Peter Buck was the first former REM-er to come out with a solo record. He also appears to be the only one planning to do that. Only a year after his eponymous and vinyl-only solo debut, he returns with I Am Back To Blow Your Mind Once Again. The debut was not earth-shattering. It felt loose and fun, things that Peter Buck never really seemed when he was in REM. The follow-up here, also a vinyl-only production, is more of the same.
His primary cohort is Scott McCaughey, he of The Minus 5 and long-time collaborator/pal of Buck. It is kind of a bluesy, boozy record. I don't suspect this record took terribly long to make. It reminds me in terms of feel of the record he and Mike Mills and Bill Berry did with Warren Zevon back in the early 90s as Hindu Love Gods. It's the kind of record that musicians make when they are having a good time. It's not an artistic statement, it's not reaching for something great. It's a portrait of a talented artist doing his thing. It does not quite live up to it's name. But it's a welcome diversion.
Buck does not have the most magnetic voice. It is often drenched in effect but his voice is sort of a natural effect. He was not meant to be a front-man. But that is not a criticism, just a fact. It suits the vibe though. When McCaughey takes the lead vocal on the nice mid-tempo cut "Fall On My Own Sword" it's a noticeable shift.
The first three songs are solid rockers, especially the third one "Life Is Short" where Kurt...somebody. The credits on the back label don't go into much detail. Anyway he gets off a great psychedelic guitar solo that goes on a bit too long, which is perfectly fine.
The Drive By Truckers' Patterson Hood shows up for the most interesting song on the record: "Southerner." It features Buck on a sinister sounding enow guitar while Hood recites the lyrics, capturing what it means to be a southerner of a certain age.
The only song I could find on YouTube was "Drown With Me," which features Sleater-Kinney's Corin Tucker on lead vocal, and sounds like it could have come off of New Adventures in Hi-Fi. I didn't look that hard for a video, though.
Peter Buck is best known as the guitarist for REM. His career with that great band has pretty much had him in the background behind Michael Stipe, a place it also seemed from general observation he was happy to occupy.
After the retirement of REM last year (I don't say break-up because it wasn't an acrimonious split, just a band deciding that was it...for the time being at least), Peter Buck is the first out of the chute with a solo record. Interestingly it is a vinyl release, and since I have recently gotten onto a crazy vinyl kick I reckoned I would track it down. Even though they only made a couple thousand copies it wasn't hard to find a copy thanks to the internet. It arrived last week.
Last night I gave it the headphone experience. Listening through headphones is the best way to listen to music, especially vinyl. It's an all encompassing experience, especially when it is later in the evening and the lights are out and you are just chill in enjoying the music, like I was last night. The only sad part is I was too lazy to go down and fetch a beer. Through the headphones you can really hear everything that's going on; every string struck, every snare hit, every pump of the organ comes through nice and clear.
Buck takes special care to note this record was recorded all analog. No digital shortcuts, no studio trickery, it is all done to magnetic recording tape, then mastered "onto a half-inch Scully deck at 30 ips." That's from the notes along with the record and I cannot say I know what that means but I will guess it's old school.
With such attention to old-school detail, the record comes off more as an experiment than a statement. Nothing wrong with that but it keeps the record from being a drawn-in experience. At the end of the second song of side two, titled "It's Alright" Buck says "if that isn't music I don't know what is." That is a statement I can support, but that doesn't mean it's great.
Buck is helped out by old friends Mike Mills and Scott McCaughey from The Minus 5. McCaughey also did a side thing called The Baseball Project where he and some friends (Buck included) did two records worth of baseball-inspired songs. The music here is much in that vein, but the negative is it sounds very thrown together, a bit too ramshackle, a bit too all-over-the-place. Buck has an interesting voice; hard to describe except that it is deep and not what you immediately think of as musical. Reminds me why you don't give a lead guitarist a microphone a lot of the time! That said there is no doubting the quality of musicianship on display. Buck is a seriously talented guy and it is here in spades.
Best songs on the album are the Byrds-y "Some Kind Of Velvet Sunday Morning" and the album closer "I'm Alive" which has a loose Stones-y Exile On Main Street vibe. But then there are songs like the aforementioned "It's Alright" and "L.V.M.F." which stands for little-village-mother-fucker. There are lots of curse words shouted in a few of the songs which doesn't bother me but seems sort of pointless.
All in all a good record. I don't expect it to be among my favorites for 2013 but I recommend it to hard core fans of REM, not neccesarily casual fans, though.
