Like squatters in a condemned building, The Datsuns have set up camp in the early 70s and refuse to leave. They're trying to evoke an era when every band rocked asses and arenas, groupies were nubile and plentiful, guitars blasted through walls, and solos lasted all night. But it's all so much rose-colored hindsight, a fantasy by musicians too young to have experienced the glory days firsthand and therefore condemned to recreate it with only a few scribbled notes and hazy childhood memories.
The Datsuns attempted to revive the classic rock era on their self-titled debut album in 2002, but the results sounded messy and anonymous, devoid of humor and personality. While its title would seem to suggest some of sort of Wilco-like transformation, the band's follow-up, Outta Sight/Outta Mind, instead offers more of the same; it's a considerable improvement over the original-- perhaps due to production by Led Zeppelin's John Paul Jones-- but that's not saying much. If their debut was Paleolithic in its riffs and sexual politics, then Outta Sight/Outta Mind is merely Mesolithic. Something closer to late Neolithic would be nice.
While The Datsuns' sound is slightly harder and heavier than their garage-rock contemporaries, the band is still confined to the genre's constricted song format. Instead of indulging in long, screeching guitar solos or groove-driven noise freakouts, they adhere pretty closely to the verse/chorus/verse/chorus/bridge/solo/chorus/finale template throughout Outta Sight/Outta Mind. This self-imposed constraint hems in other tendencies: Christian Datsun is a capable guitar player, but his solos feel compacted and listless when confined to three-minute songs. They could be powerhouse showcases for his fretwork, but usually they just sound obligatory.
It doesn't help that The Datsuns' pop-length tracks tend to substitute mindless misogyny and awkward phrasings for hooks and meaningful lyrics. Like The Darkness, Dolf Datsun tries to inject his lyrics with an undercurrent of adolescent sexuality, but without Justin Hawkins' self-awareness and sense of goofy fun, the subtext quickly becomes the text. "Girl's Best Friend" refers to Dolf's dick. It's too easy to guess what "Cherry Lane" is about. Here's a hint: "A boy is a boy/ But a girl is a child," Dolf sings, "They mustn't be broken, they mustn't be harmed." I'm not saying rock music should ever have to adhere to political correctness, but by now, this is pure cliche-- irony without a punchline.
Which is too bad, as The Datsuns show new promise on tracks like the lamenting "What I've Lost". But their caveman take on 70s nostalgia-- simultaneously misguided and entirely too obvious-- renders them mostly forgettable and entirely ineffectual. The Donnas sound more depraved and dangerous, and even Jet has better hooks. This one will soon live up to its title.
