When you think of the US North West and its music scene you
think grunge, punk and angry young men and women trying to perfect their
Courtney Love impersonations. You wouldn't generally think of a light-hearted,
laid-back country and western band… but maybe you should.
Blitzen Trapper are a six-piece hailing from Portland,
Oregon who have been on the rounds since 2000 with American Goldwing being
their sixth album. This record has been evolving since lead singer Eric Earley
was six, apparently, when he got trapped under his brother’s Honda Goldwing. So
with twenty or more years in the making the album should be their best work
yet. And after the success of Furr the country music world is surely expecting
something great.
The sound on this album is rather special. With hints of the
White Stripes, Barry Louis Polisar, Lynyrd Skynyrd and whole load of indie
thrown into the country mix, American Goldwing makes for pretty interesting
listening. Although this is definitely a country album, it’s not conventional
country , there are unexpected surprises which crop up throughout to give the
album a bit of life.
The record eventually ends up as a mixed bag of upbeat
country and some slower ballads, all written by lead singer Eric Earley.
Earley’s voice is great; he’s got a lot of soul, even sounding like Dylan at
times, especially in the ballads. It’s fair to say that the tracks about
heartfelt topics are much better than the tracks about how time flies or the
ones about nature and the mountains... The title track for example, ‘American
Goldwing’, encourages everyone to ‘Get on board’ and make the most of life.
It’s just dull, it barely evokes a reaction, let alone the kind of reaction
needed to get a song talked about. Yet the songs about love and heartbreak make
for a much more enjoyable listen. He croons in ‘Girl in a Coat’, “I been
caught, been shot, been buried alive but that’s nothing compared to the look in
her eyes.” The emotive topics, love, hate, pain are the reason why iconic songs
become iconic – more people can relate to them. It’s tried and tested and
you’ll find that Blitzen Trapper missed an opportunity to make this album
great. There are glimmers of greatness, but not enough to make this album
memorable.
The band's big break came when The Hold Steady took them on
tour and Rolling Stone grabbed a hold of them back in 2007. Now, with Sub Pop
Records behind them the album is sure to attract some attention in the US and
further afield but you get the feeling it will be short-lived until they produce
an album where all the songs are great not just a few. Overall, the album needs
some more emotion and depth within it to make it more interesting. The ballads
are good and if the album were full of them you’d love it, but the breaks to
nature and irrelevant topics spoil what could have been an impressive album.
Rx
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