1 keeper
keeper avg .091
This forgotten album from a forgotten band from Ireland seems to be relatively lost to history, though "I Want Some of That"*****, the band's one radio single, briefly got quite a few spins. That single rattling around my head for almost the last 30 years is reason enough to revisit this relic of the grunge era. First, the odd timing of the song's main riff and Graham Hopkins's correspondingly syncopated drum-smashing makes it pretty catchy to this lover of riffs; one of the Morrissey brothers' (Tony or Brendan, who knows which) inimitable guitar solo sounds like a very annoyed cat waking up from a nap. And Alan Lawlor's scream-y, wide-ranging, and often indecipherable vocal delivery is pretty attention-grabbing. That vocal style, in addition to the band's reported connection with Guns 'n' Roses, probably got the band most of the comparisons I've seen to GnR and hair metal in general.
However, I think both Lawlor and the band's sonic palette are far more similar to (proto)-grunge band Mother Love Bone, who released the album "Apple" two years earlier. Really, I think "Destiny", "Wishing Well", "Anonymous", and the title song just switch out the lead singer. The middle of the album ("L.S.D.","I Know What I Need", "Catholic Boy", and "Lonely") gets a little more pop-metal. Further afield, "Raintown" is nearly wistful, and "Been Too Long" resemble a less-pleasant Spin Doctors. Out of all of these I'm only inclined to actively dislike the draggy "Wishing Well" and "Anonymous," though apart from Lawlor there isn't much to the album that's different from something that had already been done with a less idiosyncratic singer. After "Standunder" the band moved to LA and doesn't seem to have survived their fickle label's machinations, so who knows if they would have eventually improved and created something more enduring. We'll always have "I Want Some of That."
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