CHRISTGAU CONSUMER GUIDE

CHRISTGAU CONSUMER GUIDE

Robert Christgau

RUBY BRAFF: "Very Sinatra" (Finesse):: At 55, cornetist Braff has 11 years on the title totem, but that's not why he adores melody so much more effectively than Frank these days. It's that in the end he's just as devoted to craft and a lot more modest about it; he has less talent, I suppose, but more taste. And it's taste above all that enables one to make a convincing case for the ersatz elegance of traditional pop. A-

CLARENCE GATEMOUTH BROWN: "Alright Again!" (Rounder):: Texans, Jesus—give them a black man in a cowboy hat and they won't stop jawing about the wide open spaces until they fall off the barstool. And what is this thing they have for blues brass in platoons? I mean, Bobby Bland can sing over, under, and around that shit, but this old pro obviously hasn't bulled his way past a tenor sax in 20 years. Still packs a fairly sharp guitar, I grant you, and he can make you listen up with that violin Of his. But he's fronting some very unswinging white boys, and his idea of contemporary is the stock-market woes of small businessmen. C +

CAMEO: "Alligator Woman" (Chocolate City):: Funkateers think this is "new wave" not just because the title hit sounds like the B-52's but because secret virtuoso Larry Blackmon keeps the groove stripped down and off balance. Unfortunately, the hooks are few, the humor is forced, and the ballads...well, never mind. For theoreticians mostly. B

ALBERT COLLINS: "Frozen Alive!" (Alligator):: Simply by putting him in a studio with songs and sideman worthy of the genre Bruce Iglauer got the best album this Texas legend ever cut, 1978's Ice Pickin', but faced with the blues producer's eternal what-next he settled for a record on which a full horn section justled uncomfortably against Collins's down home wit. Fortunately, the next goes for the bare live bones, with the classic "frosty" establishing a bite and authority that are never relinquished. I miss that downhome wit, though—giving your bass player for a hornpipe is the kind of dumb joke that's afflicted live albums for years. B +

CLINT EASTWOOD & GENERAL SAINT: "Two Bad D.J." (Greensleeves):: I've always had reservations about the avant-garde rep of Jamaican engineering—a lot of those whooshes, zooms, and sprongs strike me as the aural equivalent of a light show. So I get off when these two clowns play it as vaudeville. Trading chants over a fine array of twisted dials and sessionman offbeats, they make sex & apocalypse & rockers' roles seem like such a cosmic joke that their rhythmic life can sneak up on you. Rub a dub and what do you get? You get the answer of one of life's stubbornest mysteries—how to come and laugh at the same time .A* BRIAN ENO: "On Land" (Editions EG):: In pulse, movement, and textural detail, this falls somewhere between the static Music For Airports (a bore) and the exotic Jon Hassell collaborations (a trip). Whenever I play it (usually late at night) I experience an undeniable pleasure so mild I'm not sure anyone would want to pay for it. Caveat emptor. B +

FLEETWOOD MAC: "Mirage" (Warner Bros.):: This is the safe followup Rumours wasn't, and I find myself alternately charmed by its craft and offended by its banality. After seven years, you'd think they'd weary of romantic tensionand-release. But despite the occasional I'm scared and can't-go-backs, you'd never know how much passion they've already put behind them—they write about infatuation and its aftermaths like 20-year-olds. This is obviously a commercial advantage, and I wouldn't want to be immune to its truth. But pop music offers endless variations on that truth, and since only the most grateful are worth pondering, I have to tell you that there isn't another "Hold Me" here. B +

BUDDY GUY & JUNIOR WELLS: "Drinldn' TNT And Smokin' Dynamite" (Blind Pig):: I assume this 1974 live-at-Montreux was finally released because it features Bill Wyman, who does seem to know the parts, but saints be praised he's not the star. Saints be criticized, neither is Wells, who was once a sharper, tighter singer. He's plenty soulful, though, especially on harp, and Guy picks up the slack—listen to him think on "Ten Years Ago." B +

THE JAM: "The Gift" (Polydor):: It's easy to understand why this is Britannia's favorite band—their dedication is very winning. Nobody plays ex-punk quasifunk with less ostentation or more skill, and Paul Weller goes Springsteen one better— not only is he working-class, he's young. As usual, his good-heartedness is palpable here. He takes on suburban racism, nineto-five fatigue, even general strike without talking down or claiming exemption from sin. And if he's written half a dozen good melodies since he stopped settling for Who hand-me-downs, three of them have passed me by. B

KID CREOLE AND THE COCONUTS: "Wise Guy" (Sire):: August Darnell has synthesized his polyglot influences so thoroughly you'd think all show music is written over a fast funk bottom. Two of, the eight tunes—"Imitation," a sortastar's complaint in disguise, and the mum "Stool Pigeon"—could use some narrative context, but with most of them it doesn't even matter much that Augie is singing. The end pieces are the wickedest: "Annie, I'm Not Your Daddy," in which he breaks it to her traumatically, and "No Fish Today," the nastiest song about class since "Career Opportunities." A-

MAGIC SLIM AND THE TEARDROPS: "Raw Magic" (Alligator):: It ain't magic because it ain't raw enough— Slim conscientiously approximates the licks and grooves of his betters without adding a thing. In contrast, his Rooster EP is a lot cruder and considerably more exciting. Which is not to suggest he could keep it up for 40 minutes anywhere but a South Side bar. R*

MOON MARTIN: "Mystery Ticket" (Capitol):: Martin seems intent on fulfilling his formal promise: the hooks keep getting bigger and the beat keeps getting edgier. In fact, for a thirtyish wimp who frequently threatens to murder his girlfriend, he's quite an attractive fellow. B

FRANKIE MILLER: "Standing On The Edge" (Capitol):: People used to complain that Miller sounded like Otis Redding. Now, inspired by the Muscle Shoals boys and countless dangerous wimmin, he sounds like Bob Seger. This is not an improvement. C +

THE NECESSARIES: "Event Horizon" (Sire import):: Why is this the artiest of En Why's numerous art-pop bands? Because in their fascination with plectral interaction they eschew what makes artpop pop, or rather, "pop"—toons. Inspirational Titles: "Europe," "State-Of-TheArt," "AEIOU." C +

SQUEEZE: "Sweets From A Stranger" (A&M):: In a classic rock 'n' roll success story, Tilbrook & Difford are getting laid more and enjoying it less. Not that enjoyment in the usual sense is the point—flesh is hardly their specialite. But their ever more disconcerting hookcraft here signifies a "maturing" emotional grasp in which a scheduled album seems like as good a reason as any to think up nine new ways to leave your lover. B +

HOUND DOG TAYLOR AND THE HOUSEROCKERS: "Genuine

Houserocking Music" (Alligator):: The Houserockers were the Ramones of Chicago blues, cutting three wonderful, virtually indistinguishable albums before Taylor left this self-composed epitaph in 1975: "He couldn't play shit, but he sure made it sound good!" His secrets were cheap equipment, a slide fashioned from the leg of a kitchen table, and the most enthusiastic reliance on "Dust My Broom" since Elmore James. It's completely fitting that this all-new album should be almost as fine as the two that came out of the 20-cuta-night 1971 and 1973 sessions from which it's culled, yet somehow reassuring that it doesn't quite match up: Taylor slurs too much, quite a claim in this context, and "Wh't'd I Say" and "Kansas City" are bar-band throwaways, by which I mean that George Thorogood, Taylor's chief epigone, could do them better. B +

PETE TOWNSHEND: "All The Best Cowboys Have Chinese Eyes" (Atco) :: What intelligence must have gone into this album! What craft! What personal suffering! What tax-deductible business expenditure! In 1982, at 37, Townshend has somehow managed to conceive, record, and release a confessional song suite the pretentiousness of which could barely be imagined by an acid-damaged Bard drama major. That is, it's pretentious at an unprecedented level of difficulty—you have to pay years of dues before you can twist such long words into unlikely rhymes and images and marshall arrangements of such intricate meaninglessness. A stupendous achievement. D +

JANE VOSS & HOYLE OSBOURNE: "Get To The Heart" (Green Linnet):: There's only one Irving Berlin song here, but it's Berlin's vulgar, magnanimous democratic tunefulness that Voss claims for the folksie sensibility. And though her voice sure isn't as strong as Bessie Smith's, as she's good enough to point out in another tribute, she also wants to wail and moan. So where Joan Morris does Berlin by simulating the careful pitch and intonation of '20s pop singers, who still cowered in the shadow of operetta, Voss flats her melodies shamelessly, sounding half like a jazz improviser and half like Sister in her cups and/or parlor. Pianist Osbourne is squarer than need be and composer Voss sometimes runs on at the mouth, but get to the heart they do. A-

"SIPPIE WALLACE" (Atlantic):: This project scrapes by on taste and good intentions—the selection of songs by Wallace and contemporaries, Bonnie Raitt's unobtrusive voice and slide, and the impeccable swing of pianist Jim Dapogny and his Chicago Jazz Band. The problem is that where Alberta Hunter commanded an alrtiost regal strength in her eighties, Wallace sounds like a cartoon granny with denture problems. Her lyrics still sting after half a century, and her phrasing puts them across, but she doesn't even hint at the young Sippie's hard-won erotic composure. CBS and RCA: reissue. B

WARREN ZEVON: "The Envoy" (Asylum):: What convinces me isn't the deeply satisfying "Ain't That Pretty At All," in which Zevon announces his abiding desire to hurl himself at walls—he's always good for a headbanger. Nor, God knows, is it the modern-macho mythos of the title cut and the Tom McGuane song. It's a wise, charming, newly written going-tothe-chapel number that I would have sworn was lifted from some half-forgotten girl group. If "Never Too Late For Love" and "Looking For The Next Best Thing" announce that this overexcitable boy has finally learned to compromise, "Let Nothing Come Between You" is his promise not to take moderation too far. A-