Listen Hear

In Salon's latest CD roundup, the Counting Crows get Petty, the Flaming Lips reinvent and Marianne Faithfull shacks up with younger men -- again.

Jul 30, 2002 |

The Counting Crows
"Hard Candy"
(Geffen)

Oasis
"Heathen Chemistry"
(Sony)

We live in the Age of Ersatz, and despite our protestations, we regularly indulge in its ubiquitous and undeniable charms. I'm sipping on a Starbucks grande latte as I write this, purchased at the simulacrum of a mom-and-pop boho coffee shop on the corner when I could have walked half a block further and supported the real thing. Such is life -- sometimes the easy way wins out.

There is no heavy lifting and zero authenticity in the new offerings from the Counting Crows and Oasis, but they have their winning moments nonetheless. As entire albums -- works that we will return to again and again to revel in their collected charms -- both fall flat. But neither can be written off completely, as each offers moments of simple, fleeting pleasure.

Well aware that poppy roots-rock is hardly the flavor of the moment on modern-rock radio (witness the sad obsolescence of the Wallflowers), the Counting Crows are determined to be noticed on "Hard Candy," compromising their earlier principled stands (no lip-syncing; no "selling out," man) by appearing in a Coca-Cola commercial and avoiding some of the more ambitious, Van Morrison-style experiments of the last few discs in an all-out effort to craft concise, catchy Tom Petty-ish singles full of chiming guitars and anthemic choruses.

At this they succeed: "Miami" and "American Girls" (even the name screams Petty) may be the best tunes they've ever wrought. When they pop up on the car radio as I'm hopping from button to button, I will not change the channel; sprinkled in amid the Dave Matthews and the Nickelback, the Counting Crows tunes seem like a joyful revelation. But that doesn't mean I want to endure Adam Durwitz's shallow, solipsistic whining about his romantic woes ("I can never get enough of love") at any length greater than three and a half minutes at a time, no matter how sweet the manufactured musical backings.

With the subtlest of variations, the brothers Gallagher have now made the same album five times, but auteur Noel keeps coming up with enough minor twists on that wonderfully dreamy psychedelic buzz to make for pleasant listening, even if Oasis have never come close to approaching the creativity of fellow Brit-poppers Blur, Pulp or even the relatively obscure Boo Radleys. Advance buzz on "Heathen Chemistry" -- which is produced by the band and mixed by Mark Spike Stent (U2, Madonna, Björk) -- claimed that the group was turning toward alternative country. But aside from a few twangy acoustic guitars added to the psychedelic drone behind Liam's standard warbling about how he gets "so high I just can't feel it," there's little noticeable difference in the formula.

When exposed to individual tunes such as "The Hindu Times" and the now-expected Liam and Noel solo turns ("Songbird" and "Force of Nature," respectively), I don't mind a bit: Oasis may be spending an entire career rewriting three or four key songs on the Beatles' "Revolver," but "Revolver" is still, after all, one of the best rock albums ever made.

Of course, with both Oasis and the Counting Crows the question remains: Why listen to "Hard Candy" or "Heathen Chemistry" when you could turn instead to Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' "Greatest Hits" or "Revolver" itself?

Maybe we're just too lazy to walk that extra half a block.

-- Jim DeRogatis

Next Page: Marianne Faithfull hooks up with Beck

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