Dallas Voice (Dallas, Tex.), Vol. 18, No. 30, Ed. 1 Friday, November 16, 2001 Page: 46 of 68
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Sir Elton — the impostor
Capf. Fantastic fails to recreate piano heyday
By Gilbert Garcia
Pop Music Critic
Songs from the West Coast
Elton John
Universal
It's practically inevitable — musicians with
a style worth copying will eventually start
copying it themselves. Thirty years into a
career that cast him first as an iconoclast pop
star and gradually sunk him to the level of
middle of the road balladeer, Elton John has
finally come back around to his roots — sort of.
Songs from the West Coast is an escape to
innocence for Elton, and finds him in a mood
to look back. It's a bitter-
sweet remembrance,
though, as this album
revisits a sound, but
never rediscovers its
passion. Like the album
opener "The Emperor's
New Clothes," much of
Songs from the West Coast
looks back lovingly on
earlier years. Most
notable about these
songs is their simple,
straightforward
arrangements, which
also recall John's career
before string sections and wind machines
invaded his songs. A closer listen provides lit-
tle satisfaction, however.
Longtime collaborator Bernie Taupin's
lyrics have always been a bit sappy, but turned
loose like they are here, they're saccharine to
the point of being difficult to stomach. Never
mind that Elton John has gone back to his win-
ning formula of pound-
ing out his tunes with no
more accompaniment
than his piano. The
material on Songs from
the West Coast is just not
up to muster.
When it comes times
to tackle more serious
subject matter, Songs
from the West Coast goes
from simply being
mediocre to being down-
right tacky. Amid con-
fused metaphors of
wolves and Western
winds, "American Triangle" portrays the stark
images of the murder of Matthew Sheppard,
yet when it comes to commenting on them, can
offer no more than the lame platitude "It's a
cold cold world." Like another well-known
Elton John tribute, "American Triangle" strug-
gles to even have a point.
Songs from the West Coast has elsewhere
been hailed as John's renaissance, a return to
everything that made him great in the first
place. In reality, it's merely a taste. As similar
as it seems to his best work, these tracks fall
short when it comes to John's own fire and atti-
tude. Ironically, it seems that after all this time,
not even Elton John can pull off this Elton John
impersonation.
Beautifulgarbage
Garbage
Interscope
Despite labels, it wouldn't really be fair to
call Garbage a rock band. A studio band by
birth, Garbage have a remarkable talent for fit-
ting their sound to whatever type of song they
want to play, whether it be rock, pop, or even,
as in the case of their new album,
Beautifulgarbage, a little bit of trip-hop. The
ease with which the group can switch gears
leaves their rock credentials a little suspect,
and leaves you wondering whether Garbage's
real talent lies in what they do, or just how
many different bands
they can sound like on
one album.
Although Garbage's
sexy vocalist Shirley
Manson gets much of the
attention, the heart of this
group is really band co-
founder and producer
Butch Vig. Vig first land-
ed in the spotlight as the
producer of Nirvana's
seminal Nevermind
album, and quickly
became a highly demand-
ed studio wizard. True to
expectations, Beautifulgarbage's most impres-
sive aspect is its flawless production.
Cool pop tracks make a better impression
on this album than what attempts there are at
a heavier style of music. Even with its impres-
sive production value, Beautifulgarbage never
really sells the idea of Garbage as a hard rock-
ing band. The synth-sounding guitars on
songs like "Shut Your
Mouth" and "Silence Is
Golden" make the band
sound more like a tacky
'80s hair band than alter-
native rockers. The
band's attempts at
updating their sound
with techno and trip-
hop style samples also
gets them into trouble,
as is the case with the
album's first single
"Androgyny." With cool
hip-hop beats and start-
stop guitar samples, the
track shoots for a vibe like Madonna's "Don't
Tell Me," but it comes out sounding eerily sim-
ilar to a Spice Girls song. Manson's vocals are
unfortunately hit-and-miss, but do shine on
more pop-inspired ballads like "Can't Cry
These Tears" and "Cup of Coffee."
Beautifulgarbage may have some of
Garbage's best work to date, though it does
come in unexpected forms. These tracks may
not hold together as an album, but that doesn't
mean there aren't good songs to be heard here.
Play Beautifulgarbage with an open mind and
no expectations, and you're likely to be very
surprised. Play it expecting another Garbage
album, and you'll find yourself uninterested in
about half of it. ▼
46
NOVEMBER 16, 2001 DALLAS VOICE
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Vercher, Dennis. Dallas Voice (Dallas, Tex.), Vol. 18, No. 30, Ed. 1 Friday, November 16, 2001, newspaper, November 16, 2001; Dallas, Texas. (https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth615541/m1/46/: accessed April 25, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, UNT Digital Library, https://digital.library.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Special Collections.