| THE BRIDES If You Dance |
Once upon a time there was Arena Rock. And it did fill many venues and sell many albums, until it became a sad and bloated parody of itself. And the people looked upon pretentious 15-minute guitar solos and hair mousse and they did not find them good. And so New Wave -- faster, leaner and above all danceable -- arose, and it did banish Arena Rock once and for all to the barren lands of Lite FM. Today, there is Synthpop. And it has filled many venues and sold many CDs, but it too has become sad and bloated. And some have looked upon the whooshing synthesizers and the hands permanently stapled to foreheads, and they do not find them good. Which brings us to The Brides, and their debut EP, If You Dance. From the first verse of the eponymous opening track, the Brides show their roots. Today everyone wants to sound like A Flock of Seagulls or Men Without Hats. D.W Friend's strong, steady 4/4 timekeeping, Gregjaw's slap-and-tickle bass lines, Julia Ghoulia's rollicking organ and Corey Gorey's spiky guitar chords and nasal sung/sneered vocals all come straight from the Elvis Costello/Rockpile school of pub rock. Songs like "My, My, My!" and "Drunk Dreams" wouldn't be out of place on Costello's Armed Forces or Graham Parker's Squeezing Out Sparks. (Looking even further back, the farfisa riffs in "Scalpels and Screws" or "They Can't Keep Their Damn Clothes On" evoke Question Mark & the Mysterians, the Kingsmen, and other great mid-60s pop bands). The Brides come with absolutely no redeeming social values whatsoever. There's no urge to change the world, no outrage at <insert injustice of the week>. Instead, there's fun, fun and more fun: this CD has more hooks than your average bait and tackle shop. Yr. Average Goth Band might write reams of poetry dedicated to Ye Easeful Death. Corey Gorey and friends see Death as a place where "They expect you to stay down -- underground/waiting for the funeral party to come around" and Hell as a place where they only sell menthol cigarettes. I'm perfectly fine with this. I live in New York, where waiters all think they are really actors: I can live without another band whose lead singer thinks he's really Andrew Eldritch channeling Edgar Allen Poe. Deathrock is best heard live; the driving energy and theatrics are difficult to catch in the studio. The production on If You Dance is crisp and clean, with nary a sour note or missed beat to be found. At times it's almost too clean. The recording shows long hours in the rehearsal studio, but at times it loses some of the excitement of a live Brides performance. Perhaps producer Jacques Cohen would consider lending his considerable talents to a live Brides CD: if he could bottle the intensity of a Brides performance, he might very well be able to market it as a substitute for Prozac... maybe even Viagra, depending on how much you like Deathrock. 1. If You Dance On this recording The Brides were: Corey Gorey and D.W. Friend. The full line* up now includes: Corey Gorey: Guitar, Vocals (*You can mention that it's just us on the actual recording but only if you insist that WE insist that the band is much better now that Gregjaw and Julia are in the band and that the upcoming "Baby Girls Are Much More Tender" single contains some tracks with everyone performing.~ CG) Produced by Jacques Cohen, Corey Gorey and D.W. Friend Official Brides Website |