Markie Posts

A few weeks ago, I caught my editor throwing a bunch of CDs into the garbage. The sight alone kind of hurt my heart.

I’m aware that the majority of these albums are probably pretty craptacular. Not to mention a good, Andre-the-Giant-size handful are sent over by major record labels that just want us to write a review for publicity/sales-sake. But for me, that doesn’t take away from the hours, and experience, and love put into some of these unknown discs. Shouldn’t the fact that someone took the time to stuff the CD into an envelope and sent it over to a publication with the slimmest hopes that someone might give the thing a listen, enough to, well, listen?....Even if that person was just a lowly intern at Sony who gets paid by the hour to stuff them into envelopes while answering phones...

I decided to evoke my inner dumpster-diver and fish the CDs out of the trash.

Not only do I intend to listen to every one of them, I’ll write each one a short review, regardless of whether or not they should’ve stayed where my editor put them.

Philpot
Label: Toucan Cove/Universal Records

Before writing this review I took a quick glance at Philpot’s label, Toucan Cove’s website and read their description of their sound. The site claimed they were comparable to “Blur, Pearl Jam, REM, The Stone Roses, Alice In Chains, Freddy Mercury, The Yardbirds, The Beatles, The Smiths, Radiohead, Led Zeppelin and The Doors.” They then went on to say “They've been labeled ‘New Classic Rock’ and ‘New Americana’, the next band from the American heartland, and the ‘American Oasis’.”

Although I give serious props to whoever wrote this blurb simply for knowing who the Yardbirds were, it’s pretty much the standard “Manchester United” (The Stone Roses, Oasis, The Smiths) comparison given to almost every underground (i.e. local, garage, struggling) band because it’s code for indie. And for any emerging band, being labeled indie powers them with musical street cred and a convenient excuse for why you haven’t seen their name on the Billboard Charts.

To nip this budding tangent in, well, the bud, Philpot does not sound like any of these aforementioned bands.

The Toucan Cove blurber was relatively accurate when they described Philpot as ‘New Classic Rock’ (an oxymoron, but it works); they do have an acoustic sound with some jam-band tendencies and when I first popped the album in, I immediately thought ‘The Counting Crows’, (and okay, the opening to the first track, “Etc., Etc.” does have some Yardbird-quality to it). Initially, I was also quite pleased with the occasional pockets of original, fluttering riffs and piano chords that seemed to break up the music’s monotony. Yet, by Track 5, I was bored.

Really bored. In fact, I think I can sum up the dullness of their sound with their sharp as a butter knife use of lyrics in their 11^th track, “Drugstore Cowboy”:

“Just a Drugstore Cowboy/living out loud/touching the clouds/as you watch me go down”

…Wow, that’s like, what? - 4 clichés in one chorus? I think someone’s the illegitimate son of Bob Dylan!

One thing that sincerely intrigued me about Philpot was the lead singer, Kentz Ward’s voice. He sounded like the less talented love child of Chris Cornell and Rod Stewart, using the same inflections in his voice over and over again and sounding nothing like the “cross between Liam Gallagher and Kurt Cobain,“ that the label’s website promised. Plus, by the third song, you’re seriously jonzing to give Ward a cough drop due to his throaty vocals that’d make Brian Wilson cringe, flipping the straight-from-the-shelves-of HHhhhhKSDJLSJDLJ LD;KF;DKSF;L ``-==zz---------------lk;k;lk;pl[po[po[o[pohjkhjkhjhkhjkhjhjkhjkjHallmark claim that Ward “invests his soul and makes every note of these songs count,” accurate only if what they mean by “investing his soul” is that he sold it to Satan in order to produce this album.

Another thing that gets me about Ward is that I was pretty much convinced by the third song that he was Australian, or maybe, MAYBE, British. Yet, while reading the band’s official website I stumbled upon the discovery that they’re actually from Dugger, Indiana - leading me to believe that we might have ourselves another Billie Joe c/o Dookie on our hands, which is never good. Or cool.

In conclusion of my first Last Spin, my sentiments on Philpot can be summed up by the ending chorus of their final song – “I just don’t know” - if I should’ve taken this one out of the trash.