The Glitter Kicks - "Love Everything" (Iconoclastic Pop)
This CD’s title might seem ironic after listening to a hard-driving half hour of punk-fevered rock, 7 out of 10 lyrics hostile enough to knock someone out cold. But, in some way, I don’t think the title’s ironic at all. The voice and vision of the Glitter Kicks belong to disarmingly sweet-voiced Tawni Freeland, whose vocals bite hard and draw a compelling portrait of just how tough it is to simply be a decent person. “Friends” force themselves on you, beat up on you, verbally abuse you, and load you so full of their crap that you want to fade into the woodwork or tell them to just fuck off. Freeland chooses the latter with Ed Rose’s massive guitar, Chris Wagner’s urgent bass and Craig Haning’s wall-to-wall drums to provide flank attacks and cover her back. Not that she needs heavy artillery--Freeland’s most compelling weapons are her relentlessly powerful vocals and her righteously-targeted lyrics. On “Sunshine,” she even offers peace with "a broken spirit that will show us that it's not so broken at all."Both “Fourth of July” and “One and Only” close the album celebrating the promise of love fully aware of its limits--if the vision is turned too far inward or focused too narrowly. Again, “Love Everything” seems less absurd than the finale’s “I can’t love anybody else.” The many great musical moments here, such as Jon Harrison’s manic keyboards on “Sticks and Stones,” kill the irony and bring home the zen.
(write P.O. Box 193, Lawrence KS 66044 or glitter@midusa.net).