Though he has often shown a debt to REM and the Smiths, Grant Lee Phillips's most successful recordings--both solo and with Grant Lee Buffalo--represented a break with the sonic largesse and studio affectations of the 1980s. These 11 tracks serve to reconnect him with the bands and songwriters of his 20s, when he was just discovering his own voice--still one of the most expressive and supple in rock music. With a consistency that borders on singlemindedness, he drapes songs by New Order, Joy Division, Echo and the Bunnymen, the Psychedelic Furs, the Church, and the Cure in his trademark acoustic warmth and draws forth the melodies and sense of longing in these Gen-X anthems. The Pixies' "Wave of Mutilation" would hardly seem a candidate for a waltz through Hawaiian Americana, but for Phillips it is, and the result is beautiful, as is the light-Rubber Soul treatment of Robyn Hitchcock's "I Often Dream of Trains." The less successful interpretations simply fail to differentiate themselves from the spirit of the originals: REM's "So. Central Rain" and the Smiths' "Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me" are hardly rendered as carbon copies, but they lack revelation. And though Nick Cave's "City of Refuge" helps pick up the pace, the album's cumulative effect is more drowsy than daydreamy, a mood enhanced by beds of soft organ, reverbed cello, and faint guitar buzz. Call this Phillips's "synth-pop unplugged" album, but within the gauzy strumscapes are frequent moments of grace. --Roy Kasten
Album Description
Grant-Lee Phillips is one of the most gifted songwriters of his generation, having written and recorded critically lauded albums as both a solo artist during this decade and with his band Grant Lee Buffalo throughout the 1990s. On his new album, 'nineteeneighties,' Grant-Lee pays tribute to the songwriters and artists who had a significant influence on his own work. Of those formative years, Grant-Lee says, "For every hokey hair band, there was once an alternative, parallel universe, existing just below the conservative, pastel surface. It was the same unstoppable energy that would come to erupt in the form of Nirvana in the early 90s. 'nineteeneighties' is a nod to some of the songs and some of the people that made a lasting impact on my own songwriting and musicianship." 'nineteeneighties' is a creative tribute to what was truly "alternative" during the formative 1980s and exhumes an age whose underground music has long outlasted the more popular songs of its airwaves. "This album is my personal mix tape, just as it's reeled around in my head for decades," states Grant-Lee.
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