I JUST NEED SOMEONE TO TELL ME HOW TALL I AM
Review: Launch
By Lyndsey Parker
"Someday I'll return/To where your stolen body burned," frontman Simon Petty
promises the phantom of fallen Byrd Gram Parsons on "Badlands," the eighth
track on Minibar's sophomore disc--and it's a pledge that his band has
fulfilled both literally and metaphorically. Defecting from their native
England to stake their claim in Southern California, Minibar--like those
other U.K.-bred Americana-philes, Teenage Fanclub--have not only adopted
Gram's turf as their own, but they've recreated the Death Valley/Topanga
Canyon country-rock sound with such loving attention to detail, they ought
to be granted U.S. citizenship on the basis of this album alone.
On Fly Below The Radar's dusky title track, Petty may humbly croon, "I play
the same four chords/I play the same old riffs," but he strings those chords
and riffs together with a songwriting skill that indicates he might follow
in the cowboy-booted footsteps of that other Petty, Tom, while his
bandmates' inspired touches--guitarist Tim Walker's sweetly sighing
lap-steel, bassist Sid Jordan's plaintive harmonies and muscular
rhythms--give songs like the swaggering country waltz "Breathe Easy,"
rodeo-circus number "Unstoppable," and Spanish-caravan road anthem "New
Mexico" a certain pleasingly workmanlike bar-band quality that ought to
appeal to fans of more mainstream rootsy artists like Ryan Adams, the
Wallflowers, and Pete Yorn. (Minibar have in fact shared bills with all
three, and have recorded for Trampoline Records, an indie label co-run by
Yorn and Wallflowers keyboardist Rami Jaffee.)
While Fly Below The Radar suffers somewhat from its consistently languid,
laid-back tempos (all that California heat must be making these
salt-of-the-earth Brits a bit lazy), when Minibar kick it up a notch on
hearty, thigh-slapping rockers like "Somebody Down Here Loves You" and the
title track--songs that hint at the vigor and power that the band exhibits
onstage--it's clear that these transplants, whose 2001 debut for Universal
Records was criminally overlooked both here and abroad, have been flying
below the radar for way too long.
From Launch.com