REVIEW: Dodgy, Homegrown (A&M, U.K.)
- Tim Kennedy
(Mgr. Ed. Note - This is the second part of a review of the U.K. band Dodgy. The first part was contained in the 11/22 issue of Consumable)
Dodgy's Homegrown has a more accomplished feel than the debut and the playing is almost arrogant. The guitar is hard but clean edged and the harmonies are very fine. The vocal style is very Lennon, very hard edged and with that high pitch. A variety of instrumental tricks are employed and the result is an almost bewilderingly varied yet overwhelmingly melodic pop album.
"Staying Out For The Summer" has a mid-period Byrds tune to it and is a nice upbeat opener, but as usual the band throw in a super rock guitar solo wig out at the end. The ability to inject infectious pop melodies into a rock format (or is that vice-versa?) is demonstrated from the outset. This was their last, again unsuccessful, single.
"Melodies Haunt You" is another single, reviewed in the previous Consumable issue. This is a fine late sixties Kinks type of tune and deserved to go up the chart, rather than die the death it did in the UK.
"So Let Me Go Far" starts with odd quiet drum beats and atmospheric twangs. The tune is a more nervy affair. The chorus changes from minor to major, and you know this is Dodgy at their most Beatles-like. A fine circular piano riff might have appeared on Revolver and the harmonies and guitars likewise point to the purple period of the aforementioned, of 1965 or 1966. The guitar solo towards the end of the song is particularly devastating.
"Crossroads" is quite possibly named after the awful soap that polluted our (UK) early evening TV viewing in the 70s. It has a rather harassed air about it certainly. Actually the lyric deals with the admittedly moldy blues legend about the devil waiting to buy your soul off you at the crossroads. The song is not guitar driven; however, they use a mellow keyboard structure.
"One Day" borrows from Steely Dan with Haitian Divorce-style guitar, then bursts into an acoustic-led stoned section with lead vocal high-pitched declaiming like John Lennon once did and again excellent lead guitar trailing in and out. It is strange, but catchy.
Track six, "We Are Together", has a Faces air about it. It is a slower number with a warm guitar duelling with a hammond. Primal Scream attempted this kind of song several times on Give Out But Don't Give Up, but this is a far superior effort by dint of the variation within the framework of the song.
"Whole Lot Easier" has a choppy riff and the drumming, which seems to have a Keith Moon style about it, gives the song a Who-esque feel. This is a classic uptempo poppy tune. The feel is of earlier Beatles uptempo pop.
The next track, "Making The Most Of", has an almost McCartneyesque optimism about it. It drives along with a lovely lead riff. The guitar solo here as elsewhere is excellent. Horns are again used here to good effect.
The soaring guitar soloing and hammond wailing continues in "Waiting For The Day". None of the instrumental virtuosity manages to clobber the inch-perfect tunes, crafted just like the old days, god bless 'em. This is a Waterloo Sunset era Kinks-style tune. Concluding is a superb combination of guitar and swirly hammond.
"What Have I Done Wrong?" is uncannily like John Lennon on the Plastic Ono Band first album of 1970. The vocal is accompanied only by a sparse acoustic guitar, miserable though at the same time electrifying.
"Grassman" ends the album, beginning with piano and voice in somewhat doomy vein. An acoustic guitar picks along, the singer asking, "...Darling you are my heroine... (heroin?)". Then the song bursts into full-on rock depression overdrive somewhat a la 70s Pink Floyd (?!) with electronic tweets in the background and (but of course) soulful soaring female backing vocal. What, no saxaphone? A million miles from the chirpy majority of the album's songs and yet a fitting and grand conclusion to this fine CD.
As a coda, a ghostly pizzicato burst appears. Very strange. The album is as ambitious as a pop record can be, possibly harking back to an early and more innocent era when all groups were 'pop' and musical divisions were lowered whilst the great talents of our era knocked off one classic after another, unhindered by formulas of how 'rock' should sound; "See Emily Play", "Jumping Jack Flash", "Waterloo Sunset", "Strawberry Fields Forever". And yet the CD also looks to the end of that first flowering, personified by the tortured self-realizations of Ono Band era Lennon. Or not. Probably.
