Some bands strive to explore new musical territory each time they go into the recording studio, while others are content to follow the same path throughout their career as long as they improve in some way each time out.
The Black Lips
seem to be following the latter approach, though you'd be forgiven for not noticing the stylistic differences between their fourth studio album,
Good Bad Not Evil
, and their earlier efforts.
continue to split the difference between
Back from the Grave
-era garage stomp and the darker throb of post-punk noise merchants like
the Fall
, but as befits the title,
brings a bit more sunshine into the mix, and the deeper undercurrents of this music come more from the performances than the production and recording, which is clear and crisp by this group's murky standards.
Jared Swilley
's bass is high up in the mix, carrying a good share of the melodies and adding plenty of minor key tension, while guitarists
Cole Alexander
and
Ian St. Pe
use the extra room to shore up the high end with plenty of cheap guitar bashing and
Joe Bradley
's primal drumming holds the whole thing in place.
finds
the Black Lips
going for a bit more obvious humor on tunes like
"Navajo"
and the
country
-accented
"How Do You Tell a Child That Someone Has Died"
(I said they were funny, not tasteful), and there's a playful tone to
"Bad Kids"
"Veni Vidi Vici"
that's lighter than you might expect from this band. But longtime fans looking for
' patented low-tech rumble will be rewarded with
"I Saw a Ghost (Lean),"
"Cold Hands,"
"Slime and Oxygen,"
which are just as unwholesome as you could wish for.
isn't a major leap forward for
, but it shows their sound is slowly but surely evolving, and they still rock with a nasty enthusiasm that's bold and compelling; this is quality stuff for your next black light party. ~ Mark Deming