David Vandervelde is a 22-year-old Chicagoan who's managed to find himself in the full throes of T.Rextasy. On The Moonstation House Band, his mini-album debut, he's mastered all the moves-- not just Marc Bolan's cock-of-the-walk riffs, but also his excitable delivery, which, like everything else here, is drenched in dreamy reverb. Vandervelde uses the orchestral grandiloquence of David Bowie and Roxy Music as a springboard for his own spacey sonic experiments, all developed and recorded at Jay Bennett's Pieholden Suite Sound Studio. Oh, and he played all the instruments on the album-- even taught himself the ones he didn't know.
While putting everything together, he guested on albums by Bennett, Mark Eitzel, and Johnathan Rice, and he's got the chops and audacity to make both the Stones' "Cocksucker Blues" and his own "Fuckin' Around" live staples. But while his ambitions are no doubt enormous, they sometimes get the better of him on this distinctive, but not quite consistent, debut.
Musically, the touchstones are obvious, but Vandervelde tweaks them to fit his own needs. Opener "Nothin' No" builds a slow-moving sitar groove atop spastic drumming, and on "Wisdom From a Tree" droning piano twines around weightless strings to create a perfect showcase for his impressive glam falsetto. When the tempos slow, though, the production sounds busy and boisterous: The hooks fail to catch hold, the riffs don't churn quite enough momentum, and the songs settle like silt. It doesn't help that Vandervelde follows the album-opening one-two punch of "Nothin' No" and "Jacket" with back-to-back downbeat numbers, killing the momentum. Elsewhere, "Feet of a Liar" drowns its melody into too many spacey effects, while "Corduroy Blues" and the closer "Moonlight Instrumental"-- both featuring string arrangements from composer David Campbell (responsible for the Brokeback Mountain score and siring Beck)-- sound impressively large but aimless.
If Vandervelde builds from a classic rock blueprint, his lyrics sound wholly contemporary, sporting a strong impressionistic touch and attention to narrative details. "Nothin' No" (which, as you've probably already determined, is the standout) recounts summer nights spent getting high and drunk on the front porch, macking on someone else's girl: "When your mother showed up to see you, you poured the drinks under the deck," Vandervelde sings. "And when your boyfriend drove to meet you, you covered the bruises on your neck"-- two lines that effortlessly sum up just about everyone's 20th summer.
Vendervelde's songs work best when they're most specific and when his cocksure performance balances his own experiences with rock-star projection. Sporting the album's most momentous hook, "Can't See Your Face No More" laments being dumped for another guy (namely Jesus Christ), and "Jacket" never specifies the meaning of a girl's forgotten coat, only hinting lasciviously at the consequences. On the other hand, the misbegotten "Murder in Michigan" is utterly beyond him: Vandervelde can't muster the gravity to make lines like "Black-eyed Suzanne submissive and kind/ Nocturnal mistress with me in my mind" sound convincingly life-or-death, so the song reads like a basic fiction-workshop exercise.
Still, any artist who can endure such a sustained comparison to glam icons without coming off like a blowhard is doing something right. Vandervelde has obviously studied long and hard, learning what makes each of his heroes sound so distinctive. But perhaps his most crucial trait-- one which can't be taught but can certainly be honed-- is the precocious self-confidence that allows him to live out his rock 'n' roll fantasy while singing in his own voice.
