Customer Reviews

The Tape Of only Linda

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

When this came out, many Miller fans found it a little over-polished and moaned about the appearance of songs by other members of the band. Miller's never, in 20+ years of pop song genius, allowed anything less than wonderful to have his name on it, and this is no exception. Song structures and melodies are perhaps less skewed than on Interbabe Concern or even Plants and Birds and Rocks and Things (both of which are "better" albums to old fans), but the production (Mitch Easter) is luscious and a joy to listen to. Years later, this stuff is still catchy and fresh, and some of it ranks among Miller's best-ever songs. A fine second or third LF purchase for the new fan.

Let me first of all say that again as my review of Plants and Birds and Rocks and things im Zachary Smiths daughter. therfor making my reivew a tad bit biased. yet I know what I like and i do like this. It is not good all over but some songs really stick out like "Soul Drain" "Hyde Street Virgins" "My superior" (written by my father by the way). Please buy this CD and give the loud familly a try or another one for some ppl

Nobody ever accused Scott Miller and the Loud Family of being direct or easy for casual listeners to get into, but this CD may be the closest he's gotten. It doesn't have all of his best tunes or even printed lyrics (a must with his work - it needs reader's guides as much as Finnegan's Wake), but Tape of Only Linda has some knockout songs that stand up to his work with both Loud Family AND Game Theory. The only problem with the record is the length - 10 songs is fine for many bands, but with Miller you always want something a bit more sprawling. By the way, the title is a reference to a tape of Linda McCartney's vocals isolated from a live mix - pure unintentional comedy.

Best Tracks:
"Soul Drain" - Good opener, very alterna-catchy.
"My Superior" - Classic rock updated by indie kids, this is one of my all time LF songs. Great guitar riff, just the right amount of synths - a hands down winner.
"Hyde Street Virgins" - Jangle Pop 101...more like Jangle Pop 495. Advanced study for those who already mastered the form and moved on.
"Still It's Own Reward" - Cute and singsongy, this is an overlooked gem on this album. It may be a bit too sweet for the hardcore alternative/psychedelic fans but I think it's a keeper.

The music is pretty direct and the playing fairly brutal. What makes this work to some degree is the brilliance of the songs. "Soul Drain", "Wouldn't Be Christmas", "My Superior", and "Baby Hard-to-be-Around" are particularly inspired.

Not a bad album, but it has very good songs among others more pedestrian. A lower 4 stars, if this could be calibrated on Amazon. Every LF album has astonishing moments and bewildering ones. Each album that Miller has ever done contains also mundane stretches, and annoying bits. It's, as he will explain on the next LF album, his "philosophy." "Tape" remains my least favorite CD only by comparison with the other 4 LF discs, you understand. If a newcomer to the band, I would buy this only if you have liked the first "Plants" CD. The vocals, the words, the complexity are not your eager power-pop. No twinkly new wave. Harsher, meaner, if not leaner. With LF, you're blitzed with an overload of psychic stimuli.

Not counting the diffused 2006 effort half-credited to LF, this is closer to Attractive Nuisance in its mix of more direct, economical (if only by comparison), and tighter tunes with Scott Miller's signature sound of expansive, swirling, mini-epics full of vocal twists, musical filigree, and lyrical legerdemain. A quieter tone, it takes awhile to sink in. Its best songs insinuated themselves, however, much more quickly than usual. I tend to have to listen quite awhile to LF albums for their charms to fully sweep me away.

"Tape" has should-have-been-hits and nice-try-near-misses, even though it follows the template laid down by most of Miller's efforts with Game Theory and LF. He writes and sings most of the time; another band member often guests on one or two songs, taking over the mike. The efforts of the other musicians are to be applauded for their own effort, and Miller for his democratic generosity. But, they usually pale by comparison. Like Ringo's generally did, I suppose.

The strongest songs open and close the record, which hits a lull in the middle after some promising tunes on "side one." Soul Drain ramps up from a mid-tempo to a punishing hard-rock sound fueled by stuttering guitar. It fits the frustration of its words well. It's also a pleasure to hear LF turning up the amps. The first album "Plants [etc.]" tended towards little bits of studio fun and solid pop-oriented, if admirably quirky, songs that managed to express a lighter emotional and lyrical approach that expressed itself in a brighter set of diverse songs-- sort of like a mini "Lolita Nation." On "Tape," the band sounds restive and ready to break out of its soundboard and software processed hibernation.

"My Superior" sounds like a "Tape" item. It's bouncier, and lighter in attitude, but it does lurch about in typically unpredictable style, if it seems a bit clumsy in the attempt. "Marcia & Etrusca" has the type of double-meaning that Miller delights in. (As in the song and album titles he selects, not to mention the sly cover art on "Tape."). More percussive than usual, it displays this album's tendency to burrow deeper into a denser terrain than that of "Plants" or his GT albums. Pop culture collides with ancient Rome, and beyond. The usual erudite touch to transform, Midas-like, our media detritus. It's a clever song, as to be expected from the words, and it also seeks, as with the first two I mentioned, to shift gears halfway through, dissolving into a neo-psych parody of far-out voices and effects.

"Hyde St Virgins," if hits were made from Miller's songs, would be one. It's hummable (not always a Miller trademark!) and catchy. An alternative universe, as he might well agree from his own scientific career, may well rank this as a classic pop ditty. After this, the songs become more workmanlike. "It Just Wouldn't Be Christmas" is a rarer type of a Miller song, a topical one addressed at a particular class of people rather than at or about an individual. Social satire suits him as well as personal invective! Like "Hyde," it has a lighter style that allows it to float more than wedge in the listener's consciousness.

As with the best songs on "Tape," the last one rescues the disc with aplomb. "Ballet Hetero" provides a litany of wistfulness and regrets, mostly romantic ones failed or accomplished, as the title would lead you to expect. It too leaves its poppier start behind for a stretch at altered tempo that allows the melancholy sounds to yearn and reach farther than on any LF or GT album. It tries to soar, freed from Miller's anguished voice. That's how the album ends, with this ethereal longing.