In previous years Reverberations conducted a marathon, day by day, countdown of the top 25 albums from the waning year. This year, between today and the end of the month, we will take a bit less ambitious approach, chronicling only the top 10 releases of 2012. In January, in addition to reviews of brand spanking new music, we will also make occasion to reflect on some of the year's other fine recordings.
For our top 10 countdown, many of these selections will have been covered previously in Reverberations, in which event we will simply link you to the earlier review. A few of these, however, will require new reviews.
Redd Kross - Researching the Blues (Merge)
I think I first heard them in about 1982.
Guitarist Jeff McDonald and his bassist brother Steven were still in their
teens. I was a fan of their early glam-trash-punk abrasions. Born Innocent, with killer tracks like
“Linda Blair” – good stuff. From 1984, Teen Babes from Monsanto was as kool as
its title; purveying low culture thrills ala Sonic Youth, but the McDonald
brothers offered melodic twists well beyond Sonic Youth’s sing to the chords
school of songwriting. Neurotica, released
in 1987 perfected their sensibility.
Its glammy vision - freakbeat, drug through the gutter of the New York Dolls
and put through the Back from the Crypt
grinder – was Redd Kross fully realized. Even if only Jeff could buy a drink
legally.
I was even pretty
thrilled through Third Eye, a chiming,
pure pop distillation of their gnarlier selves, released on Atlantic in 1990. My
crew played the shit out of it, turned people on to it, but then grunge came
along. It was shitty timing for Redd Kross. Their sassy, suburban snarl,
unafraid of androgyny, was anything but Eddie Vedder flannel. Their closest
kinship by then may have been to bands like Dramarama (a fine, fine outfit
indeed), who were still pretty burly by comparison.
Redd Kross’ other
Nineties releases were fresh, melodic and rocking. But somehow their sound lost
some of its distinction as the band shot for a little deeper commercial penetration.
Somehow it seemed too safe, too Material Issue or something, after their
Eighties stuff. Then, they disappeared.
Fifteen years disappeared.
They re-emerge on Merge Records with Researching the Blues.
It is so good.
It’s the kind of good – so rocking, so stacked with
invention and turn of phrase – that its instantly classic songs hit you like a
ton of bricks (“Stay Away From Downtown”)
first; then give way to the subtle hooks
of (at first) less arresting songs (“Winter Blues”).
Title track, “Researching the Blues,” initially inspired by the
scholarly, but gritty passions of John and Alan Lomax, is a fond, but scathing
rebuke to a friend turning down every wrong street and dark alley (“You just
can’t win, strung out on the devil again”).
“Researching” has a brooding, insistent edge that matches the lyric’s
darkness. The devil appears again (“the devil inside your head”) in “Stay Away
from Downtown.” This song is the embodiment of a power-pop performance, with no
neglect in the power department. Jeff McDonald and Robert Hecker’s
interlocking, riff off riff, guitar lines propel the song. Drummer Roy McDonald
(no relation) holds it all together with rock-ribbed Ringo drive and occasional
Moon bursts. Jeff and Brother Steven’s
harmony vocals remind how potent sibling harmonies can be (Everlys, Davies, …
you get the picture) At 2:40 the “yeah,
you” vocals hit, the “sha la las” enter at 2:52. Shortly after, you knock
yourself upside the head and realize – damn, this is in the same league with
Cheap Trick’s “Surrender” – a kitchen sink of power moves and pop turns.
The down and dirty vibe persists with “Uglier” (co-written
by the McDonald brothers, Anna Waronker, and Charlotte Caffey – of the Go Gos
and Jeff McDonald’s missus),
a nightmare
of psychic disintegration complete with “Sympathy for the Devil” style
“whoo-whoos.” Here, Redd Kross sounds a little like Urge Overkill circa Saturation. A shift to the minor key and
a Big Star vibe is well timed for “Dracula’s Daughter.” “Meet Frankenstein” is
a charmer, clocking in at 1:45 that betrays an omnipresent Beatle influence
(especially John Lennon).
The lurching syncopation of “One of the Good Ones” evokes the Velvet Underground’s “Rock and Roll,” while
there’s a punkier edge to “The Nu Temptations” that reminds that Redd Kross
grew up in the era of the Zeros and Avengers, and with more than a little Black
Flag and X ringing in their ears. Steve McDonald also play bass with Keith
Morris’s (Circle Jerks) new hardcore outfit, Off. Much of the band’s genius is
in the effortless way they synthesize Cali-punk aggression with Merseyside
melody.
“Winter Blues” is psych-pop, reminiscent of the “Paisley
Underground” era of L.A. rock. It has echoes of everything from ‘California
Dreamin’” to “Rain” – beautiful, dream-like harmonies, a weeping, very George
Harrison slide guitar solo, and a
“radiation wave” that evokes a kinship with Fountains of Wayne’s “Radiation
Vibe.”
Researching draws
to a close with the Pete Townshend-like acoustic bash of “Hazel Eyes.” The
subtle, yet soaring power-pop arrangement shares qualities with Tommy Keene and
Teenage Fanclub. A nicely placed
breakdown to bass and drums, followed by a psychedelic guitar squall, leads
back in to the choruses that fade the song, and the album out.
Ten songs that clock in under thirty-three minutes, with
more power, melody and intelligence than most bands summon in a career.
Researching the Blues is a stunning return to form and beyond from Redd Kross.
An album with more fresh authority than one would ordinarily expect from a
veteran band after a long layoff. But then it’s no ordinary album.
Reverberating: 9.0