If you're the kind of person who likes your rock and roll hedonistic, carefree and energetic, with more than a dash of style and pizazz, then this is the band for you. No doubt some in the jaded music press will delight in heaping scorn upon a band featuring the offspring of two pop culture figures from the 1960s--singer Donovan Leitch is the son of the singer Donovan of "Mellow Yellow" fame, while guitarist Jason Nesmith's daddy is Michael Nesmith from the Monkees. Add Leitch's career as a Calvin Klein supermodel to all of this, and you have a recipe for cynicism.
However, it's hard to remain cynical when your actually play the CD. Produced by Shel Talmy of Who fame, Nancy Boy is from start to finish a glam-pop gem that doesn't pretend to have an ounce of social significance beyond its espousal of a good-time ethic laced with a touch of big city decadence. What really gives the music here its oomph is the fact that Nancy Boy don't forget that this kind of music always benefits from some razor sharp guitar, a la Mick Ronson's muscular backup of David Bowie's glam antics in the early 70s. Here, it is Jason Nesmith who supplies the requisite crunch, driving catchy tunes like "Deep Sleep Motel" and the 60s-styled garage-rocker "Can You Dig It?" over the top into glam-a-rama heaven. Everything really comes together on "Johnny Chrome & Silver," with its T-Rexish lyrics ("He's just a Jeep Boy / Looking for a tank girl"), discofied beat, raunchy guitar skronk, and, as throughout, Leitch's foppish vocal leer, a theatrical device as much as a musical one. You'll be humming this one for days after you play it.
Nancy Boy are obviously heavily indebted to their muscial forefathers, if not their genetic ones. "Dearest Girl" for instance, might just be Bowie and The Spiders: if you slipped it into one of those ChangesBowie collections, it wouldn't seem out of place. And while "W.R.I.P." is a lame tribute to Detroit that might best have been binned, "Colors" (which name checks Gary Numan), "Foxtrot" and "Ultrasex" are all worthy of the underrated glam-rock heritage which they extend: Numan, the Dolls, Japan, Soft Cell. After years of self-absorbed navel-gazing, it seems that some of today's newer rock bands are anxious to get back to what rock does best: extoll life as an endless party. And hey, isn't that what it is for young men in rock and roll bands? So if, like me, you're tired of wallowing in hypocritical WASP guilt with the Billy Corgans of the world, Nancy Boy are ready, willing and hungry (like the wolf) to take you into their world of glitter, pills and thrills. Sounds good to me.
