Album Reviews

THE RED TYGER CHURCH
Free Energy
(Alive)
The Sacramento-based Red Tyger Church comes off like the Brian Jonestown Massacre with more piss and vinegar, or the Apples in Stereo if they listened to the MC5 instead of the Beach Boys. Singer/guitarist Mike Diaz and singer/tambourine-whacker Mel Berlin swirl aggressive 60s psychedelia and Detroit-style garage rock together with the zeal of a gospel congregation and an appealing looseness that keeps it from sounding forced. "Angie Vampyre," "Cherry Cola" and the title track are strong testimonials to win converts to this spiritual path. Michael Toland [buy it]

SILVER
White Diary
(Bad Afro)
The cover shot makes this Danish quintet look like a 80s hair metal band after a bad gig, but there's more grit than glamour in these grooves. The band plays tunes like "Intimate Cussing" and "Funeral Class One" like it thinks a cat o' nine tails will thrash basic Stonesy rock & roll back into shape, while gravelly singer Blanco Summer spits out "Dark Dark Diary" and "Dead Articulation" like they were curses. White Diary is like Hanoi Rocks with more desperation, maybe even more conviction. Good shit, in other words. Michael Toland [buy it]

SUGARPLUM FAIRIES
Introspective Raincoat Student Music
(Starfish)
With a name like Sugarplum Fairies, I expected either a twinky pop band or some hopefully bizarre psychedelia. Singer Silvia Ryder and instrumentalist Ben Bohm do neither, however, instead playing a sort of slightly tweaked triple-A roots pop. Contrasting with the enticingly melodic folk rock, Ryder sounds too obsessive and disturbed to be the sweet thing pining in her bedroom. Occasional cabaret influences and creepy guest vocalists (see the excellent "Sticky Summer" for both) help enliven what might be mistaken for something normal. Michael Toland [buy it]

THE WEATHER
The Weather
(Pidgeon English)
"You oughta know it's the sound of T. Rex!" declares this young North Carolina quartet, and while the Weather favors the rougher, sloppier sounds of early 70s proto-arena rock to Marc Bolan's spit-shine glam, the rock & roll-über-alles spirit is the same. One could argue that tunes like "Middle of a Good Life" and "Bury You" travel well-trod ground, but, like its fellow NC faithkeepers in All Night, the Weather writes and plays this stuff so well and so unabashedly that it's impossible not to clasp The Weather to one's bosom. Michael Toland

VARIOUS ARTISTS
Soul Comes Home
(Shout! Factory/Stax)
The soundtrack to a PBS pledge special, Soul Comes Home presents a role call of Stax and other soul singers of the 60s and 70s (Eddie Floyd, Isaac Hayes, Solomon Burke, etc.) doing their hits in a relaxed concert setting. Public Enemy's Chuck D adds a celebratory rap to the Bar-Kays' "Soul Finger," Little Milton perfectly illustrates the transition point from blue to R&B with "That's What Love Will Make You Do" and Al Green is his usual affable, soulful self. But whoever had the bright idea to hire the execrable Michael McDonald for ("Sittin' On) the Dock of the Bay" should be fucking horsewhipped. Michael Toland [buy it]