Haunted Cities
Rarely is a side project equal to the member's primary outfit, but the Transplants subvert that long and wisely held opinion. Named because they are indeed musicians transplanted from other bands--Blink 182's skin beater Travis Barker, Rancid's guitarist and singer, Tim Armstrong, and former AFI roadie Rob Aston make up the line-up--but much to their credit they didn't bring much baggage from their rather high profile musical units except maybe just the smallest throwback to mid-career Rancid on the confrontational and rather bleak  "American Guns."  But that's really a creative blip, instead the band members display a contagious and clubby party ethic, rather like the Stone Roses before the end of Madchester years with a buzzy menacing guitar and some superb Keith  Moon-ian drumming underpinning everything. Instead of promoting punk revivalism, "Haunted Cites" is a compendium of what the band members listen to on their off hours, fusing their love of dancehall, metal, Philly soul, reggae and hip-hop into this rhythmically solid and lyrically adventurous follow-up to their standout 2002 debut. Any band that can name check Blackie Lawless in their first song, and then go on to create such luscious vintage soul, sounding like a reincarnated Stylistics on the chillingly beautiful "What I Can't Describe" deserves to be on the express elevator to the top of the charts. And that's even before you take into account their sardonic paean to hedonism on "Gangsters and Thugs," with it's charmingly bone-headed chorus "Gangsters and thugs/Criminals and hoods/Some of my friends sell records/Some of my friends sell drugs."--Jaan Uhelszki