I don\u2019t, as a general rule, have anything against artists wearing their influences on their sleeves.\u00a0 Plenty of acts I enjoy do it, and almost every artist creating meaningful music is to some extent standing on the shoulders of those who came before them.<\/p>\n
I have to admit, though, that I scratched my head a bit after reading Derek Daisey\u2019s one-sheet, and then a post on his blog, both of which state his undying admiration and affection for\u2026 the Goo Goo Dolls.<\/p>\n
Really?<\/p>\n
This declaration is not what a lot of the musical cognoscenti would consider a promising path to earning positive press.\u00a0 To many, the Dolls\u2019 \u201cIris\u201d-and-onward incarnation feels like the very epitome of turn-of-the-century homogenized-to-beige-perfection commercial adult pop music, the sort of \u201crock and roll\u201d that mildly depressed yuppies might opt for on long car rides with their mothers.\u00a0 Ah, but when you scratch beyond the surface of the rather obvious series of radio singles that followed 1995\u2019s breakthrough power ballad \u201cName,\u201d you learn that the Dolls rose out of Buffalo in the early \u201990s as rowdy Replacements disciples, before gradually sanding every single rough edge off of their music.<\/p>\n
The good news is that Daisey seems to have taken musical cues from the full arc of his idols\u2019 career to date.\u00a0 Opener \u201cWords You Bleed\u201d establishes its hook early and delivers on every melodic promise it makes, even if its wholesale adoption of the latter-day GGD template of scrubbed-clean guitars behind ascending-descending couplets is almost over the top in places.\u00a0 \u201cNot Myself\u201d veers into similarly formulaic territory, a breathy-voiced ballad built around acoustic rhythm guitar, a gently picked electric hook, and soaring strings.<\/p>\n
Fortunately, with \u201cJosie\u201d and \u201cTainted,\u201d Daisey pushes away from the edge of the pool and starts swimming toward the deep end.\u00a0 Both push for a harder sound without sacrificing melody; to the contrary, the former\u2019s hook might be the strongest on this entire disc, but unlike on the first two tracks, Daisey\u2019s voice stretches into rougher territory, and the drums have more punch and bottom.\u00a0 The latter is in fact a genuine rock and roll tune, powered by chugging brio and vocals with an edge.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s more of the same triptych of styles the rest of the way as Daisey alternates acoustic-foundation ballads (\u201cStay Or Leave,\u201d \u201cAll You Know,\u201d \u201cGone In October\u201d) with surging, blatantly commercial tunes (\u201cCouldn\u2019t Be More\u201d) and edgier rockers (\u201cHow I Roll\u201d).\u00a0 Closer \u201cWhere To Begin\u201d is perhaps the finest work here in terms of stretching Daisey\u2019s musical range, building around piano, finding and filling a solid groove, and featuring handclaps, tambourine and sweet Beatlesque harmonies.<\/p>\n
The end result of Daisey\u2019s work on All Behind Me<\/i> is actually two.\u00a0 First, Daisey has delivered a consistently appealing album of adult alt-rock; it might lack either high highs or low lows, but there\u2019s nary a misstep to be found here, and plenty of evidence of talent and drive.\u00a0 Second, thanks to the more interesting numbers here, damned if Mr. Daisey hasn\u2019t piqued my curiosity about the pre-\u201cIris\u201d Goo Goo Dolls\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":30195,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[8514],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-41841","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-derek-daisey","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/41841","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\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41841"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/41841\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=41841"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=41841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}