Imitation, it is said, is often the most sincere form of
\nflattery. If this is the case, then Jason Teach and Foam must
\nreally be fans of Live. Their debut album Big Windshield Little
\nMirror contains some solid rock, but if you weren’t reading the CD
\ncase, you’d swear you were listening to Live, pre-Throwing
\nCopper.<\/p>\n
But I stop far short of calling this quartet a rip-off of Ed
\nKowalczyk and crew, as some may be inclined to do upon first
\nlisten. While Foam sounds a lot like Live, down to the groove of
\nthe music, they do have their own unique voice as well – the
\nproblem being that they haven’t been given a fair chance to develop
\nit yet.<\/p>\n
Rounded out by lead guitarist Scott Fisher, bassist Keith Palmer
\nand drummer Joel Weedy (who, for some strange reason, isn’t in the
\nalbum’s credits that I can find), Foam plow through eleven songs
\nthat do get me interested in the alternative rock scene again,
\nthough it takes a little time to build up initial
\ninterest.<\/p>\n
“Venus” says it all on Big Windshield Little Mirror; the groove
\nthese four musicians lay down is incredibly powerful without
\nresorting to distortion up the yin-yang. It may not be an original
\nsound, but it works on this number.<\/p>\n
But the biggest bone of contention with this album is, frankly,
\nit’s confusing. I’ve now listened to it several times, and I’m torn
\nbetween liking it and writing it off as a “first-effort”. Songs
\nlike “Head Not Love,” “I Can Hardly Wait” and “Memories” are almost
\nconstantly pleasing to the ears, while others like “Rollercoaster”
\nand “Ladybug” almost smack a little of R.E.M.’s pretentiousness of
\nlate. Still others like “If” just fail to get off the
\nground.<\/p>\n
Maybe the difficulty I have with deciding whether this album is
\ngood or not is the fact that Foam had to live up to some high
\nexpectations. They were signed to a recording contract without ever
\nhaving played outside of their home state, and now are expected to
\ndeliver the Great White Hope for the alternative world. Sorry,
\nkids, ain’t gonna happen – that’s far too much to ask of any band
\nrecording their first album together (much less a young group like
\nthis – Teach is only 24… boy, do I feel old).<\/p>\n
Fact is, these guys are still very much learning the ropes, and
\nhaven’t had the chance to fully develop their own style and sound
\nyet. Oh, there are shards of evidence that this sound is coming
\ntogether, such as on “Memories” and “Hands Of You,” but all the
\npieces just aren’t in place yet – this is nothing unusual. They
\nneed a little more time to slam through sets in clubs, as well as
\nsome time on the road to earn their stripes (and scars). Only then,
\nI think, will Foam truly come into its own and have a unique style
\nand sound of their own.<\/p>\n
So, after all my ramblings, I guess the final verdict on Big
\nWindshield Little Mirror is: You decide. It’s a pleasant enough
\nalbum to listen to, but like many first efforts I listen to, it
\nsmacks of what should be and could have been.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27456,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[7326],"rating":[5612],"class_list":["post-38824","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-foam","rating-rating-b-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38824","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\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38824"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38824\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38824"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=38824"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=38824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}