The simplest way to describe the Los Angeles rock band Redd
\nKross is that they are the Smashing Pumpkins with a sense of humor.
\nThey remind me of the Pumpkins on the way their songs range from
\ngrunge to sweet pop. I wouldn’t say lead singer Jeffrey McDonald
\nsounds like Billy Corgan, but his pipes are not too far away from
\nCorgan’s either. He and his brother, bassist Steven McDonald, write
\nmost of the somewhat off-center songs. I suspect it is their sense
\nof humor that kept Redd Kross form achieving success since
\nalternative rock bands are supposed to be whiny and depressed
\naccording to the music industry.<\/p>\n
The 1993 album
\nPhaseshifter<\/i> immediately sets up the different sides of the
\nRedd Kross world. The first song “Jimmy’s Fantasy” sounds like your
\ntypical grunge song of the day – edgy with an aggressive guitar
\nassault. However, the lyrics are a bit smirky in their references.
\nThis song is followed by one nice slice of hard-edged power pop
\ncalled “Lady In The Front Row”, a clever love song that sounds like
\n70’s bubblegum rock in melody, although the guitars are louder and
\nmore accomplished.<\/p>\n
\nPhaseshifter<\/i> pretty much alternates between more
\nrock-oriented and poppier songs throughout the whole album. “Crazy
\nWorld” goes for straight grunge as the lyrics are angry and
\ncynical. “Huge Wonder” is a slow but hard rocker. And the album
\nends in rousing fashion with the punky raveup “After School
\nSpecial”. I like the beautiful piano interlude by Gere Fennelly
\nthat eventually breaks up into a punk frenzy with the guitars
\nslowly sneaking in.<\/p>\n
On the pop side, “Saragon” is pure bubblegum, even
\ninstrumentally. “Dumb Angel” tempers McDonald’s and Edward
\nKurdziel’s razor sharp guitar playing with a nice rhythmic piano
\npart. “Ms. Lady Evans” sounds like something off the third Go-Go’s
\nalbum. Incidentally former Go-Go’s bassist Charlotte Caffrey gets
\nsongwriting credit for “Pay For Love”, a witty song that is about a
\nguy looking for love but only finding prostitutes.<\/p>\n
So is
\nPhaseshifter<\/i> as good as any of the Smashing Pumpkins albums?
\nWell, there is no song here as powerful as their best songs like
\n“Bullet On Butterfly Wings”, for example. On the other hand, this
\nalbum doesn’t have some of the excesses found on most Pumpkins
\nalbums. Redd Kross, unlike the Pumpkins, are aware of their
\nlimitations and do not overreach. The bottom line is this is an all
\naround good album that makes alternative rock fun. Imagine that! If
\nthe Pumpkins ever came out with an album like this, it might not be
\ntheir greatest, but they could do a lot worse, and actually, they
\nhave.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":24910,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6047],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-36115","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-redd-kross","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36115"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=36115"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=36115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}