “Elbow Blues,” some resplendent echoes of David Bowie’s ‘Hunky Dory’ album, and, on what must be the ten-thousandth song titled “Sunday Afternoon,” a bit of Squeeze’s (or perhaps its Elvis Costello’s Attractions they have in mind) peppy organ. All these references aren’t intended to belittle the 88, who have charm, energy and riffs to spare. The 88 don’t wear the various Brittish Invasions on their sleeves; they wear entire suits made up of swaths of their esteemed predecessors. (By MARC WEIDENBAUM)
Posted on: Mon, 19 Aug 2013 09:56:01 +0000
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