We’ve all seen it before.<\/p>\n
A music scene breaks, a couple of bands get hyped to death and
\nforever etched into the public’s mind, and a flood of similar but
\nlargely unheralded bands are left to fight it out amongst
\nthemselves to stay on the music industry radar. Most of these bands
\nnaturally wash out of perception after their initial release for
\nreasons generally no more complex than they were never as good as
\ntheir labels originally wanted them to be. So when I think of U.S.
\nFederal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan coining the phrase
\n“irrational exuberance” a few years ago, I can’t help but prop him
\nfor unintentionally describing this fallout as the “throw it
\nagainst the wall and let’s see what sticks” mentality that the
\nmajor labels are known to implore is actually happening once
\nagain.<\/p>\n
The scene I’m describing is the garage rock revival of 2001 to
\npresent which has unearthed a bevy of noun bands highlighted by the
\nHives, the White Stripes, and the Strokes. Another band that should
\nnot only be on this list, but actually top it, is Finland’s Flaming
\nSideburns and I’m here to tell you why.<\/p>\n
It all starts at the top. Mixing a silky smooth Argentinean
\nvocalist, Eduardo “Speedo” Martinez, with an inspiringly matched
\npercussion and string ensemble led by drummer Jay Burnside and
\nguitarist Ski Williamson, the Sideburns have created a formula that
\nis as extremely different as it is similar to the garage rock scene
\nthey are properly linked to. In fact, there’s a complimentary
\nairiness to the way that the Flaming Sideburns tune their
\ninstruments that make me actually wonder if they don’t record in a
\ncarport rather than a typical garage. Sounds like a novel approach,
\neh? There’s more.<\/p>\n
Martinez’ greatest strength is the fact he does sound undeniably
\nSouth American with his vocal pitch while combining the swagger of
\na Mick Jagger and the aura of a Lou Reed. And it’s not contrived,
\nfolks; it’s the real deal. A track like “Loose My Soul” exhibits
\nthe swagger quality beautifully as Martinez initially rallies a
\nsimulated crowd with a Spanish spoken charge all the while a crowd
\nroar builds. The result culminates with an upbeat wah-wah drenched
\nboogie anthem that is filled with such a charismatic vocal touch
\nthat even the regarded Hives front man Pelle Almqvist would find
\nhimself spitting and drooling over it.<\/p>\n
Moreover, when garage bands attempt ballads, all hell generally
\nbreaks loose as the concept is a polar opposite to what the genre
\nstands for. The Flaming Sideburns attempt it with the
\ntrack”Stripped Down” and come up with something that would surely
\ngenerate an accusation or two that they were plundering the back
\ncatalogue of the Velvet Underground. I haven’t seen the talented
\nWhite Stripes vocalist Jack White pull this off yet.<\/p>\n
And for good measure, I’m sure we all remember the Toyota
\ntelevision commercial from 2002 with the driver of a Camry stopping
\non the freeway to do a simulated snow angel on the road in glee.
\nThe soundtrack to this madness is a seven- or eight-second blurb
\nfrom the frenetic “Street Survivor,” a song that the band obviously
\nsold Toyota on the concept\/title alone. I’ll hedge a bet that the
\noverrated Strokes, with their Casablancas Hollywood connection,
\nwill never find such profile in one of their tracks now or in the
\nfuture.<\/p>\n
And to think that the Flaming Sideburns are legitimate garage
\nrockers and they achieve such undeniable diversity to their mix.
\nThe attention to varying the track order on
\nHallelujah Rock n’ Rollah<\/i> only serves to highlight this
\nobservation and is an activity other bands of the retro-rock ilk
\nwould be wise to invest more time.<\/p>\n
Furthermore, this review wouldn’t be complete if I didn’t
\nrecognize the band copping a great rendition of that undeniable
\ntwangy, echo drenched sound on “Lonesome Rain” which is dead on
\nsurf revival material. Radio Birdman, the forgotten Australian
\nforefathers of the ’70s punk movement, are the band I think of that
\ncould sound as compelling with this genre and to think — their
\nsongs were laid to wax 25 years ago!<\/p>\n
So while hard-rock “noun bands” have become a dime a dozen these
\ndays, the Flaming Sideburns have figured out a way to create their
\nown interesting stereotype with their second full-length album
\nHallelujah Rock n’ Rollah<\/i>. Always eclectic, never stale, and
\na band that music listeners wisely should pay attention to.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":26589,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6964],"rating":[5646],"class_list":["post-37835","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-the-flaming-sideburns","rating-rating-a"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37835","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\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37835"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37835\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37835"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37835"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=37835"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=37835"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}