One of the frustrating things about being a big fan of Fountains Of Wayne is that they always leave you wanting more.\u00a0 They tour infrequently and record even more infrequently, producing a new album roughly every four years.\u00a0 The albums are brilliant, mind you, but they are relatively few and far between.<\/p>\n
Apparently we fans are not the only ones who become restless between albums, though, as longtime Fountains guitarist Jody Porter recently issued his first solo album, Close To The Sun<\/i>.\u00a0 There are naturally elements that feel familiar, both a chunkiness and a cheekiness to the guitars, a certain wiseass sensibility to the songs themselves, and solid pop smarts.\u00a0 The difference is that as a solo artist Porter takes his musical cues not from The Cars circa 1979, but from the Gallagher brothers circa 1995.\u00a0 From the first notes of opener \u201cA Beautiful Life,\u201d it\u2019s obvious Porter is not just a fan but a devotee of Oasis.<\/p>\n
The retro dreaminess of tunes like \u201cAurora\u201d has cropped up from time to time in FoW\u2019s work, but never in a sustained way; here it bleeds seamlessly into \u201cStarscraper,\u201d a virtual Definitely Maybe<\/i> homage with its Beatles\/Bowie hipster vibe and big, muddy sound.\u00a0 \u201cCars On The Motorway\u201d breaks the mold a bit, starting out with just Porter over piano, but his vocals are pure Liam Gallagher, full of that dissipated, smoked-my-throat-out superstar vibe.<\/p>\n
For the sake of variety, \u201cThe Little Things\u201d delivers a slashing riff that\u2019s more in Keith Richards\u2019 wheelhouse; \u201cHide In The Light\u201d and \u201cIn Between Time\u201d play off mid-70s Bowie and Rundgren, a stripped-down yet dreamy art-rock vibe; and \u201cThe Kids Get Higher\u201d has effects and tones that suggest Unforgettable Fire<\/i>-era U2, a bit airy and grand.\u00a0 Still, these are simply modulations of the same basic palette of loud, muddy Brit-rock Porter maintains throughout. <\/p>\n
It shouldn\u2019t come as too much of a surprise that what sticks in the mind after a listen to this album isn\u2019t the lyrics or the vocals, it\u2019s the guitar.\u00a0 Porter is an excellent player, and Close To The Sun<\/i> brims with juicy riffs and clever use of effects.\u00a0 That said, by the end I couldn\u2019t think of a single chorus that I remembered the words to.\u00a0 Unlike your average Fountains disc \u2013 but very much like your typical Oasis album — there\u2019s precious little variety here. <\/p>\n
While I have no doubt that fans of \u201890s Brit-rock will enjoy this album a lot, I don\u2019t happen to be one of them.\u00a0 Different strokes, and all that. \u00a0As for me, I\u2019ll look forward to that next Fountains Of Wayne disc and more of Mr. Porter\u2019s excellent guitar work.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":30362,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[8592],"rating":[5614],"class_list":["post-42022","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-jody-porter","rating-rating-c-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42022","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=42022"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42022\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30362"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=42022"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=42022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}