Rob Price
Gutbrain Records
rob + gutbrain.com = email

2013 December 20 • Friday

And here's Gemtones record number two.

You might notice the photographs of their faces are taken from the cover photo for the previous album.

Their second record shows them in a perkier mood, playing with more alacrity, confidence and skill. I kind of miss the frayed melancholy of the first record, however.

They do a couple of originals here and are also very much under the influence of The Shadows, playing "Les Girls", "The Savage", "Atlantis" and "Peace Pipe".

"Peanut Butter" is a pretty goofy vocal number about, believe it or now, peanut butter. "Reno" and "Palasades Park" are very familiar songs played as straight covers here.

"Turn Around — Look at Me" takes the riff or groove or whatever from Roy Orbison's "Running Scared" and uses it as a launch pad for a broken-hearted guitar instrumental. This is the kind of special thing that I'm looking for in records like this, the original piece by a band of teenagers playing in a certain region at a certain time.