Dead Meadow
Feathers
Matador

Dead Meadow are a rock and roll band that hail from Washington DC. This is their 4th studio Lp, having released their debut in 2000. Matador records says they "play an unusual blend of flawless Hendrix/Sabbath riffage, dreamy psych, heavy undulating rhythms, dirty blues-rock, and environmental jams, with eerie high-pitched vocals." Honestly it sounds a little suspect... Hey, I'm totally into Hendrix and Sabbath though! And those label made profiles rarely describe a band in a way that makes it sound good anyhow.

Feathers begins with an invocation - "Let's Jump In". Hm, yep the guitar sounds exactly like Hendrix. The voice sounds sort of fakely British. I hate to use phrases like this, but the guitar solo in this opener is both a masterbatory fan-boy fantasy and completely out of touch. "Such Hawks, Such Hounds" continues with the rip-off riffage. I must say that this band sounds just fine. In fact, if they had existed in 1967 and had these same ideas, they would be worshipped like the forefathers Dead Meadow pretend to be.

The album continues to crawl along, each song a long overblown slow ballad-like jack-off piece, and most of them with lofty solo goals that never get met. Mostly, Dead Meadow continue to be a late-sixties cover band throughout the album, but sometimes actually have the audacity to try to sound indie, which is probably worse than ripping off the old days.

I don't know, I hate to ream on albums but this honestly has no worth to me. Couldn't even get through one listen. Matador should have just come right out and said it: Are you interested in listening to a bunch of DC indie kids that sound like good bands from 40 years ago? Listen to Dead Meadow.

Copyright © 2005 Eugene Ward