Nineteeneighties
Though he has often shown a debt to REM and the Smiths, Grant Lee Phillips's most successful recordings--both solo and with Grant Lee Buffalo--represented a break with the sonic largesse and studio affectations of the 1980s. These 11 tracks serve to reconnect him with the bands and songwriters of his 20s, when he was just discovering his own voice--still one of the most expressive and supple in rock music. With a consistency that borders on singlemindedness, he drapes songs by New Order, Joy Division, Echo and the Bunnymen, the Psychedelic Furs, the Church, and the Cure in his trademark acoustic warmth and draws forth the melodies and sense of longing in these Gen-X anthems. The Pixies' "Wave of Mutilation" would hardly seem a candidate for a waltz through Hawaiian Americana, but for Phillips it is, and the result is beautiful, as is the light-Rubber Soultreatment of Robyn Hitchcock's "I Often Dream of Trains." The less successful interpretations simply fail to differentiate themselves from the spirit of the originals: REM's "So. Central Rain" and the Smiths' "Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me" are hardly rendered as carbon copies, but they lack revelation. And though Nick Cave's "City of Refuge" helps pick up the pace, the album's cumulative effect is more drowsy than daydreamy, a mood enhanced by beds of soft organ, reverbed cello, and faint guitar buzz. Call this Phillips's "synth-pop unplugged" album, but within the gauzy strumscapes are frequent moments of grace.--Roy Kasten