The Bottom Line: Outstanding album, from start to finish, with a pleasing blend of laid back hippie Blues-rock embellished with touches of jazz, funk and folk.
kcfoxy's Full Review: Sister Sweetly by Big Head Todd & The Monsters
Sometimes I think I must have been living under a rock, musically for much of the past decade. A more likely culprit is my overweening fascination with trippy hippie nostalgia, and a questionable addiction to Oldies Radio, circa 70's and 80's.
Whatever the reason, I completely missed Big Head Todd and the Monsters, (BHTM) a Boulder, Colorado trio that's been mining the same H.O.R.D.E. Festival audiences as fellow rockers like Blues Travelers, Phish, Dave Matthews, Spin Doctors and more.
Straight To The Music
What H.O.R.D.E.'s participants/audiences and select college and smallish venue crowds know, is that BHTM have been performing many years, paying their dues and earning their chops before the advent of their first mainstream CD, Sister Sweetly.
Still available, 2 earlier indie recordings, Midnight Radio and Another Mayberry, have less of a smooth polished sound. While that is neither good nor bad, I'm told nothing compares to the electrical give and take of a live BHTM concert where songs, such as Bittersweet are open to anthemic sprawl and constant variation.
Lead singer and guitar slinger extraordinare, Todd Park Mohr does possess a slightly large head, and is over all a giant of a performer. His voice has been criticized as monotonous, tired, grating. I suppose if you've only heard one track, and the title track does come to mind, you might not realize his actual dynamic range.
Try on Circle if you doubt this. Here, the song begins with power chords of anthemic style, then some of Todd's trademark smoked honey vocals. Chord progressions build nicely, as Todd then assumes a sort of Roger Daltry falsetto. His third persona is a grittier, alt-rock growl. See? Hard to pin it down, and most definitely multifaceted.
The band has been wrongly pigeon-holed as retro 70's (and very early 70's at that) pop-rock or post San Francisco psychedelia. I say wrongly, because although tracks like
the marvelous Turn The Light Out, or poignant Broken-Hearted Savior do bring flashbacks of tripping the light (show) fantastic at Bill Graham's Fillmore West and Winterland playgrounds, this is but a part of their appeal.
This old hippie gal hears trace of Dino Valenti's high tenor from Quicksilver Messenger Service and some of the likewise ecletic jazz/blues/folk/rock elements of Moby Grape, a band that self-destructed woefully long before its time. Snatches of cool sitar add the sort of quirky pleasures the latest Beatle casualty, George Harrison, bring to mind.
Pigeon-holing is often the work of A&R men and women; an advertising gambit to sell a particular sound. Alas, that's one reason BHTM never caught on commercially, though the overall excellence, and profusion of hooky melodies of Sister Sweetly had them poised on the brink. An unfortunate choice of divergent material on the subsequent pop-laden album underscored a bit of a right place, wrong time problem that seems to dog the talented trio.
Lovers of gentle alt-folk rockers such as Hootie And The Blowfish will likewise love the airy, almost unplugged acoustic sound of Brother John, whose lullaby lyrics and mellow charm made it the only song I've ever heard on public radio.
It happens to sound unique to the rest of the CD. while at the same time a cohesive element of other different tracks like the quiet charms of Soul For Every Cowboy. Do you remember those little tissue wrapped surprise balls with small Cracker Jack type prizes hidden every so often within? This last song has a surprising guitar solo hidden inside a slowly moving folk-rocker. Touches of mandolin contrast the gritty vocals, and somehow remind me of Southern-fried Blues-rockers like Lynyrd Skynyrd.
Mohr's vocals are perhaps most effecting on their signature song, a small relationship masterpiece called Bittersweet. Here the slightly jazzy phrasing reminds me most pleasantly of Van Morrison, and the arrangement, with the propensity to sprawl into a wonderful arena jam, bears favorable comparison to the earliest, (read: most coherent), manifesations of The Grateful Dead. Here, and on roughly half of the 11 tracks, a reedy sort-of Eric Clapton tenor enhances the mood.
In spite of adoring the funkiness of the disorted wah wah gem, Groove Thing and the same in the guitar line of Sister Sweetly, my favorite number has to be Ellis Island. Absolutely lush, this one reminds me of an Egyptian barque sailing down the Nile. Stately, majestic and just perfect, with Brian Nevin's drums brought to the forefront, and a Fender Jazz Bass sound courtesy of Rob Squires, (who, here at least, reminds me of Chris Squires)!
She wonders why everything ain't right - for all the people down below. Hey, Sister where's your life? Brother, where's your home? And if you should ever speak to with her, She is listening, She hears everything...A frail, frail dream that runs through everything. Which runs through traffic and plays a part. Sweet love through eternity.
Though I'd hesitate to call it the 90's Stairway, I do see comparisons. Where the slow, sad Tomorrow Never Combes raises prickles on my skin, other tracks like It's Alright keep the tenuous relationship balance that would have us keep risking.
BHTM have absorbed the lessons of their mentors, and united, since high school, in playing the sort of thoughtful, though ultimately hopeful relationship music; thinking man's sounds that could/should bridge a generation of Boomers/Gen X'ers and more. Think of it as an aural olive branch set to Blues and folk-rock chords, with soulful, funky rhythms and dreamy, jazz sparkled elements and Mohr's raspy, laid back alt-drawl that I find eminently musical.
You might as well try to capture motes of swirling sunbeams fanning through a sylvan glade, or bottle the heart-warming balm of friendship as pigeon-hole BHTM.
I've had to go ahead and give this one the vaunted 5 stars it belatedly deserves. Already tracking down a half dozen other BHTM recordings, I was likewise impressed with the website of the same name. An interesting bio, (so they tried to scam their way into Tipitina's too, eh?), plenty of band pictures, information about latest tour dates and merchandise catalog awaits.
A new recording, Riviera, is in the works for release in March 2002, and I was able to get another couple of typically generous BHTM bonuses: after ordering a limited edition Morrison, CO concert poster and a long sleeved tee shirt, I was eligible for a free 5 song video, (DVD or VHS) and a 6 song CD sampler, which included several live performances they weren't able to squeeze on 1998's Live Monsters CD!
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