If name-dropped correctly a little literature can go a long way. While trying to absorb the background information for Down for Whatever, a collection of run-of-the-mill garage-rock anthems by San Francisco's Vue, I came upon keyboardist Jessica Ann Graves' mention of one of William T. Vollmann's briefer novels, Whores for Gloria, in relation to the album's closer, "The Rest". Tantalizingly, she suggests Vollmann's scrubby evocation of San Francisco's Tenderloin district as a possible inspiration for the dopey song's lyrics. Why? Because she leant the book to vocalist Rex John Shelverton and, well, he read it. With this in mind, I decided to investigate the band's retro schtick more thoroughly, because hey, while the music itself made me roll my eyes and sigh, perhaps the language of the libretto reaches greater heights.
Though it's admittedly pretty difficult deciphering all the banality over the "blistering" harmonica, it seems likely that The Animals or Rolling Stones had a bigger influence on Shelverton's raucous approach to white-boy blues than Vollmann's dissection of traumatic desire. With a boring EP on GSL and two similarly dull albums on Sub Pop, Vue haven't changed things up much for their RCA debut. Lacking the hooks or pop sensibility of labelmates The Strokes, the quintet is an undistinguished yawn with semi-expensive haircuts. (Maybe they should've mentioned Jackie Collins in the press kit?)
At this point, you'd figure a baker's dozen of Hives sound-alikes would be enough, right? Nope: Down for Whatever proudly stands up and asks the listener to accept yet another. Dribbling out of the gate with "She's Sweet", an "energetic" three-minute pop song that could just as easily have been written by any other post-Estrus band haunting sartorial-linked labels like Dim Mak or Sympathy for the Record Industry, the comfy sameness of the attack continues for the album's remaining eleven tracks. In fact, the band never once steps outside the genre's most watered-down tropes-- not even to go to the bathroom. To be fair, if you enjoy the other examples of this pre-fab genre, then I'm sure the Vue ransack the checklist adequately: the catchy "Look Out for Traffic" is the most Is This It of the batch, while the title track harnesses a snarky rock 'n' roll rebelliousness built on fuzzed-out braggadocio ("'Cause I'm down for whatevaaaah feels bad!"), and a wee smidgen of romantic new-wave seeps-in during "Take Two Kisses".
Thinking optimistically, as I'm wont to do, maybe the random mention of Vollmann will turn a bookish rocker kid onto one of America's most idiosyncratic and ambitious writers. If that's the case, Down for Whatever will prove a valuable tool, richer in use value than its lackluster merits would otherwise suggest. While a hack-job rarely adds up to much once the label's money's gone and a new trend lodges itself in the mind of tireless hipsters, Vollmann's repeatedly beautiful dissection of commerce, colonialism, and love should survive. And, yeah, he's so much more punk rock than these cats, regardless of his unintentionally geeky glasses and 5th-grade bowl haircut.
