REVIEW: Jolene, In the Gloaming (Sire)
- Arabella Clauson
Rumors circulating about Jolene suggest this North Carolina country-rock band borrows its name from a Dolly Parton song. While the monicker actually derives from a great-great-aunt of first cousins John Crooke and Dave Burris, the tribute is highly appropriate, as Jolene makes no bones about acknowledging those predecessors of the alternative-country circuit. Much more than a straight-up rock band, Jolene seamlessly incorporates subtle qualities of a rickety country porch into a roots-heavy urban rock sound. An unlikely marriage of the city mouse/country mouse variety, the style recognizes similarities while emphasizing the benefits of genre blending.
Soon after its inception in 1995, the group quietly bred a grass roots following as the unnanounced opening act for a 1996 Hootie and the Blowfish tour. An eleventh hour signing to Sire Records led Jolene quickly into a Montreal studio to record this relaxing, Neil Young hand-me-down brand of wash-and-wear rock and roll.
Spending an hour with In the Gloaming, the band's major label debut, is like taking a relaxing stroll down a rural interstate highway. Every time the flat electric sound meanders dangerously close to the white grunge line, singer John Crooke yanks it back with his nasal, deep hickory-smoked vocals. He repeatedly sqeezes another drop of country out of almost every track, even the Hootie and the Blowfish sound resonating from the depths of "So Sleepless You" and "Two Sisters and the Laureate."
Like a mop of tangled hair, the bleeding electric guitar is everpresent, lending a sometimes pleasing, sometimes highly irritating thematic unity to an otherwise disheveled surface. Just when the listener might have a break from the flat, surging sound, the electric reclaims its place in yet another power chord. Suffice to say the guitar dominates instrumentally, as do Crooke's distinctive vocals, leaving percussion and bass in a sort of irrelevant struggle to break through the suffocating layers of humid noise.
High points include first track "Pensacola, " and the jangly "Exhibit (World Disturbance) No.2" where Crooke wafts around in tribute to something with quite incomprehensible lyrics, "I just want to live this life forever." "Recline and Sensible" and "Begin 1000" boast guitar riffs derivative of R.E.M.'s Monster and vocals which seem to channel a soaring Jeff Buckley (albeit rather slurred). Chock full of fairly typical chord progressions, none of the tracks can really spread the radio disease, but overall Jolene puts forth an interesting cross-genre appeal.
