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Album Review
by Scott Sterling-Wilder
27-12-2002
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| Brad's '... Jurockssic Park' or summin |
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Brad: 'Welcome To Discovery Park'
(Redline)
Rewind #1: Brad – Stone Gossard’s part-time project
Brad’s latest offering, ‘Welcome To Discovery Park’, preceded Pearl Jam’s ‘Riot Act’ by a couple of months. It is the third opus by the band’s guitarist Stone Gossard’s intermittent side-proj in some 11 years, hot on the heels of last year’s solo debut (‘Bayleaf’) where he made his first attempt at lead vocals.
The follow-up to 1997’s ‘Interiors’, ‘Welcome to Discovery Park’ was recorded in fits and starts over the past two years by a pack of luminaries from the Seattle underground, including members of Satchel. It’s another heavy dose of blue-eyed funk, soulful ballads and the odd psychedelic freak-out. There is a spirit of camaraderie running through it; recording the album was an excuse to hang with friends he rarely gets to see, Gossard would admit, pointing to the quality of the disc.
There’s always been a sort of melancholy feel to the group’s music, but this album feels especially so, harking back to the band’s debut album’s rawness, instinct, vibe; it is also ‘arty’ (i.e. less radio friendly) and sounds like the band’s stepped back from the professionalism of ‘Interiors’. At the same time music is more positive which Gossard explained by saying, “It’s one of those moments in your life when you can say the universe does have some patterns and stability, life is good and you can manifest things that bring you peace and pleasure. Everything’s not just f**ked up.”
The album’s tone is set with the opening lines of the opening track, ‘Brothers And Sisters’, that appears to deal with the eerie atmo of the post ‘9-11 Tragedy’ but the band’s mainman said that it had been written before the event that stopped the clocks in the West. On the whole, “singer Shawn (Smith)’s lyrics are very straightforward in terms of the message and sentiment, which is overwhelmingly positive, or sombre; there’s not a lot of irony in what he sings, which is one of the things I find refreshing,” Gossard has claimed.
Although a well-respected guitarist, Gossard plays drums on ‘Revolution’ and, for a closet-drummie, he really kicks the beats. In few other instances, such as ‘Shinin’’ and ‘Drop It Down’, they are funky the way the PJ-ers have never been. But, it is not a patch on the debut (‘Shame’) album’s ‘20th Century’ as I told him once to which his reaction was – “You like disco?” “No man,” I replied on that long-gone day, “I love music that is moving my limbs as much as my (ice-coffee pumped) heart and soul, and that was a rock-funk fusion extraordinaire.”
Brad’s ‘… Discovery Park’ has precious little new to offer; ‘Shame’ was better album than the contemporaneous Pearl Jam’s ‘Vs’ (at the time) for the difference from this one that doesn’t even make the second step on the long stairway to heaven. This is a decent disc but far from any inspiration, just a bunch of good friends hanging out in a studio and cutting an album in the process. Fun at the time, no doubt, but no such luck this end.
‘Slight Return To Jurockssic Park’ might be more appropriate title.
5/10
Scott Sterling-Wilder
27-12-2002
Brad album ‘Welcome To Discovery Park’ is available now on Redline (import)
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