Rock is going back to its roots again. Now it is garage that is being hailed as the next "new" flavor of rock that is going to "save" rock from the previous next-big-thing that ruined it.
This new breed of garage clawing its way into the air waves is not the kind of music your dad played in junior high after hearing the Kinks on AM radio. Neo-garage is harder, darker and just weirder.
Rock journalists have been drooling over the invasion of the "the" bands, a slew of rough, in-your-face acts such as the Vines, the Hives and the Strokes that have followed the path of the White Stripes -- the first garage band to creep from the background of the heady Detroit club circuit to the lofty cover of Spin magazine.
Now from New Zealand come the Datsuns, the South Island's answer to the American and British wave of neo-garage, and unfortunately for the land that gave us Lord of the Rings movies, the Datsuns are about as useless as the cars they are named after. They will not save rock.
The Datsuns are a different flavor of garage than is booming here in the States. They are more 1980s hair-band-esque than any of their contemporaries, and the Def Leppard/garage band combination does not work well.
In all fairness to the Datsuns, the idea of reviewing a garage album is in its own way a degradation of the art form. Garage is supposed to be raw, bad and moreover it is supposed to be experienced live.
Garage rock is certainly not carefully written lyric poetry to be listened to while drinking Starbucks and contemplating how the guitar solos are going to save the world. It's music that's supposed to be experienced in a smoky, crowded room, surrounded by people your parents would not be pleased to spot you with.
Perhaps this is where the Datsuns thrive. After all, the quartet recently picked up Best Live Band honors at Britain's NME Awards, so maybe their first album is not a fair assessment of their act as a whole. The Sex Pistols weren't that great on wax either.
That being said, their self-titled debut is fantastically horrible. Sometimes while listening to it I want to laugh, but more often I want to cry.
Their lyrics might be good or even interesting if you are a brooding fifteen-year-old boy who recently failed his driver's test or got caught smoking by his parents, but for the rest of humanity the lyrics are profoundly terrible. Unless you are in a serious mood for some junior-high angst nostalgia, the Datsuns will probably not live up to your expectations.
Not that profundity is the key to quality lyrics, but what worked for the Ramones is a rare and special formula that works for a few select groups -- the Datsuns not included.
Though the words vary slightly, most of the songs, whose titles range from "MF from Hell" to "Freeze Sucker," are very similar in feel and structure. In typical garage style, most of the songs are short and focus on the chorus and the guitar solo.
These Kiwis lacks the "diamond in the rough" quality of truly great garage bands like the White Stripes. When Jack White of the Stripes sings, his voice often cracks and his guitar is often a little out of tune, but there is untrained talent beneath the skin -- the essential ingredient for good garage music.
For this quartet though, there is no such underlying talent. Some of the guitar solos definitely make you want to jump around your room, but they are not enough to make the album worth a second listen.
If you're looking to get into garage bands, it would be in your best interest to start out with the White Stripes' "White Blood Cells" or the Strokes' "Is This It." If you start out with the Datsuns, your intrigue will probably have dried up after the first 30 seconds.
