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Silver Sunshine Silver Sunshine
Empyrean Records (Wishing Tree Group)
"Velvet Skies," the first track off of Silver Sunshine’s self-titled debut album, is not just reminiscent of The Beatles’ “Tomorrow Never Knows,” it IS “Tomorrow Never Knows.” Considering the promotional hype surrounding the San Diego quartet over the past few months, the songs are surprisingly pedestrian at best. “Silver Sunshine” is not a bad album, but there’s nothing particularly memorable about it either. This type of record is every reviewer’s nightmare. It’s enjoyable on a basic level, yet it fails to capture anything that is fresh or original that would make you want to play it again. It’s all done in a somewhat anonymous fashion. The songs play more like period pieces, evoking other bands rather than carving out a cohesive sound that lives up to the “Next Big Thing” industry buzz the group have so generously received.
Track listing:
01 Velvet Skies
02 I See the Silver Sunshine
03 Trinkets
04 Way Up in the Big Sky
05 Nightmares
06 If I Had the Time
07 Greenfield Park
08 Girl
09 When She Wakes Tomorrow
10 Miranda May
11 Merry Go Round
Produced by Mike Kamoo of fellow San Diego band The Stereotypes, “Silver Sunshine” is filled with backwards vocal tracks, gated reverb and flanged-out drums; all the things you would expect to hear on any late 60’s – early 70’s record. All the little ear candy that is scattered throughout the tracks is too clever for its own good, and it comes off as forced or, even worse, cliché. Oftentimes it seems like they’re merely making a tribute album to the British Invasion bands or that the group is just not willing to come up with an idea that hasn’t already been done to death. It’s a frustrating listen, because the talent is there but the songs aren’t. There are no big hooks to speak of, and if you’re making this type of record, you better have the hooks to back up all the retro-posturing.
Silver Sunshine would do best to study The Stereotypes’ latest cd, “2,” to see just how it should be done. “2” has more hooks than it knows what to do with, packed into just over 30 minutes of music. The songs are stick-in-your-head unforgettable after the first listen, and The Stereotypes know how to balance their influences without letting them get in the way of the songwriting. There may be a fine line between clever and stupid, but there’s an even finer one between reverence and derivativeness, and the guys in Silver Sunshine are straddling the fence. The next album will show which side they come down on.
