Evan Dando – Rumours of My Demise – Book Review

 Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com 

The Lemonheads – Love Chant – Album Review

 Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com 

The Lemonheads – The Academy – 24/08/25 – Live Review

 Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com 

Evan Dando – The Ambassador – Live Review

 Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com 

The Lemonheads – Opium – Live Review – 22-09-22

 Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com 

The Lemonheads – Varshons 2 – Album Review

Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com

https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2019/02/14/the-lemonheads-varshons-2-album-review/

The Lemonheads - Academy, Dublin - 06/02/18 - Live Review

Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com

https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2019/02/07/the-lemonheads-the-academy-live-review-06-02-18/

The Lemonheads – It’s A Shame About Ray

Article for www.nomreworkhorse.com

https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2019/02/01/the-lemonheads-its-a-shame-about-ray/

A Look Ahead To 2019 In Music

Article for www.nomoreworkhorse.com

https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2019/01/01/a-look-ahead-to-2019-in-music/

Evan Dando - Baby I'm Bored

Evan Dando's debut solo album arrived in 2003, not long after the country covers EP Griffith Sunset and 7 years on from the messy Lemonheads album Car Button Cloth.  This album is far more together than either of those.  It opens with the almost raunchy guitar of Repeat, swiftly followed by My Idea featuring some earnest strumming.  Proceedings darken a little for the woozy Rancho Santa Fe and the Bowie-inflected Waking Up.

Joey Burns and John Convertino were involved in the making of this album and you can hear their influence on the Americana-tinged Hard Drive, one of the catchier songs here, and also In The Grass All Wine Colored.  There's plenty here to please Lemonheads fans, songs like Shots Is Fired, It Looks Like You are up to scratch with his band's material.  The Same Thing You Thought Hard About has a more ragged edge but is really quite effective Dando clings on to the melody for dear life, and his vocal cords just about manage to keep the song in check. 

He hasn't left his country excursions behind, but the sparse, two minute Why Do You Do This To Yourself feels underwritten and doesn't really gel with the rest of the songs here.  The finest track is the sparkling All My Life, which has a yearning,  world weary melody and a moment of truth chorus: "all my life I thought I needed all the things I didnt need at all".  It's one of those wonderfully simple, yet effective songs that Evan Dando seemingly just tosses off effortlessly. 

Not a perfect album, but a must have if you like the Lemonheads. 

The Lemonheads – Academy – Gig Review

Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com

http://nomoreworkhorse.com/2015/10/06/the-lemonheads-academy-gig-review/

Most-read articles in 2014

Here are the most-read articles on Sacred Cowpats in 2014:

10. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Abattoir Blues

http://sacredcowpats.blogspot.ie/2014/03/album-review-nick-cave-and-bad-seeds.html

One half of Cave and co's 2004 set of albums, reviewed for your delectation

8. Juliana Hatfield - Only Everything

http://sacredcowpats.blogspot.ie/2014/08/album-review-juliana-hatfield-only.html

Hatfield's underrated follow-up to Become What You Are jointly with...

8. The Lemonheads - Car Button Cloth

http://sacredcowpats.blogspot.ie/2014/06/album-review-lemonheads-car-button-cloth.html

This Lemonheads album is a bit all over the shop, but when it works... (a bit like the band really)

7. Mark Eitzel - 60 Watt Silver Lining

http://sacredcowpats.blogspot.ie/2014/07/album-review-mark-eitzel-60-watt-silver.html

Eitzel does smooth, wine bar jazz.  You know it couldn't last.

6. Leonard Cohen - I'm Your Man

http://sacredcowpats.blogspot.ie/2014/07/album-review-leonard-cohen-im-your-man.html

An oldie but a goodie.  The album too.

5. Top albums of 2014

http://sacredcowpats.blogspot.ie/2014/12/top-10-albums-of-2014.html

One of the many broken-hearted lists of the year.

4. The Jesus and Mary Chain - The Power of Negative Thinking

http://sacredcowpats.blogspot.ie/2014/04/album-review-jesus-and-mary-chain-power.html

More Jesus and Mary Chain B-sides than any normal person could possibly deal with.

3. Tom Waits - Swordfishtrombones

http://sacredcowpats.blogspot.ie/2014/08/album-review-tom-waits.html

Inscrutable, uncategorisable Tom Waits

2. The Durutti Column - Short Stories For Pauline

http://sacredcowpats.blogspot.ie/2014/05/album-review-durutti-column-short.html

Exquisite guitar goodness from Vini Reilly.

1. A Winged Victory for the Sullen - Atomos VII

http://www.meg.ie/a-winged-victory-for-the-sullen-atomos-vii-ep/

Transcendent EP teaser for the full album.

Album Review: The Lemonheads - Car Button Cloth

The Lemonheads sixth album, Car Button Cloth was released in 1996, three years after its predecessor and it's a kind of a messy one.  Less countrified than their early nineties material, at its best it contains some wonderful power pop.  The opening one-two It's All True and If I Could Talk I'd Tell You are fine examples of this lurching, rollicking style.

Break Me is an impassioned, relatively heavy track where the at times barely lucid Evan Dando is reduced to desperate pleas of "break me" over hard-riffing guitars.  The Outdoor Type is a clever, classic pop tune about the joys of indoor pursuits backed by an easy, effortless pop melody, and later C'mon Daddy is almost as sweet-sounding.

Unfortunately the rest of the album is a bit of a mess.  Losing Your Mind may have been semi-autobiographical and is a passionate, ragged rocker, while the band's version of Knoxville Girl is passable.  Heavy rockers Something's Missing, 6ix and One More Time were presumably great fun in the studio but add little to the album.

The album is frontloaded with the stronger tracks which just about keep things on an even keel.  Worth checking out.

Album Review: The Lemonheads - Come On Feel The Lemonheads

Evan Dando and co were on a bit of a high after the success of their It’s A Shame About Ray album.  This follow up album, released in 1993, is a sprawling 15 track affair, far longer than the previous album.  At its best it’s full of rollicking, power-pop guitar tracks.  It opens with one of these, the ebullient The Great Big No, Dando’s perfectly drawled vocals over slightly rough guitar pop.  Interestingly the poppiest moment on the album, Into Your Arms, was actually written by The Hummingbirds.

 

Listening to this album now it feels very much like an early nineties timepiece.  It’s About Time is a glorious, sun-dappled strum, seemingly about Dando’s unconsummated relationship with Juliana Hatfield (who chimes in wonderfully on backing vocals).  Down About It has a great melody but it’s played at breakneck speed, almost too fast.  Seek out acoustic versions of this song which really allow it to breathe.

 

Speaking of songs breathing, Paid To Smile is a pretty mid-paced, vaguely country song.  They dial the country right up on Big Gay Heart, where Dando takes a tune and vocal right out of Nashville save for the gay-referencing lyrics which would never make it to the Grand Ole Opry.

 

Style, and it’s slowed-down cousin Rick James Style are two of the few mis-steps on the album, which is full of rocking melodies delivered in two minutes such as Rest Assured, Dawn Can’t Decide and You Can Take It With You.  Charming, slower tunes Being Around and Favourite T feature Dando’s heartfelt vocals with some admittedly cringe-y lyrics “if I was a booger, would you blow your nose?”.  Final track, the FIFTEEN minute The Jello Fund is a complete mess, with random studio noises battling with hard-rocking riffs.  It’s not really worth bothering with, the album would have been better without it.

 

The album deserves a relisten, at its best it’s as good as anything on its predecessor.

Album Review: The Lemonheads

After 10 years in which Evan Dando did little else apart from releasing one solo album, the Lemonheads returned in 2006.  Dando was joined by members of the Descendents as his band, as opposed to original Lemonheads. 

The album has a punkier feel than other latter day albums.  Opening track Black Gown barrels out of the blocks with a kind of harder feel, though Dando still turns in a typically goofy lyric “if it ain’t fixed, don’t break it”.  It’s all over in 2 minutes.  Similarly fast, rough ‘n’ ready Pittsburgh and Rule of Three speed along on riffs which sound like they are about come unstuck yet don’t, married to some great melodies.

Let’s Just Laugh shakes off an ominous opening to get into a classic Lemonheads groove with a hint of REM.  The latter half of the album sags a little as Dando and co run out of steam but the opening six tracks are an adrenalized version of classic Lemonheads.

Album Review: The Lemonheads - Lovey

The Lemonheads fourth album, released in 1990, was their first since the departure of Ben Deily and was also their first on a major label (Atlantic). It's kind of a split personality album, a cross between rocky numbers harking back to their past, and more laid-back material, laying the groundwork for It's A Shame About Ray. 

Of the rockier numbers, L'il Seed has a decent riff, but Ride With Me is probably the strongest of them. The song lurches back and forth on a low chord progression, like a slow, grungy waltz. Stove is faster with some good guitar work.

Half the Time is like a try out for their forthcoming album, having a breezy, country lilt to it. Later, Evan Dando gets to indulge his Gram Parsons fantasies with a cover of Brass Buttons, showcasing the direction the band was to head in. An uneven album, sure, but an interesting one.

Album Review: The Lemonheads - Lick

By 1989 the Lemonheads were still trying to find their sound.  Their third album, Lick, features mostly heavy rock.  Opener Mallo Cup is a propulsive rocker with a spindly riff, but was probably Evan Dando’s most accomplished song to date.  Almost as strong is the countrified strum A Circle of One which has quite an unusual melody and sees Dando in fine voice.

More typical are Dando’s brief speed rockers Glad I Don’t Know, Come Back D.A. and Ben Deily’s 7 Powers and Anyway which add little to the album really.  The Italo-metal Cazzo Di Ferro is pretty appalling really.

The most well known track on the album sees them take Suzanne Vega’s Luka and rock it up with heavy riffs, and a ‘loose’ treatment of the lyrics, and it works really well.  But the rest of the album is too hit and miss to have any lasting impact.

Concert Review: Evan Dando & Juliana Hatfield at The Sugar Club - 30th November 2012

Review for www.meg.ie http://www.meg.ie/evan-dando-juliana-hatfield-at-the-sugar-club/

Album Review: The Lemonheads - Creator

The Lemonheads' second album came out in 1988. It zips along, 13 tracks in just over half an hour. Ben Deily is very much to the fore, taking more of the lead vocals than Evan Dando. The band has slowed down a bit, despite the presence of Dando's speed rocker Clang Bang Clang. Out is a decent mid tempo rocker, while Deily's Come To The Window has a dippy charm.

They each take an acoustic track, Dando covers Charles Manson's Your Home Is Where Your Happy, while Deily plays sensitive original Postcard. A cover of Kiss track Plaster Caster adds little to the proceedings. So here the band are still some way off discovering their sound.

Album Review: The Lemonheads – Hate Your Friends

The Lemonheads’ debut album, released in 1987 is far away from the early 90s tracks where they made their name.  There’s not the slightest tinge of country about these tracks, there are 13 tracks over 24 minutes of mostly rather generic speed-punk.  Mainman Evan Dando alternates lead vocals with collaborator Ben Deily. 

 

Dando opens the album with the brief Eat It which sets the tone for a bunch of sub two-minute, three chord thrashes.  Nothing wrong with that, but it doesn’t set them apart.  Deily’s 3-9-4 feels like a cross between the S€x Pistols and very early Screaming Trees, and later he shouts his way through the punk version of Amazing Grace you always knew you needed.

 

The band are slightly more successful when the drop the pace a little, Deily’s Second Chance works in a kind of Jam-like way, but the one true great is the longest track here at three minutes.  Don’t Tell Yourself, with a swaggering riff and a dislocated, sullen vocal from Dando which works really well on a track made to play loudly.

 

It’s an interesting curio for Lemonhead completists (yes there are Lemonheads fans who can find some motivation to collect their releases), but inessential.