The Singles Jukebox

The Review Collective responds…

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[3.43]

Alfred Soto: Bands like The Record Company, article capitalized, exist in every town: competent musicians and firm friends who gelled around a shared love for Buddy Guy and the blues verities. Should NPR or an obtuse radio promote them as A Return to Rock Values, they’ll be destroyed. 
[5]

Josh Love: The main riff is nicely rubbery and suggests these boys might just have a little dirt underneath their nails, but then the tepid “Ooh ooh” of the refrain makes it seem clear they’re just striving for an easy wordless singalong suitable for an early afternoon summer festival slot. When you step back from it, it’s kind of remarkable too that this flavor of blues-rock could sound so much more tame than its antecedents recorded over half a century ago.
[4]

Cassy Gress: The Record Company is a band that has mostly been in CSI soundtracks and beer commercials prior to now and they are big on blues. I can tell what this is going for, but while I can appreciate blues from a cultural standpoint, pure blues is not really my favorite thing to listen to; I like it muddied up with pop or rock. The Record Company balanced it a little too heavily on the blues side for my taste; they specifically like John Lee Hooker, and you can hear it in the way the verses repeat phrases and last for an indeterminate amount of bars and HEY NOW IT’S THE CHORUS LET’S BOOGIE. They’re missing the “lifetime of woes” kind of soul in good blues, though.
[3]

Rebecca A. Gowns: I was wondering when I’d hear the new Applebee’s commercial! Here it is, in all its stale white-blues-rock blandness, enticing me to buy the new cheesy potato skin platter. Yet, much like an appetizer from a lower-mid-tier chain restaurant, it tastes like nothing but re-heated starch, with a gassy aftertaste of regret.
[2]

David Moore: I would really look forward to hearing this close a sweeps episode of The Good Wife, but The Good Wife is gone, we just need to accept that. Apparently the best it could do was a Miller Lite commercial, which seems like a waste, if appropriate. 
[6]

Adaora Ede: Nestled deep in the heart of Miller Lite World, a few white labcoats work in a factory fabricating the ideal alternative rock band to sell their beer, not realizing how anachronistic it is for bearded white dad-types from LA to play jacked blues songs and say the word ‘ain’t’. They begin with a clones of one of their finest specimens, The Black Keys. However, the clone is insufficient as there is not enough slide guitar. The science heads also add a little bit too much derivative bass line, avoiding a Musical Frankenstein that would actually make music listenable for someone who is neither inebriated or unconscious. Wiping their foreheads of sweat, they marvel at their finished product.
[2]

Brad Shoup: Can’t be a coincidence that the bassline recalls “For the Love of Money”.
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