Last modified May 7, 1996.
PUDDLE - Dricket - 13 Songs
The first tune, "Kickin' Out the Stops," sounds great, kinda like Moving Targets, at least 'til the vocals kick in and you're reminded of Steve Marriott fronting the Small Faces. "Resolvable" brings back fond memories of The Volcano Suns c. _The Bright Orange Years_. "All Get Out" is evincing in the Buzzcocks/Dickies school of abandoned power-pop fooforaw. but the real keeper here is their mammoth finale, "Too Far," which reminds us that these guys are frmo West of Boston, and that out there it gets mighty cold and lonely late at night with nothing to look at except all those trees and stars.
Much of the rest of this is acceptably lively and full of a certain soggy, dusky croaking joy, more splenetic than splendiferous, but presentable all the same. "Wonderfunk" has a pretty tormented but user-friendly, electricity-motivated riff pushing it along, sort of like watching the Northeast power grid blink on and off during a brownout from six miles up. Puddle work hard but, unfortunately, their lyrics betray no sign of genius and their instincts of how to maximize the impact of a song also have yet to fully develop. Also, all too often the band sounds like it's ten years behind the curve: state of the art in 1986 sounds like stale art ten years down the road. Still, five really good songs out of thirteen isn't any too shabby. (Four stars out of 5)
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