Tuesday, June 28, 2016

Tuesday Tuneage
Electric Angels - "Cars Crash"
1990

Wikipedia lies! Electric Angels are described as "a cross between The Replacements and Hanoi Rocks"*, but they lack the crunch of looks-good/sounds-okay Hanoi Rocks and never make it to the garage glory of the 'Mats. The guitars are solid and there are nice background harmonies but something is missing here. Maybe a top-notch hard rock producer like Ted Templeman or Tom Werman would have fared better than Tony Visconti, the sound on this album is like a flatter Bon Jovi.** Dunno how that trickster Chuck Eddy had this album rated as high as 32*** in his Stairway To Hell: The 500 Best Heavy Metal Albums in the Universe, he obviously heard things I did not.

And the lyrics. Oh Lord, THE LYRICS. I normally give lyrics secondary attention, but these ones are so bad that they scream for attention.

GROAN:
'Til death do us part
That's why I'm wearing black

GROAN (PT. 2):
You must be an actress
'Cause you sure know how to fake it

HEART OF GOLD FAILED GAMBIT (DON'T THEY ALL?)
My life is in the pawnshop
My soul is with you girl
'Cause a heart of gold is worth more
Than all the money in the world

THE "VOTE MCGOVERN" REALIZATION
We were going to change the world
But the world changed us!

MAKES BOB SEGER'S "HER STRUT" SOUND TENDER
She used to walk on water
Now she's walking like a whore

NOT SURE WHAT TO MAKE OF THIS ONE, BUT IT IS NOT GOOD
I wish I could burn her like firewood

As for "Cars Crash", it could be a Spinal Tap song. Except where the Tap would have been funny, Electric Angels play it straight.

Cars crash
Hearts get crushed

(and)

And you get crushed, I won't be your crush
Can't say I wish you were dead
Some things are better left unsaid

You know one big reason that cars crash? Drunk driving. And in "The Drinking Song", these guys shrug off drinking and driving, something The Replacements would have never done. (They didn't drive.) I don't encourage quitting, but it might have been best if Electric Angels had entered a twelve-step program and addressed the drinking which undoubtably fueled their misogyny.

*Citation needed!

**And at least Bon Jovi could approximate garage/chant/seventies glam in stuff like "Bad Medicine".

*** O.J. Simpson's number, ominously.