On Curses, Rye Coalition's once bold co-option of classic rock has fallen into flaccid impersonation. It's the kind of record that makes you reconsider a band's back catalog just to figure out what went wrong. Here, the reportedly stern producer's hand of Dave Grohl forced each band member to take on a less-is-more philosophy and focus on what they contribute to the songs. But since when has this band been about subtlety?
Rye Coalition's previous album, On Top, found them cannibalizing classic rock and twisting it with a post-hardcore sensibility, mixing it all together for a faster, cheesier, more out of control amalgamation. Maybe their more indie selves split apart and formed another band, leaving these knuckle-dragging dopplegangers in their place, but the tempos have cooled, the bass has lost its sick Jesus Lizard-like rumble, and the riffs...farewell, we barely knew ye.
I wouldn't have thought this was the same band until hearing the hoarse cry of vocalist Ralph Cuseglio. Then I listened to the words. Where I used to forgive their lyrics because of their instrumental potency, now lines like "Dont give a damn what the neighbor's say/ Gonna love you anyway" are sung unaccompanied between a few bar-band staccato bursts on "Pussyfootin'". "Oh yeah, all right," goes the chorus, and the whole thing seems straight from a pile of discarded Miller Lite commercial demos. And that's nothing compared to "Tequila Mockingbird": "We're everything he's not, we're the kings of the block/ We will never stop/ We're so cool we're hot." If you can think of song titles like "Between an I-ROC and a hard place," you can create better tongue-in-cheek lyrics than that.
"Burn the Masters" vaguely describes New York City brownouts over a snaggle-toothed two-chord shuffle, and the one-note piano hammering in the bridge is just one of many weak clichés thrown into these songs with neither irony nor verve. It's not that they've forgotten how to play, because "IROC" is crammed with fleet-fingered soloing (the indulgences are probably the most interesting moments) and "Vietnam Veterinarian" wedges a sample of chanting cheerleaders in between the chug of the guitars, while Cuseglio screams like he's being squeezed in his bathing suit area. It's the songs they've neglected: They plod forward with generic piston-like rhythms, focusing solely on the one-dimensional vocals and limp songwriting. "Clutch Pearls" is unforgivably straightforward third-stage-at-11-a.m. Ribfest hard rock, and songs like "Secret Heat" and "True Love By The Hour" lack the band's usual manic energy, or any kind of payoff in their melodies.
Perhaps Curses is an example of a flawless lampoon, but I didn't start listening to these guys because they were clever. In the past, they made old conventions sound fresh again. If this is what they've been shooting for all along, then they've perfectly filled the footprints of the dinosaur rock acts before them by cranking out boring records after their peak.
